Guides
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Importing contacts without importing the clutter
Pull in birthdays from iOS contacts, then prune down to the people you actually want to celebrate.
Your phone's contacts are a strange archive: close friends, family, a plumber from 2019, three people called Alex. Importing all of it into a birthday app would bury the people who matter.
Import first, then prune
Torte can read the birthdays already saved in your iOS contacts and bring them in at once. Start there — it saves typing — and then spend five minutes removing anyone you would not actually message on their birthday.
A few tips
- Start with the next few months so the people coming up soonest are tidied first.
- Use groups for family, close friends and colleagues, so each circle gets the right kind of reminder.
- Add the missing ones by hand. Contacts rarely have everyone's birthday; a quick message asking is a nice excuse to say hello.
A short, deliberate list beats a long, noisy one every time.
