Problems with Fantastical. The newest version should be a Beta Release

Their software was not ready for release. Appointments going to the wrong date. Unable to add your calendars. And now this while trying to upgrade.

I should not have to spend 20 mins messing with my calendar app every time I want to use it.

Sync error (icloud) Error request failed with status code 403 while upgrading.

I would like 6 months added on to my contract for the time spent helping you debug your software that based on the problems that I have been having with an app that should still be in Beta testing.

OBTW This really sucks
f you’d like to send us a screenshot to illustrate your problem, submit your message and you’ll receive an email confirmation. You can then reply to that email and attach screenshots.

That means that when I get your email I am going to have to find the screenshots to recreate the problem. Can’t you just have an attach file option like all of the other apps.

Even their I am not a robot check failed to complete.

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I agree that with a subscription pricing the app should be much more polished. I like Fantastical and am ready to support development but if it’s not by far the best app in its class, that pricing is not earned.

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I have been having increasingly worse issues on the iPad app. Trying to finish adding an event or task would be difficult to complete. Then the app went into a totally frozen state. Nothing would get it back to normal other than reinstall. It was actually pretty trivial to get it up and running again…so that was a relief. Hopefully this was an oddball glitch…we shall see.

The non-subscription version is just fine for my requirements. I almost get an impression that they are “sulking” about their subscription fiasco months ago…LOL…and it “may” be showing in their decreasing reliability or lack of QA.

I’ll pile on here by noting that the watch app just doesn’t sync unless special magical conditions are met.

I deleted an all-day event on the current date from my phone or Mac the other day. Six hours later, I happened to look at my watch, and it was still showing on both the complication and the watch app. I think I had to force touch→force refresh.

I’m a paid subscriber. I still think it’s best in class, but agree, they need to fix things before I will let this subscription refresh in ten months or so.

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Same here. Force refresh does work, but I have to do it.
Speaking more broadly, it’s a mystery to me how certain Watch apps manage to refresh perfectly in the background (Carrot Weather and OmniFocus for instance) and some are still very bad at this (Fantastical).

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I avoid Fantastical on iPadOS or iOS – just using it on macOS because I was grandparented into the new features because I had an older license. On iPadOS and iOS I use Readdle Calendars 5 which is pretty stable for me – and since iCloud is doing all the calendar sync anyway I don’t need to depend on Fantastical. I never user calendars on my Watch – form factor is too tiny.

I subscribed on a monthly basis just because flexibits were getting a hammering on Twitter I thought largely undeservedly.

It is the best in class IMO and it’s the only one I could find that managed a drag and drop from OmniFocus correctly. I only use iCloud calendars and had no problems, but decided given the trivial number of appointments I actually have the sub was better used elsewhere.

Overall it seems to be a genuinely polished product in a lot of areas but has issues in others.

No problems with it for me. Using iCloud, Exchange, and Hover accounts with Fantastical on everything… Watch, Phone, iPad, MacBook Pro, iMac (x2). It’s all working very well. At least as far as I am taking it. I’m sure there are parts I don’t use.

Problems here too. Reminders going off an hour early all the time. Very hard to enter events on iPad correctly also.

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@SteveU75 did you get a reply from them on the 6 months extension? If they had good customer service they should give it to you.

Last year I bought Mindjet’s Mind Manager Mind Mapping Software (say that 4 times fast) I purchased Version 11 and one month later version 12 came out. I wrote them an email and they send me a free customer license key. This is a great way to get a customer for life.

Beta software should be labeled as such and I do not have time or get paid to debug other company’s software that is why I do not update to the latest version of MAC OS or IOS until at least 6 months after others who want to be first brazen the trail.

I gave up on Fantastical last week when it didn’t update an important event that I changed on the Mac. I missed the rescheduled appointment because it had not implemented the changes that I saved. All of this was only using the Mac app, not on iOS. The watch also never worked for me and would either be out of date or not display any events.

Therefore, I’ve lost faith in this app and will not risk it messing up another of my meetings. I have returned to the stock app which is at least reliable, and cancelled my subscription.

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Keep in mind that Fantastical ONLY reflects the state of Apple’s Reminders and Calendar apps. Time and time again, I see things missing in Fantastical, wrong date or whatever. Check the Apple app and THAT is the problem!! Their synch is very iffy these days.

This statement is simply not true (i,e, false), Fantastical can also work with calDAV backend, That’s how I use it myself. You don’t need Apple’s (crappy, non-standard) calendar implementation to use Fantastical.

It was a G-Suite account that was on the Flexibits cloud sync. Local calendars were disabled. It wasn’t using the Apple Calender sync at all, it was using Fantasical’s.

Well, it is merely what Fantastical support told me when I was having seeing sync issues a while after iOS 13 came out.

I am currently investigating BusyCal again (bundled with Setapp) and it’s ugly… but it does everything Fantastical does. And… for a one-time purchase (or a Setapp subscription). I was happy to support the Fantastical devs especially that the app is much cleaner, but I’m not paying 40 bucks a year for such a narrow margin between the two apps.

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but it is so ugly.

I really want to want to use it.

I feel you. On the Mac, I feel like it’s not doing a much worse job than many other apps, but on iOS, it’s a real pain (especially on iPad).
Since 2Do’s dev bought the app, and 2Do is reasonably pretty, I hope he will improve that!

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I give up. I tried Calendars 366 and BusyCal but Fantastical, despite its recent bugs, remains too polished and customizable. A calendar app is too vital for my workflow. It pains me to pay so dearly but I can’t do without it. However it’s going to be the first subscription I cancel the minute I find a better alternative…

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Same experience here. The new version is slow and resource-hungry, feels bloated. Didn’t upgrade and am a very happy BusyCal user ever since. Their natural language processing is actually not all that bad :wink: