10 Best WordPress Event Calendar Plugins in 2026 (Free & Paid)

Choosing a calendar plugin now depends as much on pricing as on features.

WordPress runs 39.5% of all websites, according to W3Techs, so it is a natural home for your events. Choosing the right calendar plugin has become harder this year, though. Prices have moved, a famous plugin has been folded into a wider bundle, and ticket fees can quietly outgrow the cost of the software.

Picture a small conference selling 500 tickets at $30 each. On Eventbrite’s published pricing, the service fee alone comes to $1,450, before its 2.9% payment processing fee. The free Event Tickets plugin charges a 2% application fee on Stripe and Square sales, which is $300 on the same event. A flat license changes that math.

Our calculation from published list prices. Card processing fees and add-ons are not included.

Owning your registration page matters for another reason. Bizzabo’s 2026 benchmarks show dynamic registration flows converting at 24.4%, compared with 11.6% for static ones. The more control you have over that form, the more you can act on findings like this.

The five tests we used

We scored each plugin on what matters once your events start earning money:

1. No ticket commission. You should pay your payment processor, not a share of every sale to your plugin.
2. Calendar and booking together. Fewer plugins mean fewer things to update and fewer conflicts.
3. Recurring events without a high paywall. Weekly classes should not need a costly upgrade.
4. Event schema.Google’s documentation requires the event name, start date, and location for event rich results.
5. Active maintenance. Patchstack counted 11,334 new WordPress vulnerabilities in 2025, and 91% were in plugins.

We based this ranking on public pricing, WordPress.org data, and vendor documentation. We did not run our own speed benchmarks, so test your shortlist on a staging site.

The 10 plugins at a glance

The best WordPress event calendar plugins

1.Modern Events Calendar: best overall

MEC earns first place because it asks the fewest trade-offs. Webnus reports more than 200,000 active sites. The free Lite version already includes recurring events, front-end submissions, and several calendar views.

MEC Pro costs $99 per year for one site. It adds booking, ticket types, per-date pricing, waiting lists, native time-slot appointments, and a check-in app. You also get more than 60 layouts and importers for 10 other platforms, so switching does not mean starting over.

MEC’s monthly view, one of more than 60 layouts. Source: MEC demo.

Independent editors have noticed the design strength. Elementor’s guide singles out MEC’s large library of layouts, and Kinsta’s Matteo Duò praises how its range of designs helps an events page fit your branding.

MEC has some weak spots as well, and you should weigh them. Invoices, seating, and reports are paid add-ons. You should download it from Webnus rather than the plugin directory.

2. Events Manager: best free version

With 60,000 active installs, Events Manager gives you bookings, recurring events, and front-end submissions at no cost. Pro starts at $129 per year. If your budget is zero, start here. The trade-offs are a denser admin screen and plainer designs, which is why it ranks below MEC for most buyers.

3. Eventin: best for conferences

Eventin suits speaker-led events with schedules and ticketing, and it has an excellent 4.7 rating from 415 reviews. Its $99 plan covers two domains. With 10,000 active installs, it has a smaller community than the plugins ranked around it, and its strengths lean toward conferences rather than everyday calendars.

4. Sugar Calendar: best lightweight option

Sugar Calendar keeps things simple, with a clean editor, recurrence, and Elementor widgets. Basic lists at $99 per year and is often discounted to $49.50. It works well for simple schedules, but WooCommerce, submissions, and RSVP depend on your plan or add-ons.

5.EventON: best for visual event cards

EventON looks like the bargain at $60 one-time, and its event cards are attractive. Selling tickets changes the sum, though. Add its $120 ticket add-on and $80 submissions add-on, and year one reaches $260. Check the full cost of your setup, not only the entry price.

6.WP Event Manager: best for directories

This plugin treats events a bit like job listings, which suits community portals with many organizers. It has 20,000 active installs and a 4.0 rating, and bundles start at $99 per year. It is less suited to anyone who wants a polished design out of the box.

7.The Events Calendar: best if you already use it

The Events Calendar is still the biggest name, with 600,000 active installs, solid documentation, and QR check-in. Why seventh, then? Its 2026 changes have moved it away from the small organizer. Liquid Web’s product page now presents paid access as an all-in-one bundle at $350 per year for one site, with LearnDash, Give, and Kadence included. That is good value if you need an LMS and donations too, but it is a lot to buy for a calendar.

The fee on the free ticketing plugin has also drawn criticism. Alex Vasquez, founder of WordPress agency DigiSavvy,writes in his 2026 roundup: “they tack on a 2% fee for the tickets YOU sell.” To be fair, he also calls the plugin well supported, and the changelog confirms that a valid Event Tickets Plus license waives the fee.

WordPress.org data pulled November 4, 2026. Small review counts can swing these shares.

Reviews show the same strain, with Event Tickets at 3.5 stars and 30% of its reviews at one star. MemberPress, which competes with Liquid Web in the course space, reports that about 25% of the StellarWP team was laid off in November 2025 before the brand was consolidated. If the plugin serves you well today, you don’t need to rush away. If you are buying new, compare first.

8. Amelia: best for appointments

Amelia has 90,000 active installs and a 4.6 rating, with paid plans from $49 per year. It is excellent when clients book time with a person. It is less natural for a public events calendar, which is why it sits lower on this list.

9.My Calendar: best for accessibility

Built by accessibility specialist Joe Dolson, My Calendar has the lowest one-star share in our data, at 4%. Pro costs $69 per year for three sites. It is a very good choice for public-sector sites, although ticketing needs his separate My Tickets plugin.

10.Event Organiser: best for simple venue calendars

Event Organiser is a tidy free plugin with venues, calendar displays, and import and export. Booking and payments need Pro, which starts at £50. It suits smaller sites that value simplicity over design choice.

Which plugin should you choose?

For simple appointments and complex events choose Modern Events Calendar, since it is a hybrid and gives you all of those in 1 single wordpress event calendar plugin. Some choices are clear-cut. Choose Events Manager if you can’t spend anything, Eventin for conferences, Amelia for one-to-one appointments, and My Calendar if accessibility comes first.

Most organizers need something else, though. They want a good-looking calendar this month and ticket sales next season, without a commission, a separate booking plugin, or a bundle of products they will never open. Go back through the five tests with that in mind, and the field narrows quickly.

That is why Modern Events Calendar comes out first. Its $99 price covers calendar and booking together, its free version already handles recurring events, and you keep your ticket revenue apart from processor fees. Keep it updated and budget for any add-ons you need. A sensible way to start is to install Lite, import a few events, and move to Pro when you are ready to sell. Before you decide, you can check every feature side by side in this WordPress event plugin comparison table.