As with cameras, the best calendar you have is the one that’s with you. And with a crazy schedule, it’s practical to find the best calendar app to keep on the one device you always have on you—your smartphone.
But which calendar apps are the best? Are free calendar apps just as good as paid alternatives? We’ve got you covered with a solid list of the 10 best free calendar apps for Android and iPhone.
The best calendar apps for Android and iOS
1) Cozi
Cozi is a fantastic free calendar option available both online and as an app. It’s ideal for busy families. Obviously, you don’t have to have procreated to use the app, but it really shines with its color-coded family calendar that uses natural language to enter events, sends reminders to one, some, or all family members, and sends out a useful daily or weekly “family agenda” email.
Other useful features include shareable shopping lists, to-do lists, and a recipe box that lets you schedule meals. There’s even a “Family Journal” section that lets you save photos and moments and share them from the app.
2) Pod
Free on iOS
Pod is described by the developer as “a calendar built for people.” With support for all the major calendars, such as Google, Exchange, and iCloud, Pod gives you an intuitive, clean, and—dare we even say—intelligent scheduling solution. You simply connect your calendar, verify your email and get started. You can select a light, dark or black theme, view your daily agenda, and choose to have a monthly preview at the top of your calendar view.
The Pod app also connects to your iPhone’s Reminders to display in the calendar. You can also choose to enable iPhone maps, Google Maps, or Waze for location functionality. The really clever trick up Pod’s sleeve, though, is how it details your event history with your contacts. Add someone to an event and you can tap on them to see forthcoming and past events, notes, and emails.
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3) Informant 5
Informant works with all native calendars including iCloud, Exchange, Outlook, Microsoft 365, Google Calendar, Yahoo, AOL, and more. It offers seven- or 30-day viewing options, colors customization, tags, and emojis. Informant’s “Focus View” gives you an at-a-glance look at your day, including weather. The “TravelAssist” function helps you to schedule events taking place in other time zones.
If you cough up money for a subscription, you’ll also get to create tasks, projects (via Siri, if you wish), checklists, notes, and reminders. Advanced features include the ability to view emails and turn them into tasks and the option to create templates for recurring events and tasks.
4) Google Calendar
When you consider the best calendar apps available, there’s no ignoring Google Calendar. If you use Gmail, then Google Calendar is a no-brainer for its clever integration. For one, your Gmail events (like flights and tickets for events) are added to your calendar automatically. Unlike some other calendar apps, creating to-do reminders is free and easy to do. Plus, Google’s smart suggestions make entering text into the calendar quick and easy. Apple Health users can benefit from Google Calendar’s integration. Your calendar will track your workouts, runs, or bike rides and mark your goals as completed automatically.
5) Microsoft Outlook
The Microsoft Outlook app contains an entire suite of tools, including email. Outlook works with Microsoft Exchange, Office 365, Outlook.com (including Hotmail and MSN), Gmail, Yahoo Mail, and iCloud. The Outlook calendar is a very clean, minimal tool that is both simple and comprehensive. Want to create an event? You can tag your Outlook contacts, mark an event as a Skype call, add a description, and set an alert to remind participants.
The options to view your calendar—agenda view, day view or three-day view—let you check your plans at-a-glance. Finally, you can quickly connect Outlook with your Evernote reminders, Facebook events and birthdays, Wunderlist tasks, and Meetup events.
6) TimeTree
TimeTree is another great option for families and groups. With the ability to sync with Google Calendar, Outlook, Apple Calendar, you can create multiple TimeTree calendars and share them with different people. So you could realistically create separate family, work, and social calendars with color-coded events that you can view on a weekly or monthly basis.
TimeTree’s most interesting function is its ability to group chat about an upcoming event. Once an event is created, anyone invited can upload comments, notes, and even images.
7) Tiny Calendar
If you want to get the most of out Tiny Calendar, you’ll have to pay. But this app offers decent free functionality as well. Tiny Calendar syncs with Google Calendar and your mobile device’s calendar to supports events on iCloud, Exchange, and more. The interface is clean and user-friendly with drag and drop, gesture controls, and the ability to add events with voice commands.
If you miss the layout of your old analog agenda, Tiny Calendar gives you no less than eight standard views—day, week, month, four-day, year, mini-month, weekly agenda, and daily agenda. Lastly, it’s worth noting the Tiny Calendar app works offline. You can still create events and edit your calendar when you don’t have a connection. The app will simply sync next time you’re in range.
8) Jorte
If minimalism means nothing to you and you just want a customizable tool with a ton of data, then Jorte is your dream calendar. Jorte syncs with Google Calendar, Evernote, and more. You can create your own personalized calendar and task manager and enjoy the ability to change the background, font color and size, and icons.
It’s easy to view your monthly, weekly, or daily calendar and easily create recurring events. Here’s where the data comes in: Jorte offers users an option to import event information (sports schedules, weather data, movie and music release dates) into your Jorte app.
9) My Study Life
Although clearly a niche offering, My Study Life is a very popular cross-platform planner for students and teachers. The app gives users a unified tool to see their classes, homework and projects, and exams (all stored safely in the cloud) on any device. The calendar supports daily and weekly rotation timetables with advanced academic year and term options.
You can also create tasks for homework, assignments, and revision and get reminders in the calendar. Looks-wise, My Study Life’s calendar offers color-coding and a clean interface. And for students who have to leave their smartphones turned off in school, the app works offline, syncing seamlessly when you can get back online.
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10) ZenDay
ZenDay is a little different than your average 2D calendar app. It offers a dynamic 3D timeline view of your tasks, calendar events, and reminders. The developer describes it as like a zoomable “GPS of your time.” You can imagine people have a love/hate relationship with this interface, but this award-winning time management solution has some serious fans.
ZenDay syncs with your existing calendar and reminder apps and can let you know what you’ve missed (or if something is long overdue). There’s also a “debrief” functionality that rates your performance to give you feedback on whether or not you are achieving your goals.