A better calendar app

May 15, 2023 2:08 PM

For years, I was content to use Apple’s calendar app because it came with my devices and was easy to use, and I never had much in the way of needing to track appointments. But all that’s changed and I would like something better.

Now my life is revolving around medical appointments and therapy and taking medications and just so much goddamn stuff to do. And I hate the fact that iCal or whatever it is puts these dots on days when something is scheduled but you have to tap the day to see what it is, and half the time it’s just some obscure holiday I don’t give a crap about.

I would like to be able to see what’s happening in the month view instead of having to open the app to see the day so I don’t have to keep finding out I don’t have something scheduled, it’s just some weird holiday. (Like for instance, I could see in the month view that I have infusions every third Friday.)

I’m not a big fan of Google, but if their calendar app is the best, then I’d love to know why—or maybe there’s a better app for iPhone (and that I could use on my iMac as well) that you love? I see in the App Store that some allow color coding in month views, but it’s hard to tell what the better apps are. I’m willing to spend a few bucks but I don’t want to have to pay for a subscription.

I still feel like I’m pretty simple when it comes to calendars and scheduling—I do not need to coordinate co-worker schedules or conference calls or anything worker bee related. I live alone and am a freelancer, so the whole productivity industry is a waste of time for me. I just mostly want to see my month ahead and keep better track of my treatment plan.

posted by kitten kaboodle to Computers & Internet (16 answers total)

The default calendar app does some nice things that really work me aaannd blargh also does some dumb things.

Another option that works for me, costs some money but that means it actually gets development, and is much more configurable is Fantastical.
posted by mce at 2:54 PM on May 15, 2023 [2 favorites]

Best answer: I'm a long-time, extremely happy user of BusyCal on both macOS and iOS. It can interface to Google's calendar system, MS Office365 systems, and others. It's very configurable and is bursting with features, yet IMHO it's very user friendly and easy to figure out. Plus, the UI on the iOS app is (to me) marvelous and gorgeous.

(FWIW, it's from the people who long ago made Now Up to Date for the Mac, which was the best calendar app back then, which I happen to have also used … 20 years ago? Something like that.)
posted by StrawberryPie at 3:20 PM on May 15, 2023 [2 favorites]

I think you're going to have a tough time finding a calendar that will show you text in its month view on a phone. The only way I can imagine that happening is if you used desktop mode of your browser for the page, them zoomed in. This is to say that if the appearance on your iMac has only dots, the Google calendar will at least give you text there.
posted by rhizome at 3:20 PM on May 15, 2023 [1 favorite]

Best answer: I use Tiny Calendar on my IPhone and Fantastical on my Mac and they both are great, and better than default for showing details on month/week views. Given your specific UX needs/wants you’ll probably need to look at a few before you find the ones that fit your needs!

ETA: Tiny Calendar definitely shows text on month view! Ofc it is limited but waaay better than Calender.app
posted by wemayfreeze at 3:22 PM on May 15, 2023

Month view on google calendar shows text for events even on my little iPhone SE. There’s enough text for me to tell what events are, are much as seven or eight letters worth (I just checked).
posted by Well I never at 3:25 PM on May 15, 2023 [5 favorites]

And it shows up to four events per day, with dots for more than that.
posted by Well I never at 3:25 PM on May 15, 2023 [1 favorite]

On the text-in-month-view issue: BusyCal shows the first part of a title of an event, and that can be enough to figure out what is happening on a given day. It works on a small iphone too, especially if you rotate the view 90 deg to landscape mode.

(I swear I'm not shilling for BusyCal.)
posted by StrawberryPie at 3:25 PM on May 15, 2023

Monthly view shows events within the day for CalenGoo.
posted by Dashy at 3:47 PM on May 15, 2023 [1 favorite]

You can turn off holidays in the calendar app.
posted by Bottlecap at 3:49 PM on May 15, 2023 [1 favorite]

The Google calendar event shows the (beginning of) the name of events on month view. If you use Gmail it super seamlessly integrates with calendar invitations from others.
posted by amaire at 4:13 PM on May 15, 2023

Fastmail's calendar shows the event name in month view. It's truncated if the event name exceeds the width of the column.
posted by Lil' Blue Goat at 4:14 PM on May 15, 2023

I also vote for Fantastical if you can afford it. It's superb.
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 5:52 PM on May 15, 2023

Best answer: Agree on Fantastical for macOS. And the Google Calendar app on Android would fit your requirements, so the iOS version might too.

Both will truncate the event name to fit the column in month view, but it's there. Same goes with number of events - there are dots after you hit 6 events on my phone for Google Calendar, but you do see a whole bunch of events. And both deal well with color coding - for example, you could have separate calendars with separate coloring for appointments vs. medication. For both, I use calendars and events from different sources (Outlook, Google, etc.) without any real problems.
posted by ASF Tod und Schwerkraft at 6:02 PM on May 15, 2023

Best answer: I'm a fan of Fantastical, but it sounds like it may be overkill for your needs.

Something slightly different you might want to consider is Wallcal. This embeds a calendar in your desktop so it's just always there under everything else—I find this really useful (it works better with a plain desktop, IMO). It's got a modicum of configurability--I have it in week view, but it also has month view. It draws on the same calendar database that Apple's calendar app uses (as does Fantastical) so you don't need to worry about mismatches.
posted by adamrice at 6:22 PM on May 15, 2023

I have a very strong preference for having a week view - it lets me see all the details of my appointments and i can easy page ahead for the next couple of weeks to see what is coming. In case that might work you, I use the WeekCal app (free) which sits on top of your regular iCal.
posted by metahawk at 10:23 PM on May 15, 2023

Best answer: I’ve been using Calendars 5 for years on my phone and MacBook and I’m pretty happy with it. It’s free, syncs well and has a good week view on the phone.
posted by gottabefunky at 12:29 PM on May 16, 2023