Why Does Easy Button Show Wrong Intervals (3 or 5 Days instead of 4 Despite Default options) for New Cards?

Anki Help
1

Hi everyone,
I’m using Anki 25.02.1 on Windows (desktop version). Although all my deck options are at Anki’s default values, and the Easy Interval is supposedly set to 4 days, I notice that when I see a card for the first time, the number above the “Easy” button shows 3 days! This issue also occurs in other decks, where sometimes the number above the “Easy” button for a new card is 5 days or even other values, despite the Easy Interval being 4 days. I expect to see 4 days based on the default options.

I’ve tried various solutions to fix this:

•Installed and tested different add-ons.

•Used “Remove Card History” to clear all deck histories.

•Reset all cards using the “Reset” option.

•Set the “Added Date” to today for all cards.

•Exported the decks without their preset/schedule and re-imported them.

None of these resolved the issue. Can anyone guide me on how to fix this?

Also, I’ve decided to switch to the FSRS scheduling method going forward. Could this issue negatively impact my experience with FSRS?

Thank you for your help!

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Anki will randomly add or remove a little from intervals to help spread out reviews (fuzzing).
Newer versions of Anki will also bias the fuzz to try to keep similar numbers of reviews each day (load balancing).

This fuzz is small enough that it should not significantly affect how easy it is to remember cards.

I’m not sure where you are getting that Easy should give you exactly 4 days but Anki has done fuzzing for a very long time now.

Older versions of Anki didn’t show you these fuzzed intervals next to the buttons, they added the fuzz after you gave your answer. e.g. Your answer buttons might show 4 days but after adding fuzz it would actually schedule the card 5 days in the future.

Newer versions of Anki will show you the actual interval it will use by the buttons including fuzz.

This is expected behaviour so will not adversely affect you using FSRS.

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3

Thank you so much for your help

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