Sync Google Calendar With Windows 7 Desktop

By Nakodari on Oct 04 2009 33 Comments

After some great overall improvement, Microsoft made one stupid(I hate to say this but it is true) decision – removing Windows Calendar from Windows 7. Thus, stealing away the ability for users to sync their Google or Windows Live Calendar with their desktop.

Luckily, I came across a Windows Gadget called Windows Live Calendar Gadget developed for Windows 7 by user poulicek. It allows user to sync both Windows Live Calendar and Google Calendar(yes, it supports syncing of multiple calendars). Technically it supports any calendar in iCal format.

Now first head over to Google Calendar, hit Settings, and visit Calendars tab. Here, click the calendar that you want to sync.

Google Calendar

You will find a Private Address section at the bottom of the page. Click ICAL and copy the URL.

Private Calendar Address

Now install the Windows Live Calendar Gadget, go to Options, and paste the URL. If you have more than one calendars, you can paste the URL(one per line).

Windows Live Calendar Gadget Options

You can also choose when to check for changes and the number of displayed events. For now there is only one skin but the developer is working on more. Lastly there is an option to select the sound of alarm which will alert you when the event approaches it’s time.

In the screenshot below you can see how events are displayed. Clicking any event will show you the complete details, information such as, Summary, Location, Start/End Date & Time, and Description are easily viewable.

Google Calendar Event Windows 7

The events which have approached their date are highlighted while others are not. Click any date and it will take you to that day’s events.

Windows Live Calendar Gadget

You can also view the gadget in smaller size where only the events are displayed and the calendar is hidden.

google calendar windows 7

It is an excellent little gadget for Google Calendar addicts like me who love to keep an eye on the upcoming events.

Download Windows Live Calendar Gadget

It is developed only for Windows 7 but can run on Vista too. Enjoy!

  • Hassan

    Great tip! But could you please explain how to use this widget with windows live calender?

    • Nakodari

      Same usage. You just need to go to calendar settings and copy the URL of your calendar.

  • dazedboarder03

    Its a great gadget but it shows the times wrong. My google calendar and computer are both UTC +5 US Eastern, but it shows all my appointments 4 hours ahead (whats 8am is 12pm). Any ideas? Thanks

    • Nakodari

      This problem has been fixed in the latest release. :)

  • Bob

    Any way to make it bigger??? I love it, but it's way too small.

  • Matt

    i don't understand, i download the gadget in zip form, use win rar to unzip then no install file or anything. how do i load the gadget in the first place? please help i really want this

  • Matt

    windows 7 by the way, sorry. and im talking about the windows live calendar gadget, dont understand how to open in.

    • Nakodari

      The gadget is downloaded in .zip format by some browsers. What you need to do is to remove the .zip format and hit Enter. Then double-click the gadget and it will automatically get installed.

  • matt

    you a legend. thanks mate works fine

  • matt

    you a legend. thanks mate works fine

  • matt

    you a legend. thanks mate works fine

  • mariano

    Is there anyway in the Windows Live Calenda to double click in a specific day and create an event?

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  • Cameron

    So the calendar has to be public? You can't add credentials to the gadget?

  • Urvesh

    Great Gadget ! the one that i required badly u can say !

  • Urvesh

    is there any such gadget that can be linked to ‘google notebook’ ?

    • DA

      Yeah, it would be more useful to me too!

  • Kevin Hickey

    Keep getting 404 error cannot load calendar–do i have a setting wrong?

    • Kevin Hickey

      Never mind. Got it by using Private Address. Sorry.

  • ceejay

    It would truly be awesome if you could add/edit events through this gadget. But I guess then you would need to sync 2-way instead of 1-way. I can imagine that would be harder to implement. Does anyone know of any 2-way syncing google-calendar desktop gadgets?

  • Egizas

    is there any way to sync this widget 2-way

  • http://www.future-chall.com Mohammad

    The installation went fine and the calendar is now synced with my Google Calendar.

    Thank you
    Regards,
    Mohammad
    Computer Science student
    Saudi Arabia

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  • ELLEN LOW

    REALLY WANTED THIS GADGET! MANY THANKS FOR YOUR CLEAR INSTRUCTIONS!

  • david

    Thank you so much for this great tip. I use Google calendar but didn’t want to install Google desktop just to get the Google calendar gadget. Works great as a 1-way viewer of upcoming events. If you want to add new events then you still need to go into Google calendar via the web as far as I can tell.
    I appreciate you sharing these great tips

  • bernd

    great, works perfect !

  • Jai9100

    Thank you so much, this is just what I’ve wanted since I switch back to Win7.

  • niclas

    i heared 2-way syncing works with google desktop. but im afraid of installing that…
    does somebode know the problem, that the gadget shows appointments, that are removed long time ago in google calendar? i removed one appointment out of a series. but the gadget keeps on showing them… how can I trust in such a programm?!?

  • Janice

    How come it doesn’t show the full calendar on top? It’s just on the small gadget view – calendar is hidden. There is no option in the “Options” to show calendar above the items. It only shows one week.

  • andy

    Excellent tip! Just what I needed.

  • Silke

    I have the same problem as Janice.
    Only one week shown.

  • Debi

    Thank you for this tutorial! I followed it exactly and it works just like it’s supposed to! Thank you!!! I saved my life!

  • Anja

    Thank you so much for this tutorial. I didn’t manage before to synchronize this calendar with Google’s calendar :-)

  • Edwin

    It would be nice if I could write event in gadget and it appear in google calendar

  • G-MONEY

    Can anyone help me with this Error 404 could not load calendar https://www.google.com/calendar/ical/ghernbone81%40gmail.com/public/basic.ics

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