Calendly External Scheduling
Let candidates self-schedule live interviews on your Calendly event types — an optional, per-stage alternative to Kit's built-in scheduling.
Why It Matters
Kit’s built-in scheduling books interviews without any external tool. If your team already runs interviews through Calendly — with established event types, routing, and reminders — you can let candidates book those event types from their Kit portal instead.
Calendly is additive and opt-in. You turn it on per live interview stage; native Kit scheduling stays the default everywhere else and is never affected.
Tip
Which should I use? Default to native Kit scheduling — it needs no extra account or paid plan and keeps availability, conflict detection, and team modes inside Kit. Reach for Calendly only when your interviewers’ booking already lives there.
Prerequisites
Connect Calendly as a Calendly organization Owner or Admin — organization webhooks and single-use scheduling links are restricted to those roles.
Real-time booking sync additionally needs a paid Calendly plan (Standard, Teams, or Enterprise), because it relies on Calendly webhooks. You can still authorize on a free or Basic plan, and the connection stays Connected — it does not land in an error state. What you lose is the automatic webhook sync: Kit shows an amber “Requires Standard plan” prompt on the connection card, and bookings won’t flip the candidate’s portal to “confirmed” on their own until you upgrade. The fix is to upgrade your Calendly plan and re-verify — not to reconnect (see the Troubleshooting section below).
You connect Calendly once per Kit account, as a Kit admin. Individual interviewers don’t connect their own.
Connecting Calendly
- Go to Integrations > Calendly
- Click Connect Calendly
- Authorize Kit in Calendly’s OAuth screen (read event types, create single-use links, receive booking notifications)
- You return to Kit showing Connected
Kit registers the booking webhook automatically — nothing to configure in Calendly.
Enabling Calendly on a Stage
- Open Job Posting > Stages and select a live interview stage
- Under Interview Settings, set Scheduling provider to Calendly
- Pick one of your event types in the Calendly event type field
- Save
| Provider | What candidates do |
|---|---|
| Kit availability (default) | Pick from your team’s open slots in the Kit portal |
| Calendly | Book the Calendly event type you selected for the stage |
If Calendly isn’t connected, the stage prompts you to connect before you can pick an event type. Switching one stage to Calendly leaves other stages untouched.
What the Candidate Sees
On a Calendly-enabled stage, the candidate gets a short Kit intro and a Choose a time button that opens a single-use Calendly link in a new tab. They book as normal, and the Kit portal flips to confirmed via the webhook — even if they never return to the original tab. No Calendly account required.
A Calendly booking becomes a regular Kit interview, so notifications, the application timeline, interviewer assignment, and calendar invites all behave exactly as they do for native interviews.
Reschedule and Cancel
For Calendly interviews, the confirmation screen’s Reschedule link opens Calendly’s own UI in a new tab — Calendly remains the source of truth. Kit listens for the resulting webhook and updates the interview in place: a reschedule moves the existing interview (no duplicate) and fires notifications for the new time. (Native interviews reschedule through Kit’s in-portal slot picker instead.)
Disconnecting
Go to Integrations > Calendly and click Disconnect. This tears down the Calendly webhook. Native stages are never affected. Calendly stages can’t mint new booking links until you reconnect.
Troubleshooting
| Problem | Cause | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Connection shows a red error badge | The stored token expired or was revoked | Reconnect the Calendly account |
| Card shows an amber Requires Standard plan prompt (badge still Connected) | Your Calendly plan is below Standard, so webhooks — and real-time booking sync — aren’t available. The connection itself is fine. | Upgrade your Calendly plan (Standard, Teams, or Enterprise), then click Verify. Reconnecting won’t help — it’s a plan limit, not a broken connection. |
| Connect button fails immediately | Calendly OAuth isn’t configured on this environment | Contact support |
| No event types when configuring a stage | Calendly isn’t connected, or you have no event types | Connect Calendly; create an event type in Calendly |
| Portal didn’t flip to confirmed | The booking webhook didn’t reach Kit — often because the plan blocks webhooks | If the card shows the amber Requires Standard plan prompt, upgrade your plan and click Verify. Otherwise confirm the badge shows Connected and reconnect to re-register the webhook. |
| Candidate sees “scheduling unavailable” | The single-use link couldn’t be created | Check the connection and reconnect if needed |
Quick Checklist
- Connecting user is a Calendly org Owner/Admin on a paid plan
- Connect Calendly once at Integrations > Calendly
- On a live interview stage, set provider to Calendly and pick an event type
- Test the candidate flow — confirm the portal flips to “confirmed” after booking