FreeBusy

FreeBusy is a scheduling service that brings availability from multiple calendars into meeting booking and polls. It is best suited to people and teams coordinating across separate calendars; the free plan covers basic individual scheduling, while availability controls and team tools require paid plans.

Overview

FreeBusy’s advantage is joining calendar availability, team coordination, and website booking in one scheduling workflow. It can help when work, personal, and school commitments live in separate calendars, or when a meeting needs the right available teammate rather than simply an open time slot. It is less compelling for an individual who only needs basic bookings and polls, since the controls that prevent awkward meeting times are paid features.

Key features

Calendar connections and availability

FreeBusy connects to Google Calendar, Office 365 and Outlook, Exchange, iCloud, Salesforce Calendar, Yahoo, Zimbra, Zoho, and Amazon WorkMail. It combines availability while keeping the calendars themselves separate, a useful distinction for people juggling personal and professional commitments. Professional adds preferences to avoid back-to-back meetings and meetings too soon or too far in the future. Those controls make shared availability more practical, but they are not part of the free plan.

Team and website scheduling

Business adds a team scheduling assistant, with pooled availability, teammate discovery, delegates, and co-organizers supporting shared scheduling. FreeBusy also supports group events, round-robin routing, and team booking pages. Forms and questionnaires, reminders, and follow-ups on Business can help structure the booking process rather than leaving every detail to email.

For external scheduling, embeddable widgets and a Pick-a-Time button let visitors book through a website; webhooks provide event updates for scheduling, rescheduling, and cancellation. This suits organizations that want bookings to connect to their existing web workflow. Conferencing connections include Zoom, Microsoft Teams, RingCentral, GoToMeeting, Webex, Skype for Business, BlueJeans, Google Meet, join.me, and FreeConferenceCall. A Chrome extension, Outlook add-in, and connections to Salesforce, Greenhouse, HubSpot, Intercom, and Zapier extend its reach into business tools.

Security and credential handling

FreeBusy says it does not store calendar data, but it stores credentials for some password-based calendar connections. It says those credentials are encrypted using AES 256-bit keys wrapped by RSA 4096-bit keys, and that data is encrypted in transit and at rest. GDPR compliance and a Data Processing Addendum are also offered. Enterprise customers can request dedicated encryption keys managed with Azure Key Vault and stored in FIPS 140-2 Level 2 certified HSMs; SAML single sign-on, HSM credential protection, and VPN connectivity are Enterprise features. Organizations that require those controls should factor the plan boundary and custom pricing into their decision.

Pricing

FreeBusy uses a freemium model, with a 14-day trial. Personal is free for individual use and includes appointment bookings, meeting polls, and calendar integrations. It is a reasonable starting point for basic scheduling, but it lacks the availability preferences that make open booking times more controllable.

Professional costs $5/mo billed annually or $6/mo billed monthly. It is for individual users who want Personal plus availability preferences, web conferencing, and Outlook and Google add-ons. Business costs $10/mo billed annually per registered user or $12/mo billed monthly; it adds team scheduling assistance, forms and questionnaires, reminders, and follow-ups. That per-user charge matters as teams grow, but Business is the tier that makes FreeBusy’s shared scheduling capabilities available.

Enterprise has custom pricing, billed annually per registered user. It adds compliance and procurement support, volume discounts, executive assistants and delegates, and white label, alongside Enterprise security options. The comparison makes it a distinct choice for organizations with procurement or security requirements, not simply a larger version of the individual plans.

Platforms

FreeBusy is available on the web, macOS, and Windows, with an API and browser extension also listed. The Outlook add-in and Chrome extension provide additional ways to connect scheduling to those workflows. No mobile platform is included among its listed platforms, so readers who need a dedicated iOS or Android app should consider that before choosing it.

Who it's for

FreeBusy targets recruiting and staffing, sales and marketing, customer assistance, consultants and freelancers, executive assistants, and enterprise subsidiaries. Consultants, recruiters, or assistants coordinating across several calendars can benefit from the availability controls and booking tools. Teams that need round-robin assignment, pooled availability, or delegates have a stronger reason to pay for Business. Someone seeking only individual appointments and polls can stay on Personal; an organization requiring SAML, VPN connectivity, or dedicated HSM-backed keys should look to Enterprise.

Pros and cons

• Pros: Combines availability from many calendar services without merging calendar data, useful when users keep work, personal, and school calendars distinct.
• Pros: Paid plans add concrete scheduling controls and team workflows, including round-robin routing, delegates, and team booking pages.
• Pros: Website widgets, a Pick-a-Time button, and event webhooks support scheduling with external visitors.
• Cons: Availability preferences are excluded from the free plan, so free users cannot use the stated controls to avoid inconvenient booking times.
• Cons: Some password-based calendar connections require stored credentials, despite the company’s statement that it does not store calendar data.
• Cons: SAML, VPN connectivity, and HSM credential protection are Enterprise features, with custom pricing rather than a published rate.

Alternatives

For a broader comparison, see Meeting Scheduling Software.

• Cal.com is worth considering for users who want a free plan with one user, unlimited event types and calendars, and 100+ app integrations.
• Calendar.com offers a free-forever plan for individuals and may suit someone prioritizing a free individual option.
• Taggg is an alternative for users who want unlimited connections and meetings on a free plan, with single-calendar scheduling and bookable links.
• MeetScheduling may suit teams seeking a $12/month Startup plan with 10 event types, three team members, round-robin scheduling, collective events, and routing forms.
• Tymeslot is an alternative for readers seeking a self-hosted option with a full feature set and unlimited bookings and meeting types.
• Zoho Bookings offers a free plan for one user and a 15-day premium trial without requiring credit card details.
• Koalendar may fit users looking for a free-forever plan with unlimited bookings and booking pages, calendar sync, website embeds, and video conferencing.
• neatCal is another alternative to consider for web-based scheduling.

Verdict

Choose FreeBusy if your scheduling spans separate calendars and you want to add team coordination or website bookings without merging those calendars. Its strongest reason to buy is the combination of availability controls and team workflows; its clearest reason to look elsewhere is that important preferences and enterprise security controls sit behind paid or custom-priced plans, while some calendar connections involve stored credentials.