If you or your team use Notion and Google Calendar, there are several ways to connect the two applications. Depending on the type of integration, users can simply view view their calendar, or they can get synchronized information while using Notion.
Simple Google Calendar and Notion Integration
Notion has a limited calendar view, especially when compared with the capabilities of Google Calendar. At present, there is no native Google Calendar integration for Notion, so there is no straightforward way to connect the two apps in a more dynamic fashion. If you go to Notion’s Integration Gallery page and search for Google Calendar, your search will return with no results.
However, there is still a way for users to connect Google Calendar and Notion using a simple embed method. Here are two embed methods for Google Calendar into Notion.
How to Embed Google Calendar into Notion via Shared Link
Users can view Google Calendar in Notion with a few simple steps. For this example, we will use a created Test Calendar under the My Calendars section of Google Calendar.
Hover your mouse on the calendar you want to embed, in this case, the Test Calendar. When the three vertical dots appear, move your mouse towards it and a tip that says ‘Options for Test Calendar’ will pop up. Click the three-dot icon.
A pop-up window will appear. Select ‘Settings and sharing’ to proceed with the next steps.
On this new page, select the ‘Access permissions for events’ on the left lower side of the navigation menu. That section of the page will come up front. On this section, you need to check the box that will make the Test Calendar available to the public.
After ticking the ‘Make available to public’ checkbox, a warning will appear of the implications of making a calendar publicly available. The warning states that making a calendar public will make all events saved in the calendar visible to anyone and everyone, including through Google search.
Unfortunately, this is not an ideal situation. A calendar viewable by the general public exposes all information saved in its calendar events. If this is not acceptable, then click Cancel. If this is an acceptable situation, then click OK to continue.
A check mark will appear at the box indicating that the Test Calendar is now available to the public. On the side navigation menu, scroll down and select ‘Integrate calendar.’ On this section, there is a field that shows the Public URL to this calendar. Copy this link. This will be the URL that you will paste in your Notion page.
Open Notion and log in to your account. Create a new page or go to your Notion page where you intend to place your Google Calendar.
Since embedding is one of the ways for Notion to integrate with Google Calendar, type the command /embed on this new page. A choice of actions will appear but choose ‘Embed’ from the list.
A dialog box will appear with a field where you can paste the link of the Public URL of the calendar you want to embed. Then click the ‘Embed link’ button.
The Google Calendar is now embedded inside a Notion page. It is important to remember that this Test Calendar is only for viewing in Notion. Users cannot edit this calendar and expect that the original Google Calendar will also get updated.
Although this is not the perfect integration, there are some actions allowed with this Google Calendar embed in Notion. By default, the size of the calendar may not be the right size. Users can simply click and drag the calendar by its sides to be more viewable.
Also, users can choose from Month, Week, or Agenda views that shows the different events saved in the calendar. A calendar print preview is also available, which when selected brings up a print dialog pop-up window.
At the moment, this is the extent of the functionality provided by embedding Google Calendar into Notion. It is limited in functionality and includes the risk of exposing information in the calendar to the general public.
How to Embed Google Calendar into Notion via Plus Add-on
A better way to embed Google Calendar into Notion is through a third-party application called Plus. Plus is a smart tool that can take self-updating images or snapshots of any app or website. Users can then embed these snapshots into document editors like Notion. It has a free plan that allows for up to 5 snapshots. The free plan includes two automatic refresh rate settings. The longer rate is 1 day (24 hours) and the more frequent rate is 6 hours. Premium plans refresh more frequently, as short as 1 hour.
The first step is to sign up for a Plus account. Users can choose to login with their Google account or with an email.
After successfully creating an account, go to Google Calendar. Users can choose to take a snapshot of a view that they would like to embed in Notion. This could be a weekly view, a daily view of multiple calendars, or any other important view used by the team working in Notion. The calendar does not have to be publicly available.
To take a snapshot, users need to install the Plus Chrome extension, so using Chrome or any Chromium-based browser is a must. On the Plus page at the Chrome webstore, simply click the ‘Add to Chrome’ button.
When you are ready to take a snapshot of your favorite view of your Google Calendar, click on the Plus extension on the Chrome toolbar. The Plus pop-up window will appear. You can click on the ‘Take Snapshot’ button to begin.
Click and drag a box on the area you want the Plus snapshot to cover. After creating the snapshot, a pop-up message will appear. It includes important information such as the title, location in Plus, and the refresh rate that you can customize to automatically occur or manually do. Other options are to view the snapshot from the Plus app, to copy the link, to take another snapshot, or to close the window.
For the purpose of embedding Google Calendar in Notion, click on ‘Copy link.’ Go to Notion and on the page you want to embed your Google Calendar view, type the command /embed.
In this example, we will embed our snapshot just below our Test Calendar page. Paste the link of the snapshot copied on the embed dialog box in Notion.
After clicking the ‘Embed link’ button, the snapshot of the Google Calendar weekly view now appears in the Notion page. Similarly, you can adjust the size of the embedded object for optimal viewing.
This second embed method using the free Plus add-on Chrome extension provides users more flexibility. Firstly, users do not have to make their Google Calendar available in public to see their calendar tasks and events in Notion. So, privacy issues are better handled.
Secondly, it can automatically refresh so that when users update their Google Calendar view, the embedded view in Notion gets also updated within the set refresh rate specified in Plus.
Users can set the refresh rate manually then click on ‘Refresh’ at the bottom of the embedded calendar to see updates as often as they want to. In this example, the Google Calendar was updated to close the pending task and show a recently added task. After the manual refresh of the Plus embedded calendar in Notion, which can take a few minutes, the calendar now shows the updates.
Advanced Google Calendar-Notion Integrations
More advanced Google Calendar integration into Notion is through Notion’s API, which is in beta. Third-party automation tools likes Bardeen, Unito, Zapier, and Notion Automations can provide advanced features like two-way sync and trigger-based updates. However, they are also more complicated to set up.
These tools try their best to be intuitive but successfully setting up advanced integration using API may require someone with technical or programming background. Some of the steps require knowing database fields and types, as well as successfully mapping one app’s field to the other app’s corresponding field. A misstep can result in a lot of confusion and frustration.
Ready to connect your Google Calendar with Notion?
Notion is a flexible database tool that allows users to create a variety of pages. But its calendar view is not yet at par with some of today’s calendaring tools like Google Calendar. Also, no native integration is available at the moment to create a seamless two-way connection between the two apps.
However, Notion’s embed feature together with Google Calendar’s share link functionality provide users a simple way of viewing calendar data in a Notion page. With free and easy-to-use browser add-ons like Plus, users have more options to get the information they need with the tools currently available.
