Do you need to sync multiple calendars on your Android phone? In this tutorial we’ll show you:
- how to add a second Google account
- how to sync more than one calendars within the Google Calendar app
- how to colour-code your calendars
- the best way to import ‘live’ calendars from the web
Most of us have more than one calendar to manage our lives with. There’s the one from work, your personal one associated with your email service, those calendar for public holidays and sports fixtures that you imported.
The last thing you want is to have to login and logout of each of these apps and services every time you need to check your schedule.You don’t need to, as on an Android device you can import all your calendars to be viewed within the same app.
By making use of colour coding you can keep your calendar appointments separate, so you can keep an eye on your work/life balance in the process.
In this tutorial we’ll take a look at how to use multiple calendars within Android.
Work with more than one calendar on Android
With the calendar app on an Android smartphone you can import calendar information from a wide range of sources and applications, be they online or a desktop syncing tool. In this example we’re using a second Google account.
Set up a second Google account
Go to Settings > Accounts and you’ll see the various accounts you’ve already got set up listed. These accounts all sync on a schedule with some of the built in apps on your phone, including contacts and calendar.
Click the Add account button and select Google from the list (you can add other accounts for popular web based services here too, many of which may have their own calendar functions).
Avoid duplicate address book entries
Now fill in the details of your account, and a sync will begin. In some cases you might find it better to not sync the contacts within a second account, especially if there is the risk of creating duplicate entries in your address book.
With the sync completed now head over to the Calendar app. You’ll now see your entries from this new calendar integrated in with the existing ones. The way you can differentiate them is that each calendar will be colour-coded.
Colour-coded calendars
Go to Menu > Calendars to display and you will see listed those calendars that are now being displayed in your agenda, and the colour that has been assigned to each one. Tap the icon to change the colour for a particular calendar.
You can be more selective about which you wish to have displayed by ticking or unticking the box next to its name. Tap the Calendars to sync button at the bottom of the screen if you’ve got other calendars set up that are not currently set to sync.
To delete a calendar you’ll need to go back to Accounts in Settings and either remove it or stop it from syncing there.
Add a live calendar
Finally, it is also possible to add a ‘live’ calendar from the internet or shared with other users. This might come in the form of a .ICS file that you can import into your calendar simply by importing the file to your file (via email, Bluetooth or downloaded from the web) and opening it.
You can also click links on certain web pages that will import your live calendar. It will now be listed under the Calendars option in your app.