A parent reminder can look like a convenient heading, but it also represents a task whose actions affect its children. Before marking a project heading complete, inspect the hidden subtasks so a tidy list does not become a misleading record of work that remains unfinished.

Use updated iCloud reminders for the documented feature set. In a disposable standard list, create Practice pack with two unfinished children, Check cable and Check adapter.

Expand the work represented by the parent

Apple documents showing subtasks with the arrow beside a parent in a standard list. Smart Lists show a blue subtask-count link for viewing them, but subtasks cannot be created in Today, Scheduled, Flagged or custom Smart Lists. Indent Reminder makes selected reminders children of the reminder immediately above them.

Apple states that completing, deleting or moving a parent also completes, deletes or moves its subtasks. These are separate operations with a shared hierarchy scope. Read the parent’s children before choosing any of them, especially when the list is collapsed.

For the practice pack, ask what “complete” means: both checks finished, or only the planning step finished? If Check adapter is still outstanding, completing the whole parent would not accurately describe that state. Complete the actual finished child instead, leaving the parent’s boundary consistent with the remaining work.

Make independent work independent in the hierarchy

If a child should continue separately, Apple provides Edit, Outdent Reminder to remove it from the parent hierarchy. Inspect its resulting position and meaning before acting on the old parent. Do not use outdenting merely to hide incomplete work from a progress view.

Before moving a parent to another list, inventory its children as a group. The intended destination must make sense for all of them. A parent named Packing can contain a child whose responsibility belongs elsewhere; the broad label does not settle that organisational decision.

In a disposable demonstration, compare the known parent and child states before and after the one operation being investigated. For real work, use that understanding to choose the correct scope rather than toggling completion to see what disappears. The accepted result is a hierarchy that accurately represents both ownership and completion, with unfinished tasks still visible as unfinished.

References: Apple: reminder subtasks.