How it works

PokeeBee turns the dates already sitting in your phone into reminders you can act on — and then helps with the part that is actually hard, which is deciding what to give.

Step 1

Connect what you already have

Sign in with Apple or Google, and PokeeBee reads the contacts and calendars on your phone. That is enough on its own — there is no list of birthdays to type in.

Google is optional. Connecting it lets PokeeBee see the same data from your Google account, and all three permissions it asks for are read-only. You can disconnect whenever you like.

Birthday reminders from your contacts

The Contacts & calendars screen, with a sync toggle, an optional Google connection showing People and Calendar connected, and a separate switch for writing occasions back to your calendar.

Step 2

It works out who has something coming up

Birthdays on your contacts, and events from the calendars you chose, become a single countdown. The nearest one leads, the rest queue behind it.

PokeeBee guesses which events are occasions worth marking and which are noise. When it is unsure it asks rather than deciding for you, so a dentist appointment never turns into a gift reminder.

The Today screen showing Maya's birthday in 4 days with a Plan a gift button, and a Coming up list with Labor Day and Sofia Ricci's birthday.

Step 3

You get told in time to act

Reminders arrive on a ladder ahead of the date — a month out, a fortnight, a few days, the day before — and you choose which rungs you want.

That timing is the whole point. A birthday you hear about at 8am is a birthday you cannot buy for. PokeeBee aims to tell you while there is still something you can do.

The birthday reminder app, in detail

Step 4

And it helps with the hard part

Knowing the date is easy. Deciding what to give is not. Tell PokeeBee what someone likes and roughly what you want to spend, and it suggests ideas for that person and that occasion — then keeps the ones you save.

Suggestions come from an AI model, so read them before acting: a suggestion can be unavailable, mispriced, or simply wrong for the person. It is a starting point for your judgment, not a replacement for it.

How the gift ideas work

The Gifts screen with a To decide list — Maya Chen in 4 days, Sofia Ricci in 18 days, Leo Ricci in 25 days — each with a Start planning button, and a box to ask for a gift idea.

Screenshots are of the app running, with example people. Your own contacts never appear anywhere but on your phone — see the privacy policy and what Google data PokeeBee uses.

What does it cost?

PokeeBee is free while it is in development. If that changes, it will change here first, and the waitlist will hear before anyone else.

Can it write to my calendar?

Only if you turn that on, and only for occasions you created in PokeeBee. It works through your phone's own calendar rather than through Google's API, and it never edits or deletes an event it did not create. The Your Google data page explains that distinction in full.

When can I use it?

Soon — join the waitlist and we will email you at launch. That is the only thing we use your address for.