iphone 4 birthday calendar off by one day

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Level 1

2 points

iphone 4 birthday calendar off by one day

The title says it all. And, Yes, I searched for an answer but did not find one. Only found others who have the same problem, and even others who were willing to go in and change every single birthday on every single contact in their iPhone. That is unreasonable to me because I have a lot of contacts so the time factor comes in and I am not sure it is a true fix; it may only be temporary and the birthdays could revert back to being a day off. I say this because originally the birthdays showed correctly. This is a new problem that may have started with an OS update or may have started one time when I had to reinstall my calendars.

The whole birthday calendar is early by one day and this is only on my iPhone. They are correct on my Macbook Pro.

New contacts that I enter and sync will have their birthdays appear on the correct date - for how long I do not know though. Also if I go into a contact on my iPhone and select edit and then save (without changing anything) the birthday shows up correctly. If I do the same thing on my Mac it does not change (correct) the birthday in the iPhone.

Hope someone else has figured out a fix to the bug. Thanks.

Macbook Pro, Mac OS X (10.6.5)

Posted on Nov 28, 2011 5:47 PM

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Answer 1

05dude

Level 1

0 points

Nov 29, 2011 3:13 AM in response to IslandOwl

I have the same problem on my 4S. To view my contacts individually via 'contacts' on the iPhone, all the birthday dates are correct (as they are in the 'Address Book' on my MacBook Pro), but to go to the 'Calendar' on the iPhone, all birthdays are 1 day early...

This is frustrating as I have only had the phone for a couple of weeks, and I don't remember having this problem with my old 3GS.

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Answer 2

devnul

Level 1

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Dec 1, 2011 5:17 AM in response to IslandOwl

My fix was to, yes, redo all the birthdays in my contacts. I think this (and possibly the all-day event problem) had to do with a 12am/12pm change at some point in the internal representation. I remember when I first started (since stopped) syncing contacts with Google and my Android Phone, I'd see sync conflicts and that was the difference.

Anyway, here's a cheap workaround, so long as your birthdays show up correctly on the Mac side of things:

In your iCal preferences, make sure to turn on "Show birthday calendar" and verify that it shows birthdays correctly. In iTunes, sync "All Calendars". This will include the Mac's automatic birthday calendar. Finally, over on the iPhone (or iPad) go into the calendar app, tap "Calendars" and make sure "Birthdays" is turned on under "From My Mac" and turned off under "Other".

Note that you can leave the display of both birthday calendars turned on and look through your iPhone calendar just to visually confirm that this is working - you'll see the birthdays twice, on the correct day with a colored circle and on the day early with a gift box.

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Answer 3

ckuan

Level 10

120,680 points

Dec 1, 2011 5:45 AM in response to IslandOwl

Is your iPhone IOS 5.0.1?

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Answer 4

IslandOwl Author

Level 1

2 points

Jan 2, 2012 11:40 PM in response to ckuan

My apologies! Somehow I missed these replies and questions.

Yes, my iphone is running IOS 5.0.1. In fact, I am fairly sure the problem started when I upgraded to IOS 5.0.1.

@Devnul there does not seem to be a way for me to select the Birthday calendar to be under My Mac. It will only appear in Other. Am I missing something? I think it comes in as "Other" because the Birthday calendar is actually a subscription to the birthdays listed in the address book.

However, that is an interesting idea about the sync time. It is too close to midnight tonight to try anything now but I think I will see what happens if I have Mac overwrite the iPhone calendars when I sync tomorrow.

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Answer 5

ckuan

Level 10

120,680 points

Jan 3, 2012 1:00 AM in response to IslandOwl

Since you've updated,

do a reset (Hold Sleep/Wake and Home buttons about 10 secs or more till Apple logo appears)

Did the above help?

Is Time Zone Support On in iPhone?

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Answer 6

0815guy

Level 1

0 points

Jan 4, 2012 1:01 PM in response to ckuan

I have the same issue on my iPhone 4S ( iOS 5.0.1 ). The phone is brand new with firmware from stock. So no update involved.

My Mac runs Snow Leopard, no iCloud involved.

Some birthdays are off by one day prior to the real birthday-date !?

This applies to dates in the past and future.

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Answer 7

IslandOwl Author

Level 1

2 points

Jan 4, 2012 6:27 PM in response to ckuan

@ckuan, I did what you suggested, but nothing changed.

This seems to be a fairly common problem. In previous iOS it appears that often the birthday calendar was late by one day - at least from what I see on a Google search. Now, it appears that Apple has gone the other direction!

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Answer 8

ckuan

Level 10

120,680 points

Jan 4, 2012 10:45 PM in response to IslandOwl

Did you also check in https://www.icloud.com

click your Apple ID (top right) and that the Time Zone listed is correct?

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Answer 9

highpti

Level 1

6 points

Jan 7, 2012 2:41 PM in response to devnul

I had the same problem. I did a variation of the workaround; I first ensured my iCloud settings were correct (even though I don't synch through iCloud - BTW, they weren't) then I did the workaround, then I replaced the calendars and contacts on my phone with the ones from my MBP, rest the phone then turned off the calendar synch. Everything seems to be corrected.

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Answer 10

Jan 15, 2012 9:24 PM in response to IslandOwl

I also had this problem, but didn't start seeing it until after January 1. I attributed it initially to an iOS 5.0.1 bug that I hoped would be corrected in a future update. But over the weekend, we got an iPhone 4S for my mom and I noticed her phone did NOT have the problem. At that point, I realized the issue was somehow tied to my setup.

I tried a few things and ultimately did come up with an easy way to fix the problem that I hope will work for others. First, sync your iPhone to iTunes. Second, select your iPhone in the "Devices" list within iTunes. Click on the "Info" tab. Scroll to the "Advanced" section at the bottom and check the box for "Contacts" (yes, "Contacts" not "Calendars"). Then sync. That did it for me.

What you're doing is taking the good information from your master source and overwriting the corrupted information on the iPhone. As to why you should do "Contacts" instead of "Calendars" -- the "Birthdays" calendar that shows up on the iPhone actually comes from the birthdays listed in the Contacts data, not from the iCal calendar data.

BE SURE TO SYNC FIRST. If you don't sync before overwriting the data on the iPhone and you have made any changes to the Contacts on your iPhone, those changes would be lost.

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Answer 11

0815guy

Level 1

0 points

Jan 16, 2012 9:26 AM in response to fortbailey

**** happens !

After following your suggestion everything went even worse...

Now I have two calendar events for the same birthday. One at the correct date and one one day too early !?!?!?

This is not the kind of functionalty I'm expecting from an Apple product :-(

Undone sync'ing contacts from my Mac to iPhone to fix this again.

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Answer 12

Jan 16, 2012 9:26 AM in response to 0815guy

Easy to fix that one -- a design flaw I hope they'll fix in the next iOS update.

Open your calenar on the iPhone. Click "Calendars" at the top. You'll have two sections -- "From My Mac" and "Other". You'll see "Birthdays" appears in both. The one under "Other" is generated by your Contacts. Since that should be fixed now turn off the one under "From My Mac". That will remove the duplicate birthdays, and odds are the duplicate list is the one that is off by one day. Click "Done".

On the off chance that the remaining birthdays displayed are still the wrong one, reverse the procedure -- go back into the calendar list, disable the one under "Other" and re-enable the one under "From My Mac". That will definitely do it.

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Answer 13

IslandOwl Author

Level 1

2 points

Jan 16, 2012 10:11 AM in response to IslandOwl

NOTE: @Fortbailey's answer two above is the correct one. I accidently marked it as Helpful instead of Correct. His second answer, the one marked Correct is Helpful if you end up with two birthday calendars. However, following the steps below using iCloud worked for me without giving me duplicate birthday calendars.

FOR iCLOUD USERS: First, have all your devices turned on so the sync is up to date. Then, how I did it was:

On my Mac I turned off Contacts on iCloud. It will ask you if you want to delete the contacts from your phone - say NO! (You want to keep the contacts on your computer.) Then on my phone I also turn off Contacts on iCloud. It will ask you if you want to delete the contacts from your phone - say Yes. Now check to make sure your contacts are empty on your phone. Now turn on Contacts in iCloud. I turned on my Mac first, and then my phone. All better!!

Many thanks to everyone who replied!

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