Show the Start Time
Q: How do I show (or hide) the start time in the monthly calendar?
A: The times are visible or hidden based on the size of the calendar window. You can make the calendar window wider (or narrower) by moving the separator bar between the navigation pane and/or the To-do bar. In earlier versions move the bar separating the calendar window from the folder list or Taskpad.
Hide the Meeting Organizer
Q: How do I hide the Organizers name in a view?
A: Unfortunately, Outlook doesn't offer a way to hide the organizer's name in the Day/Week/Month view. You can add or remove the Organizer field from the table view. Because older versions of Outlook don't show the organizer's name in the day, week, or month calendar grid users aren't used to seeing the organizers name and as we all know, users hate change.
Update: Administrators can remove the organizers name from calendars in resource mailboxes. See Meeting Organizer's Name Appears in the Subject line for more information.
Change or Disable Schedule View
When I select a 5th calendar, the view changes to something different. Is there any way to view more than 4 calendars overlapped keeping them as when I overlap 2 or 3.
That "something different" is the Schedule View. It's supposed to make it easier to view a large number of calendars. By default, when you select 5 or more calendars, Outlook switches to the Schedule view. You can switch back to Month or a Day view on the View menu by choosing Month or disable Schedule view in File, Options, Calendar. If you like Schedule view, you can change how many calendars are selected before switching to or from Schedule view.
View Free appointments in Schedule View
A client preferred using Schedule view but thought it was “broken” because very few of his appointments were showing on it. A little investigation showed that most of his appointments were set to Free. By default, Schedule view only displays appointments that are marked Busy, Out of Office, Working elsewhere or Tentative.
If you use Schedule view and want to see Free appointments, you’ll need to enable the option for When in Schedule View, show free appointments if File, Options, Calendar. Or set your appointments to one of the Busy states.
See More Navigation Calendars
Q: How do I show more than one calendar in the navigation pane?
You can show more calendars side-by-side by pulling the separator bar inward. You'll need to move it a full calendar width for it to "stick". If you prefer to see the calendars stacked vertically, you'll need to reduce the items in the navigation pane, by removing calendars from the list or collapsing calendar groups, removing the Views selector, or increasing the height of the calendar window.
You can remove the views selector from the View menu. In Outlook 2007, its at Views, Navigation Pane, Current View Pane. In Outlook 2003, look for it at Views, Arrange By, Show views in Navigation pane.
You can increase the height of the calendar by maximizing the window, arranging toolbars on one row or closing them, and turning off the status bar (View, Status bar). Using a higher screen resolution helps also.
If you use the Taskpad or To-do bar, you can display more calendars on the right side of the screen by pulling the separator bar inward one or more calendar widths. Slide the separator bar in the taskpad up or down to show or hide calendars or change the number of calendars in the To-do bar by changing the options. Right click on the To-do bar title, choose Options and type in the number of months you want to display.
Whether the navigation calendars display in the navigation pane or taskpad/to-do bar is controlled by the Taskpad or To-do bar. If the calendars are visible on the right side they will now be visible in the navigation pane on the left.
If you can't see the taskpad (Outlook 2003 and previous versions), turn it on using the View, Taskpad menu.
How many navigation calendars can you display? It all depends on your screen resolution. I was able to display 48 navigation calendars on a high resolution screen in Outlook 2003's Taskpad, but only 35 in Outlook 2007's To-do Bar. Either way, it was at least 32 more than I really need to see.
See More Days in Outlook Today
How do I show more days in Outlook Today? When I select the "Customize Outlook Today" there is a selection for the number of days to be viewed but it only goes to 7 days.
You can edit the registry to show more appointment days in Outlook Today.
The number of days is stored in the following registry key and change the value of the CalDays string to a higher number.
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\xx.0\Outlook\Today
Don't forget to change the xx to the Outlook version number you are using.
If the registry entry does not exist, you'll either need to create it or customize Outlook Today and refresh the view in regedit. To see the changes in Outlook today, switch to another folder then back to Outlook today.
For more information about the registry values used by Outlook Today, see Editing Outlook Today
Jaime says
Hello Diane, I work mostly with Outlook Calendar, and in it I include phone numbers of my clients for easy access, rather than going back and forth to contacts to get that information. Is there a way to add a line where phone numbers could be placed uniformly?, in addition to Subject and Location?.
Thank you.
Diane Poremsky says
You can create a custome form and add a custom field to it. But it won't be included in the outgoing invitation. If it's always the same number, a custom form or template with the number (or other information) in the body would work.
lisa says
how can a put a title in each month on my calendar ie. Breast Cancer Awareness Month at the top
Diane Poremsky says
sorry, that is not possible to do.
Maria says
Hello, a recent update changed the order of which I view the calendars I manage. I check and organized the list in the order I prefer but then the calendars themselves shuffle to different orders. Please help.
Diane Poremsky says
You may need to reset the nav pane to fix it, but that resets everything on the navigation pane to default.
Are you caching shared folders? The usual reason Outlook rearranges folders is because the folders are not loaded in outlook when the nav pane is updated - the ones not available drop to the bottom. This happens most often with mail folders IMAP accounts, not delegated calendars.
kim schmittou says
Can I change the color of my calendars background for 2 days of the week? ie: It is pink M-F but I want it to show Green on Wednesday and Thursday only since those are days i`m in the office
Diane Poremsky says
No, not really. But if you create all day events marked busy and assign a category, the day will be colored.
If you want dark and bright, you can mark days as work days in File > Options > Calendar and the non-working days will be shaded darker.
Lamarr says
Why does the calendar list 12 AM and 12 PM? The correct names for those times are midnight and noon.
Diane Poremsky says
I don't recall anyone asking about it but assume because it's easier to do numbers in the scale and in appointments.
Debbi says
We have a similar situation to the last comment. The owner of our work calendar has left the company. We cannot share the calendar with others. How do we get around this problem. Do we have to create a new calendar? If so is there a way to transfer what is already on one calendar to another? Appreciate the help!
Madisyn says
The owner of one of our calendars is leaving the company. This calendar is extremely important as it is a shared calendar between all employees that highlights all of our events and meetings coming up. It is even shared with our owners. She has given me ownership of this calendar, but it still is listed under "People's Calendars", so when she leaves and her email is deactivated, will I still have full access to this calendar?
Charles Shaw says
When reviewing who will be attending a meeting, one my attendees comes up with a note indicating "no free/busy information could be retrieved" but I know he accepted the invitation.
Diane Poremsky says
That could mean his free/busy is not published, you don't have permission to access it, or there is problem with the free/busy server.
it could also mean he has 'working elsewhere' set on some appointments- that bug was supposedly fix about a year or so ago though.
Charles Shaw says
Thank you. I will check my free/busy option
Sandra Nicol says
Is it possible to change the Meeting Organiser of a recurring meeting? I am a temp who is leaving shortly and want to change the organiser as the booking as it runs on long after I leave. Please let me know.
Diane Poremsky says
No, unfortunately, you cannot change the organizer. Sorry.
Bill Lane says
We have a large format color plotter and I would like to be able to print an entire year on one sheet. While there would be some milestone dates, most of the calendar would be complete day durations lasting 3 to 30 days. Is this possible at this time?
Diane Poremsky says
Not using outlook's native features. An addin might be able to do it.
Natalie G says
When dealing with 4 or more appointments in each day how do I move an entry to appear in a different row? Can I set certain people / entries to always appear in a defined row?
Diane Poremsky says
No, entries are sorted by start time - if they all start at the same time, you'll have them all in one row. In month view, entires that are at the same time are displayed in order of creation.
Cynthia says
I want to be able to send meetings from my bosses calendar, as a delegate. But he doesn't want to see the replies. However, he does need to see original invites from others that he can accept or decline off hours
Janette Riebe says
Is it possible to have Outlook Calendar figure out 30 "Business" Days after a particular date?
Diane Poremsky says
No, not built in. If you needed this frequently, you could use a macro to get. It would even be able to take into consideration company holidays. A code sample is here - https://www.slipstick.com/developer/create-outlook-appointments-for-every-xx-weekday-using-vba/
Georgina says
Does anyone know how to print stacked, overlayed calendars in Outlook 2010? I can only get one calendar at a time.
Diane Poremsky says
Either the calendar printing assistant or this macro - https://www.slipstick.com/outlook/combine-outlook-calendars-print-one/
Mike says
IN Outlook 2016 is there a way to see who organized the meeting with out being invited?
Diane Poremsky says
It should be on the appointment - displayed after the subject in day/week/month views.
Are you a delegate of an attendee? Or is this on the resource calendar?
Jeff says
Is there any update to being able to hide the "Organizer" in the calendar view. I am simply trying to confirm that I am not missing any options to hide the organizer since this article is a few years old. We just upgraded to Office 2013 and this is a problem for us as well.
Diane Poremsky says
No, there is no update that will hide it in users calendars. it can only be hidden in resource calendars. Sorry.
dee says
In the outlook calendar, I want to view the enitre list of staff in a list, but when there are more than 4 staff, it goes into a drop down menu, rather than seeing it all.
Can i change that?
also the daily view and weekly view only give me a graph looking view, can't figure out how to do a list view.
thanks
Diane Poremsky says
The schedule view? you can change the count when it drops to schedule view in File, Options, Calendar. It's in Display options, about halfway down.
List view can be selected on View > Change View - but is only available for single calendars. It won't work in an overlay.
Teri Sullivan says
Is there a way to change the "show as" option for a meeting I organized for myself only? The attendees need it to show as "out of office" but I am not actually attending and need it to be "free" on my schedule. Is this possible?
Diane Poremsky says
After sending it, open the message and change the free busy then click the Save button in the QAT and close.
Amy says
Is there a way to hide months at a time from those who are viewing a shared calendar under a reviewer permission? We use the shared calendar at work to show vacation/PTO. However, we are trying to limit how far ahead the employees can view the requests of others without limiting the procedure of entering them on the calendar, for management purposes.
Thank you, Amy
Diane Poremsky says
No, sorry, you can't limit how far ahead a person can see on a shared calendar. If you published it as an ics to a WebDAV server (IIS servers support WebDAV, you could, but users would need to subscribe to it - its not as convenient as using the shared calendar directly.
Shawn Fitzpatrick says
Hi Diane,
I have to agree with the previous two posts. Rather than just saying we should accept senseless change, perhaps give us some justification for why needless change is beneficial, and why locking out ability to change settings makes sense.
Its also rather frustrating that its NOT just an Exchange based issue. How do we get rid of the organizer's name when you are running Outlook without Exchange???
Best regards,
Shawn
Diane Poremsky says
Unfortunately I didn't make the change and am powerless to change it back. Since it's not user configurable, you can accept it, revert to an old version, or complain. Complaining annoys coworkers and makes you look like a sour person... if you can't revert to an older version, you're left with accept it. Yes, it is frustrating and Microsoft is aware of complaints from users but I don't know if they will fix it. At this time, I'm not aware of any way to change it when you don't use Exchange. Sorry.
It was changed because enough people asked for it.
shari wylder says
I 100% agree, Shawn. So frustrated that I can't see the person's name on the calendars! I support multiple people who like to color code their appointments. I cannot tell who is who!!! It's a NIGHTMARE!
Diane Poremsky says
Are you talking about the calendar name or on the events on the calendar? Calendar names should either be 'calendar - name' or just 'name'
michelle applebaum says
oops - forgot to say, we're not exchange users. I am going to have to downgrade to the older outlook if I can't figure out how to do this - or go to google or something. thanks
Diane Poremsky says
Something is definitely wrong - I know what the problem is when this happens on Exchange but it should not happen in Outlook when exchange is not involved.
Diane Poremsky says
Hmm. I'm not aware of a problem like this when Exchange is not involved. You should see the Subject, location, organizer in that order.
michelle applebaum says
"while all users hate change" - I am 57 years old and even with 6-pt font, there are many meetings where all I can see is the name of the kid who sent me the meeting message, NOT the nature of the event. so that's not about change, it's about not being able to use my calendar online. Any ideas?
Diane Poremsky says
You should see the time, meeting subject, location, the organizer, and then other details in this format: time Subject organizer. All as space permits. If you see the organizer's name first, are you using Exchange server?
Ria says
can you let me know how can i create a group calender on my outlook with all users can modify the data on it?. this is for tracking for team members in my team those who works overseas.
Diane Poremsky says
Where will the calendar be kept - in your mailbox, in a public folder or a shared mailbox? People who only need to see the calendar will need read permission. Anyone who needs to be able to create appointments will need to have write permission. Basic instructions for setting folder permissions are here.
Ria says
can you let me know how can i create a group calender with all the users can modify the date on it?
Diane Poremsky says
You are using Exchange server? You need to give other users permission to create or change events on the calendar - you can use Default group if you want everyone in the organization to make changes. Right click on the calendar folder, choose Properties then Permissions.
This works best with a shared (group) mailbox that you can give permissions to the default calendar or a public folder. Sharepoint calendars are an option too - they can be opened in outlook too.
Tim Harris says
Hey Diane,
Is there anyway to increase the # of Appointments (currently I have 3) in the Calender section of the To-Do Bar?
Diane Poremsky says
Which version of Outlook? In 2007, you can set the # on the to-bar options. In 2010 its how much space is available - pull tasks bar down or remove the calendar.
Tara says
Some of team is working out of two different buildings. We are having scheduling conflicts because it's not obvious to the meeting scheduler WHERE people are. I frequently get back to back meetings that are in different locations. Is there a way to make it more obvious WHERE a meeting is located so that schedulers can make better decisions about meeting times? I don't typically add travel time to a meeting if it's in the building where i'm spending the day... so it's hard to pad my own schedule. thanks!
Diane Poremsky says
There is a location field in the appointment or you could add the location to the subject so its easier to see.
Jennifer says
Re: “As we all know, users hate change” in the above response regarding hiding the meeting organizer in the software….
While I know you were trying to make a joke, the truth is the comment is actually supremely irritating and a little too flip. I have nothing against change, but in this case, this "feature" has actually resulted in considerable confusion for my company.
For years, as a supervisor I have assigned "meetings" to the people who work for me that will appear on one of the company's public calendar. These meetings are for meetings out of the office that my employees will attend but that I usually do not attend. They are on a public calender because many people in different departments in my company need to know where these employees are and who is actually attending the meetings. Because my name now appears automatically on the calendar each time, however, it has led to confusion for everyone as to whether or not I am also attending.
Frankly, I don't need my name on literally a couple THOUSAND meetings that I will not actually be attending. Thus a product that we have used for well over a decade has now become a huge source of frustration and confusion and frankly far less useful than it was before.
Sincerely
Jennifer
Diane Poremsky says
The admin can remove the organizer name from meetings in resource mailboxes. See https://www.slipstick.com/exchange/cmdlets/meeting-organizers-name-appears-in-subject-line/ for the command the admin will run.
martha says
Hi Diane,
Re: "As we all know, users hate change" in the above response regarding hiding the meeting organizer in the software....
Sometimes the percevied benefit of those who are changing the software or make such comments do not take into consideration that some changes that might be preceived as benefits are not necessisarily bennefits at all to all or most users of the software. Sometimes information can be most extraneous informatoin since I already know whcich meetings I orginate and certainly know who the originator is without it having to be displayed on the calendar everywhere. This makes it a horrible feature when left no options. To not have the option to not turn off "the meeting originator". is making the product less useful to the many, quite obviously. Useful change is welcome. Options are even better. 2003 is cleaner and crisper by far when look at the calendar, both onscreen and printed, for key information. Meeting oridnator displayed all over the calendar is not useful and the comment above is not fair.
Sincerely,
Martha