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How to Create a Shared Calendar on Mac? [Step-Wise]

Updated on Thursday, February 27, 2025

Written by

Vain Rowe

Approved by

Jessica Shee

English

Apple has configured Mac lineups with a built-in Calendar app, which offers online cloud backup of calendars using Apple's iCloud service and synchronizes with other calendar services including Google Calendar and Microsoft Exchange Server.

However, the Calendar app does more than that. It also allows you to create a shared calendar that all members have permission to edit and modify. Today, this post provides a step-by-step guide for creating a shared calendar on Mac so that you can easily complete this task, even if you switch from another OS to macOS not long ago.

How to create a shared calendar in iCloud on Mac?

If you have an identical work schedule with your colleagues or the same date schedule with your friends or families, then it's a must to create a shared calendar here. With a calendar being shared, it lets shared users add or cancel plans on certain days and make further modifications. Now let's see how to create a shared calendar!

To share a calendar with other users, you'd log into the iCloud account on your Mac first:

  1. Click the Apple Menu from the top left corner of your screen, then choose System Settings.
  2. Select Apple ID, find iCloud in the left column, and click it.
  3. Enter your Apple ID and password, then turn on the iCloud features you want to use. 

With iCloud being launched, now you can follow the steps to share the calendar with others:

Step 1: Launch the Calendar app on your Mac.

Step 2: Place the pointer over the calendar's name in the calendar list, then click the Share Calendar button.

If you don't see the calendar list on the left, go to the upper left corner of the Mac desktop to View > Show Calendar List.

Step 3: Click Share With, then enter the names or email addresses of people you want to share your calendar. You can also enter the name of a list in Contacts to invite all the members.

If you want to limit the members' editing permission to the shared calendar, place the pointer over the person's name or email address in the Shared With list, click the down arrow, then choose View Only.

Click the Share button and select your preferred method of sending the link to invite people to sign up for your public calendar. Subscribers to your public calendar can see it, but they have no permission to edit. Changes can only be made by those with view and edit rights who are mentioned in the Share With section.

Step 4: Click Done. People you added to the Shared With list will receive an invitation to join the shared calendar.

If you want to cancel this shared calendar, you can stop it with the following steps:

  1. Launch Calendar on Mac with Spotlight Search shortcuts.
  2. Do the following based on your intentions:
  • Stop sharing your calendar with specific people: Place the pointer over the calendar's name in the calendar list, then click the Share Calendar button. Click a person's name, then press Delete.
  • Stop sharing your calendar with everyone: Control-click the calendar in the calendar list, then choose Stop Sharing.
  • Stop subscribing to someone else's calendar: Control-click the calendar in the calendar list, then choose Unsubscribe.

If you find this post informative, then share it with your families and friends!

 

How to create a shared calendar in Outlook on Mac?

Suppose you want to share a calendar in Microsoft Outlook with family, friends, and co-workers, please read the following section. You can establish permissions ranging from co-owner to view-only, and you can revoke their ability to access your calendar at any moment.

Note that the sharing only works if you and the calendar recipient have Microsoft Exchange accounts. So make sure you have signed in Microsoft Exchange which belongs to Microsoft Office for Mac previously.

  1. At the bottom of the navigation pane, select the Calendar icon.
  2. Select the calendar you want to share.
  3. On the Organize tab, choose Calendar Permissions.
  4. In the Calendar Properties box, choose Add User.
  5. In the Search box, enter the name of the person you want to share your calendar with.
  6. When you see their name appear in the list, select it and then choose Add.
  7. In the Calendar Properties box, select the Permission Level down arrow, and choose the permission level to assign to the person you added. Note that the settings for Read, Write, Delete, and Other options change based on the permission level you choose.
  8. Check the boxes that apply in the Read, Write, Delete, and Other sections, and then select OK.

You can give different permission levels to different people. The default is free/busy, which indicates your availability in the scheduling assistant. To see your calendar, Mac users must be granted Reviewer permissions.

Apple calendar sharing not working, how to fix it?

Recently, I have tried to help my grand-pa and grand-ma set up a calendar together. They both have separate iCloud accounts, so I made them a shared calendar. But when my grand-ma added something to the calendar, my grand-pa could see it, but my grand-ma couldn't see the stuff that my grand-pa added. I added myself to the calendar and I can see everything both of them added just fine. I made sure my grand-ma had the calendar set to her default and that she was connected to the Internet. But nothing helped. I don't know what's happening on her end because it's obviously synced to me. Any thoughts? Thank you!

Some users have complained the issue of Apple calendar not working on Mac online, and the scenrio is not limited to the above one. Facing this, you can try the following methods to make the sync work:

  • Check the system status of iCloud Contacts, Calendars, or Reminders for services outages or connection issues.
  • If a reminder isn't showing up on some of your devices, make sure that your Mac has the latest version of macOS.
  • Make sure that you're signed in to iCloud with the same Apple ID on all of your devices. Then, check that you turned on Contacts, Calendars, and Reminders in your iCloud settings.
  • Check that the date and time settings on your device are correct for your current location.