How to Find Your Google Calendar's Public .ics (iCal) URL

Your Google Calendar's public .ics URL lets other apps and calendars subscribe to your events as an iCal feed. Google offers two different addresses — a public one and a secret one — and choosing the wrong one can expose your schedule. This guide shows exactly where to find each iCal URL and how to use them safely.

Where the .ics URLs live

The iCal addresses are buried in each calendar's settings, and this is a web-only feature — the Google Calendar mobile app does not show these URLs.

1. Open Google Calendar on a computer.
2. In the left sidebar under My calendars, hover over the calendar you want and click the three-dot menu (Options).
3. Click Settings and sharing.
4. Scroll down to the Integrate calendar section.

There you'll see several fields, including the two that matter most below.

Public address vs. Secret address

Google gives you two iCal links, and they behave very differently.

Both end in .ics (technically /basic.ics). To subscribe another app, copy the appropriate link and paste it where that app asks for an iCal or "calendar by URL" feed.

Public address

The Public address in iCal format only returns events if you've turned the calendar public under Access permissions. If the calendar is private, this URL exists but returns nothing useful to outsiders. See how to make a calendar public or private before relying on this link.

Secret address

The Secret address in iCal format works even for private calendars because the long random token is the password. Anyone who gets this URL can see all your event details forever — so treat it like a password.

Privacy caveats (read before you share)

• The Secret address is not encrypted access control. If you accidentally post it, anyone with the link sees everything until you reset it.
• Resetting the secret address is possible: click Reset next to the Secret address field. This invalidates the old link, so any app using it must be re-subscribed.
• Public address = public calendar. Don't use the public link as a shortcut to share a private calendar; it won't expose data unless the calendar itself is public, but the moment you make the calendar public, the entire schedule becomes searchable.
• Feeds update on a delay. Apps that subscribe to either URL may take hours to reflect changes — this is the subscribing app's polling interval, not something you control.

Common uses for the .ics URL

• Subscribing the same calendar into another app (Outlook, Notion, a dashboard).
• Letting teammates pull a shared schedule into their own calendar.
• Feeding events into automation tools that accept iCal feeds.

If you instead want to subscribe to an external feed in Google Calendar, see how to subscribe to an external iCal feed. To download a one-time snapshot rather than a live feed, see how to export your calendar to a file.

If you're stitching feeds across services, nocal connects your Google and Outlook calendars into one place so you don't have to manage raw .ics URLs by hand — see how.