How To Overlay And Merge Outlook Calendars

We have found that many of our customers have multiple Outlook calendars in addition to their LeaveWizard one and want alternative ways to view these calendars and a way to merge some of them.

Overlaying Outlook Calendars

Normally Outlook displays each calendar side by side

but sometimes it is more convenient to view some calendars overlaid on each other so that all the events for the period are shown together without permanently combining them.

To achieve this you can use the ‘Overlay’ toggle button. This will be displayed on a pop-up menu if you right click on a calendar

or select ‘View’ on the main menu.

You can select any calendar and then toggle the button so it is overlaid or not. The calendar colours identify which calendar the event is from when overlaid and you can hover over each separate event for the event details.

Merging Outlook Calendars

Sometimes you may want to permanently merge calendars. This can be achieved by exporting a calendar and then importing it into another. It is important to understand that the calendar imported will then not get updated. This process is fine if the calendar is one you created but not for internet calendars (such as the LeaveWizard calendar). So, you can export your LeaveWizard calendar and import it into another one but it would not get updated. You can check the calendar types under the ‘File’, ‘Account Settings’ Outlook menu.

Export An Outlook Calendar

You can export a calendar from the ‘File’,  ‘Open & Export’ Outlook menu. Select ‘Import/Export’ and then ‘Export to a file’ from the ‘Import and Export Wizard’ pop up.

From the subsequent pop ups select ‘Outlook Data File (.pst)’ and the calendar you want to export, the file name and from the ‘options’ section, select ‘Do not export duplicate items’.

Import An Outlook Calendar

You can then use a similar procedure to import the saved calendar from your exported .pst file by choosing ‘Import from another program or file ‘.

Make sure the calendar you want to import into is selected and then use the ‘Import items into the current folder’ option.

Once you have imported the calendar you can then delete or hide the original.

For most users, using overlaying to improve visibility would be the preferred option as merging calendars is more difficult, has limitations and is not normally appropriate for Internet calendars such as our LeaveWizard calendar. This guide to merging calendars is for information only and is not recommended.