Put your team's schedule in families' phone calendars

Every team has its own calendar link. A family adds it once to Google Calendar, Apple Calendar or Outlook, and every game and practice appears there with the venue and your notes. When you change a fixture you added here, their calendar changes too. A fixture that came from your club's calendar takes its date, time and place from the club: change those here and the next import puts them back, so ask the club to change it.

The link carries the schedule and nothing else. It does not put anybody on the team: families still join by the email invite to their own child. See set up your team.

Copy the link

For the team owner, and anybody the owner has given Manage team.

1. Open Settings on the team screen.
2. Under "Fixtures and people", open "Import the club schedule". You do not need to import anything to use the link: every team has one.
3. At the bottom, under "Subscribe to this team's calendar", tap Copy.

You should see the button change to Copied. If your browser will not copy, tap the link itself. It selects on its own, so you can copy it by hand.

Send it to families in a team message (message your team), or by whatever route your team already uses.

What families get

• Games read "Your team vs Opponent" at home and "Opponent vs Your team" away, so a parent can tell at a glance whether they are driving.
• Practices read "Your team training".
• Each entry carries the location, your notes for families (uniform colors, arrival time, which field), and a link back to the game. Once a game has finished, the result is added.
• No roster, no player names and no family details. Your notes for families go in word for word, so leave children's names out of them.

Every entry is 90 minutes long in the calendar, whatever the real length. The start time is the part to trust.

Adding it

For families. Each calendar app has its own steps, and these are taken from each company's own help page.

Google Calendar

On a computer, not the phone app. Google says: "You can't subscribe to a calendar in the Google Calendar app for Android, iPhone, or iPad."

1. Open Google Calendar in a web browser.
2. Next to "Other calendars", choose "Add other calendars", then "From URL".
3. Paste the link and choose "Add calendar".

Google's instructions.

Apple Calendar on an iPhone or iPad

1. Open Calendar and tap "Calendars".
2. Tap "Add Calendar", then "Add Subscription Calendar".
3. Paste the link and tap "Find" (on iOS 18 and earlier, "Subscribe").
4. Name it, choose iCloud as the account, and save.

Choosing iCloud puts it on the family's other Apple devices as well. Apple's instructions.

Outlook

In Outlook.com or Outlook on the web, open the calendar, choose "Add calendar", then "Subscribe from web", paste the link, and choose "Import". Microsoft's instructions.

How fast a change shows up

The calendar asks each app to check for changes every hour, but the app decides when it actually does. Microsoft's own page says an update "can sometimes take more than 24 hours" in Outlook.

So a kickoff that moves on Friday night may not reach a family's calendar by Saturday morning. For a change close to game day, change the fixture (at the club, if it came from the club's calendar) and tell families in a message as well.

When a family leaves, or the link gets out

Anybody holding the link can see when and where the team plays. If a family leaves the team, or the link has been passed around further than you meant:

1. Open the same screen.
2. Tap Give it a new address and confirm.

You should see a new link in the box.

Everybody subscribed to the old link stops getting updates, so send the new one to the families who should still have it.

Troubleshooting

A family cannot find where to add it in the Google Calendar app. Google says it cannot be done in the app. Add it from a computer instead.

A family's calendar shows the old time. Their calendar app has not checked again yet. Tell them in a message, and the entry will catch up.

A family's subscription stopped updating. The link was replaced with a new address. Send them the current one.