A Howbout alternative for groups that won’t all install an app

Howbout is an app for finding when your friends are actually free, by syncing your existing Google or Apple calendar and overlaying it against theirs. Howbout is app-only: there is no web version listed on its own site or its App Store page (howbout.app; App Store id1477248221).

Howbout+ adds extras for £3.99/mo or £39.99/yr, billed as a subscription. Howbout’s specific free-tier feature limits aren’t published clearly enough to state here, so this page doesn’t guess at them.

Because Howbout is app-only, every friend you want to coordinate with needs to install it too, before the overlay works. For a tight group that already shares an app, that’s a one-time cost. For a looser group, a family, a work team, an extended friend circle, that install step is exactly where plans stall: someone doesn’t download it, and the overlay is incomplete without them, which quietly defeats the whole point of an overlay in the first place.

That’s a different failure mode from "the tool is bad." Howbout does what it’s built to do; the problem is getting everyone onto it in the first place.

Junto runs in any browser, no install, on either side. The calendar owner creates it online; anyone invited opens the link, types a first name, and RSVPs Going, Maybe or Can’t, with no account.

A private calendar is free for up to 8 members. Past that, a one-time $4.99 plus tax unlocks the calendar with no member limit, paid once, no subscription. A public calendar (anyone with the link can view) has no member limit at all and stays free.

The trade for that simplicity: Junto doesn’t look at anyone’s existing calendar. It’s a calendar you build and share, not an overlay of calendars everyone already has.

Beyond the RSVP itself, a calendar comes with month and week views, an upcoming list, categories on events, who’s going shown on the event card, admin controls to remove a member or make someone else an admin, and a .ics download per event for anyone who wants that one date on their own phone calendar.

Moving a group off "find a time" mode and onto "here’s the schedule" mode is quick. Create a calendar, name it something the group recognizes, and add the events you already know are happening: a trip, a recurring hangout, whatever used to live in a thread of "when are you free" messages.

Share the single link in the group chat. Each person opens it, types a first name, and can RSVP right away, no download, no account screen, no waiting on the one friend who never finishes setting up a new app.

Be direct about this, because it’s the actual decision point: Howbout’s core feature is an availability overlay that syncs your real Google or Apple calendar and shows when your friends are genuinely free. Junto does not sync your personal calendar and has no availability overlay. It only knows about events you or your group add directly to the shared calendar.

If that overlay is the reason you use Howbout, Junto is not a replacement for it. Switching would lose the one thing Howbout is for. Junto is the right move when the actual problem is different: getting a group to see a schedule and RSVP without asking them to install one more app.

The comparison on the facts that are actually verified for each.

Anyone whose real problem is "when is everyone actually free," across calendars that already exist and are kept up to date. That’s the job Howbout’s overlay does, and Junto has no equivalent feature. If your friend group already has the app and finds real value in the overlay, there’s no reason to switch.

A group where the plan isn’t "find a free slot," it’s "here’s the schedule, who’s in": a trip, a recurring hangout, a series of events someone is organizing. And specifically a group where getting everyone onto one app has already been the sticking point. Nobody has built a direct Howbout alternative around this problem yet; Junto’s answer is a link that works the same for everyone, app or no app.

It also fits anyone who’d rather pay once than subscribe. $4.99 one time on the calendar that needs it, instead of a recurring monthly charge, changes the math for a group that only needs this for one season or one event series.

It also fits a group with mixed devices and mixed willingness to try new apps, since a browser link asks nothing of anyone’s phone. A parent, a grandparent, or a work contact who’d never download a niche scheduling app can still open a link and type their name.

These aren’t strictly either/or. A group could use Howbout among the core few who have it installed to land on a date, then share that date as an event on a Junto calendar so the wider group, including people who never installed Howbout, can see it and RSVP. Junto’s job starts once the plan exists; Howbout’s job is finding the plan in the first place.

Howbout asks for an app install and a real calendar sync from everyone involved, and in exchange it does something Junto can’t: tell you, automatically, when a group of busy people happens to be free at the same time. That’s a genuinely hard problem, and syncing real calendars is the only way to actually solve it.

Junto asks for almost nothing (a browser and a name) and in exchange gives up that automatic overlay entirely. It only knows the schedule someone builds by hand. That’s a fair trade when the group already knows roughly when things are happening and just needs a place to confirm who’s in.

The honest way to decide: if "when is everyone free" is still an open question, Howbout is doing real work that a plain calendar can’t replace. If that question is already answered and the remaining problem is getting a reliable headcount without an app fight, that’s where a link-based calendar wins. Most groups land somewhere in between across a year: some plans genuinely need the overlay, most just need a place to confirm who’s showing up.