Use Your Smart TV as a Family Calendar

Smart TV in a living room showing a family calendar — the whole week visible from the couch — Your TV is already on the wall. Now it can show your family's week.

Imagine walking into the kitchen and seeing everyone's entire week on the big screen. Soccer at 4, dentist on Wednesday, grandma's birthday in 3 days — all visible from across the room, without anyone pulling out their phone.

Your smart TV already has everything it needs: a web browser. Five minutes from now, your family calendar can be on the biggest screen in the house. No extra hardware, no apps to buy, no cables to run.

Setup

Find the Browser on Your TV

Every major smart TV brand has a built-in web browser. Here's where to find yours:

Samsung TV:

Press the Home button on your remote.
Navigate to "Internet" (or "Samsung Internet") in the app bar.
If you don't see it, go to Apps and search for "Internet."

LG TV (webOS):

Press the Home button on your remote.
Find "Web Browser" in the app row at the bottom.
If it's not there, open the LG Content Store and search for "Web Browser."

Android TV / Google TV (Sony, TCL, Hisense, etc.):

There's usually no browser pre-installed. Open the Google Play Store.
Search for "Puffin TV Browser" or "Chrome" and install it.
Open the browser and you're ready.

Pro tip

No browser at all? On Android TV, install "Puffin TV Browser" from the Play Store — it's free and designed for TV remotes, so navigation is much smoother than regular Chrome.

Open and Bookmark Your Calendar

Open the browser on your TV.
Type in the address bar: calendar.norfeldt.com
Sign in with your Google account. (This is the slowest part — typing with a remote takes patience.)
Bookmark it — every TV browser has a bookmark or favorites option. One click to get back next time.
Select your calendars — tap the gear icon, choose which family calendars to show, pick your colors.

Pro tip

Typing with a remote is painful. If your TV supports it, use the phone app as a remote (Samsung SmartThings, LG ThinQ, Google Home) — it has a proper keyboard, which makes signing in much faster.

That's it — your family calendar is on the big screen. A few things to keep in mind about TV browsers:

Navigation is remote-based — you're clicking with arrow keys, not swiping. Once the calendar is bookmarked, you rarely need to navigate at all.
Sessions can be hit-or-miss — some TV browsers remember your login between sessions, others don't. If yours forgets, just leave the browser app open in the background instead of closing it.
No "Add to Home Screen" — unlike tablets, TVs don't support full-screen shortcuts. You'll open the browser, tap your bookmark, and you're there.

Get More Out of It

Bonus

Upgrade with a Streaming Stick

Already loving the calendar on your TV? A streaming stick plugged into the HDMI port can make the experience even smoother — better browsers, snappier navigation, and more reliable sessions. These run about $30-40:

Fire TV Stick

Comes with Silk Browser pre-installed. Navigate to calendar.norfeldt.com, bookmark it. Silk handles sessions better than most TV browsers and the Fire TV remote is snappy.

Chromecast with Google TV

Install Chrome or Puffin TV Browser from the Play Store. Same steps — navigate, sign in, bookmark. Google TV keeps apps running in the background better than most smart TVs.

Not sure if you need one? Try the built-in browser first. Many families are perfectly happy with it. If you find yourself wanting smoother scrolling or more reliable sign-in sessions, that's when a streaming stick becomes a worthwhile upgrade.

Where to Put It

Your TV is already somewhere in your home. The question is which one makes the best calendar display.

Three photos showing a family calendar on different TVs: kitchen counter TV next to a coffee machine, living room TV above a sofa, and hallway TV near the front door — Kitchen counter, living room, or hallway by the front door — wherever your family naturally passes through.

Bonus

Set Up a Night Schedule

Good news: your TV probably already has a sleep timer built in. No need to buy anything extra.

Samsung: Settings → General → System Manager → Time → Sleep Timer
LG: Settings → General → Timers → Sleep Timer (or "Auto Power Off")
Android TV: Settings → Device Preferences → Timer → Sleep Timer

Set it to turn off at bedtime. Some TVs also have an "On Timer" that turns the TV on automatically in the morning — Samsung and LG both support this. Set it to 6:30 AM and your calendar is ready before the family wakes up.

No "turn on" timer on your TV? A cheap power timer ($5-8 at any hardware store) on the outlet does the same thing.

What Shows on the Screen

Family Calendar takes your Google Calendar and turns it into a 5-day view that looks great on a big screen:

Family Calendar showing a 5-day week view with color-coded events, emoji indicators, and weather forecast — A 5-day view with emoji events, weather, and countdowns — easy to read from across the room

Emoji events that kids can read from the couch — see the soccer ball, know it's soccer day
Countdown sidebar — "3 days until grandma visits!" keeps everyone excited
Weather forecast — check if you need a jacket on the way out
Auto-refreshes — add an event on your phone, it shows up on the TV within minutes
Readable from across the room — designed for glancing, not squinting

Ready to See It in Action?

Head over to calendar.norfeldt.com, connect your Google Calendar, and watch the magic happen.

Great plans — even to just try it out:

Yearly

$10/year

cancel anytime

FREE

ONCE

$67

one-time

PUT IT ON YOUR WALL
LET'S GO!

Quick Setup (TL;DR)

	What to Do	Time
Step 1	Find and open the browser on your TV	1 min
Step 2	Go to calendar.norfeldt.com, sign in, pick calendars, bookmark	3 min
Bonus — optional extras
📺	Upgrade with a streaming stick for smoother experience	$30-40
🌙	Set the TV's sleep timer for nighttime	1 min

Frequently Asked Questions

Will this work on my TV?

If your TV was made in the last 6-7 years and connects to Wi-Fi, it almost certainly has a web browser. Samsung, LG, Sony, TCL, Hisense — they all have one. If the built-in browser feels sluggish, a $35 Fire TV Stick or Chromecast with Google TV is a nice upgrade, but most people get started with what they already have.

Can I still watch Netflix and regular TV?

Of course! The calendar runs in the TV's browser app. Switch to a different app when you want to watch something, switch back to the browser for the calendar. Some families dedicate a second, smaller TV to the calendar and keep the main TV for entertainment.

The TV keeps signing me out. What can I do?

Some TV browsers clear cookies when you close them. First, try not fully closing the browser — just switch to another app and switch back. If that doesn't help, the Yearly ($10/year) or ONCE ($67 one-time) plans keep you signed in permanently, so you never have to type your password with the remote again. A streaming stick can also improve session handling if your TV's browser is the culprit.

Do I need to sign in again every 48 hours?

With the free plan, yes — and typing your password with a TV remote every two days gets old fast. The Yearly ($10/year) or ONCE ($67 one-time) plans remove this requirement. The calendar just stays signed in. For a TV display, this is practically essential.

How much electricity does leaving the TV on use?

A typical TV uses 30-80 watts. With the sleep timer turning it off at night (say, 14 hours on), that's roughly $2-5 per month. About the same as leaving a lamp on. Use the sleep timer and it's barely noticeable on your bill.

Will the calendar cause burn-in on my TV?

For LCD/LED TVs (the vast majority), burn-in is not a concern at all. For OLED TVs, the sleep timer helps — the screen is off at night, giving it time to recover. The calendar content also shifts throughout the day as events change, so nothing stays static for too long.