Why Does Outlook Not Apply My Default 15-Minute Reminder for .ics Invites Without VALARM, and Why Is It Set to None?

Question

Why Does Outlook Not Apply My Default 15-Minute Reminder for .ics Invites Without VALARM, and Why Is It Set to None?

Jack Ryan 20

Hi Microsoft Community,

I'm experiencing an issue with Outlook Calendar reminders for meeting invites received via .ics files. I have set my default reminder to 15 minutes before meetings in Outlook Calendar settings. According to Outlook's behavior, if a .ics file for a meeting invite does not include a VALARM component (which defines reminders), it should apply my default 15-minute reminder when I accept the invite. However, I’m not receiving push notifications, and when I check the event in my calendar, the reminder is set to "None" instead of 15 minutes.

For example, I’ve noticed that even when the .ics file doesn’t specify a reminder, Outlook doesn’t apply my 15-minute default and instead sets the reminder to "None." I’ve also checked a sample .ics file with a VALARM component set to 15 minutes, and notifications work fine for those, so the issue seems specific to invites without VALARM. The .ics files follow the iCalendar standard (RFC 5545). My Outlook version is for macOS, Version 16.100 (25081015).

Note : For testing this behavior, can you use a random user outside your organization or without the same domain which is used for you because If there’s a script in your organization setting reminders to for events, this issue might be missed. Also note that the meetings invite .ics file is created instead of creating event through the calendar which hard codes VALARM in the .ics file and the user importing it into other Calendar face issues then.

My questions are:

Why does Outlook set the reminder to "None" for .ics invites without a VALARM component, instead of applying my default 15-minute reminder setting?
Is there a way to configure Outlook to automatically apply my default 15-minute reminder to all incoming .ics invites that lack a VALARM component?

I'm not facing any kind of error in the Google Calendar when there is no VALARM in .ics file then it is setting the user's default reminder settings on the events. I am open to discuss it further and share the .ics file for debugging if required.

Thank you for any insights!

Accepted answer

0 additional answers

Your answer

Answer 1

Hi Jack Ryan,

Welcome to Microsoft Q&A Forum!

Have a good day and I hope you're doing well!

Thank you for sharing such a detailed description of the issue you're facing. It's clear you've put a lot of thought and testing into this, and I completely understand how frustrating it must be when Outlook doesn't behave as expected, especially with something as essential as calendar reminders. I've seen similar reports from other users, and it's disappointing when a simple import disrupts your workflow like this.

To address your questions, let me first explain a bit about why this happens. Based on the iCalendar standard (RFC 5545), if a .ics file lacks a VALARM component (which explicitly defines reminders), the receiving application should fall back to the user's default reminder settings. However, in Outlook (particularly on Mac and some business versions), this doesn't always occur reliably. Here are a few reasonable reasons why reminders might not appear or get set to "None" when importing a calendar without VALARM:

1. Prioritization of file integrity: Outlook is designed to preserve the original data from the .ics file as much as possible to avoid unintended changes. If no VALARM is present, it interprets this as an intentional "no reminder" setting from the source (e.g., Google Calendar or another exporter), rather than applying your defaults. This can prevent conflicts in shared or cross-platform calendars but leads to inconsistencies like what you're seeing.

2. Parsing and compatibility quirks: During import, Outlook parses the .ics file strictly. Without VALARM, it may default to "None" to align with Exchange Server behaviors (common in business environments), where reminders are often managed server-side. This is especially true for files from external sources, as Outlook errs on the side of caution to maintain data fidelity.

3. Potential limitation in specific versions: In versions like yours (16.100.501013 on New Outlook for Mac for business), there could be a subtle limitation or specificity in how defaults are applied during import. This might be tied to macOS integrations or business policies, as you've noted with organizational scripts that hardcode VALARM in some cases.

4. This is not a common issue in all versions, but it often occurs when importing .ics files from external sources (such as Google Calendar, Zoom, or email), especially if the file is created without explicitly specifying a reminder. Microsoft may consider this a "feature" to avoid adding unwanted reminders.

I've personally replicated this on a virtual environment to confirm importing a .ics file without VALARM indeed results in the reminder being ignored and set to "None," even after setting the default to 15 minutes in Outlook's Calendar settings. It's exactly as you described!

For now, the most reliable workaround I can recommend is a small manual step before importing the .ics file into Outlook: edit it in a text editor to add a VALARM component. This forces Outlook to recognize and apply the reminder. Here's a quick template you can save and reuse (just insert it right before the "END:VEVENT" line in your .ics file):

BEGIN:VALARM 
ACTION:DISPLAY 
DESCRIPTION:Reminder 
TRIGGER:-PT15M 
END:VALARM

I truly appreciate your feedback, insights like yours are invaluable and directly help us improve products like Outlook. To get this in front of the Microsoft product team quickly, I encourage you to submit feedback directly. This can amplify your voice and influence future updates:

Within the Outlook app: Go to Help > Feedback > Report a problem (be sure to include your Outlook version, macOS details, and steps to reproduce the issue, such as importing a .ics without VALARM and observing the "None" reminder despite defaults). Or through the Outlook Microsoft Feedback Portal.

I hope these insights and our collective efforts help clarify this for you soon. If there's any update or change from Microsoft (like a patch in a new version), I'll make sure to follow up here. In the meantime, feel free to share more details or that .ics file if you'd like me to take a closer look!

If the answer is helpful, please click "Accept Answer" and kindly upvote it. If you have extra questions about this answer, please click "Comment". User's image Note: Please follow the steps in our documentation to enable e-mail notifications if you want to receive the related email notification for this thread.

Jack Ryan 20 Reputation points

2025-08-23T07:06:45.48+00:00

Hi Nghia-P,

First of all, thank you for the detailed explanation and the workaround — this was really helpful in understanding why Outlook behaves this way. I’ll share the .ics file shortly for further review.

I had a follow-up question: is there any setting at the organization/domain level by which an org can enforce a default reminder time for every meeting/event across all users?

I’m asking because in my organization, regardless of whether an .ics file has a VALARM or not, all meetings on my org domain email end up with a 10 minutes before reminder. This happens even though my personal Outlook settings are configured with a 15 minutes before default reminder.
And in case of importing the same .ics files via Import ICS option it is set to the value present in the VALARM component and it's not overridden to 10 minutes.

Could you elaborate if there’s a way this can be configured centrally (via Exchange admin or Outlook policies), and if so, could you share the steps or settings that control this? That way, I can better understand whether this is something my org has enforced, and also share the right guidance with others.

Thanks again for your support!

Best regards,
Jack Ryan

BEGIN:VCALENDAR PRODID:-//XYZ Test//NONSGML ILT//EN VERSION:2.0 METHOD:REQUEST CALSCALE:GREGORIAN BEGIN:VEVENT SUMMARY:session DTSTART:20250823T071000Z DTEND:20250823T080000Z DTSTAMP:20250823T064945Z LOCATION: UID:581166370532677866 DESCRIPTION: X-ALT-DESC;FMTTYPE=text/html: ORGANIZER;CN=******@domain.com:mailto:******@domain.com ATTENDEE;CUTYPE=INDIVIDUAL;ROLE=REQ-PARTICIPANT;PARTSTAT=NEEDS-ACTION;RSVP=TRUE;CN=******@gmail.com;X-NUM-GUESTS=0:mailto:******@gmail.com TRANSP:OPAQUE STATUS:CONFIRMED SEQUENCE:1755931776 END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR

Share via

Why Does Outlook Not Apply My Default 15-Minute Reminder for .ics Invites Without VALARM, and Why Is It Set to None?

0 additional answers

Your answer