WhenIsGood, Doodle and Calendly all answer the same question, "when can we meet?", but they answer it in different ways. WhenIsGood is a free availability grid with no account. Doodle sells group polls and booking pages per seat. Calendly is a booking link tool that also has meeting polls on its free plan.
To compare them properly we created a WhenIsGood event, answered it as four invitees and read the results page. Doodle and Calendly plans and prices come from their own pricing pages and help centres, read in October 2026.
Short answer. Use WhenIsGood when you need a quick "paint your free hours" poll with zero sign-up and zero ads. Use Doodle when the same poll needs deadlines, reminders, hidden participants or a booking page, and you accept a per-seat price. Use Calendly when people should book a slot on your calendar, with group polls as an occasional extra. If customers should book paid appointments on your own WordPress site, none of the three is built for that. Booknetic covers it, and the section below explains where it fits.
The tools at a glance
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What WhenIsGood is and how a poll works
WhenIsGood is a one-page tool. You paint the hours you could meet on a grid, send a link, and invitees paint the hours they can make. The results page shows the overlap. There is no sign-up form, no password and no app.
The site has looked the same for years. In our test a banner at the top said "We're making changes! Don't worry - only good things." The tool worked normally underneath it.
How to make a WhenIsGood poll
Open whenisgood.net and click get started . The grid shows three weeks, 6am to 9pm, with 8am to 6pm highlighted as office hours.
Pick the resolution: 15 minutes, 30 minutes, 60 minutes or whole days. Drag the slider to change the grid size.
Paint the slots you propose. Click SHOW OPTIONS to change the date range, hide weekdays, set a custom invitation URL, add an intro text or hide dates from invitees.
Tick Use timezones if invitees sit in different countries. Each invitee then sees the slots in their own time.
Type an event name and click CREATE EVENT . You get a seven-character results code, an invitation link, a results link and an edit link. Write the code down: without an account it is the only way back to your results.
What invitees see and how results work
Invitees open the link, switch between a grid and a list view, paint their free slots, type a name and an optional comment, and send. They get a personal update link to change their answer later. The organiser's results page lists respondents from most to least flexible, colours the slots everyone can make green and marks near misses with small red dots. Clicking a slot opens a report with an iCal file. The Options column offers more invites, a manual response, event editing and an Excel export.
Price Free, no paid tier, no ads (stated in the FAQ)
Account Optional; login by a six-digit email code, no password
Resolution 15, 30 or 60 minutes, or whole days
Time zones Optional toggle; auto-detected per invitee
Calendar iCal export of the chosen slot only; no live sync
Export Excel export from the results page
Language Date and time formats switch; the interface stays English
Pros and cons below come from our own test event.
Fastest setup of the three: a poll with six slots took under a minute and no sign-up.
No ads, no upsell screens and no participant limit that we could find.
Time zone handling, a custom invitation URL and hidden dates are all free options.
The results page shows flexibility order and near misses, which Doodle's free poll does not.
No reminders, no deadlines and no calendar sync for availability. You chase people yourself.
Lose the results code without an account and the event is gone for you.
The interface is dated. In our test the invitee grid rendered unevenly on a desktop browser, and the share button still points to Twitter.
No booking page, so it cannot replace Calendly for client appointments.
WhenIsGood has no paid plan and no published roadmap. If a team depends on it, keep an export of important polls and have a fallback such as Doodle or Rallly ready.
Doodle: group polls plus booking pages
Doodle started as a group poll tool and now sells four things: group polls, booking pages, 1:1 invitations and sign-up sheets. The Free plan gives one of each (three basic sign-up sheets) and shows ads to organisers and participants. Pro removes the limits and the ads, and adds deadlines, automatic reminders, hidden participant details, custom branding and Zapier. Team adds an admin console, roles, co-hosting and booking on behalf of colleagues.
Free One group poll, one booking page, one 1:1, three basic sign-up sheets; ads
Pro USD 15 per seat per month billed monthly; yearly billing is shown as 26% less
Team USD 21 per seat per month monthly, USD 16 yearly; two seats minimum; cheaper from 6 and from 21 seats
Enterprise From USD 15k per year, for 50+ employees, with SSO and a 99.9% SLA
Calendars Calendar connection and Stripe payments listed on every plan
Ratings 4.8/5 on G2 and Capterra, 4.1/5 on Trustpilot, as shown on Doodle's pricing page
We did not run a paid Doodle account for this update. The points below come from Doodle's plan pages and help centre and from public reviews.
One account covers polls and a booking page, so a consultant can run both from Doodle.
Deadlines, reminders and hidden participants on Pro solve the "nobody answered" problem that WhenIsGood leaves to you.
The Team plan handles roles, co-hosts and booking on behalf, which neither WhenIsGood nor Calendly's Standard plan offers in that form.
The Free plan is one poll at a time with ads, so a second open poll means paying.
Pro is priced per seat, and the yearly Pro price did not render on the pricing page in our checks; only the monthly USD 15 did.
Reviews mention ads and upsell prompts on the free plan, and Doodle's Trustpilot score sits below its G2 and Capterra scores.
Calendly: booking links first, polls as a side feature
Calendly is built around a booking page: you set your availability, share a link, and people pick a slot that lands on both calendars. Group scheduling exists as "meeting polls and one-off meetings", and the comparison table on Calendly's pricing page lists them on every plan, including Free.
Free One event type, one calendar connection, unlimited one-on-one meetings, meeting polls, browser extension
Standard $12 per seat per month monthly, $10 yearly; unlimited event types, six calendars, reminders, Stripe and PayPal
Teams $20 monthly or $16 yearly per seat; round robin, lead routing, Salesforce
Enterprise From $15k per year, 50 seats minimum
AI add-ons Notetaker and Callie on Standard and Teams, English only
Ratings 4.1/5 on Trustpilot from 714 reviews
Pros and cons here are based on Calendly's plan pages and public reviews, not on a new paid test.
The Free plan already covers one booking link with unlimited meetings and meeting polls, enough for a freelancer.
Reminders, payments and six connected calendars arrive on Standard, which keeps no-shows and double bookings down.
Teams adds round robin and routing, which Doodle only approaches with its Team plan.
A meeting poll in Calendly is a side feature. It has no availability grid, so large "paint your hours" polls are clumsier than on WhenIsGood.
Every host needs a paid seat on Standard and above, so a five-person team pays five times.
Reviews mention that advanced features sit behind the Teams tier and that support on Free is self-serve.
Booknetic: when customers should book you on your own site
None of the three tools above is built for a business that takes paid appointments on its own website. That is the job of Booknetic , a WordPress appointment booking plugin. The booking widget walks the customer through location, staff, service, optional extras, date and time, their details, a cart with the price and a coupon field, and confirmation. The admin handles staff schedules, services, locations, reminders and follow-ups, and the data stays on your site, not on a vendor's servers.
Type WordPress plugin for appointment booking; no group polls
Free version Yes, from booknetic.com, with limits and a branding bar
Paid from $45 per year on Basic ($89 regular), lifetime from $99
Calendar sync Google Calendar and Outlook two-way, as add-ons from Standard
Payments 10 gateways as add-ons, including Stripe, PayPal, Square and WooCommerce
Video Zoom and Google Meet links as add-ons
Booknetic was installed and booked end to end for our WordPress plugin roundup, so these points come from a real install.
Staff, services and locations in one booking flow, with deposits, coupons and payment at the cart step.
A flat licence per site instead of a price per seat, so a five-person salon pays once.
Automated reminders and follow-ups are part of the workflow engine, not a higher tier.
It does not do group polls. For "when can we all meet?" you still want WhenIsGood or Doodle.
It needs a WordPress site rather than a hosted sign-up.
Calendar sync and most payment gateways are add-ons, included from the Standard plan.
Best for: salons, clinics, studios and agencies that book several staff members across services and locations and want reminders automated. See the Booknetic pricing page for the plan matrix.
WhenIsGood vs Doodle
Both do the group poll. The difference is what happens around it.
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Verdict. For a one-off poll with friends, a class or a volunteer group, WhenIsGood wins: no account, no ads, no limit. For a recurring work poll with people who need nudging, Doodle Pro earns its price with deadlines and reminders. If you only ever need one poll open at a time and can live with ads, Doodle Free also works.
WhenIsGood vs Calendly
These two rarely compete for the same job. WhenIsGood finds a time for a group. Calendly lets one person at a time book you. The overlap is Calendly's meeting poll, which proposes a handful of slots and lets invitees vote. It works, but it has no painted grid and no near-miss view, so a 20-slot poll for 15 people is easier on WhenIsGood.
Verdict. If people book you, use Calendly, and its Free plan covers the occasional poll. If you organise meetings for a group and nobody books you, WhenIsGood costs nothing and asks nothing. Many people use both.
Doodle vs Calendly
The Doodle and Calendly match-up, with When2meet added, is covered in detail in our When2meet vs Doodle vs Calendly comparison. The short version: Doodle is the better poll tool, Calendly is the better booking tool, and both charge per seat once you leave the free plan.
WhenIsGood alternatives
If WhenIsGood's dated interface or its missing reminders put you off, these are the closest replacements, with prices read on each vendor's site.
When2meet is the closest match: a free availability grid with no account, a donate button and a third-party ad banner under the grid. Our guide to When2meet alternatives compares it with business tools.Rallly is an open-source poll tool you can self-host. The hosted Hobby plan is free with up to three open polls and 30-day retention; Pro is $6 per seat per month billed yearly.Doodle is the paid upgrade path: the same poll idea plus deadlines, reminders and a booking page.Calendly meeting polls cost nothing on the Free plan and make sense if you already use Calendly for bookings.Booknetic is for a different job: if customers should book paid appointments on your WordPress site, a booking plugin replaces the poll entirely. Our Doodle alternatives for WordPress and Calendly alternatives for WordPress guides cover that route.
Which one should you use?
A one-off group meeting, no budget: WhenIsGood.Recurring team polls that need deadlines and reminders: Doodle Pro.Clients or candidates booking slots with you: Calendly Free to start, Standard once you need reminders or payments.A poll tool you can host yourself: Rallly.Paid appointments on a WordPress site: a booking plugin such as Booknetic rather than any of the three.
How these tools were checked We created a WhenIsGood event on 25 October 2026 with six proposed slots, answered it as four invitees through the grid and list views, and read the results, edit and update pages. Doodle's plans and prices come from doodle.com/en/premium and the Doodle help centre. The yearly Pro price did not render during our checks. We quote only the monthly figure and the stated yearly discount. Calendly's plans come from calendly.com/pricing with both billing toggles. Rallly and When2meet were read on their own sites. Ratings are quoted from the vendors' pages or from Trustpilot on the same day. Prices change; check the vendor before you buy.
FAQ
Is WhenIsGood free? Yes. The FAQ on whenisgood.net states that everything is free with no adverts, and we found no paid tier or upgrade page on the site.
Do I need an account for WhenIsGood? No. You create an event, get a results code and three links, and that is it. An optional account logs you in with a six-digit email code and keeps your events on a dashboard.
WhenIsGood vs Doodle: which is better for a group poll? WhenIsGood for a quick free poll with no account and no ads. Doodle when you need deadlines, reminders, hidden participants or more than one open poll, which means Pro at USD 15 per seat per month billed monthly.
Does Calendly have something like WhenIsGood? Yes, meeting polls. Calendly's pricing page lists meeting polls and one-off meetings on every plan, including Free. They propose a few slots for a vote rather than an hour-by-hour grid.
Can WhenIsGood sync with Google Calendar? Not for availability. Once you pick the winning slot on the results page, you can download an iCal file and add it to Google Calendar, Outlook or Apple Calendar.
Is WhenIsGood shutting down? The site shows a banner that says changes are coming and asks users to report issues by email. There is no shutdown notice, and event creation, responses and results all worked in our test.
Can Booknetic replace Doodle or Calendly? For bookings, yes. Customers pick a staff member, a service and a time on your WordPress site and pay at the cart step, which is the Calendly job without a per-seat price. For group polls, no. Booknetic has no "paint your free hours" poll, so WhenIsGood or Doodle still handle that.
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