Best 4 WordPress Calendar plugins

By Rebecca Markowitz • October 29, 2008 • 65 Comments

Here’s a review of 4 of the most comprehensive calendar plugins that WordPress has to offer. I tried out each one and tracked the features, pros, and cons. Which calendar are you using? Send a link so we can see some more examples. For a full list WordPress calendar plugins, click here.

Still in search of a perfect calendar…

I still have hopes and dreams that the perfect calendar is out there somewhere, but I can’t seem to find The One. I’m looking for a WordPress compatible calendar that can do the following:

recurring events – monthly, weekly, bi-weekly
month view
list view with option to see 15 results for upcoming events and then to click “Next” to see next results
import a csv file of ongoing events
Advanced search functionality to do the following. For example, search for Events in New York City on December 1. Or to search by venue, city, topic, and other categories.
RSS events feed
user level management – a way for different organizations to submit and manage their own events
Email notifications when someone has added or edited an event

Event Calendar 3 by Alex Tingle

Display upcoming events in a dynamic calendar, on a listings page, or as a list in the sidebar.

Features

iCal feed subscription
sidebar widget – monthly & list view
easy admin to add events from Write>Post
links to a post for more details

Cons

no recurring events
no RSS event feed
no large view calendar
no categories
no fields within events such as location, contact person
no user level management

Calendar by Kieran O’Shea

A simple calendar plugin for WordPress that allows you to manage your events and display them in list or month format.

Features

Monthly view of events
Mouse-over details for each event
Events can have a timestamp (optional)
Events can display their author (optional)
Events can span more than one day
Multiple events per day possible
Events can repeat on a weekly, monthly or yearly basis
Repeats can occur indefinitely or a limited number of times
Easy to use events manager in admin dashboard
Sidebar function/Widget to show todays events
Sidebar function/Widget to show upcoming events
Comprehensive options panel for admin
Modifiable CSS using the options panel
Optional drop down boxes to quickly change month and year
User groups other than admin can be permitted to manage events
Events can be placed into categories
Categories system can be switched on or off
Pop up javascript calendars help the choosing of dates
Events can be links pointing to a location of your choice

Cons

no events feed
no fields within events such as location, contact person
no search feature
no bi-weekly recurring events
no way to import a csv of recurring events

Gigs Calendar by Dan Coulter

This plugin is designed for bands touring but can be used for any events.

Features

list view
amazing options in the admin panel – arrange table view of events, link to Google maps, etc.
events feed
fields for city, venue, start time, contact details
once you select a venue, the contact details appear automatically! Big time saver.
each event links to the details
user level management

Cons

no month calendar view
no recurring events
no way to search/sort by month, venue, city, date

Gigpress by Derek Hogue

Another plugin designed for bands touring but can be used for any events.

Features

list view
user level management
events feed
fields for venue, venue website, address, country, etc.
connects to posts with a link that says “related post” [I think it should say “More details”]

Cons

no month calendar view
no recurring events
doesn’t connect to a post – all the info needs to be written in the table which isn’t good if you have a lot of text
no way to search/sort by month, venue, city, date

Easy PHP Calendar Plugin

EasyPHPCalendar is a script you can buy for $20. To integrate it into the WordPress admin, you can use the WordPress plugin. This is by far the most comprehensive calendar you can use in conjunction with WordPress. It has tons of features, template options, and display options. Just beware of the clunky setup which may take a few hours to do properly. Also, there are certain features which can’t be modified because they’re encrypted by the Calendar developers. Luckily, the support forum on the site is pretty active.

Features

mySQL database support
Flat-file database support – No mySQL server required!
Single events, recurring events and floating events plus multiple categories
Complete and easy event and setup administration
Mouse-over and pop-up event details
Customizable categories and multiple event administrators
Rich event descriptions including font sizes/colors and images
different templates for list view and month view
active support forum and RSS feed for latest entries in forum
See more details

Cons

complex setup
weak search and filtering
no easy way to import a CSV of recurring events
no events feed
some encrypted code which may leave you helpless if you want to modify certain functionality

[Update ]

WP-Events by Arnan de Gans

The plugin features a straightforward user interface in the WordPress dashboard to add/edit and delete events and set some options. Events allows you to list Events on a seperate page or in the sidebar, or both. Here you can list Old (archived) events future events and if you want, events happening today. When you create or edit an event you can set it to be archived. So that it remains listed. Optionally non-archived events are automatically deleted one day (24 hours) after they expire. Many more options are available and Events is completely customizable to your theme in an easy and flexible manner.

Features:

Widget for themes that support it
non-widget option: Code to put into templates
Separate page for events
Completely customizable layout
Multi language
Link events to pages/posts
Set a start and end time (duration) for events
Set locations for events
Show events in your sidebar
Archive events
Edit existing events
Auto remove old, non-archived events
Unlimited dateformats to show events dates
Options page
Set a date and time to the minute
Set a message to show before and another one to show after the event occurs
User level restriction
Management page
Set amount of events to show in the sidebar

Cons:

Since the events in this plugin are separate from posts, the integration with linking and feeds is not so great. Other than that, I really like all the options and customization available. Definitely worth trying out.

No events feed – I wanted to offer my readers a way to get the events feed but because the events are entries rather than posts, I couldn’t figure out an easy way to do it.
Page/post relationship links – You can add a post and then create a link from the event to the post, but this seems like double the work and not so intuitive.. I guess I could link events to the main events page for more info, but then there is no direct event link to send your friends or refer back to it.
Date format – the date shows up as March 04, 2009 at 04:00pm and I couldn’t figure out a way to get rid of those initial 0’s. who needs ’em?

Author: Rebecca Markowitz

Rebecca Markowitz has built over 100 WordPress sites for clients as Web Project Manager and WordPress specialist at illuminea. illuminea is a Jerusalem-based boutique web agency. WPGarage shows my dedicated relationship with WordPress over the years - full of love, laughs, tears, growth and strong drinks. L'chaim!

Nokao

Hi there…

The article is interesting, but I still have a problem to resolve and that 3 plugins doesn’t seem to do it:
I need to publish posts in the future because I need to speak about future events (so a calendar of events that are in the future).

Do some of that plugins resolve this problem?
What can I do?
Rebecca Markowitz

@Nokao: I think you can use the first plugin and then set your posts to publish in the future. Here’s how to do it:
When you write a new post, on top of the Save and Publish buttons, it says “Scheduled for: October 30, 2008 at 2:01 pm Edit” If you click edit, you can schedule the pst for the future.
Nokao

Yes but if I schedule the post in the future… it will be not displayed in the category… unless it’s passed the right time.

How do I resolve this problem?

Please notice that administrators DO see the scheduled posts, but if you log out you won’t.
Rebecca Markowitz

@Nokao: Maybe try reading the support forum on the plugin page and see if anyone else had similar issues.
Ellen Weber

Wow — what a great site!!! makes me realize the value of wisdom in Word Press smart people. Thanks!!!! I have a question related to images. I use to be able to browse images and click on the image to upload into word press blog.

Then … puff … something mysterious happened to stop that capability.

Now, I see the grey box CHOOSE FILES TO UPLOAD but they no longer upload when I hit the box. Instead I have to go get an image URL for every image.

It’s a pain.

Can I return capability to browse images and hit on image to interst it into blog. How can I repair that capability? Thanks in advance!!!!! Thanks also for a great word press site — which I am bookmarking:-)

So much to learn here:-)
Temi

WOW. I cant believe I’m looking for this today and the post was just written today. Talk about “just in time”!
Ryan

All of the calendar plugins for WordPress I’ve tried totally suck – or at least they suck for the purposes I’ve tried using them for.

I actually think WordPress itself could be jerry rigged into becoming a semi-decent calendar system itself. You’d just need to set it up to display posts in a certain way inside a big calendar layout. You wouldn’t even need to use a plugin if you went down that route as it would just be a matter of creating a seperate theme for your calendar category. It could be a lot of work though. Perhaps someone will attempt this at some point – I don’t think it’ll be me though. It would even allow for commenting on calendar events. Plus you could grab the contents of the calendar posts and dump them into your main loop on your home page to act as reminders for events in your blog/news section of a site.
Frederic Barry

Hi Rebecca,

I did the French translation for the Gigpress plugin, nice to see you writing about it.

You are right about the fact that there’s no perfect WordPress calendar plugin and I feel the same way as you.

Just so you know, Gigpress CAN be tied to a WP Post. When you add a show (or any other event), there’s a dropdown list at the bottom of the screen just before the submit button where you can select an existing post and tie the event with it. This then create a link to your post from your event list.

Other than that, well thanks, that was an awesome post on WordPress calendar plugins which is surely very usefull!
Rebecca Markowitz

@Frederic Barry: Thanks for commenting and for pointing out the linking ability! I corrected the post and added my two cents. It’s great that it connects to the post but more helpful text would be “more details”
Rebecca Markowitz

@Ryan: Amen! A built in calendar would be incredible. It’s amazing that someone hasn’t figured out a good solution yet considering so many people need calendars on their site.
Rebecca Markowitz

@Temi: Glad to hear!
Rebecca Markowitz

@Ellen Weber: What version of wordpress are you using? Do you get the red “http error” text?
Nokao

Can someone help me with a discussion about the “future event” problem?

Do someone of you tried the first plugin for this purpose?

Was it ok for you?
Ellen Weber

Thanks Rebecca! It’s version 2.5.1

There is no error text. I used to click on (choose files to upload) and get up the images to then select. After hitting on an image I then could “insert into post.”

Now, the choose file to update no longer opens up images to select.

My only option is to paste in an image URL. Why is this a problem?

Because many images show up in window viewer and have no URL to include. So I am deeply limited in selections.

Does that make sense? AGAIN THANKS!
wpobsessed

@Nokao, I think the free plugin you are looking for is Future Post http://birdhouse.org/software/2007/12/futurepost/
You can publish now with the timestamp showing the actual events date.
If you don’t mind paying for your theme, mediatricks has a wicked events plugin as part of their Viva7 theme. I asked about getting the plugin separate from the theme and the reply was that it should be released as a plugin by the end of the year (but it will be a paid plugin).
Frederic Barry

Hi Rebecca!
You’ll be glad to learn that the wording to the related post in GigPress can be changed in the options screen under the GigPress tab!

Just a thought! 🙂
Tal galili

Add to your list the options to:
1) import events from other calendars.
2) be able to click on the event address – and go to google map search of that place (doesn’t sound to be too hard).
3) manage users (with different levels of privileges) for adding events ! (very useful for community websites)
4) integration with other services (like facebook ?!)
Tal galili

Rebecca, two questions:
1) it might be worth to organize all the info you put into a table (rows = features. columns = products)
2) I wonder if we can turn to the wordpress community for help on this.

and one more feature I thought about:
subscribing to an event – and seeing who is coming.
(again, this is related to integrating with other services)
Miriam Schwab

@Tal Galili – there’s actually a plugin that I just came across for managing event attendees: it’s called Event Registration.
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Josh

I’ve also found those similar calendar plugins, and none of them quite fit what I was needing. However, I just found this one Events Calendar (http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/events-calendar/). It give you a nice full calendar view in admin, nice features when setting up the event (like little ‘popup’ AJAX calendars to select start/end day and popup to select start/end time), also can have small version of calendar or event list in sidebar. This is just what I was looking for, at least for the current site I’m working on. What its missing for my needs is the ability to send email reminders of calendar events, on a per event basis or a subscription.

Hope that helps someone else too.
Jenyum

Regarding the WordPress Calendar plugin, I wouldn’t really say it has user management. Sure, you can allow users to manage the calendar…or not. Those are the only two options. So if you let a particular level of user manage the calendar, they are able to do everything, including editing and deleting others events. Not desireable in a community calendar.

I would vastly prefer something that used wordpress user levels the way they are intended: with greater permissions for authors and editors than subscribers and contributors. Ideally, I’d like contributors to be able to submit events to a moderation queue, the way they can submit articles. I used to use geeklog, which had a calendar that included this functionality. It’s the one thing I really miss.
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Sara Ch.

Great list. Your extensive lists of features (and missing features) saved me a bunch of time installing and trying out various plugins.

Thanks!
Sara
Laura

Sorry if I missed it… I’m looking for a calendar application that allows for multiple calendars. My client (a cafe/bar) needs at least 2, one for music events and one for screen events.

Any suggestions?

Thanks!
Michael Kay

Nice perspective to share your hunt with others, because so many in the community are looking for similar things. I have been looking for a calendar that works more like an events listing, not necessarily with the calendar grid. Events Calendar works pretty well, but it is a bit awkward because your events have to be blog posts.

I came across this one which works pretty well, simply named “events” It is a little awkward in places, for example to have a separate page for an event, you have to create it outside of the plugin, but I have gotten it to work pretty well for my needs:
http://meandmymac.net/plugins/events/
- Rebecca Markowitz
  
  Michael – I also tried out WP Events recently, so thanks for the reminder to write it up – I added it to the post. Each calendar plugin is soooo close to being what I need but they all manage to have some weird little caveats.
Paul

So which is closest to your ideal? And have you looked at Events Calendar? http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/events-calendar/
Michael Kay

Yeah, it is true Rebecca. I think what you are experiencing is similar to my frustrations in my search, and to many people’s. As awkward as it is to use, I have manages to get wp-events to work the way I wanted, for a non-calendar events listing. I link each event listing to a separate page with the details.
Andrew Chapman

Thanks for a fantastic survey – wish I’d seen this sooner. The nicest I’ve found for my needs so far – managing a multi-genre arts festival with many venues – is Gig Calendar, though the lack of import may be a dealbreaker as I’ve got 150 to enter and I don’t fancy all the copying and pasting…
Greg

Great post. Thanks a lot – I’ve been looking for good calendar plugins.
Paul Papadimitriou

Thanks for this survey, it answers many questions.

Would anyone know which of these plugins (including Event Calendar) can actually manage to pull iCal feeds?

I would need a calendar that is automatically updated from various sources.

Thanks.
Steve M

The good news…with the exception of the CSV upload update I think that the calendar from Trumba.com will satisfy virtually everything else (including allowing users to set up e-mail / SMS reminders of appointments/ dates etc). Multiple layers of calendars (a la google) enables viewing various mixes of calendar categories.

The bad news…licensing fee monthly was running $1oo per month for single users.

Still, the sidebar widget provides date/event info in tool tips, and it integrates very nicely in WordPress or virtually any other site. I set up the installation for a realtor association site (pensacolarealtors.org) and have been very impressed with its user friendliness and flexibility. Because the data is stored and served from the Trumba website, the user interface to update (and set recurring dates — even very complex ones) is clean, understandable and fast. Errors can be spotted and corrected quickly.

Its a standard for the open source programmers to shoot for — it’s certainly an app I drool over.
KlazzyBobby

I just want a site that allows my visitors to post events on their own and it shows up in a list format. I would also need the event list to allow categories because I will be breaking them down by city. New York, Atlanta, LA, etc.

Sounds like GigPress is the closest to this, so I will try it and see how it works.

Any other suggestions out there for something like I’m looking for?
KlazzyBobby

Actually… sort of like this site here in which they could post and it showed up automatically. But I would need one of those security photos so that it’s not spammed.
Eric

Great post, however, i have been looking for a religious holiday calendar and yet no one seems to have one for any religion! More specificaly, I was looking for a widget or plugin that display jewish holidays and sunrise/sunset info. Any ideas?? I found a php calendar, but I am not so familiar with coding.
Alysia

Thanks for the review. This has saved me lots of time, and I’m sure lots of headaches.
Blessings,
Rhino

Hello,
I’m looking for a plugin calendar that let me have more than one diferent calendars independ one from the other in the same entry. I just need to mark with colored or crosed days to look like busy days. No need events or messages. Just occupied or avaliable days. Thanks.
Lisa

Eric,
See http://ical.mac.com/ical/ and http://www.hebcal.com.
Robin Majumdar

Thanks for this comprehensive write-up and review… since WordPress is now at version 2.8.x and it’s been almost a year since the original article, it may be nice to revisit the calendar plug-ins and see how they’ve progressed …
Thanks!
Rob
Evelyn

Hi,
Great post! I’m looking for a weekly calendar that displays horizontally the days of the week, with vertical lists underneath each one to allow for different events..
Anyone have an idea?? I’ve been looking for ages!!

Best,

Evelyn
Roar

Thank you for this. None of them are meeting my needs and I am so soooooooooooo frustrated.

Rawr.
Ryan

I’ve been looking for a good calendar plugin for a while, thank you for providing this list for us!
David

I am looking to find a calendar plugin that could potentially break down into separate calendars for the users that register to the site.
They would be able to customize this calendar for their specific needs such as showing their availability to 3rd party viewers.
Do you have any idea if something like this is currently available? Or where I could go to see about having something like this developed?
D.
Miriam Schwab

Here’s a new calendar plugin that was recently released: Event Calendar/Scheduler. Here are the main features:

-Day/Week/Month view + ability to create custom view

-Drag-n-drop support to configure event date and time

-Customizable appearance

-Single/multi-days events (daily, weekly, monthly or yearly basis)

-Customizable time scale

-Recurring events

-Multilingual
Tal Galili

Thanks Miriam,
Please go see what I wrote here, and give support and suggest more ideas for features:
http://wordpress.org/support/topic/319682?replies=4

p.s: consider adding “intense debate” to your plugin system here on the blog.
Muhammad

I’m looking for a calender too.. so people can request to add event, then i can edit then approve so the event will be shown in the calender. i LOVE the easy php and kieran DESIGN. love it
pargodungan™

Nice post, but i need a plugins that shows only a periodically time as an event without showing the date. Is there any? Help me please..
PerryM

What is it with calendar geeks who start calendars with a Monday.
I live in the USA where we start our calendars on a Sunday.
I could use some of the above calendars if the geeks who write these plug-ins just allowed my calendars to start on a Sunday.
Rebecca

Thanks for the write-up and new links Rebecca et co.
I used GigPress on http://rudelyinterrupted.com – it rocks.
However Im now looking for a multi-day events cal (which would be a nice feature to list in your reviews Rebecca), and will follow up on some of the leads here.
The GigPress list view is particularly brilliant, as is the ticket booking links built in.
mache

hi.
i’ve been using wpng-calendar for almost 2 years already. i really need a calendar where to add images to the description of the events, flyers are a big deal for the events posted. also it would be great to be able to highlight events on the list, maybe even just with a different font style. and a better display of the events on the calendar’s page too.
i’m checking the plugin by Kieran O’sheam, but seems it doesn’t support images on the events description, of course no hope for images thunbnails (maybe as bullets) for every event listed.
i really wonder what is the big difficult to add images to the calendars. i’ve been even evaluating the option to leave wordpress, so i found out this cool calendar for joomla http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/calendars-a-events/events/97 which is making me think for real to move to joomla. but before doing the big jump (because i’d had to learn a whole new csm, and i’m not a pro web designer actually) … so i’m trying to give it a last chance to wordpress, searching for possible solutions
soooo… by any chance do you have any idea of a calendar that would suit my needs? a calendar that would consider the adding of images to it. and with more features to custumize it?

thanks in advance for any info you can share with me

Kieran O’Shea
Leo

The week can be changed to start on Sunday, just go to your WP General Settings – Week Starts On option.
Seth Ridley

You guys might be interested in a new events calendar plugin we have just released. We’d certainly appreciated your feedback as it’s only just been released today.
If you have a moment you can heck it out here: http://www.kinocreative.co.uk/wordpress-plugins/kino-events-calendar-plugin-for-wordpress/
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Victoria

Hey im trying to find this kind of event calendar. I really like, that you can select the options and see all event by day.
Can you guys tell me is you know any? I have trying to find this type for days now.
http://www.gowarsaw.eu/en/culture-nightlife/list-of-events?frmcf=OnOK&frmcf1-=&frmcf2-=&frmcf3–3=4&ofs=1
Thanks! And Hugs!
Seth Shoultes

If any one needs an event calendar with built in event registration and management. You should check out Event Espresso. Event Espresso has a built in calendar and features a registration and payment system using PayPal and Authorize.net.
Frederic VUONG

I am glad to announce the release of wp-simpleMeetingConfirmation. Available at the following address:

http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wp-simplemeetingconfirmation/
Nikos

is there a plugin that will display page as calendar with posts reference?
I need to see just a big calendar with dates that will have posts title or something like that.. any idea?
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Rik Logtenberg

There’s now the <a href=”http://theseedstudio.com/software/all-in-one-event-calendar-wordpress/”>All-in-One Event Calendar Plugin for WordPress</a> which combines a whole bunch of calendar features into one package.
Kaarel Veike

If anyone needs a powerful yet simple to use Events Calendar for WordPress then here is the link: http://plugistan.com/wordpress-events-calendar/

Highly customizable and cost effective plugin.
shabbo

Basically i would like a plugin which has multiple calendars. You can create and manage multiple calendars. In each calendars you are able to insert events.So that u can call different calendars per post or page
Seth Shoultes

@shabboEvent Espresso allows you to create calendars based on event category. So you can create a calendar for several different pages if you like.
Ace Lukman

Awesome, exactly what I was looking for. Thanks.

Best 4 WordPress Calendar plugins

Event Calendar 3 by Alex Tingle

Calendar by Kieran O’Shea

Gigs Calendar by Dan Coulter

Gigpress by Derek Hogue

Easy PHP Calendar Plugin

WP-Events by Arnan de Gans

Author: Rebecca Markowitz

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