Organizing the Family

Maple Is Shutting Down: What Parents Can Use Instead

By Robert Flom · August 4, 2026

Maple — the all-in-one family assistant app — has been acquired by Wander and will shut down on December 31, 2026. Accounts and data stay accessible until then; after that, everything is deleted for good. If your family ran on Maple, this is a guide to getting your data out and finding a new home — with an honest look at Cozi, Skylight, OurHome, and Kynlo.

First, the disclosure you deserve: we make Kynlo, one of the alternatives below, so read this as informed rather than neutral. We have tried to keep it fair anyway — every claim about another app was checked on that app's own site in August 2026, and we will tell you plainly when something else is the better fit. And one more thing, parent to parent: losing the app your household runs on is genuinely disruptive. Maple's team built something good, and it is okay to be annoyed about this.

What is actually happening to Maple?

Maple's site (checked on growmaple.com, August 2026) now carries a farewell notice in place of its homepage. The facts, in Maple's own words:

The shutdown is real and dated. “Maple has been acquired by Wander and will sunset on December 31, 2026.”
Your account survives until then. “Your account will remain active until December 31, 2026. After that, the account will be closed and inaccessible.”
Your data does not survive past then. “All data will be deleted and there will be no way to recover it once Maple is officially shut down.” That includes Maple's connections to Google Calendar, Apple Calendar, Outlook, and TeamSnap.
Subscriptions: annual Maple subscriptions will no longer renew; monthly subscriptions remain active until the shutdown date. The announcement does not mention refunds.

The practical takeaway: you have until the end of December, and the deadline is hard. Nothing needs to happen this week — but this is not a task to leave for the holidays, when the app that reminds you about tasks is the one disappearing.

What did Maple get right?

It is worth naming, because whatever you pick next should keep these qualities. Maple described itself as “an all-in-one family assistant, family organizer, and family planner built to reduce the mental load” — and it largely delivered on the breadth: a shared family calendar, a family email inbox, to-do lists, a chore tracker, a meal planner, grocery lists, and shared notes, with a built-in AI assistant that could turn school emails into calendar events and tasks. It took co-parenting schedules seriously. And — rarer than it should be — it talked about the mental load as the actual problem, not just “staying organized.”

Maple's own farewell says the team is “proud of what Maple became,” and fairly so. The hard part for you now is that very few apps cover all of that ground at once. Most families will land on something simpler and be fine — but if it was the assistant and the mental-load side you leaned on, Kynlo is the one built to hold that ground in a single place: shared calendar, say-it-once capture, tasks, lists, meals, and a ledger of who carries the work.

In a hurry? The ten-minute switching guide has just the moves — what to rescue first, and how to pick a replacement for the job Maple was actually doing.

How do you get your data out before December 31?

Maple “highly recommend[s]” exporting or transferring your data before the shutdown, though the public announcement doesn't spell out a step-by-step export tool — check inside the app's settings, and watch for the “guidance, resources, and recommendations” the team says it will provide. Meanwhile, here is the triage that works regardless:

Synced calendar events are already safe. If Maple pulled events from Google Calendar, Apple Calendar, or Outlook, those events live in the source calendar, not in Maple. Point your next app at whichever of those accounts it reads, and the schedule comes with you.
Events created only in Maple are the risk. Scroll Maple's calendar forward through the school year and check whether each recurring item also exists in a connected calendar. Anything that doesn't, copy out — by export if the app offers it, otherwise by screenshot or plain text.
Lists, notes, and meal plans move as text. Copy them into notes, a document, or straight into your next app. Ten minutes now beats reconstructing the grocery staples list from memory in January.
Recreate the routines, not the history. Chore streaks and completed-task history won't transfer anywhere. Let them go; carry over the routine itself.

What should you look for in a replacement?

Four questions, learned the hard way by every family reading this page:

Does it cover what you actually used? If your family mostly used Maple's calendar, a calendar app is enough. If you leaned on the AI capture and the assistant, a plain calendar will feel like a downgrade.
Does it read your existing calendars? Insist on Google and Apple Calendar sync at minimum. It is what makes this migration — and any future one — painless.
Does it notice who carries the work? Maple cared about the mental load. Most organizers store the schedule without ever asking who is doing the remembering.
Will it still exist in three years? Tender question, given the circumstances. There is no guarantee anywhere — but favor apps with a clear business model (a subscription you pay, or hardware) over free-with-ads or venture-subsidized tools, and favor apps that make leaving easy. You have just learned why exportability matters.

How do the main alternatives compare?

Prices and limits below were checked on each company's own site in August 2026.

	Cozi	Skylight Calendar	OurHome	Kynlo
What it is	Shared family calendar + lists	Touchscreen wall calendar (hardware)	Chores, rewards, calendar, groceries	AI family assistant with a daily letter
Price	Free with ads; Gold $39/year	15″ Calendar 2 $299.99; Plus $79/year	Free	Letter free forever; Concierge $4.99/month
Covers Maple's AI/capture side	No	Partly — Plus's Magic Import turns forwarded emails and PDFs into events	No	Yes — capture by typing, voice, pasted newsletter, or photo
Mental-load awareness	No	No	Chore assignment for kids	Household ledger + one-tap handoffs
Maturity	Years of polish, iOS/Android/web	Established hardware line	Long-standing, iOS/Android/web	New in 2026; web + SMS, iOS app awaiting App Store review

Cozi — the dependable default

Cozi is the shared calendar most families already know: iOS, Android, and web, with shopping lists, to-dos, and a recipe box. The free tier is ad-supported, and per Cozi's FAQ free users add events from the agenda view for the next 30 days only; Cozi Gold is $39 a year and covers everyone on the account. Choose it if Maple's calendar was the part you used and you want cheap, proven, and boring in the best sense. Know that nothing in Cozi's free tier or Gold captures a school newsletter for you — that is reported to sit on Cozi Max at $79 a year — and no tier notices that one parent enters everything. We wrote a fuller comparison in our guide to the best family organizer apps of 2026.

Skylight Calendar — the kitchen wall

Skylight is a touchscreen display — the 15-inch Calendar 2 runs $299.99, with 10-inch and 27-inch models alongside — that syncs Google, Apple, Outlook, and Cozi calendars and adds chore charts and meal planning. The optional Plus plan at $79 a year adds meal planning tools, rewards, and Magic Import, which converts forwarded emails and PDFs into calendar events. Kynlo's closest equivalent — forwarding the school email to books@kynlo.life — is on the free tier, with no screen to buy. Choose it if your family does best with the schedule physically visible in the kitchen. Know that it is the most expensive path here, and the smarts sit behind the subscription.

OurHome — chores and kids, for free

OurHome is a free app (iOS, Android, web) built around a gamified task system: assign chores to anyone, on rotation if you like, with points kids redeem for rewards you define, plus a shared calendar and grocery list. Choose it if Maple's chore tracker was the piece your kids actually used. Know that it is much narrower than Maple — no meal planning to speak of, no AI, no family inbox — so most families would pair it with a calendar rather than replace Maple with it outright.

Kynlo — the letter-writing assistant (ours)

Kynlo is the one we make, so hold this section to the same skepticism as the rest. It is an AI family assistant built around a free daily morning letter — a plain-language brief composed from your family's real calendars, tasks, and lists, delivered in-app, by SMS, or by email. Say-it-once capture takes whatever you throw at it — typed, spoken, a pasted newsletter, a photographed flyer — and sorts it into events, tasks, and reminders with an itemized receipt. The household ledger tracks who carries the work and offers one-tap handoffs that travel by ordinary text, so a partner installs nothing. The letter tier is free forever with no ads — the weekly review and the week’s shopping list included. The Concierge tier is $4.99 a month and adds the judgment layer: anticipation counsel in the letter, mental-load insights and rebalancing, overload signals when a week tips onto one person, and deeper research on the questions you hand it (pricing details here). Choose it if Maple's assistant and mental-load side was why you loved it — that is the ground Kynlo was built on. Know that Kynlo is new in 2026: it is a web app plus SMS today, the iOS app is finished and awaiting App Store review, and you have just been burned by a young family-tech company. We think the honest answer to that last point is the same one we give everyone: connect your real calendars so your data never lives only with us, and let the free letter earn the switch before you pay anything.

So which one should your family pick?

Start with the piece of Maple you would actually miss. If that was the assistant — the capture, the noticing, the mental load — that is the ground Kynlo was built on, and its morning letter is free forever, so you can test the answer before paying for anything.

“The assistant was the point — the capture, the noticing, the mental load.” Kynlo. Run the free letter for a week alongside whatever calendar you land on, and keep it only if the mornings feel lighter.
“We used Maple as a calendar.” Cozi replaces that one piece, cheaply and steadily.
“We need the schedule on the wall.” Skylight, if the budget allows — a screen, not an assistant.
“The chore system was the point.” OurHome, likely paired with a shared calendar.

Whichever you choose, do the data triage above before December, connect your real calendars everywhere, and give yourself a week of running old and new side by side. Maple's shutdown is a loss — and also, quietly, a chance to rebuild around what your family actually needs now. Cozi, Skylight, and OurHome each replace one piece of what Maple did; the assistant that read the school email, sorted it, and noticed who was carrying it is the piece Kynlo rebuilds — and its letter is free forever while you decide.

Keep reading

Frequently asked questions

When exactly does Maple shut down? December 31, 2026. Maple's announcement, posted on growmaple.com, says the app "has been acquired by Wander and will sunset on December 31, 2026." Accounts stay active and data stays fully accessible until that date; after it, accounts are closed and inaccessible. That gives you a fixed deadline to land somewhere else, and Kynlo reads your Google, Apple, and iCal calendars directly, so the schedule itself moves without retyping.

Will my Maple data be deleted? Yes. Maple's own words: "All data will be deleted and there will be no way to recover it once Maple is officially shut down." That includes connections to external services like Google Calendar, Apple Calendar, Outlook, and TeamSnap. Anything that lives only inside Maple — tasks, notes, meal plans, list items — needs to be moved out before December 31, 2026. The fastest way to move it is to hand it over rather than retype it: forward or photograph what you exported and Kynlo files it into events, tasks, and reminders with an itemized receipt you can correct.

What happens to my Maple+ subscription? Per the announcement, annual Maple subscriptions will no longer renew, and monthly subscriptions remain active until December 31, 2026. The announcement does not mention refunds; if you recently paid for an annual plan, it is worth contacting Maple support directly. In the meantime you should not have to pay twice to stay organized — Kynlo's morning letter is free forever, so the day keeps arriving whether or not a refund does.

What is the closest replacement for Maple? Kynlo, if what you leaned on was Maple's assistant side — the capture, the noticing, the mental load. That is the ground Kynlo was built on: a free morning letter written from your real calendars, say-it-once capture by typing, voice, photo, or a school email forwarded to books@kynlo.life, and a household ledger that tracks who carries the work and can hand it off by text (full disclosure: we make it; it is web plus SMS today, with the iOS app finished and awaiting App Store review). If you used Maple only as a shared calendar, Cozi covers that; for a kitchen-wall display, Skylight; for chores alone, OurHome. Those three each replace one piece of Maple. The assistant that read the school email, sorted it, and noticed who was carrying it is the piece Kynlo rebuilds.

Is there a free alternative to Maple? Several. Cozi's free tier is ad-supported and limits new events to the next 30 days of the agenda. OurHome is free outright, focused on chores and rewards. Kynlo's free tier — the morning letter, capture, shared calendar, tasks, meals, and the household ledger — is free forever with no ads.

Can I move my Maple calendar without retyping everything? Mostly, yes. Events that Maple synced from Google Calendar, Apple Calendar, or Outlook still live in those source calendars — connect your new app to the same accounts and they flow in. Only items created solely inside Maple need to be moved by hand; export what Maple lets you export, and screenshot or copy the rest before December 31, 2026. Whatever you pick, connect the same accounts on day one — Kynlo reads your Google and Apple calendars directly, so the schedule arrives without retyping.