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YearMap is built and optimised for schools in England and Wales and is free for educational institutions there. You sign in using an official institutional Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 education account. As long as you use your organisation's domain email, YearMap will not block access based on location — see our note below about international use. If your school domain is not recognised, contact us and we can review access.

Visit the YearMap login page and choose your provider: Google or Microsoft. You'll be redirected to your institution's sign-in page and then returned to YearMap automatically. No password is stored by YearMap.

Settings are shared across your school rather than tied to just your own login. Your school logo, header colours, custom categories, notable date types, Auto Bank Holidays preference and default PDF orientation are configured once and then used by everyone at your school when they create or edit a calendar. This keeps colleagues working from a consistent shared setup instead of everyone building their own category list from scratch. Many of these can still be overridden for an individual calendar inside the wizard. Visit Settings from the navigation to get started.

This is deliberate. The category catalogue and notable date types are shared at the school/organisation level, so everyone collaborating on calendars at your school sees the same consistent options rather than conflicting personal lists. If the UI still refers to this area as "Settings", that's simply the label — the configuration itself is shared with your organisation.

The wizard walks you through five steps: (1) set the academic year, title and date range; (2) enter your term dates — the autumn term start and summer term end are locked to the dates you set in Step 1, so only the four middle fields are editable; (3) review Settings for this calendar, including calendar-specific overrides such as Auto Bank Holidays and the Beginning/Last Day of Term markers; (4) add events — Category Events, Notable Dates and Diary Events — using the event list on the left and the live calendar preview on the right, with a help icon that opens guidance in a modal when you need it; and (5) review a summary and generate your PDF and ICS. Auto-save activates from Step 2 onwards once an academic year has been entered.

Yes. If Auto Bank Holidays is enabled, England and Wales bank holidays are automatically calculated and inserted as you move through the wizard. YearMap computes these internally, so no external service is required. If you're based outside England or Wales, disable Auto Bank Holidays in Settings and add your own public holidays manually instead.

A pupil day is any weekday within the academic year that isn't marked as a holiday, INSET day, or bank holiday. YearMap recalculates the pupil-day total automatically as your calendar changes, and shows it on your dashboard and generated PDF. Only Category Events tied to a non-pupil category (such as School Holidays or INSET) affect this total — Notable Dates and Diary Events never do.

When you mark a date or date range in Step 4, you're choosing between three types of entry.

Category Events use a shared, colour-coded category (like INSET Day, School Holidays, or a custom category) and may affect the pupil-day total depending on the category.

Notable Dates visually highlight important dates — for example an Open Day — and never affect pupil-day calculations. They're configured centrally in Settings and can sit alongside a Category Event on the same date.

Diary Events are plain-text entries such as a Parents' Evening or a School Trip. They don't use a category colour and never affect pupil days, but they do appear in your event list, in ICS output, and on the PDF Diary page.

Every calendar includes five built-in categories: School Holidays, Teacher INSET Day, Bank Holiday, Beginning of Term and Last day of Term. Their names and core behaviour can't be changed, but their colours can be configured.

You can also create custom categories centrally in Settings, so they're available to everyone at your school. A custom category's name can't conflict with a built-in category or with another custom category. The wizard always uses the current shared catalogue.

Notable Dates highlight individual calendar cells without affecting pupil-day counts or category assignments. A date can carry both a Category Event and a Notable Date marker at the same time.

To use them, first set up your notable date types centrally in Settings (for example "Parents' Evening" or "Open Day", each with its own colour). Then in Step 4, click or drag on the calendar preview to open the Mark Date modal and switch to the Notable Dates tab.

No. You can open Settings in another browser tab, save your changes, and return to the calendar wizard — YearMap detects that Settings has changed and refreshes the available category and notable-date options automatically. You don't need to close and reopen the calendar editor to pick up the change.

YearMap distinguishes the structural term date you enter in Step 2 from the actual first or last pupil day. For example, if Monday is structurally the start of term but is marked as an INSET day, YearMap will show Tuesday as the real Beginning of Term, because that's the first day pupils attend. The same logic applies at the end of a term. This is reflected consistently in the Review step, your generated PDF, and the view-only calendar link.

Yes. YearMap can represent non-pupil events that fall just before the first pupil day or just after the final pupil day without changing your actual academic-year boundaries. The academic year itself stays anchored to the dates you set in Step 1.

No. YearMap keeps existing historic calendars working as they always have, while making the current shared catalogue available whenever you open a calendar to edit it. Older calendars are not automatically rewritten just because Settings changes elsewhere.

Yes. Each open calendar editor tab keeps track of which calendar it's editing, so you can work on several different calendars in separate tabs and each will continue auto-saving to the right place — opening Settings in another tab won't cause the calendar editor to lose track of what it's editing. That said, avoid editing the same calendar in two tabs at once unless you have a genuine reason to, as normal concurrent-editing caveats apply.

Yes. From the dashboard, use the three-dot menu on any calendar card and select Clone. This creates an independent copy owned by you, which you can then edit without affecting the original — this is also how most schools set up their School Diary. See School Diary & Live Calendar below.

Your academic calendar can become the foundation for an internal, collaborative school diary. Schools typically clone their official academic calendar, share the internal copy with selected colleagues, and add Diary Events such as meetings and trips throughout the year.

No. Plenty of schools use YearMap purely as an academic calendar generator. The diary functionality is entirely optional and can be added whenever it's useful.

A typical workflow looks like this: (1) finalise your official academic calendar and generate its PDF/ICS; (2) clone it into an internal copy, e.g. "2026/27 Internal Calendar"; (3) share that clone with the colleagues who need it; (4) add Diary Events throughout the year as they come up; and (5) share the Live ICS Feed link so staff only need to subscribe once. See Exports & Live Feeds for how the Live ICS Feed keeps everyone's calendar current.

Anything that belongs in a plain-text school diary entry — Parents' Evenings, trips, staff meetings, governors meetings, training, open evenings, performances, sports fixtures, assessment windows and deadlines are all common examples.

A single-day Diary Event is untimed by default, but you can optionally add a start and finish time. A Diary Event spanning a date range doesn't offer timed entry — it's treated as an all-day event across that range.

Yes. There's no limit to the number of Diary Events on a single date, and they'll all appear in the chronological event list, ICS output, and PDF Diary page.

No. Diary Events are plain-text entries and never affect the pupil-day total, in the same way Notable Dates don't. Only Category Events tied to a non-pupil category can change that figure.

Yes. Share the internal diary calendar with Can Edit permission for the colleagues who need to add or update Diary Events. See Sharing for how permissions work.

To edit the diary within YearMap, colleagues need a YearMap account and appropriate sharing permission. To simply view the diary in their own calendar app via the Live ICS Feed, staff use the feed link you share with them — treat that link as something to share only with the intended staff, since it's what gives access to the feed.

From your dashboard, click the share icon on any calendar card. Enter your colleague's username (they must be at the same institution domain) and choose a permission level: Can View or Can Edit. The calendar will appear in their Shared With Me tab immediately.

Important: Your colleague must have signed in to YearMap at least once before you can share with them — YearMap can only recognise users who already exist in the system. If your colleague has never signed in, ask them to log in first, then try sharing again.

Can View allows a colleague to open, inspect and export the calendar, but they can't save any changes. Can Edit allows full editing access, so changes they save go directly back into your original calendar. Only users within the same institution domain can be granted access.

Sharing doesn't create another calendar — your colleague accesses the same original, and any Can Edit changes update your source calendar directly. Cloning creates a completely separate, independent copy; changes made to the clone never alter the original. This distinction matters most for the School Diary workflow, where you typically clone your official academic calendar into an internal copy, then share that clone with colleagues.

This usually means your colleague hasn't logged in to YearMap yet — a user account is only created the first time someone signs in. Ask them to visit YearMap and sign in with their institutional Google or Microsoft account. Once they've logged in at least once, you'll be able to find and share calendars with them. Sharing remains limited to users within your own organisation's domain.

Yes. Open the Share panel for the calendar and select Remove next to the user you want to revoke. Access is removed immediately, and any subsequent save or export attempt by the removed user is rejected.

YearMap generates a PDF — a printable calendar including your school logo, term summary, category key and pupil-day count — and an ICS file that can be imported into Google Calendar, Outlook, Apple Calendar, or any compatible application, including most school website CMS platforms. Once an ICS exists, you can also share a Live ICS Feed so it stays current for subscribers without redistributing files.

Yes. Your default PDF orientation is set in Settings, but you can override it for any individual calendar during the generation step of the wizard. Both layouts include all content.

Yes. A second PDF page listing your events is normally optional and controlled by your shared default and calendar-specific preference in Step 5.

If your calendar contains at least one Diary Event, this page becomes mandatory automatically. YearMap enables it and the option can't be unticked, because Diary Events need somewhere to be listed chronologically — in that case the page is presented as a Diary page rather than a plain calendar summary.

Once you've generated a PDF at least once, YearMap keeps it current for you. Your PDF isn't regenerated on every single auto-save, since PDF generation takes a bit more processing — instead, when the dashboard notices your calendar has changed since the PDF was last generated, that calendar's tile shows an updating state while YearMap regenerates it in the background. A calendar that has never had its first PDF generated won't get one automatically; that first PDF still comes from the normal generation step.

Yes, once an ICS file has been generated for a calendar. Future edits and auto-saves keep that ICS current automatically, so you don't need to keep returning to Step 5 just to refresh it.

The Live ICS Feed is a subscription link available from your dashboard once a calendar has an ICS file. Rather than downloading a one-off ICS, staff subscribe to the feed URL once in their own calendar application, which then periodically checks the feed for updates — letting future YearMap edits flow through without you having to redistribute new files.

A downloaded/imported ICS is a one-time copy — later changes in YearMap won't update that imported copy. A Live ICS Feed subscription is added once, and the receiving calendar app periodically checks the feed for updates, so future edits can flow through without you sending anyone a new file.

Updates become available through the Live ICS Feed as soon as you save them, and they appear when the receiving calendar application refreshes its subscription. How frequently that happens is controlled by each person's calendar app rather than by YearMap, so this isn't instant real-time syncing — most apps refresh subscribed feeds periodically throughout the day.

Google Calendar, Microsoft Outlook, Apple Calendar and any other ICS/iCalendar-compatible application can subscribe to a Live ICS Feed. It's also useful for school website or CMS integrations where live feed/subscription support is available.

Yes. Most school website CMS platforms support ICS imports, so you can publish your academic calendar directly to your public website — look for an "Import" or "Upload ICS" option within the calendar or events section of your CMS. If your CMS supports live feed subscriptions rather than a one-off import, the Live ICS Feed link will keep your published calendar current automatically.

Yes, if you've uploaded a logo in Settings. Logos must be PNG or JPG format and under 500KB. YearMap automatically crops near-white margins and resizes the logo to fit neatly in the PDF header.

No. YearMap uses SSO (Single Sign-On) via your institution's Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 account. Your password is never sent to or stored by YearMap. We recommend enabling two-factor authentication on your institutional account for added security.

Domain access is managed by Schuled Educational Services. If you believe your institution should have access, please contact us with your school name and domain and we'll review your request promptly.

To request deletion of your account and associated data, please contact us using your institutional email address. We will process your request in accordance with our privacy policy and applicable UK data protection law.

YearMap is designed and built around the standard three-term academic year, England and Wales bank holidays, and the term structure commonly used by schools there. YearMap doesn't block access based on location — as long as you sign in with your organisation's domain email, you're welcome to use it. If your school also follows a compatible three-term academic year, you should find YearMap works well with a little configuration.

The main thing to adjust is bank holidays. In Settings, turn off Auto Bank Holidays so England and Wales bank holidays aren't inserted automatically, then add your own public holidays manually in Step 4 by assigning dates to the Bank Holiday (or a custom) category. Everything else — term structure, pupil-day calculation, PDF and ICS export — works as normal.

YearMap is built specifically around a three-term academic year. If your school operates on a similar structure, you're welcome to use it. YearMap does not currently offer good compatibility with two-semester or four-quarter systems, so if your country uses a fundamentally different structure it may not map neatly to your needs. We're always open to hearing from schools with other structures — please reach out to us with your specific requirements.

We'd love to hear from you. We're always open to working with schools from other countries and happy to discuss your specific needs. If there's a strong case for supporting different regional structures, it's something we'd genuinely consider. Please get in touch and tell us a bit about your school and what you're looking for.