Starting automation inside Routine app
The very first time I opened Routine I expected it to feel like another boring calendar app, but it actually pushes you to think about your day in blocks. To set up something simple for mornings I created a recurring daily routine template. The idea here was to avoid opening five different apps before my brain even wakes up. In Routine you can build a habit sequence, which I set up to trigger right after my alarm. Instead of clicking around, my tasks and notes slide into a small panel so I do not waste time deciding. For example, I placed a block called “Plan Day” followed by another block for “Read Email Headlines Only,” which forces me not to deep dive into inbox chaos before coffee :).
When you create these blocks, the tricky part is remembering that Routine sometimes hides the repeat toggle under a separate menu. I discovered this after assuming my morning habit list would just reappear. It did not, which meant I spent one morning staring at a blank list and wondering if I was still half asleep. Quick fix: open the template menu, click repeat, and select daily. Once saved, the pop up card shows up correctly right after I unlock my phone.
Connecting calendar with task blocks
This is where Routine becomes tricky but also useful. I have both Google Calendar and Outlook because clients insist on sending invites in different ecosystems. If you simply connect both in Routine, sometimes the event titles collide in the same block and it looks like there are two meetings at one time. What I had to do was create a filter so Google entries are set to “primary” and Outlook ones just sync as reference. That way my standup meeting does not look like a dissertation with duplicate titles.
The syncing process itself involves logging into each provider, granting access, and then waiting for Routine to update. The first time, nothing showed up. I thought the integration was broken, but it actually takes a couple minutes. My advice is: after connecting, just refresh the app a few times and leave it alone. Suddenly everything loads. Once that hurdle was over, I arranged a recurring block called “First Calendar Sweep.” It sits at the top of my morning template and ensures I know which calls exist before I get swept away. Without this, I once accidentally joined the same Zoom call twice and was that awkward ghost attendee ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
Building reminder flows that actually trigger
Reminders in Routine work differently than the usual alarm buzz. They appear as a card you can swipe away or expand into details. I wanted something lightweight to remind me to drink water around the time I normally grab coffee. At first I set a task with time based notification, but nothing popped up. After some poking I found there are two different toggles, one for “deadlines” and another for “notification alerts.” Unless you set the second one, the task just quietly expires. The screenshot was confusing, the switch hides in a small bell icon.
Once set up properly though, the reminder works perfectly. The card floats in and does not demand an immediate decision. I can either mark it done or snooze it for a few minutes. Honestly, this feels less intrusive than the blaring alarms I used with Apple Reminders. The only bug I hit was that sometimes when I rename the reminder list the notifications stop firing until I remake them under the new list name. It smells like a database link issue but oh well, easiest fix is to just not rename lists after building flows.
Embedding quick journaling into mornings
Routine is not a notes app per se, but it lets you jot down free text under daily reviews. I use that slot as a micro journal. Every morning after my “Calendar Sweep” I tap into the daily note and force myself to write two lines: what I am focusing on today, and what distracted me yesterday. That way I start with context rather than just emails. If I skip it, the rest of the routine feels flat. Setting this up required nothing more than dragging the “Journal” block into my morning template, but what caught me off guard was that the editor sometimes strips formatting. Bullet points vanish randomly.
Funny detail, tapping Control Enter saves the note but any other key combo just closes the card. It took me three frustrating mornings to figure that out. Now that I know, I almost enjoy the quirk. And no, it does not sync properly to external notes apps like Evernote, so if you want it outside Routine, you will need to copy text manually or rely on integrations via services like Zapier. But be warned, Zapier connections sometimes duplicate entries when you reopen the editor twice. Learned that the hard way, now I copy paste instead.
Integrating email review without rabbit holes
Emails consume mornings if unchecked. Routine gives you a way to attach Gmail quickly so unread items appear in the sidebar. The workflow I built was labeled “Ten Minute Email Review” so that I literally cannot exceed ten minutes. I put that block right before work blocks start. The hiccup came when I renamed the Gmail label I used. Everything broke downstream. Filters suddenly showed nothing, my automation stopped, and the app acted like Gmail had no mail at all. Turns out, if you change a label name in Gmail, Routine loses track of it. The solution was to reselect the new label name in Routine’s connection settings. Annoying, but once done the sidebar filled up again.
Now it works fine: unread emails appear, and I go down the list marking tasks as “Later.” One trick I use is to write “Review Later” directly as a Routine task while reading, because sometimes moving the email into a label in Gmail does not sync quickly. With direct tasks at least I have a visible placeholder. Beginners should be ready for this lag — it is not your fault, the sync just has a slight delay.
Making quick links accessible inside Routine
Another part of the morning involves opening the same three pages daily, like project dashboards and Slack. Instead of typing them each time, I stored them in Routine’s Quick Access panel. It is basically a list of links pinned within the app. Setting them up is easy, except I once forgot that links need the full https prefix. Without it, clicking did nothing at all. No error, just nothing. That whole week I thought Slack was down when in truth the link was incomplete :P.
Once corrected, tabs open directly in my default browser. This small change sounds trivial but has a significant effect on mornings. By the time coffee is brewed, dashboards are loaded without me making five clicks. You can reorder them by dragging, and unusually, the drag handle only becomes visible after hovering at the far right of the list. Until I figured that out I thought the list could not be reordered. Documentation is thin on this so just trust me — hover further to the right.
Recovering from sync bugs and frozen screens
Not everything with Routine is smooth. Half the time my app freezes when connecting multiple accounts. Sometimes the freeze lasts half a minute then all the scheduled blocks appear suddenly. Other times I have to force quit and reopen. The good news is reopening never loses data; it just reloads slower than expected. If this happens on mobile, toggling airplane mode oddly jogs it back to life. It reminds me of how restarting a WiFi router often fixes things for no reason. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
If someone is completely new and gets discouraged by these freezes, do not abandon the app right away. Most of the time the data is still there, hidden behind a laggy refresh. Worst case, use the web app version in a browser while the mobile side is shaky. The core point is: Routine automates mornings well enough that occasional hiccups are worth tolerating. And yes, I have reported these bugs and the developers usually patch something every month or so, just expect a moving target when renaming labels or reconfiguring flows.
Pulling it together without overstuffing
After lots of trial and error, my current morning sequence in Routine looks like a real chain now. It starts with Daily Journal, then Calendar Sweep, then Ten Minute Email Review, then Coffee Reminder, and ends by opening Quick Links dashboards. When everything fires correctly, that whole flow replaces what used to be twenty minutes of scattered phone taps. The most important lesson for me was to resist overstuffing the routine. Once I tried adding meditation prompts, news feeds, budget trackers, and even gym workouts. That bloated setup would freeze half the time and never felt manageable. Cutting back to core actions actually makes the automation reliable. So while Routine can technically hold every habit you want, mornings work best if you keep it lean enough that the automation finishes before your head fills with new distractions.