As a long-time Notion user and productivity enthusiast, I’m excited to share my expertise on leveraging Notion’s capabilities to create recurring reminders and checklists.
Table of Contents
An Overview of Notion
For those unfamiliar, Notion is an incredibly versatile workspace that allows you to organize notes, tasks, documents, and more in one centralized location. Some of the key features that make Notion such a powerful productivity tool include:
- Databases – Allows you to store related content in a structured format, like a spreadsheet, and view it in various ways like a table, calendar, Kanban board, etc.
- Relationships – Connect your databases and pages to display linked information dynamically.
- Templates – Reuse elements to maintain consistency across your Notion workspace.
- Markdown – Format your text easily with simple syntax like headers, lists, and emphasis.
With its flexibility and customizability, Notion can be molded to suit a wide variety of needs. Now let’s look at how we can leverage these capabilities specifically for recurring reminders and checklists.
Creating Recurring Reminders
While Notion doesn’t have an inherent recurring reminders feature, we can emulate this functionality by combining databases, templates, and relations.
Step 1: Make a Tasks Database
First, create a database to store your tasks. I recommend including key properties like:
- Name – The name of your task
- Recur – Toggle whether it recurs or not
- Frequency – How often it repeats (daily, weekly, etc.)
- Last Completed – Date it was last marked as complete
Tasks database screenshot
Step 2: Make a Recurring Task Template
Next, build a template tailored to recurring tasks. Mine includes:
- A title showing the task name and due date
- A checkbox to mark it complete
- A formula to calculate the next due date based on last completed date and frequency
It looks like this:
Recurring task template screenshot
Step 3: Connect with a Linked Database
Now link your tasks database to this template using a linked database:
- Create a new linked database
- Set the source to your Tasks database
- Filter to only show recurring tasks
- Group it by the Name property
This will display all recurring tasks neatly grouped under their names.
Step 4: Add Recurring Tasks
Finally, open your tasks database and create entries for the recurring tasks you need. The linked database will automatically populate with those tasks in a recurring format.
Now you’ve successfully set up recurring reminders in Notion!
Building Recurring Checklists
Similar to reminders, we can construct recurring checklists with databases, templates and relations. The process is nearly identical.
Step 1: Make a Checklists Database
Start by making a database to contain your checklists. Useful properties include:
- Name – The checklist’s name
- Recur – Toggle for recurring
- Frequency – Daily, weekly, etc.
- Last Completed – Last completion date
Step 2: Make a Checklist Template
Design a template for your checklists. Mine has:
- A title with the name and due date
- A set of checkbox items to complete
- A formula to calculate next due date
Checklist template screenshot
Step 3: Connect via Linked Database
Connect your checklists database to the template with a linked database:
- Add a linked database
- Set source to Checklists database
- Filter for recurring checklists
- Group by the Name
Step 4: Build Recurring Checklists
Lastly, open your Checklists database and create entries for the recurring checklists you need. The linked database will display them in a recurring format automatically.
And that’s it! With these steps, you can create versatile recurring reminders and checklists within Notion to systemize repetitive tasks.
Additional Tips and Tricks
Here are some additional pointers to level up your recurring Notion setup:
Add reminders – Attach reminders to your recurring tasks so Notion will notify you when they are due.
Color code – Color code tasks by frequency or category for quick visual organization.
Tag people – @-mention others to assign recurring tasks to team members.
Track progress – Add progress trackers to checklist templates to monitor completion over time.
Consolidate views – Combine recurring reminders and checklists into a single Notion dashboard for one centralized place to manage recurrences.
Sync calendar – Sync your Notion calendar to Google/iCloud Calendar to also view reminders there.
Auto-archive – Use an automation tool like Zapier to auto-archive completed recurrences for a clean workspace.
Mobile access – Install the Notion mobile apps to stay on top of recurring tasks from anywhere.
With some thoughtful setup, Notion can become an incredibly powerful system for managing all types of recurrences. I hope you find these tips helpful for planning out your own Notion recurring reminders and checklists. Let me know if you have any other questions!
