Different Intervals on Mac and iPhone/iPad/AnkiWeb

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1

Hey I’ve been having issues with my Anki intervals between my Mac (which are correct) and iPad/iPhone/Ankiweb (which are weird and incorrect). I noticed this issue generally only happens when unsuspending new cards, and that it recently happened after I reset my entire deck after taking Step 1. I do have FSRS on and my Anki is up to date throughout all my devices. Attached is the same exact card on my Mac and iPad. I can see that the card info for the card on my Mac shows 18 day interval while actually being 2 days for good so I’m really confused whats going on.

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2

I’ll help you understand what’s happening with your intervals across devices. Let me search for some relevant information first.

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Found 3 results for 'tags:official FSRS intervals different devices status:public'

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Found 5 results for 'tags:official Anki sync FSRS status:public'

I see you’re experiencing differences in intervals between your Mac and iOS devices when using FSRS. Based on the information provided and my analysis of Anki’s FSRS functionality, here’s what might be happening:

What’s Likely Happening

This appears to be a version compatibility issue with FSRS across your devices. From the Anki manual:

Before Enabling FSRS

  • Please ensure all of your Anki clients support FSRS. Anki 23.10, AnkiMobile 23.10, and AnkiWeb all support it. AnkiDroid supports it in 2.17alpha3+. If one of your clients doesn’t support it, things will not work correctly.

The discrepancy you’re seeing shows:

  • Mac: Shows an 18-day interval in the card info, but a 2-day interval on the “Good” button
  • iOS/AnkiWeb: Showing different intervals

Possible Causes

  1. FSRS Version Mismatch: Make sure all your devices are running compatible versions of Anki that fully support FSRS.

  2. Fuzz Factor: Anki applies a small random “fuzz” to prevent cards introduced at the same time from always coming up together. With the v3 scheduler, this fuzz appears on answer buttons, but might display differently across devices.

  3. Day Boundaries: If you’re studying at different times, Anki treats steps differently when they cross day boundaries.

  4. Sync Timing: The discrepancy could occur if you’re checking the interval before a full sync has completed between devices.

Solutions to Try

  1. Update All Clients: Ensure all your Anki installations are on the latest version (23.10+ on desktop and mobile).

  2. Force Full Sync: On your Mac (with the correct intervals), try forcing a full sync to AnkiWeb.

  3. Check FSRS Parameters: Verify that FSRS parameters are identical across devices. If you’ve optimized parameters on one device, those changes might not have synced properly.

  4. Rebuild Card State: On your Mac, you could try:

    • Tools → Empty Cards… (to fix any oddities)
    • Check Database in the preferences

  5. Avoid Long Learning Steps: If using FSRS, keep (re)learning steps under a day as recommended in the manual.

If the problem persists after trying these solutions, please provide more details about your specific Anki versions on each device and any add-ons you’re using that might affect scheduling.

3

Well this is weird I just updated my Mac to the latest Anki version and now all my intervals became the messed up one (17 days)

4

Hello,

I’d be happy to help. :slight_smile:

​For syncing between desktop and mobile, there isn’t much to do to keep desktop and mobile in sync, so long as you’ve made sure to do two things:
​

  • You’ll want to be logged into AnkIWeb on both devices (this is how they cross-sync)
  • You’ll want to be on the same version of Anki on both devices (if the versions are not the same, the scheduling can differ and the two devices can fall out of sync)
    ​
    Since the mobile version often auto-updates it might be the case that your versions are different. Ensuring that they are the same, and that you’re logged into AnkIWeb on both devices, typically solves this issue in about 99.9% of cases

If, as it sounds, you’ve updated and the intervals are not to your liking you might need to double-check your settings, as having been running different versions of Anki may very well have knocked your deck settings out of sync

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