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iCal

Score4.4 out of 10

44 Reviews and Ratings

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What is iCal?

The Apple iCloud Calendar (formerly iCal), is the calendar tool associated to Apple's productivity product suite.

Categories & Use Cases

Most Frequent Users

Top 3 industries using Apple iCloud Calendar (iCal).
Based on HG Insights installation data
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#1 most frequent

Manufacturing

21.1%

16 installations of 76

#2 most frequent

Information

15.8%

12 installations of 76

#3 most frequent

Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services

11.8%

9 installations of 76

iCal Reviews

What users are saying about iCal.
View all iCal reviews

iCal is a great time management tool

Incentivized
Brett Levy
CMO in Marketing at Beyond Intent (1-10 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

I am a Mac User and my entire office and ecosystem is Apple so iCal is the main Calendar that is shared between me and my team and my customers. As we are only on Apple devices iCal syncs seamlessly across our iPhones and iPads too. We also have a public iCal that is used to book appointments with our team

Pros

  • Perfectly syncs between all devices
  • It allows me to set multiple reminders before a meeting
  • When I add an address it automatically links to Apple Maps so I can see where i am going and also how long it will take me. I can easiy click on the link and it will start navigation for me, pretty cool

Cons

  • It is not easy to share with non-apple users (like Google calendar is)
  • The default setting are not easy to change so if you prefer to use Waze you can't change the iCal to make Waze the default navigation
  • iCal doesn't have an easy to use booking system wher you can share a link like Calendly

Return on Investment

  • As mentioned previously iCal provides more info to me than just an appointment
  • i can add attachments like notes or links to other services inside the appointment and these will synchronise across my devices.
  • The search functionality in iCal allows me to save items in the notes and then find them at a later stage. An example - I save key information about meetings or activities and then when I am looking for it at a later stage i can jjst search iCal and find it without having to look for documents or through my notes.
  • There is no default video call setting (like Google has Meet as a default and Microsoft has Teams) this is a problem in that I can't schedule video calls so the work around is that I sync to a Gmail calender and then schedule the video call (Meet) in Google

Usability

Alternatives Considered

Google Calendar and Microsoft 365

Other Software Used

Asana, HighLevel, HubSpot CRM, Klaviyo, Planable

Constant syncing issues with Microsoft Exchange/Outlook

Incentivized
Verified User
Engineer in Engineering (11-50 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

I use the Apple iCloud Calendar (iCal) app on my Mac to view and manage my Microsoft Exchange/Outlook powered calendar. In my experience, the Apple iCloud Calendar (iCal) app is incredibly buggy and I often end up with duplicated events (or no events) that don't/do appear if I view my calendar directly in Outlook. It's more common than not that my Apple iCloud Calendar (iCal) calendar is out of sync in some way with Outlook. I've been using this setup for about five years and Apple iCloud Calendar (iCal) has been a constant, consistent battle for me. I don't recommend using Apple iCloud Calendar (iCal) with Microsoft Exchange/Outlook calendars.

Pros

  • Simple layout
  • It tells you the current date on the app's desktop icon
  • The easy-to-access month vs week views are helpful

Cons

  • Integration with Microsoft Exchange/Outlook calendars
  • Staying in sync with third party calendars
  • Ability to easily re-sync / reset events with third party calendars

Return on Investment

  • Apple iCloud Calendar (iCal) has caused me to miss meetings because it didn't sync up properly with my Microsoft Exchange/Outlook calendar
  • Apple iCloud Calendar (iCal) has caused me frustration because it will often show duplicate events that aren't duplicated in my Microsoft Exchange/Outlook calendar.
  • Apple iCloud Calendar (iCal) has caused my headaches and wasted my time by causing me to have to manually re-sync my Apple iCloud Calendar (iCal) calendar with my Microsoft Exchange/Outlook calendar. Apple iCloud Calendar (iCal) offers no easy way to do this automatically.

Usability

Alternatives Considered

Microsoft Exchange

Other Software Used

Slack, Microsoft Visual Studio Code

Apple iCal is great for an Apple World

Incentivized
Adam Prose
Service Manager in Information Technology at Bailey Office Outfitters (1-10 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use iCal to coordinate private and shared availability times of our employees to help manage our time better. We have private as well as shared calendars setup and populated with the relevant information needed to plan our upcoming day, week, and sometimes month. Apple iCal allows us to not only plan for the time consideration of the event in question, but the travel time and prior preparation time needed for the event as well. We have notifications setup for reminders before, day of, and time to leave to ensure we are where we need to be.

Pros

  • Visual Organization
  • Time Management
  • Notification
  • Integration with Apple devices

Cons

  • Populating locations of events can be harder sometimes
  • Location of event may also not be in the correct place (down the street one direction or another from actual location)
  • Populating via another software can be tricky as well

Return on Investment

  • Mostly intangible positives such as being on time
  • Having a realistic idea of your daily time commitments
  • Communicating those realistic time commitments to customers so they are not waiting on you.

Alternatives Considered

Google Calendar

time management with iCal

Incentivized
Miguel Sanchez
Ingeniero de soporte a redes in Professional Services at MONARCH MEXICO (51-200 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

I am currently a Mac user and its calendar for more than 9 years and over time the application has improved a lot, for me ical on a day-to-day basis helps me schedule my tasks, schedule meetings, add guests, and even allows me to add notes or links. for easier use. I have the facility to program it on the mac and be able to see it on any iOS device. scheduled alerts and reminders work very well. It is very easy to use, it even allows you to copy events or reschedule them in a very simple way.

Pros

  • share calendar with other people
  • creating events and task alerts works great
  • inviting more people to the scheduled task is very useful for scheduling a meeting

Cons

  • I would love it to have more visualizations and not just the classic one in a common calendar and that it could be customized
  • You have the possibility to have a face-to-face call by sharing a link that, in my opinion, could be improved by creating groups of only contacts and limiting access to the meeting.

Return on Investment

  • Before, I used other apps to remind and schedule events like Evernote, but ical has improved a lot and now I can bring all my schedule here, including those from other emails, since it allows me to synchronize my tasks.
  • it is easy to create meetings very quickly without paying licenses like in other applications

Alternatives Considered

Google Calendar

Other Software Used

Cisco Meraki MR, Cisco Meraki SD-WAN, Cisco Catalyst 9800 Series Wireless Controllers

Syncing All My Calendars

Incentivized
Johnny Rudisill
General Manager in Corporate at Nevada Special Utility District (1-10 employees employees)

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

I use Apple iCloud Calendar (iCal) everyday in my professional life and my personal life. The problem I faced was keeping my professional calendar from conflicting with my personal calendar. With iCloud Calendar, I can see my professional schedule, personal itinerary, and my family's activities. It allows me to thoroughly schedule all 3 aspects without conflicts.

Pros

  • notifications of upcoming events
  • syncing across all my devices
  • syncing all of my calendars

Cons

  • time delay of viewing new events when others add events (family sharing)
  • user interface
  • more personalization

Return on Investment

  • made scheduling less confusing
  • made scheduling less conflicting
  • made scheduling easier to plan future events

Alternatives Considered

Google Calendar

Other Software Used

Dropbox, Apple Pay, LogMeIn Pro