GetSiteCalendar Lite vs NetterTech Events

A WordPress events calendar that just works. Site Calendar Lite is the free events plugin built for community groups, clubs, churches, schools and small venues — sites that need a beautiful calendar without the bloat or the enterprise pricing. Publish your first event in minutes. Embed the calendar with one shortcode. Let visitors RSVP without forcing them to create an account. Subscribe to your event feed in Google Calendar, Apple Calendar or Outlook. All free, all GPL, all maintained by the team that built it. Free features Custom post types: Events, Venues, Organizers Five views: Month grid + List (Week, Day, Photo are Pro) Single-event pages with venue and organizer details Featured-image thumbnails in every view, with category-coloured icon fallbacks for events without an image Categories and tags Featured events with visual highlight Tickets (one or more ticket types per event, each with label, price, capacity, and max-per-order) Attendees list in wp-admin showing every front-end RSVP Free RSVP form with attendee capture and basic confirmation email ICS feed for calendar app subscriptions (Google Calendar, Apple Calendar, Outlook) Add-to-calendar buttons (Google, Outlook, .ics download) JSON-LD schema for SEO REST API for headless / external integrations Customisable colours: primary, accent, event-link, and Week view chip colour [getsitecalendar] shortcode for the full calendar UI [getsitecalendar_list] shortcode for upcoming-events lists [getsitecalendar_search] shortcode for filter forms Upgrade to Site Calendar Pro for: Week, Day and Photo views with toolbar switcher Full recurring-event series management (skip / override per occurrence) Multi-ticket-type RSVP with capacity gauges and CSV export Paid tickets via Stripe Checkout and WooCommerce Custom fields engine with front-end filter UI CSV bulk import with smart venue/organizer auto-create Front-end event submission for logged-in users Compact upcoming-events widget and Gutenberg block Door check-in with QR codes and mobile scanner Dedicated Pro Calendar Scanner role for door staff Branded HTML confirmation emails with custom From / Reply-To Sequential PCAL- order numbers for unified audit trail Priority email support Site Calendar Pro is a separate commercial add-on available from getsitecalendar.com. External services Site Calendar Lite does not send analytics, telemetry, or any data about your site back to its authors. The only external service the plugin interacts with is: Google Maps embed (single-event pages) When a single-event page is rendered and the event has a venue with an address, the plugin embeds a Google Maps iframe so visitors can see the venue location and get directions. The embed uses Google’s public https://www.google.com/maps?output=embed endpoint and does not require an API key. What data is sent: The venue address only (no visitor data, no event details, no attendee data). The browser — not the server — is what loads the iframe, so the request originates from the site visitor, not from your WordPress installation. When it’s sent: Each time a single-event page is rendered that has a venue with a non-empty address. Events without a venue address do not embed the map. Provided by: Google LLC. Google Terms of Service: https://policies.google.com/terms Google Privacy Policy: https://policies.google.com/privacy If you do not wish to embed Google Maps on event pages, simply leave the venue’s address field empty — the map will not be rendered. Privacy Site Calendar Lite stores attendee names and email addresses (provided via the RSVP form) in your own WordPress database, in the pcal_attendee custom post type. No data is sent to third parties from the server side. Site owners are responsible for their own privacy policy and GDPR compliance. See also the External services section above for information about Google Maps iframe embeds on single-event pages.

NetterTech Events stores your events in dedicated database tables rather than WordPress post meta. That architectural choice means calendar queries stay fast whether you have 50 events or 5,000, and it means recurring event schedules are pre-computed rather than recalculated on every page load. Recurring events that handle real schedules: Full RFC 5545 recurrence rule support covers patterns like “every second Tuesday” and “last Friday of the month.” Change a rule, and occurrences regenerate automatically. Ticketing without per-ticket fees: Sell tickets through WooCommerce with automatic capacity tracking per occurrence. Series passes let attendees buy once for an entire recurring event run. No external ticketing service means no percentage taken on each sale. Free event registration: RSVP forms work without WooCommerce for events that don’t require payment. Attendees register, receive confirmations, and can be tracked through the same admin interface. Check-in built in: Manual attendee check-in by name or email search works from any device. QR code and volunteer check-in workflows can be added with the separate NetterTech Events Pro plugin. Spaces and locations management: Define bookable spaces and physical locations through a dedicated admin interface. Assign spaces to events via the event editor metabox to track which room or area each event occupies. Display options for any layout: Month, week, and day calendar views. Carousel slider for featured events. Filterable grid with live search. Weekly regulars table for recurring events. All three calendar views are available as Gutenberg blocks and Beaver Builder modules. Reminder emails that send themselves: Configure pre-event reminders at any interval you choose. Emails go out automatically via WordPress cron – no third-party service required. SEO handled at the source: Schema.org Event structured data integrates with Yoast SEO and Rank Math’s JSON-LD output rather than generating a second duplicate block. Custom sitemap entries cover recurring occurrence URLs individually. Custom SEO title variables (%%nettertech_events_event_date%%, %%nettertech_events_event_venue%%, %%nettertech_events_event_organizer%%) let you build dynamic titles per-occurrence. Breadcrumb trail follows the full event hierarchy. Works without either SEO plugin using built-in Schema.org and Open Graph output. Accessibility throughout: Designed to WCAG 2.2 AA standards with ARIA labels, full keyboard navigation, focus management, and reduced motion support across every public-facing view. Your data stays yours: All attendee, ticket, and event data is stored in your WordPress database. No data is sent to external services. GDPR tools let site administrators export or erase attendee records on request. For Developers: Repository and Service patterns with documented hooks and filters throughout Theme-overridable templates in nettertech-events/templates/ – copy to your theme to customize REST API for headless or custom implementations Over 5,000 automated tests with over 17,000 assertions covering core functionality Shortcodes [nettertech_events_calendar] – Monthly, weekly, and daily calendar views with navigation. [nettertech_events_list] – Filterable event grid or list with live search and category filters. (Also available as [nettertech_events_grid] for grid-only layout.) [nettertech_events_carousel] – Sliding carousel of upcoming events with configurable columns. [nettertech_events_rsvp] – RSVP registration form for free events. Supports party size and custom confirmation messages. [nettertech_events_regulars] – Display weekly recurring events in a compact table grouped by day of week. Replaces manually maintained static HTML with live data from published recurring events. Parameters: limit – Maximum events to display (default: 50) show_venue – Show venue name column, true/false (default: true) show_time – Show event time column, true/false (default: true) show_day – Show day-of-week grouping, true/false (default: true) heading – Optional table heading text (default: empty) class – Additional CSS class for the wrapper (default: empty) Example: [nettertech_events_regulars show_venue="false" heading="Weekly Classes"] Third Party Services This plugin does not connect to any external third-party services by default. WooCommerce Integration (Optional) When WooCommerce is installed and activated, this plugin integrates with it to provide paid ticketing functionality. WooCommerce is a separate plugin that handles payment processing through payment gateways you configure. WooCommerce is developed by Automattic WooCommerce Terms of Service WooCommerce Privacy Policy No data is sent to WooCommerce servers by this plugin. All ticket and order data remains in your WordPress database. QR Code Generation QR codes are generated entirely on your server using the bundled PHP QR Code library. No external API calls are made. Bundled Third-Party Libraries NetterTech Events is licensed under GPL-2.0-or-later. The plugin bundles the following GPL-compatible third-party libraries via Composer. The authoritative dependency list and resolved versions live in composer.json and composer.lock (both shipped with the plugin so reviewers can verify vendor contents). chillerlan/php-qrcode 6.0.1 — MIT (selected from the upstream dual MIT / Apache-2.0 license). Used for QR code rendering on tickets and check-in flows. Source: https://github.com/chillerlan/php-qrcode chillerlan/php-settings-container 3.3.0 — MIT. Transitive dependency of php-qrcode. Source: https://github.com/chillerlan/php-settings-container symfony/polyfill-mbstring 1.33.0 — MIT. UTF-8 string-function polyfill (transitive). Source: https://github.com/symfony/polyfill-mbstring The MIT license is selected for the dual-licensed chillerlan/php-qrcode because Apache-2.0’s patent-retaliation clause is GPL-3.0+ compatible but not GPL-2.0 compatible. MIT keeps the bundled code consistent with the plugin’s GPL-2.0+ choice. Privacy Policy NetterTech Events collects and stores the following data in your WordPress database: Data Collected Attendee Records: Name, email address, and ticket details when users purchase tickets or submit RSVPs Accessibility Requirements: An optional free-text field on the checkout and RSVP forms, used only to arrange accommodations for that event; kept out of emails and logs, and cleared automatically 30 days after the event ends (filterable) Check-in Data: Timestamps when attendees are checked in at events Event Data: Event details, occurrences, and ticket configurations created by administrators Data Storage All data is stored locally in your WordPress database in custom tables prefixed with nettertech_events_ (e.g. {$wpdb->prefix}nettertech_events_events) No data is transmitted to external servers by this plugin Data retention is controlled by you; delete events and ticket records to remove associated data Data Export and Erasure Attendee data integrates with WordPress’s built-in privacy tools Site administrators can export or erase attendee data on request Event organizers should document ticket/RSVP data collection in their site privacy policy Cookies This plugin does not set any cookies. Source Code & Build The plugin ships pre-built block assets under blocks/*/build/ (compiled from @wordpress/scripts) so it runs without requiring users to install Node.js or run a build step. The human-readable source for every compiled file is included in the same distribution under blocks/*/src/: blocks/calendar/src/index.jsx — source for blocks/calendar/build/index.js blocks/carousel/src/index.jsx — source for blocks/carousel/build/index.js blocks/event-grid/src/index.jsx — source for blocks/event-grid/build/index.js To rebuild from source after editing any *.jsx file: npm install && npm run build The build configuration lives in package.json (scripts.build) and uses the official @wordpress/scripts toolchain with no custom webpack config. Additional Resources Plugin Homepage Support Forum