Set up a shared family calendar: Google, iPhone and Outlook

Pick one home for the family calendar

A family calendar fails for one reason: it isn't the one everyone looks at. Before any settings, agree on where the family's events live. There are three honest options.

• Everyone on Google. Use Google's Family calendar, which Google creates automatically when you set up a family group. Simple, free, and it shows in the Google Calendar app on every phone.
• Everyone on iPhone and Mac. Use the shared family calendar that Apple's Family Sharing sets up on each member's devices, or share one iCloud calendar by hand.
• Mixed, which is most families. Sam lives in Google Calendar at work; Jordan runs on the iPhone calendar. Here a calendar that syncs two ways with both, like HouseChief's, means an event added by either parent shows up in both apps as an ordinary event, and nobody has to switch.

Whichever you pick, give each person a color from day one and add kids' activities under the kid's name. A calendar you can read at a glance is a calendar people keep using.

Option 1: Google's family calendar

When you create a family group on Google, a shared calendar called "Family" is created automatically, and every member of the group sees it in Google Calendar on any device they're signed in to. Google's help page Use a family calendar on Google covers the details: the family manager owns the calendar and can transfer ownership, members get the same reminders they get for their own calendar, and leaving the family group removes access.

Two things to check. First, sharing the Family calendar with someone outside the group (a grandparent, a sitter) is done from Calendar settings on a computer, under the calendar's sharing options; Google notes that by default people you add can edit events, so set their permission to see-only if that's what you want. Second, kids' events go on the Family calendar, not a kid's own account; it keeps everything in one place and avoids making accounts for children who don't need them.

Option 2: iCloud Family Sharing

Apple's Family Sharing works the same way: the organizer invites up to five other members, and once they accept, Family Sharing sets up a shared family calendar on everyone's devices automatically, so an event added by one member shows for all. Apple's guide Manage Family Sharing describes the setup.

If you'd rather not use Family Sharing, you can share any iCloud calendar with specific people from the Calendar app: open the calendar's details, add a person by their email address, and choose whether they can edit. Apple's page Share iCloud calendars on iPhone walks through it. People you share with must be iCloud users, which is where a Google-only parent gets stuck.

Adding Outlook and work calendars

Work calendars usually live in Outlook, and many workplaces don't allow them to be shared outside the company. The practical approach is one-way: show the family calendar in Outlook, and don't try to push work events into the family calendar automatically. In Outlook.com, go to Calendar, choose Add calendar, then Subscribe from web, paste the family calendar's link and select Import; Microsoft's page Import or subscribe to a calendar in Outlook.com has the steps and notes that subscribed calendars refresh roughly every three hours for personal accounts and every six for work accounts.

For the few work events the family needs to know about (travel, a late night), add them to the family calendar by hand or forward the invitation to a family address. If you want an Outlook calendar visible inside a Google or Apple family calendar, most Outlook accounts can publish a calendar link that other apps read, one way and on a delay.

If a parent keeps their own life in Outlook (an Outlook.com or Hotmail account, say), a family app that syncs with Outlook directly avoids the one-way workaround. HouseChief syncs two ways with Outlook Calendar, as it does with Google and iCloud: the parent signs in with Microsoft, chooses which Outlook calendars show in the family calendar, and picks the Outlook calendar that HouseChief's events are copied to. Each event can go to the calendar you choose, or stay in HouseChief only.

Work and school Microsoft 365 accounts can connect to HouseChief too, but check first: some workplaces need IT to approve an outside app, and some company policies don't allow family events in a work calendar. When in doubt, keep the work calendar one-way as above.

School and sports calendars (subscription links)

Almost every school, league and club publishes a calendar link, often labeled iCal, ICS, "subscribe" or "add to calendar". Subscribing means the school's changes flow to you; copying events by hand means they don't. Find the link on the school's website or in its app, then:

• Google Calendar (computer): next to Other calendars, choose Add other calendars, then From URL, paste the link and click Add calendar. Google's help page Subscribe to someone else's calendar notes you can't subscribe from the phone app, only on a computer; the calendar then shows on your phone.
• iPhone: in the Calendar app, tap Calendars, then Add Calendar, then Add Subscription Calendar, paste the link and follow the prompts. Apple's page Use iCloud calendar subscriptions has the current steps; subscribed calendars are read-only.
• Outlook.com: Add calendar, Subscribe from web, paste the link, Import (same page as above).
• HouseChief: Settings, calendar feeds, paste the link. It shows alongside the family's own events, read-only, and refreshes in the background.

Subscribe once, in the family calendar, rather than on each parent's phone separately. Otherwise one parent's subscription silently stops working and the other never knows.

Step by step: one calendar for everyone

Here is the whole setup for a mixed household, in order. It takes about an hour, most of it waiting for people to accept things.

1. Choose the home calendar

   Decide where family events will live: Google's Family calendar, Apple's Family Sharing calendar, or a two-way-synced family app. Write it down where the family can see it, so nobody has to ask.

2. Give every adult access

   On Google, add them to the family group; on Apple, invite them to Family Sharing or share the iCloud calendar by email. In HouseChief, each parent signs in and connects their own Google, iCloud or Outlook calendar, which syncs two ways.

3. Set a color per person

   One color for each family member, including each kid, in every app the calendar shows in. Keep the same colors everywhere so Maya is always purple.

4. Add school and activity calendars by link

   Find each organization's ICS or iCal link and subscribe to it in the home calendar, once. Name the subscriptions clearly: "Maya school", "Leo soccer".

5. Bring in work calendars one way

   Subscribe to the family calendar from Outlook (Subscribe from web) so work can see home. Add the work events home needs to know about by hand or by forwarding the invite. If you use a family app that syncs with Outlook, and your workplace allows it, you can connect Outlook there instead.

6. Give helpers a read-only view

   Grandparents and sitters get see-only access, not edit rights: Google's sharing permission set to see-only, an Apple shared calendar with editing off, or a read-only share link that needs no account.

7. Put it on the wall

   A tablet in the kitchen showing this week, with everyone's colors, is what turns a calendar into a family habit. Any tablet with a browser will do.

Keeping it working: color, ownership, a weekly look-ahead

Setup is the easy part. Three habits keep the calendar trusted. Color, so a glance tells you who's where. Ownership: every event has a parent's name on it, and that parent handles the logistics, so "who's taking Ruby to the party?" is already answered. And a weekly look-ahead, ten minutes on Sunday evening, both parents, next week on the screen: what's missing, what collides, who needs a ride. Families that do the Sunday look-ahead rarely get surprised on Wednesday.

In HouseChief, the calendar is the household's and each parent connects their own Google Calendar, iCloud or Outlook for two-way sync, so the mixed-household problem disappears, and each event can go to the calendar you pick. School calendars come in by link, the wall display shows the week in everyone's colors, grandparents get a read-only link, and the Sunday look-ahead can start with "what's on next week?" to your Chief of Staff. The dates that only ever arrive by email have their own guide: school emails to the family calendar, using email forwarding.