Best Shared Calendar App in 2026: Ranked
Compare the best shared calendar apps for couples, families and shared households on sync, cost and how easily events actually get added in 2026.
Shared CalendarsA shared calendar app is one calendar that everyone in the household can see and add to from their own phone, so nobody double-books and nobody carries the whole schedule in their head. The best general-purpose options are TimeTree if you want a dedicated calendar app with a comment thread on every event, Google Calendar or Apple Calendar if you want something free and already on your phone, and OneHaus if you want the calendar to sit next to shared tasks, shopping and home admin rather than in an app of its own. The full comparison, with pricing and platform facts checked July 2026, is below.
If it's specifically two of you, our shared calendar app for couples guide covers couples-only options like Cupla too. If you're coordinating a family with kids, see the best shared family calendar apps for that angle specifically. This guide is the general comparison: couples, families, roommates and shared households all need broadly the same thing from a shared calendar, and the apps below cover all four.
What actually matters in a shared calendar app
Plenty of apps can hold a calendar. Fewer hold up to a real household. Five things separate the ones people keep from the ones that quietly get abandoned.
- A genuinely shared view. Both partners, the whole family, or every housemate sees the same events, not a copy that drifts out of sync. Add something from your laptop and it should show up on everyone's phone within seconds.
- How easily events actually get in. A calendar that is painful to fill stays half-empty. Look for quick add, natural-language input, or photo/email capture, not just a form with a dozen fields.
- Syncs with what you already use. Google, Apple and Outlook, so a work meeting and a school event sit side by side without anyone copying it across by hand.
- A line between private and shared. Sharing the calendar should not mean sharing every therapy appointment and job interview. Look for the ability to keep a personal calendar separate and share only the household one, rather than opening up everything you already have.
- Fair pricing. A shared calendar should not cost more the more people use it. Watch for apps that charge per person, or that cap the free tier's calendar window.
The best shared calendar apps, compared
OneHaus
OneHaus is a household app first, and the shared calendar is one piece of it. It syncs two-way with Google, Apple and Outlook calendars, so events created elsewhere appear automatically. The AI assistant lets you add an event in a sentence, "dentist Tuesday at four", or from a photo of a school newsletter, instead of tapping through a form.
Strengths: the calendar sits next to shared tasks with rotation, aisle-sorted shopping lists and home inventory, so household admin lives in one app instead of four. Natural-language and photo event capture. No per-person charge.
Limits: it is not a dedicated calendar app, so power-user calendar features (multiple colour-coded calendar layers, deep customisation) are not its focus. Its strength is breadth, not calendar minutiae.
Platforms: iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch and Android, plus connected AI assistants.
Pricing: free to download with a 30-day trial, then one household subscription that covers everyone, with no per-person fee.
Best for: households who want the calendar alongside the rest of home life rather than in a separate app.
TimeTree
TimeTree is a dedicated shared calendar app used by over 75 million people worldwide. You can run unlimited shared calendars for different groups (family, work, a friend group), attach comments and photos to individual events, and pull in Google and Apple calendars on a view-only basis.
Strengths: the deepest calendar-specific feature set here, a genuinely useful comment thread per event, and a free tier that already covers unlimited shared calendars and cross-device sync.
Limits: it is a calendar first and only. Tasks and shopping live in a basic Memo feature, and there is no rotation, inventory or AI capture. The free tier is ad-supported.
Platforms: iPhone, iPad, Android and web.
Pricing: free with ads; TimeTree Premium is $4.49 a month or $44.99 a year and removes ads, adds file attachments and a vertical day view.
Best for: households who want a dedicated, feature-rich shared calendar and do not need it to hold anything else.
Google Calendar
If your household already lives in Google, a shared or joint Google Calendar costs nothing extra and works on iPhone, Android and the web. You can share an existing calendar with view or edit access, or build a new joint calendar everyone adds to directly.
Strengths: free, reliable, and most people already have a Google account. No new app to install.
Limits: nothing household-specific. No shared tasks, shopping lists, rotation or home inventory, and setting up sharing permissions correctly takes a few extra steps most people never revisit.
Platforms: iPhone, iPad, Android and web.
Pricing: free (Google's own sharing guide walks through the setup).
Best for: households who want the simplest possible free option and already live in Google.
Apple Calendar (Family Sharing)
If everyone in the household is on Apple devices, Family Sharing creates a shared Family calendar automatically the moment everyone joins the group. There are no invites to send or accept individually.
Strengths: built in, free, and genuinely no-setup once the Family Sharing group exists. Works across iPhone, iPad and Mac.
Limits: Apple devices only, so a single Android phone in the household is excluded from the shared calendar entirely. No tasks, shopping or inventory features.
Platforms: iPhone, iPad and Mac.
Pricing: free.
Best for: all-Apple households who want the simplest possible setup and do not need cross-platform support.
Cozi
Cozi is a long-established family organiser built around a colour-coded shared calendar, with shopping and to-do lists bundled in. It has been a default recommendation for families for years.
Strengths: free to start, covers calendar and basic lists in one place, and the colour-coding is genuinely easy to read at a glance.
Limits: the free tier now caps the calendar to a rolling 30-day window, and unlocking full calendar access, month view and search requires Cozi Gold. No chore rotation, home inventory or AI capture.
Platforms: iOS, Android and web.
Pricing: free with ads and the 30-day limit; Cozi Gold is $39 a year.
Best for: families who want a free calendar-plus-lists app and can live with the free tier's limits.
Microsoft Outlook
If one or both of you already live in Outlook all day, a shared Outlook calendar keeps the household schedule in an account you are checking anyway. Make a new calendar for it rather than sharing your work one: a work calendar carries client names, interview slots and meeting notes that nobody at home needs to see. You can invite someone and manage their permissions from the Outlook app on iPhone or Android, but publishing a read-only link is only available in Outlook on the web, under Settings > Calendar > Shared calendars. That link is a standard ICS feed, so most calendar apps can subscribe to it, Apple Calendar and Google Calendar included. Publishing is not just read-only, it is public: anyone holding the link can see the calendar without signing in. Use a direct invite for anything private, and save publishing for a schedule you would not mind a stranger reading.
Strengths: free with a Microsoft account, granular permission levels from availability-only up to full editing, and it publishes an ICS link that Apple Calendar or Google Calendar can subscribe to, so the other person does not need Outlook.
Limits: the setup is the fiddliest here and lives in a settings screen most people never open, which is why we wrote a step-by-step guide to it. Nothing household-specific: no tasks, shopping or rotation. A published link is one-way, so only a direct invite gives two-way editing. If the account belongs to an employer, sharing outside the organisation may be greyed out entirely: Microsoft 365 admins can switch external calendar sharing off, which is a good reason to run the household calendar from a personal Microsoft account instead.
Platforms: iPhone, iPad, Android, Windows, Mac and web.
Pricing: free with a Microsoft account. A Microsoft 365 subscription adds storage and desktop apps but is not needed for calendar sharing.
Best for: households already living in Microsoft accounts who are happy to run a separate household calendar alongside the work one.
How the best shared calendar apps compare
| App | Cross-device sync | Event capture | Extra features | Platforms | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| OneHaus | Two-way with Google, Apple, Outlook | Natural language, photo | Tasks, shopping, home inventory | iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Android | Free trial, then one household subscription |
| TimeTree | Two-way (view-only for Google/Apple) | Manual, quick add | Comments, memos, unlimited calendars | iPhone, iPad, Android, web | Free with ads; Premium $4.49/mo or $44.99/yr |
| Google Calendar | Native | Manual | None calendar-specific | iPhone, iPad, Android, web | Free |
| Apple Calendar | Native (Apple only) | Manual | None calendar-specific | iPhone, iPad, Mac | Free |
| Cozi | Native | Manual | Shopping and to-do lists | iOS, Android, web | Free with ads (30-day cap); Gold $39/yr |
| Microsoft Outlook | Native in Outlook; published ICS is a one-way subscription | Manual | None calendar-specific | iPhone, iPad, Android, Windows, Mac, web | Free with a Microsoft account |
How to choose
| Your situation | Best pick | Why |
|---|---|---|
| You want the calendar next to the rest of household admin | OneHaus | The only option here that also handles tasks, shopping and home inventory in the same app, on both iPhone and Android. |
| You want the most capable dedicated calendar app | TimeTree | Comment threads on every event and unlimited shared calendars, if a calendar is genuinely all you need. |
| You are already in Google and want it free | Google Calendar | Costs nothing and needs no new app, though chores, lists and home records still live somewhere else. |
| Everyone in the house is on Apple | Apple Calendar | Family Sharing creates the shared calendar for you, as long as nobody is on Android. |
| You are already in Microsoft accounts | Microsoft Outlook | Free with a Microsoft account, as long as you make a new household calendar rather than sharing your work one. |
| You are a family who also wants a shopping list | Cozi | Calendar and lists in one, if the rolling 30-day cap on the free calendar works for you. |
Setting one up without losing what you already have
The most common reason a shared calendar fails is not the app, it is that switching feels like starting from zero. It does not have to. Whichever option you pick, the same three steps apply:
- Make a new calendar for the shared stuff rather than sharing your personal one. Call it Household, Us, or the family surname. Sharing your existing personal calendar means every work meeting and private appointment lands in someone else's view, and it is the single fastest way to make a partner want out.
- Connect, do not migrate. You almost never need to move events by hand, but check what your pick actually supports before you commit. OneHaus syncs two-way with Google, Apple and Outlook. TimeTree imports Google and Apple calendars on a view-only basis, so those events show up but stay read-only. Google, Apple and Outlook each subscribe to an ICS feed from the others. Connect the old calendar so it shows alongside the new shared one, and add new shared events to the shared calendar going forward.
- Agree what belongs on it. A shared calendar works when everyone knows what it is for. The usual rule that survives: anything that affects somebody else's day goes on the shared calendar, everything else stays personal.
One habit decides whether it survives past the first month: put the task next to the event when something actually has to be done rather than just attended. The school trip goes on the calendar, but the packed lunch and the signed form belong on a list, and a two-minute look at the week together on a Sunday catches whatever both of you missed. This is the part a standalone calendar cannot help with, and the reason a household app keeps the calendar honest.
If the calendar you want to share sits on an iPhone, how to share a calendar on iPhone covers the Apple route step by step, and the Google and Outlook guides linked above cover those.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best shared calendar app?
For most households, OneHaus or TimeTree. OneHaus wins if you want the calendar alongside shared tasks, shopping and home inventory in one app. TimeTree wins if a dedicated, feature-rich calendar is all you need. For a completely free option, Google Calendar or Apple Family Sharing cover the basics well if your household already lives in one ecosystem.
Is there a free shared calendar app?
Yes. Google Calendar and Apple Calendar (via Family Sharing) are both free with no limits on the calendar itself. TimeTree and Cozi have free tiers too, though Cozi's free calendar is capped to a rolling 30-day window.
Can I share a calendar between iPhone and Android?
Yes, as long as the app is cross-platform. OneHaus, TimeTree, Google Calendar and Cozi all run on both iPhone and Android. Apple Calendar via Family Sharing is the exception: it only works between Apple devices, so it will not work if anyone in your household is on Android.
Does a shared calendar app work for more than couples or families?
Yes. Everything in this comparison works just as well for roommates, flatshares and larger shared households as it does for couples or families. The apps do not care how you are related, only that everyone in the group has access.
Try OneHaus for 30 days
If you want the shared calendar to sit next to shared tasks, shopping and home inventory instead of in a separate app, download OneHaus on iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch or Android. Free to start with a 30-day trial, then one subscription covers everyone in the household.