How do i transfer 2011 Birthdays to this year (2012) in iCal

Depending on the OS X and iCal/Address Book versions you are running, there is a Birthdays calendar available with iCal that pulls birthdays entered for contacts in the Address Book into iCal automatically without having to manually enter birthdays for select contacts in iCal.

You're welcome.

If you are running 10.6.8, yes you do have this available with iCal and the Address Book on your Mac.

iCal and the Address Book are integrated.

If you want the birthday for each one of your contacts that you want to track birthdays for entered automatically in iCal every year - year after year without having to do anything extra, enter the birthday for each contact you want this for in the Address Book. In iCal preferences, select to show the Birthdays calendar. Done.

If not, keep doing it the way you have been doing it which will require copy and paste each birthday in iCal from last year to this year. Repeat for next year and the year after that. Or go into each Birthday event in iCal one by one and select repeat every year for the event. Have fun with that since your question is based on iCal only and you are not interested in learning anything new that makes this process easy and automatic. A contact's birthday should be entered with the rest of the contact's info in the Address Book, and Apple includes a simple option with one mouse click in iCal to bring the birthday entries for each contact in the Address Book over to iCal automatically each year - year after year. But pay no attention - your question is about iCal only.

Good luck.

Johno11111, you obviously need your intellenge insulted in this regard, and you need to learn simple manners when someone volunteers their time to help you such as "thank you" regardless if you think what is offered is acceptable. Jack ***.

I too would really appreciate being able to automatically update the age of birthdays in iCal without putting a birthday field into address book for each person - as I do not want to add a contact in my address book for each individual member of a family, my cousins, nephews, my childrens friends etc etc. For me it would be great if iCal could take a birthday calendar on yearly repeat and update how old the person is itself without me having to go in and manually change them every year one by one... and not using address book. I do see how that is easier for some but for me as a mum in charge of the whole family's birthday calendar I simply do not wish to have every person in my address book to remember their birthday.

Are there any other suggestions?

Many thanks in advance for any help available.

Sorry if I come here one year after... ... if the question is still open.... 🙂

If you use a normal calendar for bithday you need to simply select the Repeat each year.

Of course it is much better to use the Birthday field in Contacts and add a subscribed Birthday Calendar.

If you do not have a Birthday field in your Contact you need to add it from Preferences... add field.

I like to put my birtday date without year (only day Month). Not sure if this is necessary but this way I get my Birthday each year.

Hi Walter-Milano-Italy

This is exactly how I use it but it doesn't build in any option for adding a year onto birthdays, and so working out how old people are and increasing it each year. This is the functionality I would like without using the address book for each person. For my children's friends for example I do not want to have them as an entry in my address book but it would be great to keep track of their birthdays without having to manually go through the calendar each year and edit it to add another year onto how old they are in the entry.

Many thanks

I understand your point. I have made some test and I see it can work as you wish.

I never put the year in the Contacts, only day and month. because I am not interested in how old are my friends (no chindren). But answering your question I have seen that if you put in the contact also the year you can have in Calendar the age in parenthesis. I have written 1 febr 2000 for this "friend" in its (neutrum A2A is a company !) contact, and I see it goes on every year with the count of age. (14 on next 1/02/2014)

For your children's friends you could add an entry in the Contacts, may be in a special group.

Thankyou, it does seem the only way to do it is to have a contact for every single person.

Thanks for your help and time.

Kate