The Best Calendar App for iPhone

Going by the number of calendar alternatives in the iTunes App Store, nobody seems satisfied with Apple's offering. We think Fantastical trumps them all, offering fast event input, a great interface, and full support for the calendars already on your phone.

• Add new events in plain English (e.g. "Dinner with Mom at 7pm on Sunday")
• Simple gestures make it easy to switch from week to month view
• Calendar scrolls as you move through your events, keeping you aware of what date you're actually viewing
• Easily edit any event with a quick tap
• Locate specific events with search
• View and manage Facebook events (requires iOS 6)
• See an event's creation on your calendar as you type it in
• Supports the same calendar services as the built-in Calendar app: iCloud, Google Calendar, Exchange, and more
• Fully localized in English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish

Fantastical started out as a great menu bar-based calendar for OS X at a hefty price ($20). Although we like it, we felt it wasn't worth the cost. While the iOS app is a little higher than the average for the category, $4 is quite a bit more reasonable. The mobile version of Fantastical is just as elegant, which is what makes it such a great replacement for your standard iPhone calendar. Creating an event is a very simple process: you just type in what you plan to do (e.g. "Dinner with Mom at 7pm on Sunday") and Fantastical figures out what you mean. You can create the event manually by selecting the various options, but this is tedious and takes a bit more time. Fantastical also provides a simple interface with a weekly calendar view and a list of your events (which you can edit easily by tapping). If you want to see the entire month, just swipe down from the top and Fantastical will witch modes. If you want to go back, just swipe again. If you're using iOS 6 or higher, Fantastical also integrates your Facebook events and allows you to edit them. Overall, it just makes the majority of your everyday calendar tasks faster and easier to accomplish.

Fantastical lacks an enormous feature set like some of the competition. Week Cal, for example, offers a lot more. We prefer Fantastical because it makes the most important things easier, but if you're looking for a larger number of features in a small package you can get them for less money with another app. Price is Fantastical's other downside. While we don't think it's worth quibbling over a few dollars for a truly great app, some will find $4 to be a little too much for something their iPhone already does reasonably well.

Week Cal ($2), our former favorite calendar app, packs in a lot. Like most of the competition, it offers multiple views for your events and tasks. Where it truly excels, however, is in how easy it is to use such a vast number of features and still see all the information you need directly from any view. You can still scan the events of your day quickly even in year view, simply by tapping a date. Moving events around works just like moving apps on your home screen?you tap and hold, then drag it to where you want. Everything is very intuitive, it feels like you're using iCal or Google Calendar but in a way that's suited for your iPhone. Basically, it has the elegance of a minimal calendar app while still retaining a very respectable set of features.

ActionFocus ($4) and miCal ($2) are both feature-rich alternatives with different interfaces you may appreciate. For the most part, the feature set is the same with a few exceptions (e.g. miCal has a neat dashboard view and ActionFocus has an awesome tabbed task manager). Both are more than adequate. Pocket Informant ($5 currently, regularly $13) is also another feature-rich app with tons of features but bills itself as a task manager. While we don't find it more appealing than the previously mentioned options?which also cost less?a lot of people do like this app so we wanted to give it a mention.

Organizer for iPhone ($8) is a little on the pricey side (at least compared to the other options), but gives you a full organizer. It lets you pin location maps, sound recordings, notes, tasks, photos, and more to your dates. Even with all of this extra data, it still syncs with Google Calendar. If you'd prefer a more flexible format for your datebook, this might be a more appropriate option for you.

Calvetica, or Fast Calendar and Tasks ($3) and Agenda Calendar ($1) are both great options if your main draw is a minimalist aesthetic. That's not to say they aren't great?they both have simple, intuitive interfaces that allow you to quickly navigate around all your events. That said, they're not designed to be the feature-rich behemoths mentioned above. If you don't need much more than the built-in calendar app provides but would prefer a better interface with additional views and some extra features, both of these apps are completely serviceable and nice to look at.

Finally, it's just worth mentioning the UNIQLO Calendar (Free) purely for its uniqueness. It costs nothing, syncs with Google Calendar, is very attractive, and plays tilt-shift videos while you navigate. It may not be the most practical option, but it is free and a lot of fun.

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Lifehacker's App Directory is a new and growing directory of recommendations for the best applications and tools in a number of given categories.

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Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/vQf-5o23GFc/the-best-calendar-app-for-iphone

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