Sharing care with others (sync)
Care is rarely a one-person job. CareHaven gives you two calm ways to keep everyone on the same page: keep your own iPhone, iPad, and Mac in step, and invite a trusted co-caregiver to follow along for a specific person.
On this page
Both are completely opt-in. Nothing leaves your device until you turn it on, and you stay in control of who sees what. Available
Across your own devices
If you use CareHaven on more than one Apple device signed in to the same iCloud account, you can keep them in step. Turn on Sync via iCloud in Settings, and the same people, logs, and settings show up on your iPhone, iPad, and Mac. Available
This is your own private iCloud. There is no CareHaven account and no CareHaven server in the middle, and CareHaven can never read your data. It rides only through your own private iCloud, protected by Apple's encryption in transit and at rest — and if you turn on Apple's Advanced Data Protection, not even Apple can read it.
For more on the backups that ride alongside this, see Privacy & security (in depth) and the Walkthrough: Back up & restore your data.
Inviting a co-caregiver
When more than one person helps care for someone, you can invite a co-caregiver to a specific person's profile. Maybe that is your partner, a grandparent, or another family member who needs to see what you are tracking. Available
You stay in control:
- You invite people one at a time, to one person at a time. Sharing one profile never shares the others.
- You can pull a co-caregiver's invitation in from your iPhone Contacts, so their name, phone, and email fill in for you. Available
- The invite travels through Apple's private sharing, the same kind of secure invite Apple's own Notes and Reminders use. There is no server in between.
- Each co-caregiver needs their own iCloud account to accept. Once they do, their CareHaven fills in with the shared person's history.
What a co-caregiver can and cannot do today
Today, sharing flows in one direction. Here is exactly what that means:
- A co-caregiver you invite can see the shared person's records, and the records you add or change keep flowing out to them. Available
- They also get the activity feed for that person, so they can keep up with what you have logged.
- What does not happen yet: a co-caregiver's own additions do not sync back to you, or out to any other co-caregiver. If they log a feeding or a note on their device, it stays on their device for now.
Full two-way sharing, where every caregiver can add to the record and everyone sees it, is something the team is building. Coming soon
In the meantime, decide together who is the one logging. The simplest pattern is that one person keeps the record and the others use the shared view to stay informed.
For a step-by-step walkthrough, see Walkthrough: Invite a co-caregiver.
Removing access
You can take a co-caregiver's access back at any time. Open the invitees, tap their name, and revoke. Their app stops showing the shared person, and that local copy is cleared. CareHaven also keeps an eye on shared access and lets you know if an invitation is about to lapse.
Seeing recent activity
When you share a person, you want a single place to glance at recent sync activity. CareHaven aggregates a co-caregiver activity feed across every person you share, so you can see what was logged, and when, in one newest-first list. Available
You will find it in Settings, under the Sync section, as Co-caregiver activity. Until iCloud sync is on and you have shared a profile, it simply tells you there is nothing to show yet.
How edits are reconciled
When the same record changes in two places, CareHaven keeps this simple and predictable: the most recent edit wins.
Today this matters in two places:
- Across your own devices. If you edit a medication detail on your iPhone and change it again on your iPad a moment later, the later change is the one that sticks. You never end up with two conflicting copies.
- With your calendar. This is the same reconciliation you will see in Appointments & calendar: when CareHaven and your calendar disagree, the most recent edit wins there too.
For things that only ever get added, like a feeding, a behavior note, or a logged seizure, there is nothing to collide over. Each entry stands on its own, so logs simply add up. The most-recent-edit rule only matters for details that can be edited in place, like a goal or a medication.
When full two-way co-caregiver editing arrives, this same rule will settle the rare case where two caregivers edit the same detail at nearly the same moment, and the later change will win there too. Coming soon
What stays private to you
A few things are personal by design and never travel to a co-caregiver, even on a shared person:
- Share the Load is your own private list of the mental load you are carrying. It syncs across your own devices, but it never appears on a co-caregiver's device. See Caregiver tools (for you).
- Your own Caregiver tools (for you), like your wellbeing self-check, are for you.
A note on what ships today
Syncing across your own devices, inviting a co-caregiver to a person, and the activity feed all work in the current beta. Today that sharing is one direction: your records flow out to the co-caregiver you invited, but their own additions do not yet flow back to you or to other caregivers. Full two-way sharing, where everyone adds to the record and everyone sees it, continuously and instantly, is in active development. Coming soon
If you rely on co-caregiver sharing for anything time-sensitive, treat the in-person handoff as your backstop for now. See Known limitations & what's coming.
Privacy notes
- Sync is opt-in. With iCloud sync off, all your care data stays only on your device.
- There is no CareHaven account and no CareHaven server. Sharing rides on your private iCloud, end to end.
- Your records are encrypted before they reach iCloud.
- Co-caregiving is shared per person. You decide who is invited to each profile, and you can revoke at any time. Today the invitee sees the shared person's records; their own additions do not sync back yet. Coming soon
To see exactly what is on your device and what is shared, open Privacy at a Glance in Settings. It shows a live count of your profiles and events, your encryption status, your iCloud sync status, and any active caregiver invites. More in Privacy & security (in depth).