A good calendar plugin is necessary for any company — the more events and appointments your business requires, the more likely it is that you need a visual way to lay them out to avoid confusion.
But separating your calendars from the rest of your website or software is an ineffective way to run your business, especially since planning meetings through back-and-forth emails can waste a ton of your time. This is especially true of individual appointments, and large events.
Choosing the right calendar for your needs will make your company more productive and efficient when communicating with clients and potential customers. And, ultimately, a calendar plugin can free up your time so you can spend more of it improving your customer experience, conducting experiments, or testing other high-value activities to grow your business
If your company uses a WordPress website, you’re in luck — there are plenty of calendar plugins you can use.
But before we dive in, let’s explore the characteristics you’ll want to find in any WordPress calendar plugin.
The Characteristics of the Best WordPress Calendar Plugins
The best calendar plugins do several things:
- Display your availability for client bookings or events.
- Allow clients or groups to self-book in those free times.
- Request and store customer data in a customer database for future use.
- Record the event in your calendar.
- Send confirmation notifications to the involved parties of the event’s creation.
- Send updates in the event changes.
It’s also critical your calendar plugin includes important information such as the event time and date, how many people are involved, what equipment will be needed, who needs to be present, staff required, and other relevant logistics.
Next, let’s take a look at some of the best WordPress calendar plugins to help schedule your workflow and smooth out your clients’ booking experience.
Best WordPress Calendar Plugins
- Stachethemes Event Calendar
- The Events Calendar
- EventON
- My Calendar
Stachethemes Event Calendar
Stachethemes Event Calendar is a mobile-optimized calendar with WooCommerce integrations that offers a single-page admin feature. It allows you to directly sell merchandise related to your events from the calendar event itself.
There’s a quick auto-update feature and direct customer booking based on your availability.
Event booking options are integrated with WooCommerce, iCal, and ICS, and calendars are available in six different types of views. Every calendar is customizable with colors, fonts, and design.
Some calendar features include:
- Easy to set up recurring payments
- Easy to share on social networks
- Works across multiple sites
The Events Calendar
The Events Calendar plugin is designed to help any user plan large events. Events are displayed in SEO-friendly microformats, which eliminates the need to click on the event.
You can export your events to other relevant platforms. The plugin allows calendar view and list view for events. It’s compatible with iCal, Google Maps, and Google Calendar. Search functions make finding the right event easy and intuitive — even from your mobile device.
This calendar is ideal for venues that regularly host events, including bookstores, philanthropies, concert halls, cafes, and other public gathering places. It’s also good for performers or artists on tour.
The EventON
The EventON WordPress plugin helps you design calendar events but letting you select the address, time, and date. It’s simple to promote your events — this is probably the best plugin to do that.
Photos and Google Maps can be added to your events as well, and you can select the colors for your calendar to the rest of your site. EventON has different views, so if you want to see from day-to-day or month-to-month, you can.
The whole calendar is searchable, so finding the event in question shouldn’t be difficult. If you want to pay more, you can buy the WooCommerce integration for ticket selling.
My Calendar
This calendar plugin has some truly unique features. For instance, My Calendar is a developer’s dream when is comes to creating custom calendars and templates.
Creating an event triggers an email notification to be sent to the participating parties, and the settings can be set to post your new event directly to Twitter as needed.
This is a good option for users who need to manage multiple sites and calendars. The main appeal is that the plugin enables many sites to host the same calendar, or one site to host many calendars, all through the same WordPress page. You can also display your calendars in a miniaturized version on your website.
