The short answer: you do not need to build a bot. Slack's reminders are built in: type /remind, say who it is for (me or a #channel), what it is about, and when, and Slack delivers it on schedule. Add a phrase like every Monday and it repeats until you delete it.
/remind me to check the invoice tracker every Monday at 9am
/remind #support to review open tickets every weekday at 4pm
The rest of this page covers repeating reminders, finding and editing the ones you have set, when a Workflow Builder schedule is the better tool, and the one job reminders cannot do. Steps were checked against Slack's help centre on 1 October 2026.
Table of Contents
- Set a reminder for yourself or a channel
- Repeating reminders: daily, weekly, every two weeks, monthly
- List, edit and delete reminders
- When a scheduled workflow beats /remind
- Do you ever need a real bot?
- Reminding another person until they answer
- FAQs
Set a reminder for yourself or a channel
There are three ways in.
The command. /remind [me or #channel] [what] [when]. This is the fastest and the only way to set a channel reminder.
From a message. Hover over any message or file, click the three dots, and choose Remind me about this. Pick a time from the list or a custom one. Handy for "come back to this on Friday".
From the Later tab. Click Later in the sidebar, click the plus sign at the top right of the list, pick a date and time, add the details and click Save.
Two rules catch people out. Guests can only set reminders for themselves. And Slack recommends typing times in American English format, so 9am and March 3 parse more reliably than 09:00 and 3 March. If you give a day but no time, the reminder arrives at 9am in your time zone.
Repeating reminders: daily, weekly, every two weeks, monthly
Put the repeat phrase at the end of the command.
| You want | Type |
|---|---|
| Every day | /remind me to log hours every day at 5pm |
| Every working day | /remind #team to post standup notes every weekday at 9:30am |
| Every Monday | /remind #sales to update the pipeline every Monday at 10am |
| Every two weeks | /remind me to run payroll every two weeks |
| Once a month | /remind me to send invoices on the 1st of every month |
Slack repeats reminders by the day, not in time increments, so every hour or every 30 minutes will not work. For "every other week", use every two weeks, which is the phrasing Slack's own examples use. Two different weekdays (Monday and Thursday, say) are most reliable as two separate reminders.
The full phrase list, and the ones that fail, is in Slack recurring reminders: the /remind syntax that works.
List, edit and delete reminders
See everything: type /remind list and send it. Slack shows your active reminders, including channel reminders, each with a delete option.
Edit a personal reminder: open the Later tab and click the clock icon on the reminder to change its time. Click the checkmark to mark it done, or the three dots and Delete reminder to remove it.
Edit a channel reminder: you cannot. Delete it from /remind list and create a new one with the corrected time or text.
When a scheduled workflow beats /remind
A /remind message is plain and always reads as a reminder. If you want a message you wrote yourself, with formatting, links or a button, posted to a channel on a schedule, use Workflow Builder instead:
- Click Agents & tools in the sidebar (or Tools on some workspaces), then under Workflows click New and Build Workflow.
- Click Choose an event, select On a schedule, and set the date, time and how often it repeats.
- Add a step that sends a message to a channel, write the message and click Save.
- Click Finish Up, then Publish.
Workflow Builder is available on paid Slack plans. On the free plan, /remind is the tool. A full walk through every Slack automation option, including scheduled messages and Slackbot keyword replies, is in Slack automated messages: every way to set them up.
Do you ever need a real bot?
Rarely, for reminders. A custom Slack app makes sense when the reminder depends on data somewhere else: "remind the on-call engineer when the queue passes 50", or "post when a deploy fails". That is a developer job using the Slack API, or a no-code job for Zapier, Make or a Workflow Builder webhook trigger.
For anything that runs on a calendar, /remind or a scheduled workflow already does it, and neither needs an install, a token or a server.
Reminding another person until they answer
This is where reminders run out. A channel reminder that mentions Marcus will ping Marcus every Thursday forever, in exactly the same words, whether or not he already sent the thing. That is fine for a routine and wrong for a chase.
Chasing one person for one thing (an approval, a document, a payment) works better when:
- each message is a little firmer than the last,
- the messages stop once they answer,
- and the channel matches the person. Clients and suppliers are usually not in your Slack.
autoremind.ai does this. Describe the chase in a sentence and it writes up to four messages that move from professional to firm to urgent, and sends them on your schedule. Its main channel is email: it sends from your own Gmail in the original thread and stops on its own when they reply. It can also send to a teammate on Slack, from your own account, but it does not read Slack, so when they answer there you close the reminder yourself.
Try it on yours
Edit the sentence and press Continue. Free for 3 reminders, no card.
If you are deciding which channel a chase belongs in, Slack vs email for business reminders goes through it.
FAQs
How do I set up an automated reminder in Slack without a bot?
Type /remind in any message box, followed by who it is for, what it is about and when. For example: /remind #design to post the weekly update every Monday at 10am. Slack already has the reminder feature built in, so there is nothing to build or install.
How do I make a Slack reminder repeat? Add a repeat phrase to the end: every day, every weekday, every Monday, every two weeks, or on the 1st of every month. Slack repeats by the day, not by the hour, so "every hour" does not work.
How do I see and edit my Slack reminders?
Type /remind list to see every active reminder, including channel ones, with a delete option. Personal reminders also live in the Later tab, where you can reschedule or complete them. Channel reminders cannot be edited, so delete and recreate them.
Can I set a Slack reminder for another person? Slack documents reminders for yourself and for channels. To nudge a specific person, set a channel reminder that mentions them, or send them a scheduled message.
When should I use Workflow Builder instead of /remind?
When you want a formatted message you wrote, posted on a schedule or when something happens in a channel. Workflow Builder needs a paid Slack plan; /remind works on every plan.
Does a Slack reminder stop when someone does the task? No. A reminder fires on its schedule until you delete it. It has no way of knowing whether the person replied or the task is done.
See also: Slack Automated Messages: Every Way to Set Them Up · Slack Recurring Reminders: The /remind Syntax · Slack vs Email for Business Reminders
