Goal Settings

• Goalname
• Goal Description
• Goal Units
• Y-Axis Label
• Fine Print
• Charity

In the settings menu of an individual goal, you can change things like your goalname, goal description, goal units, reminders, deadlines, privacy settings, and custom goal settings. These settings apply to the goal you're viewing only, and aren't applied to any other goals (either existing goals or future goals). Each existing goal's settings must be edited separately in most cases. Defaults can be set for any new goals you might make via the new goal defaults settings.

Goalname

The goalname (we say "goalname" by analogy to "username") should typically be a single word that reflects the goal's intent. It's also used in the URL of your goal, so choose wisely! You can change this anytime, but Beeminder will not automatically create redirects — if you've linked to it elsewhere, those links will be dead! Goals set up with IFTTT/Zapier/etc also lose that link, and you'll have to reset it on the side of the integration (e.g. in your IFTTT applet). We have some tips and examples for goal naming on the blog.

You can use an underscore, for example if you want to create a prefix to use for a set of goals (e.g. hw_upstairs and hw_downstairs, if you wanted to have two separate goals for housework).

To change the goalname, first type the current goalname in the popup to confirm you understand you'll break links. Then type the new goalname in the text field that appears and hit Enter or press Update Goal below to save the change.

Goal Description

The goal description is an optional, slightly longer way to describe the goal's intent. It appears underneath the countdown on the goal page, as well as underneath the goalname in the dashboard. Most people use this to provide a little more info on goal context, for when the goalname doesn't convey quite enough info. It's a good place to put a note to yourself about exactly what counts for a goal where it might be ambiguous, for example!

To change the goal description, type the new one in the text field, or use the pencil icon below the countdown line above the graph image to do the same thing. Hit enter or press Update Goal to save the change.

Goal Units

Goal units is the field that describes what you are counting with your goal. If your goal is to read more, for example, the units could be "pages" or "books" or "papers" — whatever you're measuring to satisfy the goal!

You can change the units text anytime by editing the text field, then hit enter or press Update Goal to save the change. If you want to change the unit text and the value (e.g., from minutes to hours), scaling the goal is probably the route you want to take!

Y-Axis Label

The Y-axis label is the label that appears on the side of your graph to describe the units measured on the Y-axis. This is usually the same as your goal units: on a do-more goal measuring time spent doing something, your goal units might be "hours" while your Y-axis says "cumulative total hours". The two can be different if you want, so editing one field doesn't change the other!

Fine Print

The fine print is an optional free-form text field that lets you enter just about anything you want. It's a great place to make any notes about the goal's exact parameters, keep notes about the goal, etc. The fine print is private unless you want to make it public, by checking the Make fine print publicly visible box and saving changes.

Charity

Keywords: goalname vs goal name, change goalname, change goal name, rename goal