Improve Milestone Due Date Messaging and Overdue Day Calculation

[anxielray]

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Since I could not find a category for Milestones, opted to do it here.

Description:

Hello GitHub Team,

I’d like to raise a concern regarding the way milestone due messages are currently displayed, particularly in the following situations:

🐞 Issues Identified:

1. Inaccurate "Overdue by ..." messaging:

• When a milestone is set to end today, the message says:

• Overdue by 1 day(s) – which can be misleading, especially if the milestone was just set.

• Conversely, when a milestone end date is set to a day before today, and today arrives, the message reads:

• Overdue by 0 day(s), which feels inconsistent and confusing.
  Here is a screenshot from 25th June 2025 on a milestone.

2. Milestone continues counting overdue days even after the milestone/project has ended.

• This leads to a strange experience for the user, especially in cases where the project is completed or abandoned.

here is a screenshot of a completed milestone:

💡 Proposed Improvements:

1. Clear and user-friendly time messaging:

• When the due date is today, the message should say:

  • 📌 This milestone is due today at [HH:MM time set]

• If the milestone end date is set to the exact same day of creation, consider using:

  • 📌 Overdue today

• This wording is friendlier, clearer, and more helpful in daily workflows.

• Inclusion of time in milestone deadlines:

  • Allow setting specific due times (not just dates).
  • This would make GitHub milestones more useful for developers working on short sprint/mini apps. and teams in different time zones needing precise coordination.

• Reconsider overdue day counter beyond milestone end date:

  • If the project is inactive, archived, or closed, maybe stop showing “Overdue by x days”.

  • If this has a technical reason, I’d love to understand the rationale.

  • Otherwise, I suggest removing or hiding this counter after the milestone is not a WIP

✅ Why this matters:

• These improvements would:

  • Enhance the clarity and usability of GitHub milestones.

  • Improve time-sensitive planning and cross-time-zone collaboration.

  • Avoid confusing or misleading messaging for developers and project managers alike.

• Let me know your thoughts or if I can help contribute to this!

• Thanks for the awesome work you do 🙌

— Raymond Martin

Guidelines

• I have read the above statement and can confirm my post is relevant to the GitHub feature areas Issues and/or Projects.

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[LegalizeAdulthood]

I just noticed the same thing; I use milestones to track releases and close the milestone when the release is published. All my closed milestones are showing as "overdue". IMO, a closed milestone should only be marked as overdue if it was closed after the due date.

[labudis]

Thanks for reporting this @anxielray @LegalizeAdulthood. We have shipped a fix for the erroneous message when the milestone is closed. We will ship the fix for the case when the due date falls on the current day shortly as well.

[SmartLamScott]

Thanks for reporting this @anxielray @LegalizeAdulthood. We have shipped a fix for the erroneous message when the milestone is closed. We will ship the fix for the case when the due date falls on the current day shortly as well.

Hello, @labudis. Is there any update on the status of this fix? As of today, I'm still getting an overdue warning for a milestone that's due today.

[labudis]

Hi @SmartLamScott, we've shipped a fix for this in July, and in my own tests just now I'm unable to replicate the problem.

Would you mind sharing a screenshot of the issue you are seeing?

[SmartLamScott]

Thanks for the quick reply. I've attached a screenshot. I'm in the US Central time zone.

[aconsuegra]

@SmartLamScott I'm not sure if it would help, but can you share the OS and browser (including the version) that you are using? Thanks in advance!

[SmartLamScott]

@SmartLamScott I'm not sure if it would help, but can you share the OS and browser (including the version) that you are using? Thanks in advance!

Apologies for not seeing this sooner. I am still having this issue and found this thread again. I am using Windows 11 Pro (Version 10.0.26100 Build 26100) and Firefox 144.0.2. I have been having this issue for at least several months, possibly 1-2 years.