How to set a reminder on WhatsApp

⚡ Forwardo works today on Telegram — same assistant, ready in 2 min. WhatsApp coming very soon.

To set a reminder on WhatsApp, long-press a message, tap “More” then “Remind Me,” and pick a time (in 2 hours, 8 hours, 24 hours, or a custom time). It is handy for nudging you to reply, but it does not read the date inside the message. To turn a message into a dated reminder, even from a voice note, you need a smart layer like Forwardo.

You get an important message, you think “I’ll deal with that later,” and it vanishes under forty other chats. Good news: WhatsApp now offers a few ways to remind you about a message. Less good news: they stop at the notification. Below is an honest walk-through of each native method, what it can and can’t do, and what’s missing to go from a simple nudge to actually staying organised.

The 3 native ways to remind yourself about a WhatsApp message

1. The built-in “Remind Me” feature

Since 2025, WhatsApp has a real per-message reminder. It rolled out on iOS first and is reaching Android, so it may still be arriving on your version. It’s the most direct option when you simply don’t want to forget to come back to a message.

1. Open the conversation that has the message you want to revisit later.
2. Long-press the message until the options menu appears.
3. Tap “More” then “Remind Me.”
4. Choose a time: in 2 hours, 8 hours, 24 hours, or tap “Custom” to set a specific date and time.
5. Confirm. A small bell appears on the message bubble. At the chosen time you get a “Reminder” notification that resurfaces the message, even with the app closed.

The reminder is fully private and handled on your phone: no one else in the chat knows you set one. To cancel it, long-press the bubble with the bell again and choose “Cancel Reminder.” The limits: presets cap around 24 hours, you get one reminder per message, and it doesn’t read any date written inside the message — you still pick the time yourself.

2. Pin the message to the top of the chat

You can pin a message so it stays visible at the top of the conversation. Long-press the message → “Pin” → choose a duration (24 hours, 7 days, or 30 days). It’s a visual cue, not a reminder: nothing notifies you. If you never open that chat, you’ll never see the pinned message.

3. Message yourself

The oldest trick: open the chat with yourself (search your own name in your contacts) and forward the message there, or copy it across. You end up with a personal notepad inside WhatsApp. Useful for storing things, but again: no notification, no date. It’s a box that fills up and that you have to remember to reopen.

WhatsApp reminder methods compared

The shared blind spot: no native reminder reads your message

All three native methods share the same gap. When a client writes “confirmed for Thursday 2pm, don’t forget to bring the contract,” WhatsApp doesn’t understand there’s a meeting on Thursday at 2pm and a task to remember. The Remind Me feature will re-ping the message after a delay you picked — you still have to read it, interpret the date, and turn it into an action yourself.

Same story with third-party to-do apps that connect to WhatsApp: they make you retype the content by hand. And from a voice note? No native method listens to it for you. If you want to understand how a voice note becomes a task, that’s exactly the gap Forwardo fills.

Forwardo: the smart layer on top of WhatsApp

Forwardo is an assistant that lives inside WhatsApp. No app to install: you forward a message to it, an AI extracts the task, date, time, and place, then sends you a dated reminder at the right moment. Text or voice, it doesn’t matter. The “forward” gesture is the single way in.

1. Save the Forwardo number in your contacts (just once).
2. Forward the message you want to remember — a text, a voice note, a group message.
3. The AI reads it and pulls out the type (task, reminder, event), the title, the date, and the time.
4. You get a recap in your language, with dates in your local format. You confirm with a quick “ok” — or it confirms itself after 15 seconds.
5. Forwardo schedules smart reminders (the evening before at 6pm, an hour before, or in the morning) and adds the event to your Google Calendar if you’ve connected it.
6. Every morning, a briefing recaps your day at the time you choose.

In practice: you forward “dentist Tuesday 9am” and stop thinking about it. The reminder lands Monday evening and Tuesday morning. That’s the difference between a notification that repeats a message and an assistant that organises it for you. If your real goal is to never forget anything day to day, that’s Forwardo’s angle.

Which method should you use?

If you just want to remember to reply to one message in a few hours, the native “Remind Me” feature is more than enough and costs nothing. For a one-off visual cue, pinning does the job. But as soon as your messages contain dates, recurring appointments, or voice notes to process, these tools hit their limits. That’s where a tool that actually reads the content earns its place. Forwardo isn’t the only option out there; if you’re comparing, take a look at our Memorae alternative.

Frequently asked questions