When vs Deadline

When and Deadline are separate fields because planning work and tracking a real due date are different jobs.

Use When for your plan. Use Deadline only when there is a real due date or final time.

What When means

When is the date or time you plan to work on a task.

It controls where the task appears:

Today, when the task is scheduled for today or has rolled forward
Upcoming, when the task is scheduled for a future date
Inbox or another unscheduled view, when the task has no When date

When can be all-day or time-specific.

The When picker includes:

Today
Tomorrow
Next Week
No Time
Morning, 9:00
Afternoon, 5:00 PM
Evening, 7:00 PM

The default time is 9:00 AM when a time is needed.

What Deadline means

Deadline is the date or time when the task is actually due.

It does not mean you plan to work on the task at that moment. It means the task has a real final date, due date, or cutoff.

The Deadline picker includes:

Today
Tomorrow
Next Week
No Time
Morning, 9:00
Afternoon, 5:00 PM
End of Day, 11:59 PM

The default Deadline time is End of Day.

Use both together

A task can have both fields.

Example:

When: Tuesday at 9:00 AM
Deadline: Friday at 5:00 PM

That means you plan to work on the task Tuesday, but it must be finished by Friday.

This is useful for taxes, client deliverables, travel documents, school work, and anything else where the work date and final date are not the same.

Use only one field

Use only When when:

you want the task to show up on a planned day
there is no real due date
you are time-blocking or batching work

Use only Deadline when:

the task is due on a date
you have not decided when to work on it
you want to keep it unscheduled but still remember the due date

Use neither when:

the task belongs in Inbox
the task is an idea or reference item
the task is part of a project but not ready for scheduling

Natural language

Pinwork’s natural-language parser recognizes date and time phrases for task capture and title editing paths that enable parsing.

For example:

Review pitch deck Friday at 2pm #startup

This can create a task with a parsed When date and tag.

The parser does not recognize a separate Deadline syntax in natural language. Use the Deadline picker or context menu when you need a Deadline.

Calendar events

When a task is linked to Apple Calendar, Pinwork uses the task title, notes, When, estimate, and Deadline where available.

When controls the event timing. Estimate can provide event duration.

Deadline can be used as an EventKit alarm on the linked event.

See Calendar for the full calendar behavior.

Clear a field

You can clear When or Deadline later.

If you remove the When date from a recurring task, Pinwork also clears recurrence because recurrence needs a When date to anchor the next occurrence.

Clearing Deadline does not remove the task’s When date.

Was this page helpful?