To-do lists and reminders on your phone are no good if they pop up at the wrong place or time. Thankfully, the Reminders app in iOS has a neat trick up its sleeve: it allows you to set reminders that alert you when you arrive or leave a specified location.

Reminders can alert when you arrive at or leave a destination

You could, for example, have your iPhone remind you to pick up milk and eggs when you reach your local grocery store. Or have it remind you to drop off your courier package when you leave your office.

Pretty nifty, huh? Here’s how to set up a location-based reminder:

• Launch Reminders from the home screen and tap ‘New List’ to give your list a name (like Groceries or Tuesday tasks).

• Tap a blank field to create a new reminder and fill in a description (E.g. ‘Pick up milk’) and then tap the ‘i’ icon to customize it.
  

  Create a new reminder

• Toggle the option labeled ‘Remind me at a location’ and tap Location to select an address.
  

  Choose ‘Remind me at a location’ to enable location-based reminders

• Type in the name or address of a location (such as your local department store) and tap the appropriate button to set an alert for when you arrive or when you leave that location.
  

  Set a location for your reminder and choose when you want it

• You can also adjust the radius of the area where you want your alert to appear: simply drag the black dot on the blue circle out to increase the radius, or drag it closer to your intended location to reduce the radius.

• Tap on Details to return to your list and then tap Done to confirm.

That’s it! The next time you arrive or leave your chosen location, you’ll receive an alert with your reminder on your phone. Now if only iOS could figure this out on its own…