How to “really” delete completed reminders on iPhone and Mac forever

Okay folks, most of us at one point or another have bashed our head into the wall trying to get reminders to disappear after they’ve been completed. Marking a reminder complete doesn’t delete it from the list automatically.

Also, if you’re brand new to Apple products, it can be tempting to think it’s more complicated than it actually is, but it’s really quite simple.

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Lists and reminders

In the Reminders app, you can create lists to organize your reminders. When you’re having a busy day with several tasks ahead, you can mark a task as complete to help you keep track of where you are with your day.

Completing a reminder and deleting a reminder

It’s important to note that while marking a reminder complete removes it from your list, it doesn’t delete the reminder. When you select Show Completed at the bottom, there it is again.

This looks different depending on if you’re using the Reminders app on the iPhone or Mac.

To delete a reminder on the iPhone:

First select Show Completed.

Then select Edit in the top right.

Then swipe left from the far right of the list item.

Select the red delete button to delete the item and that permanently deletes the item from the list.

To delete the list on the iPhone:

First select the list.

Second select Edit on the top right.

At the bottom, are the red words Delete List.

When you select Delete List a window pops up.

Select Delete to complete the deletion.

On the Mac

On an Apple desktop or laptop, Reminders is a much tamer beast.

To delete a Reminder, you simply highlight the completed reminder you want deleted.

Then you simply hit the delete key on your keyboard and voila, it’s gone.

Same thing with deleting a list.

Just highlight the list.

Hit the delete key on your keyboard and bam, you’re done.

Keep in mind, there must always be at least one list in Reminders.

Across multiple devices

If you’re signed in with your Apple ID across an iPhone, iPad and a Mac, deleting a reminder will be deleted across all of them, which is handy if it’s just a few reminders.

If you have a lot of completed reminders, it’s tedious and time consuming to delete them all individually. The easiest and most convenient way at that point is to delete the completed reminders from your Mac or PC.

After you log into iCloud.com with your Apple ID, click on Reminders.

Select a list to see a completed tab.

Once you select it, your completed tasks appear.

To delete all your completed tasks, select Clear Completed.

A window then pops up to verify what you’re doing and warns you that this action cannot be undone.

Select clear completed again and away they go.

Remember

It’s an easy trap to fall into if you don’t know the difference between a completed task and a deleted task, but just know that completed tasks remain on your device until they’re deleted.

That’s not necessarily a bad thing though. Some people may want to keep track of their completed tasks to use as a reference point later on. It’s all up to you though.

Andrew Palmer

Andy is a former Apple employee with a deep knowledge of Apple products. He currently covers writing tips and tutorials for different Apple products.

Andy is also an avid video producer with superb video editing skills and loves editing using his MacBookPro.