Skip to main content

Public Availability Calendar

Let prospective clients see which dates are open before they ever reach out.

What is the Availability Calendar?

The Public Availability Calendar is a view-only, day-level calendar that shows prospective clients which dates your venue has available and which are already booked. You can:

  • Embed it on your own website

  • Show it inside your HoneyBook lead form

  • Share it as a direct link with leads

It displays a simple month grid marking each day as available or unavailable.Client names, event details, and booking information are never shown to your clients, so their privacy is fully protected.

The Public Availability does not replace the Scheduler. Scheduler is for booking specific time slots (like venue tours), while the Public Availability Calendar is for displaying the availability of event dates.

đź’ˇ Why it matters

Prospective clients often reach out just to ask "is my date open?" before they're seriously considering booking. That back-and-forth takes up admin time and often leads nowhere. The Public Availability Calendar lets them check the open dates themselves, so the inquiries that do reach you are from clients who already know your venue is free to book for their desired date.

Who can use it

  • Available to venues that haven’t set up Spaces. If you already have Public availability and add Spaces later, you’ll keep the calendar you already have.

  • Currently manageable only by the Account Owner

How it works

Staying up to date automatically

Public availability is auto-synced with your HoneyBook booked projects, but only while a project is set to Busy. A date blocks as soon as a project with that event date is marked Busy, and opens back up if the project is removed or switched to Free. There’s no manual upkeep required. Learn more in Set your availability for project dates in HoneyBook.

The calendar is always live so there's no separate toggle to turn it "on." Whether prospective clients ever see it is entirely up to you. It's only visible if you choose to embed it, share the link, or add it to your lead form.

Manual control over what shows

While the calendar automatically updates based on booked projects, you can manually override any date in either direction:

  • Block a date that's open in HoneyBook but unavailable for another reason (a personal day off, an off-platform booking, maintenance, etc.)

  • Unblock a date to make a currently blocked day available again

A date tied to a booked project shows as unavailable only while that project is set to Busy. To open a booked date to clients, set the project to Free instead of trying to override it from the calendar — see Set your availability for project dates in HoneyBook.

Set recurring closed days

If your venue is closed on the same day every week (for example, “always closed Mondays”), you can set that once under Weekly availability rather than blocking each date individually. Need to open just one of those recurring closed days? Use Mark as available on that specific date.

Automatically branded

The calendar automatically picks up your brand colors from Company Settings, so it matches the rest of your public-facing pages without any extra setup. If you’d like a different look, open the Design tab to set a custom Calendar color and Background color, and use the Show company info toggle to control whether your company details appear.

Preview as client

Before sharing your calendar, use Preview as client to see exactly what prospective clients will see, in both desktop and mobile view.

Where to find it

Go to Calendar, then find the Public availability card in the side panel and select Manage. This opens Public availability as its own page, where you can view your calendar, make overrides, set Weekly availability, customize your branding, and get your sharing options.

Sharing your availability

You have three ways to put your calendar in front of prospective clients:

  1. Embed it on your website using the provided embed code, so visitors can check availability without leaving your site.

  2. Add the Public availability block to your HoneyBook lead form from the block list, so anyone submitting an inquiry can see your open dates first.

  3. Share a direct link with a lead over email, text, or social media.

What clients can & can't see

Prospective clients only ever see a month grid of available and unavailable days. They cannot see:

  • Client or contact names

  • Event details or descriptions

  • Any other booking information

The calendar only shows available vs. unavailable dates. It never explains why a date is blocked.

Still have questions? Feel free to send us a message by clicking the Question Mark icon on any HoneyBook page. Our team is always happy to help!

Related Articles