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Birthdays and Anniversaries in BusyCal for iOS

BusyCal can display the birthdays and anniversaries from the iOS Contacts app in your calendar.

Go to Settings > Show in Calendar and turn on “Birthdays” and/or “Anniversaries” switches.

With these settings enabled, a Birthdays calendar and an Anniversaries calendar appear under the Other heading in the Calendar List, and any contacts with birthdays or anniversaries in their Contacts records are displayed as all-day events in the calendar.

The Birthdays calendar and Anniversaries calendar are read-only and cannot be edited in BusyCal. If you want to change or remove a birthdate or anniversary, you must make the change in Contacts.

The Birthdays and Anniversaries calendars appear only in BusyCal and do not sync to other services like iCloud and Google; however, the Calendar app in iOS and macOS has a similar option for displaying a Birthdays calendar.

Setting up Birthday & Anniversary Alarms​

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To receive notifications for upcoming birthdays and anniversaries, you can set default alarms that will automatically be applied to all birthday and anniversary events:

  1. Open BusyCal Settings from the top left corner
  2. Tap New Event Defaults > Alarm Defaults
  3. Tap For Birthdays & Anniversaries

You can configure up to 3 different alarms with various timing options (such as on the day of, 1 day before, 1 week before, etc.). Once configured, birthday and anniversary events will automatically alert you at your chosen times.

note

If the alarm times do not appear on existing birthday events after making these changes, try turning off Birthdays and Anniversaries under Settings > Show in Calendar > Birthdays, then turn them back on to refresh the calendar data.

⚠️ Troubleshooting iOS Birthday and Anniversary Issues​

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BusyCal requires access to the Apple Contacts app for displaying Birthdays and Anniversaries on your iPhone or iPad. Please open iOS System Settings > Privacy & Security > Contacts, tap BusyCal and give it Full Access. Without this permission, BusyCal will not be able to fetch birthdays or anniversaries from your contacts. Rest assured your privacy and data is protected, learn more..

iPhone or iPad Birthdays Not Showing​

If you're having issues with birthdays or anniversaries not appearing in your BusyCal iOS calendar, try the following steps:

  1. Check Contacts Permission

    • Open iOS Settings app
    • Navigate to Privacy & Security > Contacts
    • Make sure BusyCal is listed and has permission
    • If denied, toggle it on and restart BusyCal

  2. Force Reset Birthday Calendar

    • Open BusyCal Settings > Show In Calendar
    • Uncheck Birthdays and Anniversaries
    • Close Settings and wait a moment
    • Now repeat the process and re-enable the settings
    • Close settings and wait for sync to complete

  3. Verify Contact Data

    • Open Apple Contacts app
    • Check that your contacts have birthday/anniversary data properly set
    • Make sure date fields are properly formatted

  4. Restart Your Device

    • Sometimes a simple device restart can resolve sync issues
    • After restarting, open BusyCal and check if birthdays appear

If you're still experiencing issues after trying these steps, check if birthdays appear in the native iOS Calendar app. If they show there but not in BusyCal, please contact our support team for further assistance.

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