A trigger is anything that might bring on a migraine for you. Caffeine, a poor night of sleep, a drop in air pressure, a stressful day, a missed meal. MigraineMe comes with a long list of common triggers, and as you log your migraines it works out which ones look like yours.
You do not have to set up every trigger by hand. The app does most of the work. But there are a few places where a quick tap helps it learn faster.
Where to find your trigger settings
These steps are the same on iPhone and Android.
- Open MigraineMe.
- Tap the gear icon in the top-left corner. A drawer slides in.
- Tap Manage Items.
- Tap Triggers.
A screen called Triggers opens. You will see your whole trigger pool grouped by category: Body, Cognitive, Diet, Environment, Menstrual Cycle, Physical, Sleep. There is a search box at the top if you know the name you are after.
What you can do here
- Star a trigger as a favourite by tapping the small star on its row. A filled star means favourite. Favourites appear first when you are logging, so you do not have to scroll to find the ones you use most.
- Delete a trigger by tapping the small trash icon on its row. A confirmation asks if you want to remove it and reminds you that past logged entries are not affected. Tap Delete to confirm.
- Tap a row to expand it. From there you can change its category, set its severity weight (HIGH, MILD, LOW, or NONE), and for auto-detected triggers, switch Auto-detect on or off and change the threshold it fires at.
- Add a custom trigger that is not in the list. Tap the + at the top of the pool card. In the sheet that opens, type a name, pick a category and (optionally) a severity and icon, then tap Add.
There is no rename. If you want to change a trigger's name, delete the old one and add a new one.
When you change severities, categories or thresholds, remember to tap Save & Recalculate at the bottom so the changes apply and your risk score is recomputed.
Automatic triggers from your data
You do not need to log every common trigger by hand. MigraineMe is already watching things like sleep duration, heart rate variability and stress (from your phone or wearable), weather pressure (from your location) and many nutrients (from your food log). When one of these goes outside your normal range, the trigger fires on its own and can show up in the Top contributors card on the home screen.
Tuning sensitivity
If you find MigraineMe is over-flagging or under-flagging a trigger, you can adjust its threshold. That is covered in its own article called "Adjusting how sensitive a trigger is", in this same Setup section. Open it from the Help list when you are ready.
A note on patience
The trigger list will not be very useful on day one. Give it two to four weeks of logging at least one migraine. After that, the picture sharpens. You can always come back here and tidy up.
