How to Plan Your Day With Claude (Tasks + Calendar, 2026)
Plan your day with Claude: connect your tasks and calendar over MCP in 2 minutes, then use 9 copy-paste prompts for morning plans, re-plans and shutdowns.
Open Sunsama Team · · 9 min read
To plan your day with Claude, connect it to a task app and your calendar, then say "plan my day" in a chat. Claude reads your tasks and meetings, proposes a time-blocked schedule, and books it only after you say yes. This guide sets that up with Open Sunsama's MCP connector in about 2 minutes, then gives you 9 prompts for real routines.
Open Sunsama is an open-source daily planner built for this. It keeps your tasks, time blocks and meetings in one place, so Claude needs one connector to plan your day.
Key takeaways
- Claude needs a place to write. Chat alone forgets your list. A connector gives Claude a real planner it can read and change.
- One connector covers the whole day. Open Sunsama holds your tasks and time blocks and reads the meetings synced from your calendar.
- Setup takes 2 minutes on any plan. Paste one URL, sign in, click Allow. The Free plan allows one custom connector.
- You approve every booking. Claude proposes first. Nothing lands on your calendar until you say yes.
- Nine prompts cover a full week: morning plan, time blocking, brain dump, get back on track, rollover, shutdown and weekly review.
Let Claude or ChatGPT plan your day with Open Sunsama
Claude plans your day best with a planner it can write to
Claude is good at the thinking part of planning. It can weigh priorities, spot a day that's too full, and suggest what to drop. What it lacks on its own is memory of your tasks from one chat to the next.
A connector fixes that. It is a small bridge, built on the Model Context Protocol (MCP), that lets Claude use another app's tools. Here is what each setup can do:
| Setup |
Sees your meetings |
Keeps a lasting task list |
Books time blocks |
Rolls tasks to tomorrow |
| Claude alone |
No |
No |
No |
No |
| Claude + Google Calendar connector |
Yes |
No |
As calendar events |
No |
| Claude + Open Sunsama connector |
Yes, synced from Google, Outlook or iCloud |
Yes |
Yes, linked to tasks |
Yes |
| Claude + both |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
Open Sunsama's connector also reads the meetings you synced from Google Calendar, Outlook or iCloud, so Claude sees your whole day through one connector. Add Claude's own Google Calendar connector only if you want Claude to create or edit calendar events.
How to connect Open Sunsama to Claude in 2 minutes
You need an Open Sunsama account and any Claude plan. Custom connectors work on Free, Pro, Max, Team and Enterprise. The Free plan is limited to one.
claude.ai, Claude Desktop and the mobile apps
- In Claude, open Customize → Connectors (direct link).
- Click Add (or +), then Add custom connector.
- Name it Open Sunsama and paste this URL:
https://api.opensunsama.com/mcp
- Click Continue. Keep the sign-in settings Claude detects, and click Add.
- Click Connect, sign in to Open Sunsama, and click Allow access.
You approve access once. Claude never sees your password.
Claude now shows Connected to Open Sunsama. The connector works in Claude Desktop and the phone apps too, with nothing to install.
To let Claude see your meetings, connect your calendar in Open Sunsama under Settings → Calendars. If you added the connector before calendar access existed, reconnect it in Settings → MCP → Connected apps and allow calendar access.
On Team and Enterprise plans, an owner adds it once in Organization settings → Connectors, then each person connects. The full steps are in the Claude setup guide and the Claude Desktop guide.
Claude Code
Run this once in your terminal:
claude mcp add --transport http --scope user open-sunsama https://api.opensunsama.com/mcp
Then start Claude Code, run /mcp, pick open-sunsama, and choose Authenticate. Your browser opens the same consent screen.
Claude asks before each tool call. Once you trust it, open the connector and set Read-only tools to Always allow. Lookups then run without a prompt, and changes still ask first.
Settings → MCP has the URL and steps for every assistant, ready to copy.
What Claude does when you say "plan my day"
It helps to know what happens behind the scenes. Open Sunsama gives Claude 24 tools for tasks, subtasks, time blocks and your synced meetings. A morning plan uses a handful of them, in this order:
- Checks your timezone with
get_user_profile, so "today" means your today.
- Reads your list with
list_tasks: today's tasks, overdue ones and their time estimates.
- Reads your calendar with
get_schedule_for_day, which returns your meetings and time blocks together.
- Proposes a plan in chat. It shows each block with a time, and flags what won't fit.
- Waits for you. You approve, or you say "move the review to 3pm."
- Books it with
create_time_block and link_task_to_time_block, and moves spillover with schedule_task.
Steps 1 to 4 only read. Step 6 writes, and it runs only after your yes. Delete tools are marked as destructive, so Claude asks before it removes anything.
Claude plans the afternoon over MCP, and the time blocks appear in Open Sunsama live.
9 Claude prompts to plan your day (copy and paste)
Each prompt below is a real routine. Paste it as is, or add your own details. Most of them tell Claude to show the plan before it changes anything.
1. Morning plan
Plan my day. Look at today's tasks, anything overdue, and my meetings.
I work 9 to 5 and want a 30-minute lunch at noon.
Propose a time-blocked schedule with 10-minute buffers.
Show it to me first and wait for my OK before you book anything.
What Claude does: it reads your tasks and calendar, fits your top work into the free gaps, and lists what doesn't fit. After you say yes, it creates the time blocks.
2. Time block my afternoon
I have from 1pm to 5pm free. Pick the 3 most important open tasks for today
and block time for each, using their estimates. Put the hardest one first.
Show me the blocks before you create them.
What Claude does: it sorts by priority (P0 to P3) and estimate, then proposes three blocks. You can say "swap the order" before it books them.
A time block in Open Sunsama is a task placed on the calendar. You can drag or resize it after Claude books it.
3. Brain dump to tasks
Here's my brain dump. Turn it into tasks with a rough time estimate and a
priority for each. Put anything urgent on today, the rest on this week,
and the vague ideas in the backlog. List them first and wait for my OK.
[paste your notes here]
What Claude does: it splits messy notes into clear tasks, guesses estimates, and asks about anything unclear. Then it creates them with create_task.
4. Get back on track after a bad day
Yesterday went off track. Show me everything that's overdue.
Help me pick what matters today, move the rest to later this week,
and send anything I keep skipping to the backlog. Keep today realistic.
Show me the new plan before you move anything.
What Claude does: it lists overdue work without judgment, suggests a short list for today, and spreads the rest across the week. This is the prompt that turns "a wall of stuff" back into a plan.
5. Roll over what's left
It's the end of the day. Move every unfinished task from today to tomorrow,
keep their order, and put them at the top of tomorrow's list.
What Claude does: it moves each open task with schedule_task and reorders tomorrow. Open Sunsama can also roll over unfinished tasks for you each night (turn it on in Settings). Use this prompt when you want to choose by hand.
6. End-of-day shutdown
Run my shutdown. What did I finish today, and how did my estimates compare
with the actual time? What's left, and what should be first tomorrow?
Keep it short.
What Claude does: it reads completed tasks, compares planned vs actual time, and drafts tomorrow's first move. The focus timer in Open Sunsama records the actual time, so the numbers are real.
Check off what you finished, then let Claude sum up the day and set up tomorrow.
7. Weekly review
Do my weekly review. What did I finish this week? What's overdue, and what
has sat untouched for 2+ weeks? Suggest what to drop, and draft a rough
plan for next week. Don't change anything yet.
What Claude does: it scans the week and the backlog, then gives you a short report. You decide what moves, and then it makes the changes.
8. "I only have 4 hours today"
Something came up and I only have 4 hours today. Look at my plan and tell me
what to keep and what to push to tomorrow. Then update the time blocks.
What Claude does: it cuts the plan to fit, protects your top task, and moves the rest after you agree.
9. Break a big task into steps
The task "Launch pricing page" feels too big. Break it into subtasks of
30 minutes or less, and block the first two for tomorrow morning.
What Claude does: it adds subtasks with create_subtask, then proposes two small blocks. Small first steps make a hard task easier to start.
Run the morning plan on a schedule
You can have Claude start the day for you. On paid plans (Pro, Max, Team and Enterprise), Claude's scheduled tasks run a saved prompt on a set cadence. They use your connectors and run even when your computer is asleep.
Tell it: "Every weekday at 8am, draft my plan for today from Open Sunsama and my calendar. Don't book anything." Then open the result with your coffee and reply "looks good, book it."
4 tips that make Claude's plans realistic
- Add time estimates to tasks. Claude can't fit a task into a gap if it doesn't know how long it takes. Even rough guesses help.
- Tell Claude your rules once. Put working hours, lunch and "no meetings before 10" in a Claude Project's instructions. Then every chat starts with them.
- Leave buffers. Ask for 10 to 15 minutes between blocks, and keep part of the day open. Full plans break by 11am.
- Review planned vs actual on Fridays. If your estimates run short, ask Claude to pad them by 25% next week.
Other Claude task management options
Open Sunsama isn't the only planner with an MCP server. Here is a fair look at the main choices in 2026:
| App |
How it connects to Claude |
Best for |
| Open Sunsama |
Hosted MCP with OAuth, 24 tools |
Tasks and time blocks in one place, open code, self-hosting |
| Todoist |
Official hosted MCP at ai.todoist.net/mcp |
A mature task list you already use |
| Sunsama |
Official MCP server, included in its Pro plan |
Guided daily planning rituals |
| Google Calendar |
Claude's built-in connector |
Meetings and events only |
Pick Todoist if your life already runs on it and you mostly need a task list. Pick Sunsama if you love its guided rituals and don't mind a closed app. Pick Open Sunsama if you want tasks, time blocks and focus time in one planner that your agent can fully use.
A few things set Open Sunsama apart. The code is public on GitHub, and you can self-host it with Docker. It also has a documented REST API with API keys.
And the same connector works in ChatGPT, Cursor and any MCP client, so you aren't tied to one AI.
For a full comparison, see our guide to the best task managers with MCP.
Which setup should you pick?
- If you want Claude to plan your whole day, connect Open Sunsama and sync your calendar in its settings.
- If you only need Claude to read your meetings, the Google Calendar connector alone is enough.
- If you live in the terminal, add Open Sunsama to Claude Code with one command.
- If you want the plan to run each morning, use a scheduled task on a paid Claude plan.
- If you want to plan by hand too, use the Open Sunsama app on desktop, web or phone. Claude and you edit the same plan.
Want to see more of what AI can do with your calendar? Read time blocking with AI, or see how the AI integration works.
Frequently asked questions
Can Claude manage my to-do list?
Yes, once you connect a task app. On its own, Claude has no lasting task list. With a connector such as Open Sunsama or Todoist, it can create, update, complete and move your real tasks.
Can Claude access my calendar?
Yes. Open Sunsama's connector reads the meetings synced from your Google, Outlook or iCloud calendar, next to your tasks and time blocks, so Claude sees your meetings and your work in one plan. Claude's built-in Google Calendar connector can also create and edit events.
Does this work on the free Claude plan?
Yes. Custom connectors work on every Claude plan, including Free. The Free plan allows one custom connector, so Open Sunsama can be that one.
Will Claude change my schedule without asking?
Not by default. Claude asks before each tool call, and the prompts in this guide tell it to show the plan and wait for your yes. You can later set read-only lookups to always allow.
Can Claude plan my day automatically every morning?
On paid Claude plans, scheduled tasks can run a prompt every weekday with your connectors. Ask it to draft the plan only, so you still approve what goes on the calendar.
Is there a Claude task management app that works on my phone?
Yes. A custom connector added on claude.ai also works in the Claude mobile apps. Open Sunsama runs on the web, on Mac, Windows and Linux, and in your phone's browser, so you can check the plan anywhere.
Does the same setup work with ChatGPT or Cursor?
Yes. Open Sunsama's connector is a standard MCP server. The same URL works in ChatGPT, Cursor, Claude Code and any other MCP client.