Android isfull of excellent calendar apps. We recommend many of them, but Google Calendar is the easiest. It integrates smoothly with the Google ecosystem. If you’re an active Google user, there’s little sense in switching to anything else.
A calendar can be an essential addition toyour favorite Android tablet, especially if you’re meticulous about your time. Google Calendar lets you create calendars of events, such as birthdays and daily tasks. you’re able to create a calendar through a personal, work, school, orGoogle Workspace account. There isn’t a way to create a calendar for appointments via the Android app. You must access Google Calendar on the web.
In this guide, we show you the best method to create your own appointment calendar in Google Calendar.
Create an appointment calendar with a personal Google account
You can use Google Calendar for appointments even if you don’t have a work or school account. It’s not as easy to set up and lacks some advanced features of Workspace accounts, but it’s an excellent way to organize your schedule.
How to make your appointment calendar public
By default, only you may see new calendars. To make your appointment calendar public so that it can be found in a search or embedded on a website, follow these steps:
How to share your appointment calendar
If your appointment calendar is private, you must share it with anyone you want to have access to it.
It’s best to permit viewing only, not changing the permission, unless you trust the person you are sharing with. When you allow changing events, every event on your appointment calendar can be altered or removed.
After the setup is complete, your basic booking calendar is visible in your Google Calendar view. Anyone with access can see your schedule and add or make changes if you give them that permission. The level of access should be more nuanced, which is why it’s better to use Google Workspace appointment slots or appointment schedules when possible.
If you need help with general calendar access, our in-depth tutorial walks you through the steps toshare or unshare a Google Calendar.
Set up a Google Workspace appointment schedule
Google Calendar appointment schedules allow more control and customization than a personal account or appointment slots. There are some tradeoffs, and we discuss the differences between these two booking features and which you should use later.
Create a new appointment schedule
More appointment scheduling options in Google Workspace
There are options to fine-tune appointments. The scheduling window is the period when people can book a meeting. The default is to allow meetings to be booked up to 60 days in advance and as late as four hours before the scheduled start time. If that range doesn’t suit your needs, change it.
Booked appointment settingslet you specify a buffer time between meetings, as well as setting the maximum number of bookings per day. The default setting is to include no buffer time and allow every meeting to be booked.
Create your booking page
After setting up a schedule, customize the details for your booking page. This is where you control what people see when booking an appointment. You can set a location, specify a phone or video conference method, add a description, and add fields to the booking form.
ClickChoose a locationto select the type and place of the appointment. Google Meet for a video conference, In-person, Phone call, or None are the options. This can be changed later. A description can be added to share more information with potential attendees, and the text can be styled with bold, italics, lists, and links.
The ability to change the booking form is a nice touch. Fields for email, first name, and last name are the defaults. You can collect more information, such as a phone number. If you are concerned about the booking form being abused, check the box besideRequire email verificationto have an email address for anyone who schedules an appointment.
TheBooking confirmations and reminderssection lets you specify when email notifications are sent to attendees. The default is for one day before the appointment. You can change this and add more reminders. When finished, click theDonebutton in the lower-right corner.
Sharing your Google Calendar booking page
After creating an appointment schedule and customizing your booking page, let others know about it. You can do this by sharing a link to your booking page. After saving your schedule, a window opens with an Open booking page button and a Copy button to the right.
Click theCopybutton to get a link you can share via email, Gmail, chat, and social media. You might want to post this link on your profile so that anyone visiting can book an appointment.
To see the booking page, click the blueOpen booking pagebutton.
Appointment slots are a convenient option accessible to every Google Workspace account. You can’t access appointment slots with a personal account.
With appointment slots, you mark when you will be available, add others who might be involved in the meeting, and send invitations to contacts who need to book an appointment. Follow the steps below to set up appointment slots in your Google Calendar.
If you used appointment slots before, this is the default setting in a Google work or school account. This option isn’t available to Google Workspace Individual accounts. If you haven’t, turn off appointment schedules to use appointment slots.
Turn off appointment schedules
Create appointment time blocks
The first step is to create appointment blocks in your Google Calendar.
Add team members or guests
If you want coworkers or project members to be aware of your appointments, this is easy to do and keeps everyone on the same page. Guests are different from the person who makes an appointment. We’ll cover that later.
Send invitations to people who need to book an appointment
After setting up appointment blocks, let others know your availability. Your Google Calendar doesn’t automatically become visible to people needing to set up an appointment, so you must share the booking page.
Should I use appointment slots or schedules?
Appointment schedules are available to most Google Workspace accounts. Business Starter accounts and personal Google accounts are excluded. Appointment slots aren’t available to Google Workspace Individual accounts or personal Google accounts. If you can’t use the advanced booking you prefer, choose one of the other methods described above.
If you have a Google Workplace account through your school or work, you can use any of these three appointment calendar types, although you must choose between appointment schedules and appointment slots. Appointment schedules are more powerful and versatile. If you have that option, it’s the best choice. Use appointment schedules for more control of your booking page and to customize reminder emails.
Appointment slots are nicer than sharing a personal calendar. Sharing a personal calendar is too permissive, allowing attendees to make changes freely, or too restrictive, requiring back-and-forth communication to find a good time to meet.
Google Calendar is a powerful tool for appointments
Whichever method you use, it’s better to use Google Calendar to create an appointment calendar than relying on phone calls and paper calendars to set up your schedule. If you need more control and use a Google personal account,consider getting a Workspace Individual account. With a little setup work, you’ll streamline your appointment process and fit in more meetings with less effort.
