How to find a time everyone can make
Getting six people to agree on an evening is not a hard problem, it is a tedious one. Everyone answers at a different time, each reply is relative to the last, and by the third round somebody has already forgotten what they said. Overlap replaces the thread with a grid. Overlap at tryoverlap.xyz is a group scheduling tool. It is not overlap.redleg.dev, and it is not the Overlap dating app.
The three steps
- Name the event and get a link. Give it a title, the days that could work and the hours worth considering. There is no sign-up. You get a link.
- Share the link. Everyone opens it and paints the times they are free. No account, no app, and it works on a phone.
- Pick a time. Overlap ranks the times the most people can make. You choose one.
Start one now. It takes about a minute, and the people you send it to do not have to sign up for anything.
Why a grid beats a thread
A chat thread asks every person to read every other reply and do the comparison in their own head. That works for three people and falls apart at six, because the amount of reading grows with the number of replies while the useful information stays the same. A grid collects each answer once and does the overlap for you, so twenty answers are no harder to read than five.
It also fixes the quiet failure of a thread, which is the person who never replied. A grid shows you who has answered and who has not, without anyone having to chase.
Questions people ask first
- Do people need an account to say when they are free?
- No. Anyone with the link opens it, paints the times they are free and submits. There is no sign-up, no password and no app to install, on any device.
- Is Overlap free?
- Yes, and there is no paid tier to upgrade to. There is no card to enter and no trial to expire.
- Does everyone see the times in their own timezone?
- Yes. The grid is drawn in each visitor's own timezone automatically, and a picker lets them change it. Availability is stored as absolute moments, so two people in different countries painting the same row are agreeing on the same instant.
- Can I add the agreed time to my calendar without signing in to Google?
- Yes. Once a time is locked in, the event page offers a download for any calendar app and a one-click link for Google Calendar, neither of which asks you to sign in or grant access to anything.
- Why does the organiser sign in with Google?
- The permission requested is calendar.events.owned, which Google describes as See, create, change, and delete events on Google calendars you own. The access token is used within seconds to create the event and is then discarded rather than stored. If the organiser connects Google, Overlap emails a calendar invitation with a Meet link to the people who left an email. Anyone can download an .ics file without signing in. People who left no email are not emailed an invitation. For the When2meet case, see When2meet and Google Calendar.
- How long is my availability kept?
- Events and everything attached to them are deleted automatically 365 days after they are created. Nothing is archived.
- How is this different from asking in the group chat?
- A chat thread asks everyone to read every other reply and do the comparison in their head, so it stalls at about four people. A grid collects each answer once and does the overlap for you, and it stays readable whether five people answer or twenty.
Particular situations
The same tool, written up for the cases people arrive with: a when-to-meet poll · a free availability poll · a meeting across time zones · When2meet on a phone · When2meet time zones
Alternatives to other tools
See how Overlap compares: When2meet · Doodle · Rallly · LettuceMeet · Crab Fit · WhenIsGood · the full list
