Best WordPress Schedule Plugins

Plenty of businesses still rely on phone calls and emails to take reservations and schedule appointments. Those systems work, of course, but they’re also highly inefficient. If you run a website for your business, there’s no reason you can’t use it to accept reservations instead. Putting a calendar directly on your site is a great way to keep your audience informed and get people to your events. 

As a WordPress user, you get access to a lot of calendar and scheduling plugins that will enable visitors to set their appointments through your site. With the right WordPress schedule plugin, you won’t need to do anything except possibly confirm the reservations once they’re made.

In this guide, we’ll introduce you to some of the best WordPress schedule plugins. We’ll talk about their features, and explain why you should consider using them. Let’s get our calendars out!

Top WordPress Schedule Plugins for Your Site

In this roundup, we’ve chosen to focus on WordPress schedule plugins that offer robust functionality. This way, you can automate the process of taking reservations, which means you’ll have more time to focus on other tasks.

The Events Calendar

Modern Tribe’s The Events Calendar is one of the most full-featured schedule plugins on the market. You can set up and publish an event schedule anywhere you want on your website and customize the calendar to fit your needs. 

Once you’ve created a calendar, set up as many events as you’d like, and include separate sections on each for venue and organizer information, location maps, and more. Display the entire month and let users hover over to an event to get details. If you want to show more information upfront, opt for the list display. This option shows the event name with a detailed description.

When someone clicks on an event, the post will show time information, an image, and even a map to the location. Whichever way you decide to display your information, The Events Calendar will make it look professional and sophisticated.

Booking Calendar

Booking Calendar is a versatile plugin that enables visitors to make appointments through your website, using a simple calendar. All they have to do is open the calendar, pick a date, and check to see if the time they want is available.

This plugin automatically keeps track of reservations for you, and it also sends out notification emails, both to you and to whoever made the appointments. Finally, Booking Calendar also enables you to pick which dates and times will be available for appointments, so you can manage your schedule more effectively.

To sum it up, this plugin is a perfect fit if you run any type of service business that relies on appointments to stay organized. You can even use it to take reservations for hotels or rentals.

Booking Calendar, Appointment Booking System

Booking Calendar, Appointment Booking System shares a similar name to some of our earlier picks. However, this plugin includes plenty of functionality that sets it apart from the pack.

What this plugin does is enable you to take down appointments and bookings, whether that’s for services or properties. You can configure availability depending on the date, force users to select check-in and check-out dates, configure notifications, and more.

Overall, this plugin is incredibly customizable. That’s very useful if you’re looking to configure every aspect of your booking system, although it may be a bit much if you just need a simple solution.

Events Manager

Events Manager is one of the most versatile calendar plugins we’ve seen so far. As you might expect, it enables you to display your events and let users register for upcoming ones. However, it takes things one step further by offering plenty of advanced features, such as support for multi-day events and a ticketing system.

You will receive booking results, and know exactly how many people are expected to show up. Whether your event is free or paid, you’ll be able to easily keep track of attendance. You can even customize whether or not users can buy bulk tickets, or get discounts for certain items.

Like The Events Calendar, you can choose how the events are displayed. For instance, you can add an image, description, time, and map. This is a great option for a site that needs to keep track of attendance.

The free version of this plugin has a lot to offer on its own. However, the premium version also enables you to take payments via PayPal and Authorize.net. That makes it a great option if you want a WordPress schedule plugin that can also process payments.

WP Simple Booking Calendar

A lot of the WordPress calendar plugins we’ve seen so far are focused on providing as many features as possible. That can be useful if your needs are complex. On the other hand, WP Simple Booking Calendar lives up to its name by providing a more straightforward experience.

With this plugin, you can easily display available dates and take reservations for any property you want. You can even use Simple Booking Calendar to set up a shift system for your business.

The downside is that the free version of this plugin just supports a single calendar, so it only works for one property or business. If you want more calendars throughout your website, you’ll need to use another tool or upgrade to this one’s premium version.

Why Are Calendar & Scheduling Plugins Important?

If you run a business that relies on appointments or bookings, there’s no reason you shouldn’t let your website do some of the work for you. Ideally, you’ll still take appointments over the phone and through email as well, since offering multiple options is likely to increase the number of bookings you receive.

For example, some people don’t like having to call in for a reservation. Setting up a calendar plugin with scheduling functionality can be the difference between those users making a reservation (and spending their money with you) and looking elsewhere. In other words, scheduling functionality can offer a better digital experience for your potential customers.

Of course, not all business websites require calendar functionality. However, if you deal with bookings, appointments, or events of any kind, then it’s smart to set up one of the plugins we introduced above.

Industry Leading WordPress Hosting and Plugin Management

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WP Engine also offers Smart Plugin Manager, which solves the issue of time-consuming plugin maintenance by automating plugin updates to keep your sites secure. Once Smart Plugin Manager is up and running, you no longer have to devote valuable time and resources to regularly reviewing and updating plugins. 

Instead, plugins are automatically checked for updates every 24 hours. And to ensure those updates don’t interfere with your workflow, you can select an ideal time of day for them to take place. 

Finally, because some plugin updates may be more critical for certain sites, Smart Plugin Manager allows updates to be customized on an individual basis, so they run automatically or manually, depending on user preference for each plugin. Click here to learn more or speak to a representative today to learn more about WP Engine’s WordPress hosting solutions!