Calendar Settings (Understanding How Motion Works With Calendars)
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Note: This article assumes you've read "". If you haven't, we recommend starting there for foundational concepts.
One of Motion’s core value props is the ability to connect all of your calendars into one place, keeping your life streamlined and organized by seamlessly syncing with external calendars like Google, Microsoft Outlook, and iCloud. The ability to have all your schedules, responsibilities, and obligations sorted and prioritized in one place is an absolute productivity game-changer.
This article explains the difference between Motion’s bi-directional and uni-directional syncing with your external calendar(s), how each works in conjunction with tasks and events, and how to configure your calendars for the best and most efficient Motion experience.
Let's begin by explaining how the different calendar syncing works in Motion.
Bi-directional syncing ensures that event changes made in Motion are reflected in your external calendar and vice versa. This bi-directional synching strictly applies to events in your calendar and does not apply to tasks.
For example, if you create a meeting in Motion, it will automatically appear on your select calendar (Google, Microsoft, or iCloud). Similarly, if you add an event externally through one of your connected calendars, it appears in Motion.
Time Saved: by instantaneously providing real-time updates between Motion and your external calendar you save time by not needing to duplicate event information across platforms.
Streamlined Focus: You can rest easy knowing your Motion account accurately updates your event obligations and responsibilities in one place, allowing you to focus on your projects and tasks while simultaneously staying up to date with all your events.
Example Scenario: While working on a task in Motion, Hannah receives an update from a colleague requesting to schedule a meeting for 10 AM the following day. While working on her task in Motion Hannah quickly creates the meeting event in Motion. The meeting automatically appears on her Google calendar upon creation.
Result: The meeting time is synchronized in both Hannah’s Motion account and Google calendar.
Uni-directional syncing, on the other hand, applies specifically to tasks. Tasks created and scheduled in Motion can still sync to your external Google/Microsoft calendar(s), however, tasks created directly from external calendars (e.g., Google Tasks) won't sync back to Motion. Additionally, updates made to a Motion task in your external calendar will not update in Motion. Only task updates made from Motion would flow into your external calendar.
External calendar tasks typically lack key parameters that Motion’s AI requires to auto-schedule (e.g., deadlines and priorities). By keeping task syncing uni-directional, Motion ensures task scheduling integrity and prevents incomplete task data from affecting your algorithm scheduling.
Time Saved: tasks are automatically and seamlessly added to your external calendar from Motion allowing you to remain focused on your tasks and projects in Motion.
Streamlined Scheduling: by avoiding potential conflicts from tasks created externally with limited data, Motion’s algorithm continues to work effectively to provide you with the most efficient and productive schedule possible.
Example Scenario: You create a project milestone task in Motion, which then appears in your Outlook calendar. If you manually add the same task directly to Outlook to match your Motion schedule, it won’t reflect back in Motion, preventing duplication.
Motion uses Accounts, My Calendars, and Frequently Met With calendars to optimize scheduling. This section explains the purpose and function of each calendar type to help you configure Motion to best fit your productive preferences.
Accounts – External calendars (Google, Microsoft Outlook, iCloud Calendar) directly connected to Motion. This layer forms the foundation of event and task synchronization.
My Calendars – Personal, shared, or sub-calendars under your connected account that affect your availability. These calendars have been manually added to ‘My Calendars’ and are actively taken into consideration by Motion’s auto-scheduling algorithm.
Frequently Met With – External calendars from colleagues or collaborators that provide visibility of colleagues schedules for optimal planning.
Accounts are the primary external calendar providers linked directly to Motion (Google, Microsoft Outlook, iCloud Calendar). You have the ability to designate one of these calendars as your "Main Calendar", which serves as the default host for any events or meetings you schedule within Motion. Selecting a main calendar informs Motion which specific external calendar you would like to have taken into consideration for all uni-directional and bi-directional syncing. Note: While Accounts and My Calendars are similar, there are two primary distinctions between them: 1) Accounts dictates which emails on file can be deemed your Main Calendar 2) Sub-calendars cannot exist in 'Accounts' because all calendars in 'Accounts' are unified and can be authenticated by the email itself.
The Accounts section can hold a variety of calendars, allowing for the option switch main calendars in Motion, if need be. This allows you flexibility when balancing a variety of schedules, ensuring you are always up to date with your scheduling obligations internally in Motion and externally in your main calendar.
Emily has two calendars linked to Motion: "emily@gmail.com" (personal) and "emily@usemotion.app" (work). She has set "emily@usemotion.app" as her main calendar. As a result, all new events will automatically be added to her work calendar by default.
My Calendars includes all the calendars from your Accounts section, as well as any other calendars within those accounts that are unable to be set as your main calendar (e.g. Birthday and Holiday sub calendars).
The calendars saved in your My Calendars section are integral as they are the calendars in which an event's free/busy status will directly impact Motion's auto-scheduling.
Let’s revisit Emily's calendar configuration. She has her professional calendar, emily@usemotion.app, set as the main calendar, and her personal calendar, emily@gmail.com, in My Calendars.
Emily wants to schedule her family reunion on her personal calendar, even though her work calendar is set as her main calendar. By selecting emily@gmail.com as the host for the family reunion, Emily can keep her work schedule unaffected while managing personal events.
Frequently Met With calendars are external calendars shared by team members, colleagues, collaborators, or clients. While these calendars do not influence the auto-scheduling of tasks, they do give you seamless visibility into the schedules of those you work with regularly.
The Frequently Met With section provides a streamlined way to manage collaboration. By integrating shared calendars into Motion, you can easily display your colleagues schedule against your own to find time to meet or collaborate with them, without any impact on your own calendar’s scheduling.
This feature improves scheduling efficiency with collaborators and colleagues and helps you avoid potential scheduling conflicts when trying to coordinate with multiple participants.
Emily works with a colleague named Jill, who has shared her calendar, jill@usemotion.app with Emily. Emily saved Jill’s calendar under her Frequently Met With calendars allowing Emily to seamlessly view Jill's availability.
When Emily plans a meeting, she can toggle on Jill's calendar to displays Jill’s schedule and check for times of availability; ensuring she chooses a time when Jill is free to meet. Additionally, saving Jill’s calendar in the Frequently Met With section will not impact Emily's existing auto-scheduled tasks and events.
No, Motion only supports linking one unique email address at a time.
Tasks from Motion only sync to Google or Microsoft Outlook calendars. iCloud currently does not support task synchronization, so tasks will not appear in your iCloud calendar.
No, Motion automatically syncs all connected calendars, even if they aren’t listed under 'My Calendars.'
Deleting an event in Motion also deletes it from your external calendar (Google, iCloud, Outlook) as part of bi-directional sync.
Delays can happen if the external calendar provider (e.g., iCloud) has longer sync intervals—iCloud calendars may take up to 10 minutes to sync. In contrast, Google and Microsoft calendars sync instantly.
Yes, you can set a main calendar calendar under 'Accounts' to ensure Motion uses it as the default for event creation and task syncing. Simply click the 3 dots located to the right of the preferred calendar and click ‘Mark as main calendar.’
Yes, you can disconnect or disable specific calendars under 'Accounts' or remove them from 'My Calendars' to prevent them from affecting scheduling.
Learn more about displaying tasks externally by clicking [].
Learn more about meeting with teammates .