We might earn a fee from hyperlinks on this web page.
Once I first realized of the Skylight Calendar, I assumed it as a household instrument. In spite of everything, these sorts of gadgets that combination calendars and to-do lists, just like the Fireplace Show, usually promote to households as a option to keep organized. However I stay alone and use my Skylight every single day, and I discover it spectacularly helpful even with out youngsters.
The Skylight is a digital hub meant to assist manage your life, and whereas the corporate additionally has digital image frames, the Skylight Calendar is probably the most helpful: It’s a calendar aggregation instrument, to-do checklist, and dinner planner, together with being a digital image body. The Skylight Calendar appears to be like like a cross between a pill and a framed image, and it is available in a typical 15-inch model or gigantic 27-inch Max model that you could mount in your wall vertically or horizontally with a easy clamp.
The Skylight’s show has a sequence of tabs on the left that scroll via its principal capabilities, an important being the calendar, to-do lists, and pictures. You may set a default display screen by tapping the top-left menu and selecting the view you’d desire. You may also arrange hours to your Skylight Calendar to sleep by tapping the menu and choosing “Sleep Mode.” I set mine for 11 p.m. to five a.m., however a easy faucet will all the time wake the show, and I have not needed to double faucet or await the display screen to reply from lag.
The Calendar performance is one of the best a part of Skylight Calendar
Credit score: Amanda Blum
The calendar is definitely probably the most practical a part of the Skylight. You may pull in your present Google, iCal, Outlook, Cozi, or Yahoo calendar, and so they can seamlessly sync to your Skylight transferring ahead. You may pull in a number of calendars from a number of sources too, every coloration coded, so you may select totally different colours for various members of your loved ones (or if you happen to’re single like me, use coloration coding to distinguish work duties from dwelling). You may also enter customized occasions immediately into Skylight, however I believe most individuals don’t do this since most of us have already got digital calendars elsewhere, and there’s not a lot you are able to do with a Skylight calendar besides see it in your app or show.
The Skylight Calendar can be a digital image body
Credit score: Amanda Blum
The market is filled with digital image frames just like the Aura and Pexar, and there are household administration hubs just like the Fireplace Show that additionally permit you to add customized pictures. The Skylight Calendar walks the road between the 2: It is a shared calendar and planning instrument, however it’s nonetheless a digital image body (in case you have a subscription to the Professional plan), and Skylight encourages you to share photos with different customers. Folks can ship pictures to you utilizing the app if they are a shared person, or they will electronic mail the photographs to your designated Skylight electronic mail tackle. Because the administrator, you may then select which photos you need to present in your Calendar. As long as the show is ready to pictures, your Skylight will scroll via no matter is authorized.
I used to be a bit of perplexed by the thought of sending Skylight pictures by electronic mail, however in actuality, the Calendar isn’t meant to be cutting-edge tech. In case you’ve obtained older mother and father or kinfolk who don’t need one other app, an electronic mail is simply a better option to ship photographs. My pals with and with out Skylights nonetheless ship me photos of their youngsters, and in return I ship them photos of no matter I am cooking and of my doberman in onesies. On this manner, I just like the Skylight as a cheaper hub that may be accessible to exterior household and pals.
Find out how to use Sidekick for process, chore, or occasion uploads
Credit score: Amanda Blum
Skylight has a characteristic known as Sidekick (with the Professional Plan subscription), which may take any picture of textual content—a cookbook recipe, college flyer, or typed checklist, for instance—and add it to the suitable Skylight class. You may import occasions, plan meals, and to-do lists from PDFs, emails, or photographs, and it shocked me how effectively it really works. I can take photos of my to-do checklist from ToDoist, and Sidekick transcribes them to separate duties on my Skylight. It is not technologically ahead, however it works. I additionally had my good friend ship me her most aggravating PTA flyer, and Sidekick obtained the occasion identify, date, location, and particulars correct.
You may also use Sidekick as a microphone to inform Skylight about your occasion, to-do checklist, or recipe. I’d desire that Skylight sync with my voice assistants like Siri and Google Assistant so I may add issues rapidly to lists, however it’s just a few swipes to entry the Sidekick instrument and add gadgets to a grocery checklist.
You may create customized Skylight lists
Credit score: Amanda Blum
Skylight affords a number of methods to customized to-do gadgets. You may make as many lists as you want, from buying to to-do lists, with a number of notable limitations: subtasks aren’t accessible, you may’t reorder duties, you may’t assign deadlines, and you may’t assign a process to a selected person like you may with a Fireplace Show. I nonetheless discover these easy lists usable, however if you happen to’re in search of one thing extra practical, you’ll should look elsewhere or use the “Chores” characteristic.
Chores are reusable, assignable lists
Though the identify implies a option to farm out duties to youthful relations, Chores is definitely the practical process checklist. You may create chores and assign them to members of your loved ones, assign deadlines, make it recurring if wanted, and assign a reward worth for the duty (Skylight calls these “stars”). You may entry Rewards in a separate tab in your app and assign them, let customers redeem them, or take away them.
Once more, this isn’t as practical as, say, Asana or ToDoist—you may’t break chores out to separate lists, solely particular person chores, and I query why “Lists” exists when it’s a much less practical model of Chores—however you may select how these instruments match your loved ones. Maybe my best annoyance is that you could’t use Sidekick on Chores, so you may’t import lists or add to them on the fly via the microphone.
Find out how to create meal plans together with your Skylight Calendar
Credit score: Amanda Blum
The Skylight meal planning instrument (with a Professional Plan subscription) can take your preferences under consideration and plan a complete menu round them. (I used to be curious how effectively the meal planner would work round my preferences given that you simply inform the planner your preferences in a plain textual content field, so I entered, “I do not like oatmeal,” and it eliminated all of the steered oatmeal breakfasts from my planner.) You may add your individual recipes, use Sidekick to add photos of your favourite ones, or save Skylight recipes you to your recipe field. You may also simply add the deliberate meals to your grocery buying checklist. Whereas I can see this being an amazing household instrument, I prefer it as a instrument for myself, a single particular person. There are legions of devoted meal planning apps, and a lot of them are most likely higher than Skylight, however it’s a pleasant characteristic to have in a complete organizational instrument.
My greatest frustration with the Skylight Calendar
Once I obtained my Skylight a 12 months in the past, my greatest disappointment was that it had all this extra performance—from to-do lists to meal planning—however it didn’t permit you to combination from present apps like ToDoist, Asana, or any variety of meal planning apps. As a workaround, I discovered that almost all apps I take advantage of, together with ToDoist, will be synced to a Google calendar, which I then convey into my Skylight to stay on my calendar. I’d clearly desire to have these duties within the To Do tab of my Skylight, however I am going to have to attend till that performance is added.
How a lot does a Skylight Calendar value?
The Skylight Calendar runs $319.99 for the 15-inch model and the large 27-inch Max Calendar is $599 on backorder. Skylight affords an annual $39 subscription known as a Professional Plan. It is not required, however many of the above options, from utilizing pictures, its import instrument, and meal planning, are solely doable with the Professional Plan. The primary month of the Skylight Professional Plan is free although, so you may strive it out to see the distinction is significant for you.
Is the Skylight Calendar price it?
Most households are possible already utilizing apps for to-do lists, calendaring, and perhaps meal planning. In case you’re prepared to take a position $300 in a central household hub, Skylight will be incredible. I additionally suppose it is nice as one particular person: As an individual with ADHD, it’s invaluable. I’ve my calendar mounted in my rest room, so it is one of many first issues I see every morning and jogs my memory of my to-do gadgets and conferences every day. There are costlier household administration instruments on the market just like the Fireplace Show, however they will run virtually $600, and I am undecided if they provide double the performance.
