Whether it's your work or personal life, a calendar app is a vital tool for staying organized, productive and on schedule. But you shouldn't just pick the default calendar app that comes on your smartphone (although, it's likely a good choice) — you need to pick the calendar app that works best for you, which means the devices and software (including other productivity apps) that you use everyday.
Fantastical
Fantastical is a powerful and wonderfully-designed calendar app that's optimized for the Mac. (In fact, Apple awarded it "Mac App of the Year" in 2020.) It's bread-and-butter is its intuitive controls and its intelligent AI, which is smart enough to pull information from a wide-variety of Apple and third-party apps. Additionally, it works really well across all your other Apple devices, including iPhone, iPad and Apple Watch. The app is free, but you'll have to pay a $5/ monthly fee for some more premium features, such as customizable task templates and integrations with conference calling apps like Zoom or Google Hangouts.
Price: Free ($5/month for a Premium subscription)
Google Calendar
Google Calendar is the best app for the majority of Gmail users because it's so easy and seamless. It takes information from your emails, say if you have a meeting, or a hotel or flight reservation, and auto-populates them as events on your Google Calendar. It will send reminders for events, too. And the app is compatible with a most other productivity apps, such as Todoist, Evernote and Google Keep, so you stay organized without having to jump around all your apps. It works on iPhone and Android.
Price: Free
Apple Calendar
This is the default calendar app that's baked into every iPhone, iPad and Mac. So, naturally, if you're somebody who uses all of Apple's devices and services, this will likely be your safest bet. It's super easy to create and manage appointments — you can even ask Siri for help — and everything will seamlessly across all your Apple devices. The other cool thing is that it can sync with your other calendar apps, such as Google Calendar or Microsoft Exchange, which allows you to view other events you've created elsewhere (which is convenient if you use a different calendar app for work). It's available on all Apple devices, but you can access your Apple Calendar using any web browser, going to iCloud.com and logging in with your Apple ID.
Price: Free
Outlook Calendar
Outlook Calendar is the obvious calendar app for Windows 10 users that are deeply ingrained in Microsoft's Office 365 suite of apps. For example, it instantly syncs the emails from Outlook, notes from OneNote, attachments from OneDrive, and you can even sync your contacts from LinkedIn. It's also compatible with several other calendar apps, including Google Calendar, so you can see what other events you have scheduled on your other calendars. The app is available on both iOS and Android, as well as on any web browser by going to Outlook.com.
Price: Free
