If your business or organization hosts events, workshops, or meetings, then you need an easy way to showcase them on your website to keep your audience informed. But without the right tools, event management can quickly become a time-consuming hassle.
Manually updating event details and handling registrations can eat into your productivity. I know from experience, having spent over 15 years marketing events for nonprofit organizations.
If your website visitors struggle to find event information or to complete event registration, then you’re losing potential attendees. Thankfully, there are some easy solutions, especially if you use WordPress.
WordPress event calendar plugins simplify event marketing by allowing you to create, manage, and display events directly on your website.
In this article, I’ll share the 7 best WordPress event calendar plugins to help you organize events effortlessly, boost attendance, and provide a seamless experience for your visitors.
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How to Choose the Right Event Calendar Plugin
There are many event calendar plugins available, and therefore it becomes challenging to select the right one.
You’ll discover that some plugins are good for booking appointments, but they lack other features like event organization. Since not every plugin is created equal, you’ll need to figure out which plugin matches your exact requirements.
Here are some of the features that you should look for in an event calendar plugin:
- Plugin setup: Setting up the event calendar plugin should be easy
- Event types: Ability to create single day, multiple days, and recurring events.
- Event organizer: Adding, editing, and categorizing events from the WordPress dashboard should be easy.
- Payment integrations: The plugin should offer integration with popular payment integrations like PayPal and Stripe.
7 Best Event Calendar Plugins for WordPress
Event Calendar Plugin | Best for | Free | Premium Pricing |
---|---|---|---|
1. Sugar Calendar | Simple, lightweight event scheduling with Google Calendar and WooCommerce integration. | ✅ | $49.50/year + |
2. The Events Calendar | Recurring and virtual events with powerful add-ons for ticketing and marketing. | ✅ | $149/year |
3. Amelia | Automated booking system for salons, gyms, and consultants. | ✅ | $49/year + |
4. Simple Calendar | Displaying Google Calendar events on a WordPress site. | ✅ | $99+ |
5. Timely | SEO-friendly event calendar with social sharing. | ✅ | Custom pricing |
6. My Calendar | Basic event calendar with sidebar widget support. | ✅ | $69/year + |
7. Booking Calendar | Reservation system for hotels, rentals, and appointments. | ✅ | $39+ |
1. Sugar Calendar
Sugar Calendar is the best event calendar plugin on our list.
It’s a simple, lightweight plugin and does not impact your website speed. You can create daily, weekly, monthly events and manage them easily with the help of categories.
I particularly like how elegant the plugin’s interface looks. You’ll find filters and event search capabilities on a single screen. You can also easily connect your WordPress calendar to Google Calendar and iCal.
The plugin seamlessly integrates with WooCommerce and payment gateways, so you can sell event tickets with the Event Ticketing addon. In addition to this, you can extend the functionalities with the help of free and third-party addons.
Features:
- Easy to install and set up the plugin
- Simple event management interface
- Integration with form builder plugins
- Synchronization with Google calendar
- CSV and XML file support
Best for: Businesses that need a lightweight, fast event calendar with Google Calendar integration and WooCommerce support. Great for simple event scheduling without unnecessary bloat.
Pricing: Sugar Calendar offers a free version of the plugin. The premium version starts at just $49.50 per year with email support.
2. The Events Calendar
The Events Calendar is a free plugin to create and manage in-person or virtual events. You can add a single day, multiple days, and recurring events. Visitors can check the details of each event with a tooltip and a different section.
I used The Events Calendar for a nonprofit website I ran, and I found it extremely intuitive. The event feed also looked great on the site. It was a great solution for a busy marketer who needed to add events to a WordPress site quickly.
The plugin allows you to create a grid/list view and filter events with tags, categories, location, and other settings. You can use the event aggregator to schedule event imports from Google Calendar, Facebook, X (formerly Twitter), Meetup, and many more.
You can extend the calendar functionalities with their premium addons for ticketing, email marketing, and crowdsourcing features.
Features:
- Support for recurring events
- Tooltips for event information on the calendar
- Integration with Google calendar and iCal
- Multiple hooks for customization
- Addons for more functionalities
Best for: Organizations hosting recurring or virtual events that need an easy-to-use interface with powerful add-ons for ticketing, marketing, and event aggregation.
Pricing: The Events Calendar is a freemium plugin with basic features in the free version. To get more features, you can upgrade to the Pro plan for $149. It includes one year of updates and support.
3. Amelia
Amelia is a list-based event plugin that comes with automatic event booking features. You get an easy to understand admin dashboard for tracking the events.
I love how easy this event calendar plugin is to configure and how it automates the event booking process. Using Amelia, you can schedule daily, weekly and recurring events.
The plugin is suitable for professional businesses like gyms, medicals, beauty salons, and personal consultants. You can synchronize the plugin with Google calendar for better tracking.
Features:
- Recurring Appointments feature
- Free readymade demo templates
- Integration with Google meet and Zoom
- Synchronization with Google Calendar
- Integration with payment portals like PayPal and Stripe
Best for: Service-based businesses like salons, gyms, medical practices, and consultants that need a full-featured booking system with automated appointment scheduling.
Pricing: Amelia Lite is a free plugin. The premium versions of Amelia start at $49, including one year of support.
4. Simple Calendar
Simple Calendar offers an easy way to add your Google calendar events to your WordPress website. The plugin is easy for setting up and managing event activities.
You can create a simple grid layout or a list layout of upcoming events and display these events for private and public Google calendars.
Simple calendar works by integrating with the Google API. This allows you to create and edit the events directly in your Google calendar, not in WordPress.
Features:
- Display event organizer information
- Option for making events private or public
- Google API integration
- Advanced settings for different time zones
- Additional addons for extending functionality
Best for: WordPress users who want an easy way to display Google Calendar events on their site without managing them separately in WordPress. Perfect for syncing external event schedules.
Pricing: The plugin is free, but you can purchase premium addons starting at $99 .
5. Timely
Timely is a free and popular event calendar plugin installed on 150,000+ websites. You can create elegant-looking events matching your website theme and share them with anyone.
With this plugin, you can create single day, multiple days, and complex recurring events. The events calendar is optimized for SEO and provides filtering options to categorize the events.
The plugin has import and export features and social sharing buttons for sharing events on social media like Facebook, Twitter, etc.
Features:
- The user interface is clean and simple
- Event search option
- Event importing and sharing option
- SEO optimized events calendar
- Social sharing buttons
Best for: Users who need a free and SEO-friendly event calendar with built-in social sharing and customizable recurring event options. Great for nonprofits and community groups.
Pricing: Timely offers a free plugin. If you need more advanced features, you’ll need to visit the Timely website to book a meeting.
6. My Calendar
My Calendar is an easy-to-use event calendar plugin actively installed on more than 30,000+ websites with a good number of 5-star ratings.
The plugin provides simple customization options and categories to segment events depending on location, author, and more.
With the My Calendar plugin, you can showcase daily, weekly, and monthly events in the calendar. You can also add the events in the sidebar using a widget for gaining visitors’ attention.
Features:
- Different display layouts are available
- Feature for scheduling recurring events
- Integration with the Twitter plugin for tweeting events
- Mini Calendar view available
- Location manager feature
Best for: Small businesses or bloggers who need a basic, free event calendar with widget support to showcase events in a sidebar or footer.
Pricing: My Calendar is a free plugin. You can upgrade to My Calendar Pro starting at $69/year.
7. Booking Calendar
With the Booking Calendar plugin, you can let your website visitors check availability and make reservations for specific dates or time slots.
You will receive email notifications and can manage all the reservations in a booking admin panel where you can add groups, modify descriptions and review pricing details.
Features:
- Simple to use interface
- reCAPTCHA support to avoid spammers
- Intuitive booking dashboard
- Integration with popular payment gateways
- Event searchable setting
Best for: Businesses that require a reservation system where users can check availability and book time slots. Ideal for hotels, vacation rentals, and appointment-based services.
Pricing: Booking Calendar offers a free event calendar plugin. The premium version starts at $39.
Which is the Best Event Calendar Plugin for WordPress?
We examined the most widely used event calendar Plugins. Some of these plugins offer a good set of configurations for creating events but comes with limited payment integrations in the free version.
If you like a clean interface with minimal settings, Sugar Calendar is the best option. It is lightweight, syncs with Google Calendar, and is best known for simplicity.
We hope this article helped you choose an event calendar plugin for your website. If you liked this article, kindly consider checking these below articles as well:
- How to Create an Event Calendar in WordPress (Step by Step)
- 10 Best WooCommerce Bookings & Appointment Plugins
- 35 Best Lead Generation Software & Tools for Targeted Leads
Get started with your first event calendar today! Try Sugar Calendar now!
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