Event calendars can be used to schedule and organize small or large events such as conferences, parties, family get-togethers, sports events, etc. You may have a website devoted to events and booking for events, or you can add a calendar to an existing website and schedule events and enable bookings from there. If you’re using WordPress, you’ll be glad that there are many WordPress themes for events and many WordPress Calendar plugins that can help you with this function.
These WordPress calendar plugins can be minimal, adding a simple calendar to your website. They can display events, highlight a particular event and show the venue for the event. And you can generally insert a calendar in any page, post, or widget area. Or, the plugins can be feature-rich, allowing you to do many things. They can facilitate visitors to make reservations to hotels or other events or submit events. They can also import and export calendar events and feeds using iCal feed.
Calendar plugins can help you take bookings for your product or service, plan and manage any events, manage an editorial team, schedule your posts and social media, etc.
Best Event Calendar WordPress Plugins
There are many quality-free calendar plugins that you can rely on to carry out basic event management tasks. Some offer features you’re more likely to find in a premium plugin.
The Events Calendar
The Events Calendar is a feature-rich, easy-to-use plugin that allows you to easily add events and manage organizers and venues. It allows you to customize a few display options such as Google Map zoom level and currency symbols. Upcoming events can be placed in a calendar grid format complete with tooltips and descriptions or a stylish list view or day view. The venue locations can display on Google Maps.
It has a nice user interface from which you can adjust many settings. You can set event information such as time and date, location details, organizer details, event website, and cost details. You can also slot events into categories and tags, all-day display events, and import data from CSV files. It includes an Ajax-enabled calendar that can be searched and filtered for events. There’s support for caching and debug mode for developers.
The plugin has undergone an audit by many WordPress experts for best practices and plugin compatibility. It is highly popular, and many large Fortune 100 companies, major universities and government institutions use it to manage their events.
The premium version of the plugin adds options for recurring events, custom event legends, default content and location search. Additional calendar viewing options such as week, map, photo, venue and organizer are available. You can also access featured venue, week, and event countdown widgets. Premium add-ons are available and help integrate with Evenbrite, Easy Digital Downloads and WooCommerce to sell tickets. Frontend user submission of events is also possible.
All-in-One Event Calendar
All-in-One Event Calendar has three themes for calendar display, and you can customize each by changing colors. The inline calendar theme editor helps you change the calendar’s appearance. Theme options are available that help with further customization. It’s a great option to run a community events calendar.
There’s not much that you cannot control from the plugin’s Settings page. You can add the event name, location, description, category, and tags. You can also include other details such as the date and time of the event, the price and the link for visitors to purchase tickets. Event locations can be pinned to a Google map. The calendar offers multiple viewing options: day, week, month, schedule, and posterboard view.
You can embed a calendar into a WordPress page without modifying your theme. The plugin includes recurring events, event filtering by categories and tags, and events from Facebook. Each event is optimized for SEO and links back to the original calendar. Upcoming events can display in a widget on your website.
The paid plans offer more functionality such as filtering by venue and organizer, Twitter autosharing, paid and unpaid frontend submission of events, and keyword search. Besides categorizing, tagging, and displaying the events, it also supports CSV / ICS import from other websites. So, you can create events on one website and then export them completely or selectively based on categories and tags. You can also import feeds and post featured events.
Events Manager
Events Manager is a popular plugin to manage your events from a calendar based format. It allows you to configure settings to match your needs, and supports recurring events, all day events and multi day events. It manages bookings efficiently, approving and rejecting, exporting bookings in CSV format and more. Advanced permission levels are available to restrict user management of events and locations.
The plugin supports Google Maps, multisite and BuddyPress. Members and guests can submit events.You can assign locations to events, categorize them and create custom attributes like dress code. A Add to Google Calendar button helps to add events to calendar easily.
Events Manager supports RSS feed and iCal support for single and multiple events. So you can import calendars from other websites. Templates files can be adjusted to control how your calendars appear. Template tags and shortcodes are available for use in your posts and pages. The plugin also includes widgets for events, calendars, and locations.
The Pro version offers additional features like PayPal, Authorize.net and offline payments, custom booking forms, coupon codes and faster support via private forums.
Booknetic
If you need a one-stop solution for your online calendar and bookings, Booknetic sorts you out with everything you need. It is entirely customizable to seamlessly fit your business needs, keeping online bookings 100% automated.
While this WordPress plugin has many features, working with it is quick and easy. (Read: you don’t need to have coding & design experience.)
Save time, set online payments, enjoy in-depth reporting, and sync Booknetic with 3rd-party software, like Zoom, Google Calendar, and more. Plus, creating the perfect form for your clients requires the method of dragging and dropping that you’ll master on the fly.
Enjoy.
Sugar Events Calendar Lite
Sugar Events Calendar focuses on simplicity and retains essential features for an event management plugin, while doing away with the not-so-important features. You can create events and display them to visitors in a simple Ajax-enabled calendar via a shortcode. It relies on custom post types to store event information, making it easy to use the plugin. It allows you to set event dates and times and archives the events by date of occurrence.
The base plugin has limited functions and no styling options. The pro version of the plugin includes support for recurring events, event categories, calendar styling and calendar widgets.
My Calendar
You can use My Calendar to create events and display them in posts, pages, and widgets. The plugin is highly configurable, and using the event custom post type, you can add descriptions, host, start and end time / date, and more. You can also enter the event’s exact location and display it on a map. My Calendar supports multiple calendars, categories and locations.
The calendars display monthly, daily or weekly view in a grid or list format. You can fine-tune every aspect of how the calendar displays at the frontend. Advanced users can use a style editor’s help to upload their CSS. Widgets help show today’s events, upcoming events, a packed calendar and event search. The plugin allows you to schedule and edit recurring events. A venue manager is available for managing popular venues.
It’s possible to restrict access of some areas to some users, and use integration with WP to Twitter to send event updates to Twitter followers. If you wish to sell tickets, you’ll need to purchase a paid add-on separately.
The Pro version of the plugin is responsive. It allows both paid and unpaid submission of events, and users can edit the events they submit. Every new event is posted to the blog.
Modern Events Calendar Lite
With Modern Events Calendar Lite, you can do a lot about satisfying your users and keeping your business organized. It is a WordPress calendar plugin you will swiftly set up in a breeze and have it live on your website. You can now display the calendar and expand your web space with a new fantastic feature with the beautiful templates. Adding a calendar to your website can show your availability and even implement a full-blown booking system.
One convenient feature of Modern Events Calendar Lite is an option to import content from an array of other plugins, like The Event Calendar, EventOn and Calendarize It to name a few. Other goodies include but are not limited to single- and multi-day events, slider, carousel, filtering, local time and notifications. These are just a small percentage of all the features that Modern Events Calendar Lite has available.
Event Calendar WD
Creating events and organizing them in a calendar is child’s play when you employ the Event Calendar WD WordPress plugin. While the tool is easy to use, it does not mean it is half-baked. Instead, Event Calendar WD rocks a ton of amenities that will do you exceptionally well. Also, it practices all the latest trends and regulations to ensure your events and calendars run smoothly on all devices and platforms.
From unlimited events and calendars creation and social sharing to Google Maps support and widget for sidebars and footer, Event Calendar WD has it all and more. On top of that, whenever you need even more features, you can always upgrade to the pro plan. If you ever find yourself stuck, you can always contact a friendly team of experts who will be happy to assist you.
Event Calendar
You can add an event calendar to your website using an appropriate WordPress calendar plugin. Of course, we have loads here for you, and Event Calendar will easily do the trick. Making configurations and fine-tuning the tool to match your style will be a piece of cake. And you do not need to touch a single string of code to edit and adjust Event Calendar for your project requirements.
Hence the name, you can now create a sophisticated and responsive calendar with events like a pro. The Event Calendar plugin includes ten free web designs that you can use or tweak according to your needs. You can create a fully functional event calendar with the free version, but there is always an option to go premium if you need even more features.
Booking Calendar
The Booking Calendar plugin can be used whenever you want to add an online booking option on your website. It adds a calendar at the frontend, where users can check availability in a calendar and fill in a simple form to submit their bookings. They can make reservations for any event. You’ll receive a notification when a booking is requested, and you can accept or decline the booking. It’s possible to search and sort the bookings and also prevent double booking.
The free plugin allows you to schedule bookings, but you cannot add any input fields to the booking form. You can configure and insert a booking shortcode into any post or page from a booking button in the edit toolbar. In the calendar overview mode, you can see all the bookings in a day, week or month in the Admin Booking Panel. You can also see this information in a list view.
The plugin cuts down on spam with CAPTCHA support. It also offers widget support and is suitable for many industries that need online bookings. You can also import your Google calendar events into your booking admin panel and quickly add a booking to Google Calendar manually.
Booking Calendar Pro allows you to edit bookings, add notes, and export bookings. Some plans also integrate a payment gateway.
Amelia
Small businesses, agencies and individuals, you are all welcome to use the powerful and practical Amelia. This WordPress calendar plugin helps you save time and energy for making appointments and bookings. Offer your potential clients an easier way of booking your services or setting up an appointment with you. Regardless of the industry, you are in, Amelia easily caters to it, making sure everyone gets the most out of the tool.
You can fully set things up for your business in just a few minutes and have Amelia actively work on your website already. Flexible appointments, nifty calendar view, working schedule, email notification and other whatnot are some features you get with Amelia. Keep your business organized and grow it to new heights using Amelia.
Booking Calendar
Booking Calendar is nothing else than a superb free WordPress plugin that allows you to add reservations and bookings to your website. You can now set up any scheduling calendar tailored to your business precisely in little to no time. Keep in mind Booking Calendar comes both in free and pro versions. However, if you start with the former, you might even use it forever, as the features are many and that’s all you were looking for. On the other hand, unlock yourself a horde more goodies and go premium at any time.
The free version’s features include unlimited form creations, widget support, customizable timing, single reservation, multiple choices per field and email notifications. Thank’s to the user-friendliness, Booking Calendar is perfect for beginners and experts.
Booking Package
Adding a full-blown booking system to your page is not complicated once you pick the right plugin. Booking Package is an excellent alternative that does the job without breaking a single drop of sweat. Yes, using, managing and maintaining an appointment booking system is a breeze with Booking Package. You can employ the tool for all sorts of stuff, like services, events, rentals, you name it, Booking Package has a solution.
There are heaps of features that come with the free plan. Complete freedom to create the exact booking calendar you want, shortcode, email notifications, customizable design, booking confirmation from the admin and Google Analytics goals are just some of the specialties of Booking Package. Enjoy the process and start with a fully organized booking system on the internet.
WP Simple Booking Calendar
WP Simple Booking Calendar is a good choice of plugin for arranging bookings for hotels, car rentals, appointments, and more. Using a widget or shortcode, you can insert the calendar into your website. The feature list for the free plugin is rather limited, and to fully experience the benefits, you’ll need to upgrade to the premium version.
WP Simple Booking Calendar Pro adds features such as unlimited booking calendars and a legend to display right next to your calendar. It generates a shortcode to display booking calendar on any page or post. You can display multiple months in multi page format, change the first day of the week or start of the month or year, and display the week’s number. Specific users can be assigned to specific calendars and tooltips can be used to display information.
The plugin allows you to highlight the current day and sync your calendars to calendars on other websites that use iCal feeds. It’s also possible to block specific dates, and export data in CSV or Excel format. Users can be enabled to book multiple appointment slots.
Premium plugins include advanced event solutions such as RSVP and receiving payments for tickets and bookings. They can even allow for promotional features such as discounts and coupons.
CoSchedule
CoSchedule is a complete calendar based scheduling tool that you can use to build a cohesive editorial team. The editorial calendar integrates smoothly with WordPress and allows you to collaborate, schedule, and automate your content marketing and social posting. It handles the scheduling of all content marketing and social media posting with ease. Manage all content activity in one drag and drop calendar and add color labels to keep track of timelines.
CoSchedule helps all team members stay abreast of any task and share information with other team members. Social media messages can all be added to one calendar, allowing the plugin to pick the right time to promote your content at the best possible time. The plugin integrates with many tools important to an author or editor such as Evernote, Google docs, Headline Analyser, Google Analytics and Pinterest.
Several payment plans are available, and all plans come with a 14 day free trial.
EventON
EventON is minimalist in design and allows you to create events and insert them into posts and pages using shortcodes. You can also display events in widgets. It supports recurring events, featured images and Google maps. It allows you to add custom fields and color code events as well.
The plugin is packed with more than 200 features and is highly customizable. Events can be color coded, and you can highlight any event as a featured event and hide or delete past events. The interactive shortcode generator also helps to customize your calendar. An event excerpt can be displayed in fade mode with full details in the background. It’s also possible to categorize events and have one calendar to display all events in any category alone. The calendar is Ajax-enabled and ensures smooth month-to-month transitions.
EventON includes Font Awesome icons and social share icons for the calendar. The calendar can display as a slidedown, in a lightbox, single event page, or normal mode. The Appearance editor can style the look of your calendar to match your website. Visitors can filter and sort events and search calendars. Users can download events in ICS format and add them to an iCal feed or a Google Calendar. EventON is a feature-packed plugin that packs in a load of functionality while allowing for much customization.
FAT Event
Managing and maintaining events and calendars becomes straightforward with FAT Event. FAT Event instantly adjusts to your needs and regulations regardless of your project. Indeed, it comes with a horde of features and several different customization options for you to combine events and calendars like a champ. In addition to that, FAT Event also works with Google Maps, bookings (WooCommerce) and supports Paypal and Stripe payments.
FAT Event supports timetable, listview and grid layout. It also comes with two different skins for an upcoming event and a neat widget with three colors to place on your website with a simple drag and drop technique. Coupons and custom pricing are also possible. Finally, you can translate FAT Event to any language you want and alter it to suit your local community best.
Calendar Anyting
Calendar Anyting is an engaging WordPress calendar plugin that can show any custom post type in a calendar. It is ideal for schools, restaurants, concerts, conferences, and similar websites. For your information, Calendar Anyting is compatible with any event plugin you can currently use. You get to pick between eleven fully adaptable themes out of the box. You will realize the final layout will also be responsive, mobile-ready, and cross-browser compatible. Calendar Anyting works on any device and platform without a hitch.
The full feature list of Calendar Anyting is vast so we will put an extra shine on only a few. Event filtering, tooltips, caching, Google Fonts, two event fetching modes and custom date range are a few of the traits of Calendar Anyting. Now go ahead and Calendar Anyting.
Calendarize.it
Calendarize.it is built with full compatibility for WPBakery Page Builder. So, if you’re using WPBakery Page Builder on your website, you can use that plugin’s drag and drop features to create your calendar templates. The plugin offers many color schemes and a CSS editor that you can use to customize your calendar. There’s support for Google Maps and recurring events. Display of event calendar, or upcoming events in a widget is possible. Many free add-ons are available for functions like displaying upcoming events in an accordion format, event countdown, social sharing, member profile, ratings, and reviews.
Events can be added at the click of a button and you can categorize the events too. Therefore, it’s possible to filter the calendar for events.
To Wrap Up
When it comes to calendar plugins, the choice among both free and premium plugins is huge. Other free plugins not on this list include Editorial Calendar. If you’re looking for more options for premium plugins, you can try WordPress Pro Event Calendar, WPEventsPlus. One practical way of choosing a plugin may be to try out the free plugins, become familiar with features and find out what additional features your website needs. You may then be in a position to make a better choice.
As I said, many quality plugins are not on this list and if your favorite plugin is missing, share it with us in the comments below.
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