As a Bullet Journal enthusiast who wants to meld my digital and analog life together efficiently, I relied on Google Calendar quite a bit for things like recurring tasks, collaborative events, and more. One of the best features I’ve found to balance my life and realign after a hard week was the Goals feature in Calendar. It allowed you to check off a task and fill a ring circle by a certain percentage for different habits you wanted to form, and quite honestly, it was a refreshing addition to the otherwise corporate feel of the app.
Listen to me, I’m speaking about Goals in the past tense. The truth is that these still exist, but like any other good thing Google creates, it won’t for long. 9to5Google has discovered that the company plans to ‘sunset’ this wonderful productivity feature and make its users rely on recurring events instead.
<string name=”habits_deprecation_banner_title”>Goals is leaving Calendar soon</string>
<string name=”habits_deprecation_banner_learn_more”>Learn more about Goals alternatives</string>
<string name=”habits_deprecation_banner_button_text”>Create an event instead</string>
9to5Google
The code strings found in the latest version of the Google Calendar app indicate that “Goals is leaving Calendar soon”, and that Google wants you to “Learn more about Goals alternatives” like creating “an event instead” as previously mentioned. I imagine that the determination on these things is largely based on how many users make use of (or don’t make use of) each feature, so it was likely a matter of time before these niche tools were nixed.
You may also remember that Google recently killed off Assistant and location-based reminders, instead asking users to swap over to standard tasks. It looks as though it’s cleaning season for Calendar and Assistant, and much to my dismay, many of my favorite and most used features simply didn’t make the cut.
What I liked most about Goals was that it allowed me to focus on what matters most – people and habits. In a sea of Calendar invites, Zoom calls, company meetings, and time blocking, Google’s simplified habit tracking without the need for a third-party application on my phone was a breath of fresh air. Unless it adds some personalization into Events, I have yet another reason to head back to my Bullet Journal for pretty much all of my productivity needs.
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