Umgangszeit

Contact calendar apps compared 2026: which one suits you?

Most apps for separated parents assume that both sides take part. If you are the one who travels and documents on your own, you easily slip through the net. This comparison tells you which app suits which situation, and where Umgangszeit stands.

This guide is written for parents in Germany and describes the German app market as it stood on the publication date. Prices and features in other countries may differ.

Published on · updated on 28 September 2026 · prices and details as of 28 September 2026

Illustration: three app cards, the middle one in terracotta with a tick, the others with the two-parents symbol

What a contact app should be able to do today

A calendar you enter care times into is quickly built. The differences lie in what happens around the calendar:

None of these tasks is legally difficult. What matters is that you know which of them you are currently missing before you decide on an app.

The apps compared

The table shows the six characteristics that make the difference when you document on your own. Three apps from the German-speaking market, plus OurFamilyWizard as the international reference point for court-oriented documentation.

Comparison of selected contact apps. Information as of, and retrieved on, 28 September 2026. ✓ = applies according to the provider's public information, ✗ = does not apply, partly = only to a limited extent. Price per month gives the lowest documented entry price, for OurFamilyWizard the annual price per parent.

Criterion Umgangszeit Wechselplan CoParently Copario Getrennt Gemeinsam OurFamily­Wizard
Works offline ✓ ✗ partly ✗ ✗ ✗
Without the other parent taking part ✓ ✓ ✗ ✗ ✗ ✗
Data stays on the device ✓ ✗ ✗ ✗ ✗ ✗
Records structured as evidence ✓ ✗ partly ✗ ✗ ✓
Receipts and trips ✓ ✗ partly partly ✗ partly
Price per month no price yet, to be set at launch €4.98 €0 or €4.99 €0 or €6.99 €0 110 to 299.88 US dollars per year per parent

What the competitors' marks are based on: Wechselplan expressly confirms on its website that the app can be used entirely on your own. CoParently and Copario cover receipts, but have no trip or mileage logic of their own. OurFamilyWizard is strong on evidential value, but remains a two-parent platform on a server. The full sources are listed below.

The strengths of the others in detail

A comparison you cannot check for yourself is not worth a cent. So here are the strengths of the others, named honestly, with price and retrieval date.

Wechselplan

German web app that runs in the browser and can be installed like an app. Its strength is the care share calculated to the hour as a planned-versus-actual account, plus automatic school holidays for each federal state. The provider names its own limits: no chat, no document storage, no permanent free plan. Price: €4.98 per month or €49.98 per year for both parents, 14-day trial without a credit card.

CoParently

German all-in-one app for iOS, Android and web. Its strength is its breadth: calendar with care schedule, receipt recognition, encrypted chat with a tone filter, family gallery and document vault in one. Price: basic plan permanently free, Premium €4.99 per month or €49.99 per year for the family.

Copario

German web app with store apps. Its strength is the Kindkern, a central child dossier with allergies, documents and emergency contacts, plus a grandparents' read-only access and the solidarity programme Copario Care. Price: core permanently free, Solo Premium €6.99 per month, Family Premium €9.99 per month. The provider itself says it is not a lawyer's tool but a family organiser.

FamilyManager

German family organiser for iOS, Android and web. Its strength is everyday life alongside contact: appointments, tasks, shopping and chat with a shared changeover schedule and swap requests. Price: €34.99 per year per household, €24.99 in the first year; core features permanently free.

Lina

Norwegian app with a German-language version. Its strength is the clear contact schedule with rotation and swap suggestions, plus appointments and expenses. Price: Lina+ for €6.99 per month, €69.99 per year or a one-off €129.99; one subscription covers both parents.

Getrennt Gemeinsam

Free app from a Bavarian professional association, with funding from the family ministry of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) for the holiday calendar. Its strength is the zero price and the protected, encrypted exchange of appointments, messages and documents. Access requires one parent to create the child and bring the other in with an invitation code.

The international providers in brief

If English is your language or you need an exchange that has been tested in court, you will come across the US providers:

What Umgangszeit does differently

Umgangszeit starts at a point most others leave open: the parent who documents on their own. You keep contact times, cancellations, handover check-ins, receipts and travel costs for yourself alone, without the other side having to join and without being forced onto a server.

What Umgangszeit expressly is not: a two-parent platform with a shared chat or control instruments such as background location tracking. And the finished dossier export as a single file is still in progress. What is available today is the backup in open formats (ZIP, JSON, PDF with embedded fonts), which you can export from the app at any time.

The honest limit: the app makes no claim that it will hold up in court. What it delivers is a record structured in a way a court can work with, traceable, chronological and without gaps, and in your own hands. Whether an entry carries weight in proceedings is always for the court to decide in the end.

How to find your app

Three questions are enough to boil the list down:

  1. Is the other side taking part? If yes, the all-in-one apps are open to you. If no, almost the whole field drops away. What remains are the ones you can use on your own.
  2. What do you need to record? Only appointments, or also cancellations, reasons, costs and receipts? The more of this belongs in the same chronological sequence, the more important documentation becomes compared with the calendar.
  3. Who may see your data? If you share a joint household with the other side, you choose the server provider you trust. If you want to keep your records to yourself, you choose an app that stays on the device.

For a pure calendar, any of the inexpensive tools will do. For the other, more common situation (you travel, you collect, you have to be able to prove it later), documentation is the real core. That is exactly where Umgangszeit comes in.

What comes next

These features are planned and not yet finished. We deliberately do not name a date:

Built and evidenced in the first step is what is listed above under "What Umgangszeit does differently". The rest follows only once the foundation holds.

Further reading

Documenting contact costs

Which costs come with contact, how to work out your journeys properly and which receipts you will be missing later.

Umgangszeit records exactly what this guide is about: contact times, cancellations, costs and moments, in chronological order and on your phone.

Join the waiting list

Sources

Comparisons are a snapshot at the time of publication. Prices, features and ratings change all the time. Check the provider's website before you make a decision.

This text is for orientation, not legal advice. In a dispute, only a lawyer specialising in family law can help.