Thoughts on Google Calendar

If I have to summarize what problem Google Calendar is trying to solve in one sentence, I would say that it tries to solve the problem that people can’t track and manage their schedules.

That general problem can break down into smaller problems:

• Scheduling with others is hard.
• Sometimes people forget things.
• It is hard to keep track of the schedule.
• Pulling up information from a full calendar is complicated.
• Keeping on top of the agenda is a lot of effort.
• ……..

The Google calendar solves the problem efficiently for active Google users by centralizing the schedule information and notifying the upcoming events. However, if we look at making schedules in life as a whole, many things are out of the app’s reach. For example, a husband promised wife bringing 2% reduced-fat milk home during a call may forget details about milk and ended up getting whole milk or even completely forget about buying milk. Unless he learned the behavior of actively putting notes in Google calendar — buying 2% reduced-fat milk after work, the Google calendar could not help note down any detailed schedule from all kinds of input.

When comparing Google calendar to apps like iCalendar, many design choices are more successful on the function level, like seeing other people’s schedules while scheduling, allowing customized notification about upcoming events, and offering an overview schedule by list, days, or weeks. They all provide a better user experience and utility for Google calendar. When an app’s higher-level user experience is similar to Google Calendar like Microsoft Outlook, visual design becomes the battleground.

Take information design as an example (see image below): on the event list page, Google calendar groups information by the colored box and put organizer information in the same line; Outlook separates events by divider and dots and put organizer information in its line. At a glance, the organizer’s information on Outlook looks like an independent item. Mentally, the user will have to read the line, separate it from the next thing, then group it back to where belongs. It is less effort for Google users to tell the events apart because everything is grouped clearly in the first place.

If users try to schedule an event, the amount of information and features are the same on both apps. However, Google Calendar constructed a better information hierarchy using layout, contrast, and color. In the date column, Google included the least amount of necessary information not to overwhelm users. As a comparison, Outlook had as much data as possible, which creates a visual cluster.

When selecting a date, Google automated the step by showing an hour after users have picked a date. However, Outlook chose to use a carousel model to let the user manually switch in between screens. Also, comparing to the pop-up model, putting a date picker in a full screen foldable improves the accessibility. Full-width gives users a broader space to interact with, which is more comfortable and limits the likelihood of accidentally dismissing the model by tapping on the black overlay when choosing the date closer to the edge.

Overall, I think Google Calendar is a well crafted, beautiful, easy-to-use product. Although it still has more space to grow as the technology becomes more mature, and the input type gets more, it makes my life easier.