Top 7 Calendar Apps for 2024

In the ever-accelerating pace of the modern world, keeping track of appointments, events, and deadlines can be challenging. Calendar apps have become essential tools for managing our personal and professional schedules. 

As we step into 2024, we have curated a list of the top 7 calendar apps that can help you organise your time effectively. Whether you need a simple interface for basic scheduling or a powerful tool that integrates with other applications, this list has something for everyone.

Top 7 Calendar Apps: Quick List

1. Akiflow – All-Rounder Calendar App with Meeting Scheduling
2. Google Calendar – Integrated and intuitive time management
3. Apple Calendar – Sleek and simple scheduling for iOS users.
4. Fantastical – Powerful calendar and tasks with natural language processing.
5. TimeTree – Shared calendar for groups and collaborative planning.
6. Business Calendar – Versatile and customizable for business users
7. Any.do Calendar – Combines tasks and calendar in a clean interface

Benefits Of Calendar Applications

Before we get in-depth on our list of top 7 Calendar applications, let’s take a look at the benefits of using a calendar application and how it can help boost your productivity while ensuring you get enough rest. 

1. Efficient Time Management: Calendar apps help users effectively manage their time by providing a visual representation of their schedules. This allows individuals to plan their day, week, or month more efficiently, ensuring that they allocate time to important tasks and appointments.
2. Real-time Reminders: Calendar apps offer the convenience of setting reminders for upcoming events, meetings, and deadlines. These reminders can be configured to provide notifications well in advance, reducing the chances of forgetting important commitments.
3. Improved Organization: With a calendar app, users can categorize and organize their events and appointments. This categorization makes it easier to differentiate between personal, work-related, or other commitments.
4. Accessibility Across Devices: Calendar apps are typically cloud-based, allowing users to access their schedules from multiple devices such as smartphones, tablets, and computers. This ensures that users always have their schedules at their fingertips, regardless of the device they are using.
5. Sharing and Collaboration: Many calendar apps support the sharing of calendars with colleagues, family members, or friends. This collaborative feature simplifies scheduling group events and ensures everyone is on the same page.
6. Integration with Other Apps: Calendar apps often integrate with other productivity tools and apps, such as email clients, task managers, and note-taking apps. This integration streamlines workflow by providing a centralized hub for managing tasks, appointments, and communications.
7. Customization: Users can customize their calendar app to suit their preferences. This includes choosing different calendar views (daily, weekly, monthly), setting custom reminders, and adding specific colors or labels to events for easy identification.
8. Time Zone Management: For individuals who work with colleagues or clients in different time zones, calendar apps can automatically adjust event times based on the user’s location. This feature prevents scheduling conflicts and confusion related to time zone differences.

In conclusion, a calendar app is an indispensable tool for managing time, appointments, and commitments effectively. Whether you’re an individual looking to streamline your daily life or part of an organization coordinating meetings and events, a well-chosen calendar app can greatly enhance productivity and organization. Now, le’ts take a look at the qualities that make a calendar application good for using. 

What Makes A Good Calendar Application?

A good calendar app should possess a blend of features that cater to a wide range of needs, from basic scheduling to advanced planning. Here’s what to look for when choosing a calendar app:

1. User-Friendly Interface: The app should have an intuitive and easy-to-navigate interface. Users should be able to add, edit, and delete events with ease and without a steep learning curve.
2. Customization: It should offer a variety of view options (day, week, month, year, and agenda) and allow users to customize the appearance and settings to suit their personal preferences. This includes color coding for different event types, adjustable notification sounds, and various widgets.
3. Reliable Notifications: The app must provide consistent and accurate reminders for upcoming events and tasks. The ability to set multiple reminders at different times before an event is also beneficial.
4. Cross-Platform Syncing: The calendar should sync across all devices and platforms, providing a consistent experience whether you’re on your phone, tablet, or computer.
5. Integration Capabilities: A top-notch calendar app should integrate smoothly with other applications, such as email clients, contact lists, social networks, and productivity tools, to pull in events and enable direct scheduling within the app.
6. Sharing and Collaboration: Good calendar apps allow for easy sharing of calendars or specific events with others, facilitating collaboration and coordination for both personal and professional engagements.
7. Time Zone Support: For those who travel or work with people in different time zones, automatic time zone support is essential for keeping track of appointments accurately.
8. Offline Access: The ability to access and manage your calendar without an internet connection, with changes syncing once you’re back online, is a valuable feature for those who are often on the move.

There are hundreds of calendar applications out there, but only a few meet the criteria above. Hence, we’ve hand-picked the list of the top 7 calendar applications for you. Let’s dive right into it!

1. Akiflow

Supercharging Your Productivity with NLP

Akiflow is a powerful all-in-one calendar and task management app designed to streamline your scheduling and increase productivity. It offers a robust set of features that cater to various aspects of time management. Some of its key features include:

1. Natural Language Input: Create events and reminders by typing in phrases like “Lunch with Sarah at 1 PM on Thursday”.
2. Task Planning and Scheduling: Drag and drop tasks to your calendar and plan them according to your schedule​.
3. Snooze Options: Defer tasks that aren’t immediately actionable or snooze them for someday​​.
4. Share Availability: Akiflow lets you create a bookable link sharing your availability with others. The link can be used to schedule a meeting as well. 
5. Unlimited Integrations: Connect with various apps like Gmail, Slack, Asana, Notion, and more​.
6. Time Blocking and Event Management: Increase efficiency by managing your time and events effectively​.
7. Multi-Time Zone Support: For those working across different time zones, it adjusts your time blocks based on location​.

Pricing: Akiflow offers a monthly subscription for $24.99 or a discounted annual rate of $14.99 per month, billed yearly at $179.88. They also offer a ‘Believer’ package, billed every five years at $500, which works out to $8.33 per month, saving users about 67% and including additional benefits like dedicated customer success and productivity coaching. A free trial is available for those looking to test the waters before committing.

Ending on a high note, Akiflow provides users with the ability to seamlessly work across multiple time zones, adjust time blocks based on location, and categorize tasks for better management. This makes it a quintessential tool for professionals looking to master their schedules and enhance efficiency.

2. Google Calendar

Integrated and intuitive time management

Google Calendar is a highly versatile tool that integrates seamlessly into the daily workflow of individuals, teams, and organizations. With features like Schedule View for side-by-side calendar comparisons, meeting room bookings, simplified appointment slots for easy scheduling, and an out-of-office feature to automatically decline meetings during specified times, it addresses a broad spectrum of scheduling requirements. Let’s take a look at some more of its features.

1. Schedule View: This allows you to see your and your colleagues’ calendars side-by-side, ideal for coordinating within teams​​.
2. Schedule Meeting Rooms: Enables booking of company meeting rooms directly through the calendar, preventing double bookings.​
3. Appointment Slots: Offers a tool to create bookable time slots that others can reserve, streamlining the meeting setup process​
4. Out-of-Office Feature: Automatically declines meeting requests during specified out-of-office periods​
5. World Clock: Keeps track of different time zones, helping to schedule meetings across the globe without confusion.

Pricing: Google Calendar is a free tool from the Google Workspace. 

Google Calendar is definitely one of the best out there. It has many features, such as advanced search capabilities, a year view, and a world clock, making it an indispensable tool for time management and productivity. These functionalities are backed by Google’s robust ecosystem, providing a seamless experience for managing time across personal and professional domains.

3. Apple Calendar

Sleek and simple scheduling for iOS users

Apple Calendar is also quite famous among other calendars due to its simplicity and the fact that Apple created it. It is very easy to navigate through Apple Calendar. It offers several features that enhance productivity and scheduling for individuals and teams:

1. Unified Calendar Views: View all your calendar accounts in one application with different views such as List, Day, Week, Month, and Year (iPad only)​
2. Event Creation and Modification: Easily create new events by touching and holding a blank space on your day or dragging appointments to reschedule​
3. Travel Time and Location: Add event locations to receive notifications for when to leave, calculated based on travel time to your destination​
4. Invitations and RSVPs: Send and receive meeting invitations with iCloud, Exchange, and CalDAV servers, simplifying the process of coordinating with others​
5. Special Calendars: Manage special calendars for contacts’ birthdays and subscribe to calendars for holidays and favorite sports team

Pricing: Apple Calendar is a free application that comes pre-installed on all Apple devices, including iPhone, iPad, and Mac. There is no additional cost to use Apple Calendar, and it integrates with other Apple services like iCloud, which is also available for free with limited storage.

Apple Calendar is designed with simplicity and integration in mind, making it an excellent choice for those within the Apple ecosystem seeking a seamless scheduling experience. Its ability to sync across devices, coupled with a user-friendly interface, ensures that staying on top of your appointments is effortless.

4. Fantastical

Powerful calendar and tasks with NLP

Fantastical is a widely acclaimed calendar app known for its intuitive design and powerful features that cater to both casual users and productivity enthusiasts. Its hallmark is the natural language parsing ability, which allows users to type in events just as they would speak them, and the app translates this into a calendar entry effortlessly.

1. Enhanced Natural Language Input: Effortlessly schedule appointments and set reminders by simply typing phrases like “Dinner with Samantha at 1 PM on Wednesday”
2. DayTicker: A unique scrolling interface that provides a clear view of your daily events.
3. Calendar Sets: Customizable and easily switchable sets of calendars for various parts of your life or work.
4. Weather Integration: View weather forecasts and conditions integrated within your calendar.
5. Meeting Proposals: Suggest multiple times for a meeting and let invitees vote on their preference.

Pricing: Fantastical is available for purchase at just $4.75 for individuals, and $7.50 for families.

Whether you’re scheduling a coffee date or orchestrating a series of business meetings across time zones, Fantastical’s adaptive functionality aims to make calendar management not just manageable, but delightful. With continuous updates that embrace user feedback, it’s an app that evolves with the needs of its users, solidifying its position as a top contender in the realm of calendar apps.

5. TimeTree

Shared calendar for groups and collaborative planning

TimeTree is a collaborative calendar app designed to keep family, friends, and teams connected through shared scheduling. It excels in coordinating among multiple people, making it ideal for managing shared responsibilities and events. Here are some of its features.

1. Shared Calendars: Create multiple calendars for different groups or purposes and share them with relevant members.
2. Color-Coded Events: Assign colors to different types of events for easy recognition and organization.
3. Chat & Communication: Built-in messaging allows for discussion and communication about specific events within the calendar.
4. Sync with Other Calendars: Ability to import and sync with other calendar services to keep all schedules in one place.
5. Mobile & Desktop Compatibility: Accessible across various devices, ensuring you stay connected with your plans on the go or at your desk.

Pricing: TimeTree premium can be purchased for just $4.49 per month.

Whether it’s for family gatherings, sports team practices, or project deadlines, TimeTree keeps everyone in sync with a user-friendly interface and adaptable features, embodying the idea that calendars are not just about dates but about bringing people together.

6. Business Calendar

Versatile and customisable for business users

Business Calendar is a robust and flexible calendar app that’s tailored for work environments, emphasizing efficiency and customization. It’s particularly favored by professionals for its functionality that supports detailed scheduling and task management. Let’s take a look at some of its features.

1. Custom Views: Offers a variety of views including day, week, month, year, and agenda to cater to different planning needs.
2. Task Integration: Manage your tasks alongside calendar events, with seamless integration.
3. Event Templates: Save time by creating templates for events that occur frequently.
4. Advanced Event Reminders: Set up multiple reminders for events to ensure you never miss an important meeting.
5. Customizable Widgets: Choose from various widget types and sizes for at-a-glance access to your calendar from the home screen.

Pricing: Business Calendar is a free-to-use application that offers in-app purchases. 

Business Calendar is designed to be a comprehensive tool for managing a professional’s busy schedule. It provides a high degree of control over how your calendar looks and functions, with a strong focus on individual user experience. The app’s detailed customization and practical features make it a solid choice for anyone seeking a business-oriented calendar solution that keeps productivity in mind.

7. Any.do Calendar

Combines tasks and calendar in a clean interface

Any.do Calendar, part of the Any.do productivity suite, is known for its clean design and seamless integration of calendar and task management features. It’s a favorite for individuals who want to consolidate their personal and professional life in one place. Here are some of its known features.

1. Unified Task and Event Management: Combines your tasks and calendar events in one app for streamlined planning.
2. Smart Notifications: Receive timely reminders for scheduled tasks and events to keep you on track.
3. Voice Entry: Quickly add tasks and events using voice entry, which recognizes natural language.
4. Daily Planner: A focused view of your daily tasks and events that can be reviewed and planned out with a simple drag-and-drop interface.
5. Cross-Platform Synchronization: Syncs across all devices, including mobile and desktop, ensuring your calendar is always up to date.

Pricing: Any.do is priced at $2.99 per month for an yearly subscription.

Any.do Calendar is ideal for those who prefer a minimalist yet powerful approach to time management. It’s designed to help users organize their lives with greater efficiency and less clutter, providing the flexibility to balance the myriad of tasks and events that comprise modern life.

Conclusion

In the digital age, where time management is more crucial than ever, these top 7 calendar apps offer a range of solutions tailored to diverse needs. From the sophisticated task and event handling of Akiflow to the collaborative spaces of TimeTree, the meticulous business focus of Business Calendar, or the personalized touch of Jorte, each app brings unique features to the table. They are designed to streamline your schedule, enhance productivity, and even bring a bit of joy to the mundane task of managing time. We hope you were able to find the right calendar application for your needs.