How to let people book time with you using a Google Calendar appointment schedule
An appointment schedule is a booking page that lives on your Google Calendar. You set the hours you're willing to be booked, send people a link, and they pick a slot. The appointment lands on your calendar and you both get a confirmation email. No more "does Tuesday at 3 work?" emails. This guide covers the desktop browser version of Google Calendar.
What you'll need: A Google Account and a desktop or laptop browser open to calendar.google.com. A free personal account gets one booking page. Paid Google One and Google Workspace plans add extras such as more pages, email reminders and taking payments, but none of that is needed for the steps below.
Open Google Calendar
Go to calendar.google.com and sign in if you aren't already.
Start a new appointment schedule
Click the Create button in the top-left corner, then click Appointment schedule in the menu that drops down. A setup panel opens on the right.
Give it a title and set the duration
Type a name in the title box at the top of the panel. People see this on the booking page, so make it describe what they're booking. For example:
30-minute phone callUnder Appointment duration, choose how long each slot lasts. The dropdown has set lengths, and Custom at the bottom lets you type your own.
Set your general availability
Under General availability, each day of the week has a time range next to it. Edit the start and end times to the hours you're happy to be booked, and click the bin icon beside any day you want to leave unavailable. Use the + next to a day to add a second block of time, such as a morning and an afternoon window with lunch left out.
Leave the dropdown above the days on Repeat weekly if you want the same hours every week.
Decide how far ahead people can book
Under Scheduling window, set the maximum time in advance an appointment can be booked, and the minimum time before the appointment start. The second one is the notice you want: set it to a day, for instance, and nobody can book a slot that starts in twenty minutes.
Add breathing room between bookings
Open Booked appointment settings. Tick Buffer time and choose a gap, so two bookings can't sit back to back. Tick Maximum bookings per day and set a number if you don't want a whole day filled with appointments.
Existing events on this calendar already block slots, so you won't be double-booked over something you've put in yourself.
Set up the booking form and where you'll meet
Click Next at the bottom of the panel. The second page covers the booking page itself. Under Location and conferencing, choose Google Meet video conferencing for video calls, Phone call, or In person with an address.
Under Booking form, the person's first name, last name and email address are already required. Click Add an item if you also want their phone number or a short note about what they want to discuss.
Save the schedule
Click Save. The panel closes and your available hours appear on the calendar as a shaded block carrying the schedule's name.
Copy the booking link and send it
Click the shaded block on your calendar. In the pop-up, click Share, then Copy link. Paste that link into an email, a message or your website. Anyone who opens it sees a calendar of your free slots, picks one, fills in the form and clicks Book.
Open booking page in the same pop-up shows you exactly what they'll see, which is worth a look before you send the link to anyone.
Variations
Open the schedule for editing (click its block on the calendar, then the pencil icon). Under Adjusted availability, click Change a date's availability, pick the date, and either set different hours or mark yourself unavailable for that day. Your regular weekly pattern stays as it was.
A free personal account allows one booking page, so one schedule has to cover everything. If you need separate pages, say a 15-minute call and a one-hour consultation, that needs a Google One Premium or Google Workspace plan, after which Create › Appointment schedule works the same way for each extra page.
In the Share pop-up, the Website embed option gives you a snippet of code. Paste it into a page on your site and the booking calendar appears there, so visitors can book without leaving.
Troubleshooting
Check you're in a desktop browser rather than the Google Calendar phone app, and that you're signed in to the account you expect. On a work or school account, the administrator can turn the feature off, so ask them if the option is missing there but present on a personal account.
The schedule only checks the calendar it was created on. A clash with an event on one of your other calendars isn't spotted on a free account, as checking additional calendars is a paid feature. Either keep everything on your main calendar, or use Adjusted availability to block the dates you know are taken.
Click the booked appointment on your calendar, then use the bin icon to cancel it. The person who booked gets an email telling them it's cancelled. To move it, send them the booking link again and ask them to pick a new slot, so the confirmation and calendar entry stay in step on both sides.
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