How to Add & Keep Facebook Events in Sync With Google Calendar

Has Facebook made us more social or has it induced a social laziness in all of us where we think that a simple status update suffices? Well, that debate will rage on, but what’s more definite is that Facebook has given us some easy social and participatory tools to better engage our friends.

Facebook Events is all about letting the world (or a select few) know about anything that happens at a given place and time. It is one of the easiest ways to spread an invite across the viral network. Whether it’s an impromptu get-together or a mass protest, Facebook Events could be the broadcast tool.

But Facebook Events are about dates and times. There might be thus a need to sync all that data into a Calendar app like Google Calendar. So, it’s useful to know that you can export all your Facebook Events into Google Calendar with a few clicks. Here’s how –

1. Log into Facebook and click on Events in the left column.

2. The Events page is where all the action will take place.

3. Click on Export to bring up the Export Events dialog box. As it says, you can copy the link and paste it in programs like Apple iCal, Outlook, and Google Calendar. This subscribes all your events to the target program.

4. You can also export individual events from each Event page by clicking on the Export Event link. It brings up the following screen:

5. Clicking on the blue Export button generates an .ICS file that can be saved to the desktop.

6. Log into Google Calendar and click on the downward pointing arrow next to Other Calendars. You can now import your Facebook Events using two methods:

Add by URL: Paste the link you had copied from Facebook into the Add by URL field.

Import Calendar: Choose the ICS file you had downloaded and upload it into Google Calendar.

The calendar will appear in the Other Calendars section of the calendar list to the left. It will sync with Facebook events and Google calendar will now update automatically every time you accept or decline an event in Facebook. You can always go into the Google Calendar settings and unsubscribe from Facebook Events updates.