PRO TIP

Group Scheduling Made Easy

Fantastical’s new features help you coordinate.

The calendar app Fantastical made its name by letting you add an event simply by describing it: Type “Meet with Grace Thursday at 11 am in Room 103” for a new event, and the app magically puts all the details in the right fields. The latest version also removes much of the friction from making appointments with others.

Check out these two fantastic features for finding the right time.

Give People Options

Instead of asking others if they can make it to an event at a specific time, you can offer multiple slots to choose from by using the app’s Proposals feature.

When creating your event, pick a time for the first option, then click Propose Another Time to add a second; rinse, repeat. Fantastical will email your invitees a URL where they can choose which slots work for them.

Once everyone agrees on a time, Fantastical sends a final invite to all—and automatically adds the event to your calendar.

Your invitees see a list of possible meeting times. (Those who don’t use Fantastical can reply on the web.)

Curious how everyone replied? Open the calendar entry for the event, then click Invitees for a nifty grid of the options each person selected.

Let Attendees Find the Time

As an alternative, the Openings feature lets invitees find time in your existing schedule.

When you first use Openings, you’ll configure one or more meeting templates—for example, a half-hour block that can occur any weekday during the hours of 9 am to noon or 1.30 pm to 4 pm. Each template gets a custom URL: Send someone your “half-hour check-in” URL and they can see any open half-hour slots in your schedule, then request the best one for them.

With Openings, other people can request a meeting at a time they know you’re available.

The feature is also privacy focused: You choose which of your calendars Openings should use to determine free blocks, and only the times of your existing events—never their details—are viewable by others.