Settings

Open Settings from the tab bar (iPhone and iPad) or the sidebar (Mac). The sections below follow the same order you’ll see in the app. Rows marked (Pro) need a Set Pro subscription; everything else is free. Where a row only exists on one platform, it says so.

Set Pro

The first section tells you where you stand.

• Your status: either Pro Subscription Active or Free Version.
• Upgrade to Pro: opens the paywall (free plan only).
• Restore Purchases: re-checks your App Store account for a subscription you already own.

Pro supports Family Sharing, so one subscription covers your whole household.

Tutorial

Directly under Set Pro, so the way back into the walkthrough is never buried.

• Replay Tutorial: runs the interactive walkthrough again. The Mac has its own version, written for a window rather than a phone, covering the sidebar, the quick-add bar, natural language, keyboard control and right-click menus.
• Regenerate Welcome Project: replaces the “Welcome to Set” project with a fresh, up to date copy. It asks first, because anything you added to that project is deleted with it. Nothing else in your data is touched.

General

• Schedule starts at: The time your Today list begins when a task has no set start time.
• Day ends at: When your day rolls over. Completed tasks and the widget clear at this time.
• Week starts on Monday: Toggle for calendar and statistics preferences.
• Haptic feedback: Toggle vibration feedback (iPhone and iPad).
• Day Complete Popup: When to show the completion celebration (None, Once a Day, After 5 PM, or Anytime).
• Default task duration: How long a new task is, from 5 minutes to 2 hours. New tasks were always a hardcoded 30 minutes before this.
• Default task priority: The priority a new task starts at, any level including None, or Last Used, which follows whatever priority you last set by hand. Useful if your work arrives in runs of the same urgency.
• Default subtask duration: The duration applied to new subtasks (None, or 5 to 60 minutes).
• Parse data from title: Pull durations, dates, and times out of a task title as you type (for example “45m”, “tomorrow”, “10.15”). When on, you can also:
  • Remove after parse: Strip the parsed text from the title once it’s read.
  • Date format: Choose how ambiguous dates are read, M/D or D/M.
• Export Options: Opens the export settings sheet (see below).

Export Options

Reached from General, these settings apply to every Today, project, and Inbox export (PDF, Markdown, and Rich Text):

• Black & white: Best for printing. Overrides all colors, including markdown heading and highlight colors.
• Include notes: Keeps each task’s notes, with your Markdown Settings styling.
• Include subtasks: Includes subtasks under their parent task.
• Email: The address the Email export starts from. This is a prefill rather than a fixed destination, several addresses separated by commas all get a copy, and every email carries a Markdown file alongside the PDF. Whoever receives it can open that Markdown file in Set with Import Project.
• Show Set branding in footer (Pro): Pro users can export without the Set footer. Page numbers are always kept.

See the Export documentation for the full walkthrough.

Timer

• Keep screen awake in timer: Prevents the screen from sleeping while a timer runs (iPhone and iPad).
• Auto-simplify while running: Strips the running timer down to just the countdown and task name. Pausing brings the controls back.
• Show Live Activity (iOS 17+): Enable or disable timer Live Activities on the Lock Screen and Dynamic Island.
• Overtime counting: Keeps counting up once a task passes its estimate.
• Overdue alarm: Keeps sounding at your chosen interval once a task runs past its estimate, until you complete or pause it. It only applies to tasks, never breaks. Two rows appear underneath it:
  • Repeat alarm every: 5, 10, 15 or 30 seconds, then 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10, 15, 20 or 30 minutes.
  • Alarm sound: A grouped picker with 17 tones generated in the app, filed under Bowls & Bells, Clicks & Pops, Chimes & Notes and Beeps & Rings, plus the three Timer Complete sounds and Same as Timer Alarm. Picking one plays it, so you can find a nudge that moves you without making you jump.

On Mac, the Timer section also includes:

• Show timer in menu bar: Puts the running timer in the macOS menu bar.
• Show floating timer: Shows a floating always-on-top timer window.

See the Timer documentation for how the timer itself works.

App Blocker (Pro, iPhone and iPad only)

Block distracting apps while you work. The App Blocker uses Screen Time, so the first time you turn it on you’ll be asked to grant Screen Time access. It is not available on Mac.

• Block apps during timer: The master toggle. Turning it off requires typing a short focus sentence.
• Mode: Block chosen apps, or Allow only chosen apps.
• Blocking schedule:
  • While a timer runs: Apps are blocked only while a task timer is running, never during breaks.
  • Until Today is clear: Apps stay blocked until every task in Today is complete.
• Choose Apps: Pick the individual apps or whole categories to block or allow. App selections are stored per device, because Screen Time authorisation is tied to the device.

The in-timer shield badge was removed, so the App Blocker is managed from Settings only. See the App Blocker documentation for details.

Interface

Free options:

• Theme: Light, Dark, Black, or System.
• Color Mode: What tints your task cards, Project, Priority or Accent. You can also cycle it by tapping the weekday in Today, a project’s icon, or the task name in the timer.
• Completed Icon: Choose the symbol for completed tasks, Slash or Tick. It applies everywhere in the app.
• Quick Delete: Delete tasks instantly, with no confirmation popup. An Undo pill appears for a few seconds afterwards, coloured like the tab bar, and it restores the task with its fields, subtasks and project links.
• Task lines: How many lines a task title shows before it truncates (1 to 5).
• Subtask lines: How many lines a subtask title shows before it truncates (1 to 5).
• Inbox tasks per page: How many tasks a page of the Inbox holds, 10 to 100 in fives, 50 by default. A deep Inbox pages instead of rendering in one piece, with a pager underneath.
• Hide Completed in Focus Mode: Hide finished tasks while in Focus Mode (iPhone and iPad).
• Show Notes in Focus Mode: Keeps each task’s notes on screen while everything else falls away (iPhone and iPad, off by default).
• Reschedule Button Animation: The reschedule button spins while it rebuilds your day. Turn it off if it distracts.
• Minimal Tab Bar: A compact tab bar (iPhone and iPad).
• Icon-Only Tab Bar: Drops the labels and gives your list back a row of height (iPhone and iPad).
• Collapse toolbar into menu (Mac): Always collapse the Today toolbar into a single menu, instead of only when the window is narrow.

Pro options:

• Add Button Position (Pro, iPhone and iPad): Where the floating add button appears (Bottom Left, Bottom Right, or Off).

Hide Status Bar (iPhone and iPad)

One free group gathers every place the status bar can hide. It used to be a Pro toggle in Interface, with separate ones living under Focus Mode and Timer.

• Everywhere: Hides it throughout the app. The four rows below disable while this is on, because it already covers them.
• In Focus Mode
• In Sort Mode
• When Isolating a Task
• In Timer

Swipe Actions (Pro, iPhone and iPad)

Choose what a left or right swipe on a Today task does. Available actions:

• Duration (edit task duration)
• Star/Unstar (add to or remove from Today)
• Priority (change task priority)
• Delete
• Move (to a different project or stage)
• Select Mode (enter bulk selection)
• Start Timer
• Schedule (set a start time)
• Skip to Tomorrow
• Isolate (open a distraction-free view of just that task)

There’s also Show Skip to Tomorrow in the evening: after a time you choose, a left swipe on a starred task reveals an extra Skip to Tomorrow button alongside your primary action.

Markdown Settings (Pro)

Opened from the Interface section on Mac, and from a Notes section just below it on iPhone and iPad. It controls how notes are styled: heading colours, bold colour, highlight style, bullet and numbering styles, and indentation.

Customization (Pro)

Personalize colors throughout the app:

• Accent Color: 11 color options.
• Inbox Color: Custom color for inbox tasks, including None and Grey (Flat) for cards with no tint.
• Break Color: Custom color for breaks.
• Swipe Left/Right Colors: Customize swipe gesture colors (iPhone and iPad).
• Day Complete Color: Random, Accent, or a specific colour for the completion celebration.
• Sidebar Icon Color (Mac): How sidebar icons are tinted, by project colour or your accent colour.

Sounds

Free options:

• Sounds enabled: Toggle all sounds on and off.
• Volume: Master volume control (0 to 100%).

Pro sound customization lets you choose individual sound effects:

• Task completion: Sound when a task is completed.
• Timer complete: Sound when the timer finishes.
• Notification: Sound for task notifications.
• Today complete: Sound when all tasks are done.
• Project complete: Finishing the last task in a project sounds like finishing a project rather than like any other task. Choose the classic fanfare, one of six generated in the app, an achievement sound, Random, or None.
• Recalculate: Sound when recalculating the timeline.
• Achievement: Sound when unlocking achievements.
• Timer sounds enabled: Toggle ambient sound during timer sessions, with an Ambient sound picker and a Continue sounds when paused option.

The long menus are split into labelled groups instead of one endless list, which includes all 52 ambient sounds under Weather, Water, Nature, Atmospheres, Colored Noise, Rhythmic and Focus Tones.

Notifications

Configure which notifications you receive and their style. See the Notifications documentation for details on notification types, the daily and evening reminders, Time’s Up alerts, notification styles, and the app badge.

Calendar & Reminders (Pro)

Turning either service on prompts for access to that app. This is a summary of the rows; Calendar & Reminders Sync explains what each direction reads and writes, and why.

Direction

• Sync with Calendar and Sync with Reminders are separate toggles, each with its own Direction.

• Switching one on opens a consent sheet first, which spells out exactly what that service does before anything happens. Calendar and Reminders ask different questions, because they work differently.

• Your calendar: Show Only or Show & Add. Nothing is imported from your calendar, since events are read live and drawn rather than copied, so the only choice is whether Set writes to it. Show Only never does. Show & Add puts your tasks there as events. Editing an event from its own card reaches your calendar either way, because that is you rather than sync.

• Your reminders: Import Only or Two-Way. This one really does run both ways. Import Only reads and never writes back; Two-Way sends your edits, completions and deletions back to Reminders.

• You can change either whenever you like, and the read-only option is easy to try first, because there is nothing to undo.

• Show events from: Which calendars Set reads.

• Add events to (Show & Add only): Where events for tasks created in Set are written. Four options: one Set Calendar in your accent colour (the default), Priority Calendars, Project Calendars in each project’s colour, or any calendar of your own. Switching reassigns your existing Set events on the next sync. Events you imported always stay on their own calendars.

• Show calendar events in Today: Events from your selected calendars appear in Today at their real times, as read-only rows that never become tasks, so they cannot land in your Inbox or turn into duplicates.

• Clear finished events: How long a finished event stays in Today before its row goes: Off, as they end, or 1, 5, 10, 15, 30 minutes or an hour after. A delay keeps a meeting on screen while it overruns.

• Also clear when Set opens: Sweeps finished events away whenever you come back to Set. Reschedule always clears everything already past, whatever these are set to.

• Use calendar colors: Color tasks with their source calendar color.

• Auto-delete calendar events (Show & Add only): Remove the calendar event when its task is deleted.

• Remove events when logging (Show & Add only): Whether logging a task clears its event. Off keeps logged tasks’ events on your calendar as a record of your day.

• Sync breaks to calendar (Show & Add only): Creates a “Set - Breaks” calendar for break events.

• Sync only Today tasks (Show & Add only): Limit what Set writes out to your starred tasks.

Reminder rows

• Reminder Lists: Which lists Set reads. This sheet also has a Stopped Importing section listing lists whose Set project you deleted, each with an Import Again button that rebuilds the project on the next sync.
• Import lists as projects: Each reminder list becomes a project with the same name and nearest colour, instead of everything landing in the Inbox. Your default list stays in the Inbox. Turning it on also files reminders already sitting in your Inbox into their list’s project.
• Create a list per project (Two-Way only): The other direction. Every project gets a Reminders list of the same name, with its tasks’ reminders inside. Renaming a project renames the list, and deleting one asks what to do with it.
• Delete reminder after import (Import Only): Clears each reminder from Apple Reminders once it becomes a Set task, so nothing lives in two places. Off unless you turn it on.

Running a sync

• Sync Now: Runs a full sync on demand, and shows when you last synced.
• Access needed on this device: If sync is on but this device never granted permission, a warning row appears with a Grant Access button. Your sync settings travel between devices, so a switch you flipped on your iPhone can arrive on your Mac before the Mac has been asked.
• Sync is Paused: If a subscription lapses, sync stops rather than carrying on quietly. Set explains that nothing already in your calendar or reminders has been changed, and your settings are kept.

Data

• Auto Log Completed: Automatically archive completed tasks. Off, Midnight, At App Launch, or 5 Seconds After Completing, which clears each task moments after you tick it off rather than waiting for a day boundary.
• Auto-move overdue tasks to Today: Automatically star tasks whose scheduled date has passed so they show up in Today.
• Import Project from Markdown (Pro): Opens a Markdown file exported from Set, or any Markdown checklist, as a new project. # becomes the project, ## become stages, list items become tasks, indented list items become subtasks, and durations and dates in each line are read. The same sheet has a Paste from Clipboard button, and you can share a .md file to Set from Files, Mail or anywhere else. A review step shows exactly what will be created, you can untick anything you don’t want, and one undo removes the whole project. Imported tasks are never starred.
• iCloud Sync: A read-only status row reading Automatic. There is nothing to switch on: Set syncs through your iCloud account by itself.
• Reset statistics: Delete all statistics data. Your tasks and projects are not affected.
• Reset all data: Permanently delete everything (projects, tasks, stages, breaks, statistics, and templates). Welcome content and preset templates are recreated afterwards.

About

• Version: The installed app version.
• Changelog: What changed in recent updates.
• Keyboard Shortcuts (Mac): The full shortcut reference.
• Send Feedback: Email your thoughts or report a bug.
• Diagnostic Reports: Appears only when there is something to show, with a count beside it. If Set ever freezes or closes unexpectedly, your device records which part of Set’s own code was running. Those reports are handed to Set on your device and stay there: nothing is uploaded, and the developer only ever sees one because you tapped Send. Copy puts them on the clipboard and Clear deletes them. Nothing about your tasks is included.
• Website: Opens get-set.app.

Also by Matthew Dickerson

A list of the developer’s other apps, tap any to open it on the App Store. The list updates itself straight from the App Store, so new apps appear on their own. No personal data is collected to build it.

Legal

• Privacy Policy and End User License Agreement, both opening on get-set.app.
• An Important Notice stating plainly that Set is a productivity tool and not a medical device. It is not intended to treat, diagnose, or cure ADHD or any medical condition. Always consult healthcare professionals for medical advice.

Third-Party Services

The credits at the very bottom, naming what Set relies on: subscription management by RevenueCat, and data sync through Apple iCloud.