[App Friday] This digital calendar helps sync up your family schedule, sports events, and public holidays all in one place

In 2021, in the top 10 mobile markets around the world, consumers spent a staggering 4.8 hours per day on their mobile devices, according to the State of Mobile 2022 report released by App Annie, a market research firm.

In the last two years, several folks have resorted to downloading calendar apps to stay on top of virtual meetings and plan day-to-day schedules compared to almost never using such apps before March 2020. If this were not enough, imagine syncing entire families’ calendars to keep all those schedules organised.

In-built calendars on the phone do not easily sync with all your email ids and are often still quite traditional in their features. That’s where DigiCal Calendar comes in. 

Released in 2012, DigiCal Calendar has over five million downloads and a 4.2 rating, according to data available on the Google Play Store. 

How does it work?

Once you download this Android only app from Google Play Store, a simple tour of the app is sufficient to understand the workings of this app. DigiCal does not ask you to enter any login details. As first steps, it gives you the option to choose between a light or dark theme before moving on to using the app. 

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Next, the app asks for permission to access your in-built calendar, besides the contacts list and location access. The latter two are optional, and you can opt out from letting DigiCal have access to your location and contacts list immediately. 

The app then opens up to a monthly calendar layout with your present day’s schedule listed in the second half of the home page. There are a certain number of dots under every date on the calendar. The number of dots is equal to the number of tasks or meetings listed. Reminders can come through notifications, emails and text messages, depending on your preference.  

To set up a meeting or a reminder, all you need to do is click on the ‘+’ icon on the top right corner. A tab similar to other calendars will appear where you can choose to fill the title of the meeting, select the email address, put the location, and add guests, among other things. You can also choose a colour for the event, which will help you distinguish the event when you glance at your calendar in the future. 

The home page’s default calendar could also be changed in the setting. This can be accessed by clicking on the icon at the top-left corner. The drop down has options including daily, weekly, and monthly calendar layout. 

These layouts can also be enlarged or reduced in size. This writer’s personal preference is the weekly layout as it gives you the entire picture of what the next seven days is going to look like.  

Where DigiCal Calendar differentiates itself is that it syncs schedules from other calendars on different email ids. This writer uses four accounts with their own calendars and until now keeping tabs on every calendar meant logging in into four different accounts from a laptop. DigiCal makes it possible to do this on the phone.

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You could also use DigiCal to access public holiday calendars of England, Northern Ireland, Wales, and Scotland. Sports schedules including Premier League, cricket, basketball, baseball and cycling, among other world sports, could also be synced in with your calendar. This access comes under an annual subscription plan currently priced at Rs 199. 

There is also an upgrade to DigiCal+ for Rs 180, which offers a few new functions including images, and removes advertising.

Verdict

DigiCal Calendar is probably the most useful calendar app this writer has come across so far. The app is easy to use with minimal design constraints. It’s familiar calendar layout helps with navigation. DigiCal also has many colours, themes and designs to choose from. While some can be accessed through the free version, others are behind a paywall. 

The app claims to integrate free weather forecast in your calendar and widget views, however it did not work for us. 

If you are looking for an app that goes over and beyond a Google calendar, and helps you become more organised by having it all in one place, then this is probably it.