Google Calendar alternative: move calendar and contacts to Disk

How it works

This is a move, not a link between two services. You export the files from Google once, upload them to Disk, and from then on your calendar and contacts live with us — a CalDAV alternative to Google Calendar.

It is easiest on a computer, in the browser. Nothing needs installing for the move itself.

Calendar

.ics files — one for each Google calendar

Contacts

one .vcf file in vCard format

Where to upload

to Disk: https://disk.alpost.ch/, with the same sign-in as your mail

If you have never opened Disk

sign in there once: your Disk account is created at the first sign-in

Export your calendar from Google

1. Open Google Calendar on a computer: calendar.google.com.
2. Click the gear at the top right → “Settings”, then “Import & export” on the left.
3. Under “Export”, click “Export”. A .zip archive downloads.
4. Unpack the archive: inside are .ics files, one per calendar. Disk needs these files, not the archive itself.

Export your contacts from Google

1. Open Google Contacts: contacts.google.com.
2. Click “Export” and choose which contacts to export.
3. Format — “vCard (for iOS Contacts)”. Do not let the name put you off: it is an ordinary vCard, and Disk reads it too.
4. Click “Export” — a contacts.vcf file downloads.
5. The Google CSV and Outlook CSV formats will not work: Disk “Contacts” accepts only vCard.

Import the calendar into Disk

1. Open Disk and choose “Calendar” in the header. The webmail header has the same item.
2. At the bottom of the left column, click “Calendar settings”, then “Import calendar”.
3. Select the .ics files — you can pick all of them at once.
4. For each file, choose where it goes: an existing calendar or “New calendar”. A new one is more convenient: if something goes wrong, you can delete it whole without touching the rest.
5. Confirm the import. Disk reports how many events were imported.
6. If you import the same file into the same calendar a second time, there will be no duplicates: Disk skips the events it already has and reports “Import partially failed”.

Import contacts into Disk

1. On Disk, click “Contacts” at the right of the header.
2. At the bottom of the left column, open “Contacts settings” and click “Import contacts”.
3. If you have several address books, choose one. Then click “Select local file” and pick contacts.vcf.
4. Upload the file once: a second upload may duplicate your contacts.
5. Disk shows birthdays from your contacts in the calendar by itself — as a separate “Contact birthdays” calendar.

Connect your phone

Imported calendars and contacts connect to your phone like any others on Disk: over CalDAV and CardDAV, with the short login like u123 from your account and an app password from Disk. Step by step for iPhone, Android and Thunderbird — in the guide “Sync Disk with your phone and computer”.

1. First connect Alpost and check that the events and contacts have appeared on your phone.
2. Then turn off calendar and contacts sync with your Google account on the phone — otherwise you will see everything twice.
3. Save new entries to the Alpost calendar and address book: on iPhone, make them the defaults in the Calendar and Contacts settings; on Android, choose them when you create an entry.
4. Anything saved to a Google or iCloud calendar will not reach Disk or your mail.

Calendar and contacts in your mail

1. The “Calendar” item in the webmail header opens the calendar on Disk.
2. At the top right, webmail shows up to five upcoming events for the week ahead — from all your Disk calendars, including those moved from Google. Click an event to open it.
3. A new event shows up in this block within a few minutes, not instantly.
4. The “Contacts” button in webmail opens the mail’s own address book, separate from Disk “Contacts”. For webmail to suggest addresses as you type, import the same contacts.vcf there: “Contacts” → “Import”.

What is not here

1. No two-way link with Google. This is a move, not a sync: what you change in Google after the export will not reach Disk by itself, and the other way round.
2. No one-click transfer: Disk does not connect to your Google account; everything goes through files.
3. Webmail does not take addresses from Disk “Contacts” — it has its own address book.
4. No full calendar inside webmail: only upcoming events are shown there; the calendar itself opens on Disk.
5. No Exchange or ActiveSync: calendar and contacts connect to phones and programs only over CalDAV and CardDAV.
6. We make no backups. Keep the exported .ics and .vcf files yourself, and do not delete anything in Google until you are sure everything has arrived.

See also

• Free Disk
• Disk: first steps and sharing files
• Sync Disk with your phone and computer
• How to send large files by email: a link instead of an attachment