Google Calendar’s ‘Appointment Schedule’ Is Good, Not Great

Appointment Slots, the corporate offering, looks dated compared to Appointment Schedule. It’s also much less configurable—you can’t add custom question fields, for example, and there’s no way to automatically add a video call.

So, to review:

1. Individual Google users, basically anyone with an @gmail.com email address, can pay to upgrade to Google Workspace Individual. This includes the Appointment Schedule feature, which compares reasonably well with Calendly.
2. Business Google users, basically anyone whose company pays for Google Workspace, have access to Appointment slots, which looks ancient and is far less customizable.

I am not going to pretend I understand why this is, and I have to imagine Google intends to offer the superior version to its corporate customers eventually. For now, though, this is the state of things—individual users have access to a better system, if they’re willing to pay up.

Don’t Give Up Your Calendly Account Quite Yet

Calendly would be in serious trouble if Google’s new feature were free. As is, Calendly’s free offering is significantly more powerful than the service Google is charging for.

This isn’t to say Google Workspace Individual might not be worth $10 a month for you. There’s something to be said for managing everything in one place. Email marketing features and longer Google Meet calls are also compelling.

For appointment scheduling alone, though, Calendly’s free version will work better than Google’s paid service. It offers similar or better features, and upgrading to a cheaper plan gives you even more. Google might try to kill off Calendly someday, but this offering won’t do that.

Adding these features to the business version of Google Workspace, on the other hand? That would make this conversation a lot more interesting.

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