A dated planner suits you if
- ✓You plan most days and want every date ready to write in.
- ✓You like seeing the whole year laid out, with weeks and months linked together.
- ✓You start at the beginning of a year, or at the start of an academic year with a midyear planner.
An undated planner suits you if
- ✓You plan in bursts, and blank weeks in a dated planner make you feel behind.
- ✓You are starting part way through the year.
- ✓You want to reuse the same pages, for example by printing a fresh copy each month.
Daily pages or not
Daily pages are useful if your days are full of appointments and tasks. If you mostly plan by the week, a weekly planner without daily pages is lighter and easier to keep up. Pick the smallest layout that holds what you actually write down.
On a tablet the trade-off changes
In a digital planner, empty dated pages cost nothing and do not sit on a shelf reminding you of missed days. Links also make a dated planner quick to move around. So a dated digital planner works for many people who found paper ones too rigid.
A simple way to decide
Look back at your last planner. If you used most of the pages, choose dated. If it has long empty stretches, choose undated or a weekly layout. If you have never kept one, start undated or weekly, and move to dated once the habit sticks.
You can use both
Some people keep a dated planner for appointments and an undated notebook or workbook for goals, habits and projects. That keeps the dated pages clean and gives longer thinking a home of its own. If that sounds like you, pick a slim dated planner and a separate undated one.
When to switch
If you have bought the same kind of planner three times and stopped by March each time, try the other kind. The format that fits you is the one you are still using in October.
An undated planner you can start any day. The Undated All-in-One Life Planner is a free 12-page fillable PDF for your year, months, weeks and days, with pages for routines, money, meals, habits, goals and a monthly reflection. Type on a computer or print as many copies as you need.
View in the StoreFrom the Stelaah Store
- ✓Stelaah 2027 Complete Planner. A free, dated 2027 hyperlinked digital planner for iPad and tablets with month plans and habit trackers, 53 weekly pages and 365 daily pages.
- ✓Undated All-in-One Life Planner. A free, undated 12-page fillable PDF life planner with year, month, week and day pages plus routines, money, meals, habits and goals.
- ✓Free January to December 2027 Digital Planner. A free, dated January to December 2027 hyperlinked digital planner in soft rainbow colours, with a menu page per month linking its calendar, plan, vision board, goals and finance pages.
We build Stelaah and the Stelaah Store. These guides cover the everyday problems our planners, kits and tools are made for, in plain steps you can use with or without them.