But Calendar’s conflict reminders can actually be annoying when the conflict is an all-day event like someone’s birthday. Using Siri to make Calendar events will also check for conflicts, while Fantastical didn’t notify me of a conflict when I added a coffee date at the same time as the WWDC keynote. The Calendar app can’t parse generic items like “lunch” or “dinner,” so Siri will insist you give an exact time, while Fantastical’s engine will automatically schedule lunches for noon and dinners for 6pm. Using Siri to add things to Apple’s own Calendar app is a little more robust, but also more finicky. In my tests, it worked pretty well, but if it gets something wrong, there’s no way to really edit it. The app will parse your spoken phrase into an appointment-sometimes it wouldn’t work until I pressed Done at the top-right of the Siri screen. Tapping that will bring up a Siri screen, and you just speak your next appointment.įantastical 2 lets you add events from your Apple Watch, and it parses words like “lunch” into exact times, which Apple’s Calendar app can’t do.

Force-touch the screen in the Fantastical app to get the Add Event button. Fantastical also uses Siri to get this done in-app. Apple’s built-in Calendar app only lets you view appointments, not make new ones, although you can always hold down the Digital Crown and add new items to your calendar with Siri. My favorite thing about Fantastical 2 on the Apple Watch is that you can add new appointments right from your wrist. From here, you can choose to show maps of your events’ locations, whether you tapping the Glance to open your next appointment in the Apple Watch app or your whole list, and other small tweaks. But then you also have to launch Fantastical 2 on the iPhone, tap the gear icon in the upper-left, and look for the new Apple Watch settings. Updating to version 2.3 adds the Apple Watch app-you have to add the app, and optionally its Glance, to your Watch with the Apple Watch app for the iPhone. The $5 iPhone app, which syncs to Fantastical 2 for the Mac (or the original Fantastical, which is no longer for sale but still works fine), lets you enter events and appointments into your calendar by just typing a sentence, “Lunch with Leah at Super Duper on Friday,” and tasks by entering sentences like, “Todo pick up ice for the party.”

Fantastical 2 for iPhone got an update Wednesday to version 2.3, including the natural language calendar’s companion app for Apple Watch. The first batch of Apple Watch apps were pretty underwhelming, but some diamonds are starting to emerge from the rough.

Fantastical apple watch