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Fantastical Unifies Its Mac, iOS, and Apple Watch Calendar Experience With Weather, Tasks, Meeting Proposals, and More

boxermansr said:
They just released the update for iOS and it has not fixed the Apple Watch issue, I still get the red spinner.
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And my v2 features have not been restored for iPhone.

Guess I can try the nuclear option of erasing the phone and restoring from backup pre-v3 and see if things corrected, but too much a hassle and putting too much trust in Flexbits not further messing things up. Or totally paywalling v2 people down the road.

They're dead to me.
 
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Fantastical auto-updated on all my devices, and I started getting a slurry of requests to buy the paid subscription. Sooo...been searching for a new app the last couple of days.

I was reminded of GoodTask by a previous poster—looks like it is going to be my go-to app. It’s incredibly complicated, and their settings section could use a tremendous overhaul. But, I managed to get a view that I preferred, with all my reminders and calendar entries on a single scrollable page, with the red notification bubble on the home screen denoting how many reminders I have left to complete. 10 bucks goes to the developers, one time purchase, and applies to my ipad version. So long fantastical, you’ve been a rollercoaster ride.
 
Another update released - fixes watch issues, though I had to uninstall and reinstall on watch twice. Also seems we get no weather (not that I really care) like we do on the iOS app (all weather on the watch has the “premium” star/circle icon) so seems they want you to pay for -every little thing-.
 
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pdaholic said:
Fantastical auto-updated on all my devices, and I started getting a slurry of requests to buy the paid subscription. Sooo...been searching for a new app the last couple of days.

I was reminded of GoodTask by a previous poster—looks like it is going to be my go-to app. It’s incredibly complicated, and their settings section could use a tremendous overhaul. But, I managed to get a view that I preferred, with all my reminders and calendar entries on a single scrollable page, with the red notification bubble on the home screen denoting how many reminders I have left to complete. 10 bucks goes to the developers, one time purchase, and applies to my ipad version. So long fantastical, you’ve been a rollercoaster ride.
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I am checking out GoodTask as well. What I found fascinating is that, yes, it's a one-time $10 purchase but they also have a completely voluntary subscription model of $10 per year if you just want to support them.
 
So, a few thoughts after some time with the paid version (trial). It's very good. I just tried every other comparable calendar app out there - this is the best. If you're like me, calendar sets, templates, specific colour coding for appointments and the portrait week view are all things that I have no trouble paying for - even at $60 Australian dollars a year. I use my calendar every day and the added functionality saves me a ton of time.

That said, it's a hard sell for most people who just want a calendar. As one guy mentioned earlier, they need new pricing for people who just want things like more views. For those who want the more fancy pants things, have a higher tier.

To add fuel to the fire, the launch was done with good intentions I think, but mishandled. Data deleting bugs, a broken Apple Watch app and automatic updates with no proper explanation all add to the frustrations.

So, it's the best calendar app out there, marred by poor decisions and a disregard for their own customer's wishes.
 
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Glennster said:
Can I ask: what is wrong with the iOS stock calendar app...? What makes Fantastical so vastly superior?
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Nothing really for me. After years with Fantastical, I switched back to the stock macOS, iOS and watch OS Calendar apps this week when all this blew up. Quite adequate. I was always correcting the natural language input anyway. One of the reasons I switched originally to Fantastical was for reminders integration, but I ended up using Things3. I’ve got weather widgets on my devices that cover weather fine. I found myself often using the stock apps anyway for various reasons. Tapping the search window brings up a scrollable list of appointments. Tight integration within iCloud. Free. Good enough for me.
 
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dhoughal said:
German users giving Fantastical 3 the finger.
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On turkish App Store it's down to 2.9 from 4.5 I believe and all last comments are 1 or 2 stars.

They deserved this.

You can't play with users and they are giving value to your app, not you. This downfall of Fantastical is well deserved and they should've either make a better research or don't act like a jerk when answering complaints.
 
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gr4z said:
I would of been happy with V3 and a ONE TIME price of £10-15. I am not paying a subscription for a calendar app which costs almost as much as Netflix! Pure greed from the developers.
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As a Fantastical user, I would have even gladly paid $40 for a greatly updated and non-subscription version 3, because I believe in supporting small developers who put their heart and loads of time into creating a superior and robust product.

But their recent move comes off to me as a stunt, and there's no way I'll support them or Fantastical going forward. Flexbits has lost my trust.
 
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citysnaps said:
As a Fantastical user, I would have even gladly paid $40 for a greatly updated and non-subscription version 3, because I believe in supporting small developers who put their heart and loads of time into creating a superior and robust product.

But their recent move comes off to me as a stunt, and there's no way I'll support them or Fantastical going forward. Flexbits has lost my trust.
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Yes fully agree.. I paid for Mac, iPad and IOS version 1 and Version 2.. Would have muttered to myself about the cost of the upgrade but would have paid it to support the developer, etc.. However I would have liked the choice..

I can't keep using version 2. It's gone and so am I.
 
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They can avoid all of this by just leaving v2 in the app store for users who purchased and not anchoring v3 to it so we get the "App Update" message in AppStore. v3 should be a separate app. With this fiasco, Flexibits has shown that they are not in the same league as Omnifocus or 1Password.
 
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Just tried, and then bought, Calendar 366. I like the list view and now I’ve got it back. No subscription needed.

The watch complication now can show the full month grid, something the stock app can’t do. I requested that from Fantastical a long time ago, was told they’d add it, and they never did.

Guess that development time went to this BS pointless subscription instead.
 
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Buran said:
Just tried, and then bought, Calendar 366. I like the list view and now I’ve got it back. No subscription needed.

The watch complication now can show the full month grid, something the stock app can’t do. I requested that from Fantastical a long time ago, was told they’d add it, and they never did.

Guess that development time went to this BS pointless subscription instead.
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I bought Calendar 366 as well. The watch app is decent and does show month, which I like. I am so-so about the iPhone app. I have until 2/11 to decide if I want to subscribe to F3. I really like Fantastical. I do have Calendars 5 but, haven’t been impressed with it for a good while.

Too bad Flexbits doesn’t offer a lifetime price of $100. I would jump on that purchase.
 
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Spaceboy88 said:
Their notification center widget is also amazing, being able to see your calendar on different days directly within the widget. Honestly, if iOS added those two features, Fantastic would be removed from my phone.
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This is what I paid my €4.99 for, aye. I don't use the Mac app, I don't even have a Watch. Bundling all three is perhaps the most ridiculous part of it. I bought the widget and the integration of reminders and events all on one scrollable list.

I switched off the auto-updates, but I think I'll just look into alternatives, I don't like having auto-updates off just because of Fantageddon. Too bad I bought v2 two weeks before they came out with v3. Judging by how the new app is scoring so far, they might need that €3.50 or so more than I do.
 
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