Somewhere in your house is a tablet that stopped being anyone's tablet years ago. Ten minutes from now it can be the thing that ends "what time is swimming?" — everyone's schedule, chores, dinner and the grocery list, on a wall everyone walks past.
Nothing to install on the iPad. Works on iPads from 2014 onwards.
The iPad. 2017 or newer is comfortable. A 2014–2016 iPad works too, minus a couple of the translucent effects. (No iPad? A cheap Android tablet, a Fire tablet, a spare monitor with a streaming stick, or an old laptop all work — the display runs in a browser.)
A charger and somewhere to stand it. The kitchen counter against the backsplash is where most families start. A $15 tablet stand or a shelf works; wall-mounting can come later, once the family is hooked.
A Family Kiosk account. Free for 30 days, every feature, no card. Set it up on your phone first — two minutes — so the iPad has something to show.
One honest hardware note: any tablet kept plugged in at 100% for months can eventually swell its battery. A cheap timer plug that charges it a few hours a day sorts it — or use a monitor and skip batteries entirely.
The calendar — everyone's week in their own colour, so you can tell whose day is busy from across the room. Two-way Google Calendar sync is optional: family events reach your phone, work meetings never reach the wall.
Chores — whose turn, ticked off by tapping the screen.
Meals — the week's dinners, so nobody has to ask at 4:55.
Grocery lists — sorted the way the store is laid out, on the wall and in every pocket at once.
And the party trick: photograph a birthday invitation or a school newsletter and the dates become events — after you've checked what it read. A month of sports fixtures without typing one of them.
2017 onwards: comfortable. 2014–2016: works, minus a couple of translucent effects. Fire tablets work through Silk (installing Chrome helps on older ones). Any device with Chrome or Safari from 2020 onwards is fine — the wall display is a web page, not an app.
Yes — set Auto-Lock to Never and let it run. The battery caveat above is real but solved for $10: a timer plug that charges a few hours a day. Some families use a monitor with a streaming stick instead and skip the battery question entirely.
Touch makes the wall itself tappable — tick a chore, flip to the meal plan. But it's optional: with a plain monitor, everyone adds and edits from their own phone and the wall just displays.
$39/year for the phones-only plan, $69/year with the always-on wall display and Google sync. The screen costs nothing because you already own it — compare that with $299.99 for a Skylight Calendar or $699 for a Hearth before their subscriptions start.
Guided Access pins the iPad to the calendar. Inside the app, kids don't have accounts to lose passwords for — everyone is a name and a colour. And nothing scanned is ever added to the calendar until an adult has reviewed it and tapped Add.
30 days free, every feature, no card. Ten minutes to the wall.
Comparing devices instead? Family Kiosk vs the Skylight Calendar.