Why You Receive Two Reminders for One Calendar Event

Look at the app and account named on each alert before deleting an event. Two apps can notify you about one appointment, an event can have several reminders, or a work-calendar copy can send its own alert. Google Calendar and Apple Calendar on the same phone are a common example of the first case.

Identify the sender of each alert

When the next pair arrives, look at the app icon, account, and event title. Open each notification and check the calendar associated with the appointment.

If both alerts open the same account and event, investigate app notification settings first. If one opens a personal original and the other a work copy, investigate the copy's reminder settings.

Also distinguish an advance reminder from an invitation or update email. An email announcing a meeting change and a ten-minute reminder are different notification types, even if both refer to the same appointment.

Decide which alert to keep, for example, one phone notification ten minutes before the personal appointment.

Reminders attached to the event

Open the event in its original calendar and inspect its reminder or notification list. It may intentionally contain more than one alert, such as one day before and ten minutes before.

In Google Calendar on a computer, edit the event and review the notifications attached to it. Remove only the reminder you do not want. Google's notification guide describes event-level and calendar-level settings.

For a repeating appointment, check whether you are editing just one occurrence or the series. A change to one date may leave the other weekly reminders unchanged.

For an invited meeting or shared calendar, check which reminder settings apply only to your account and which affect the shared event. Leave other people's arrangements unchanged.

Calendar defaults and app notifications

A calendar may apply default reminders to new appointments even when individual events look simple. Inspect the calendar's notification defaults, then create a new event to see which settings it receives.

Separately, review which apps are allowed to notify you at the device level. If two calendar apps show the same account, you can often choose one as the source of phone reminders while keeping both installed.

Make one change at a time. Disabling notifications for every calendar app can eliminate the duplicates and your only useful reminder.

If the appointment itself is duplicated, identify the original and the extra copy before deleting either.

Alerts from destination copies

An event copied into several accounts may generate an alert from each account. Fastmail documents this as one possible consequence of external-calendar connections in its troubleshooting guide.

With a desktop add-in or automation, inspect which reminder fields are copied. A separate Busy event intended only for work availability may not need to notify you at all.

For a work copy in Avum, open the reminder setting in its Sync Rule. You can copy source reminders, use destination defaults, remove reminders, or set a custom reminder. For a busy-only work block, remove its reminders if the personal original already supplies the alert you need.

Changing a copy's reminders manually may not be durable if a rule maintains that field. Change the rule supplying the reminders when editing a maintained copy.

Run one quiet test

Create a test appointment without guests, starting about 15 minutes from now. Choose one desired reminder and check what arrives from each app. Then move or remove the test at the source.

If reminders still differ from the event settings, trace the calendar route to see whether an old copy or another service is involved.

You can keep both calendar apps. Silence the extra copy or app, then confirm that the reminder you rely on still arrives.

Ready to try copies with deliberate reminder settings? Start your free 30-day trial with Avum today.