Sunrise Calendar is a light and elegant alternative to Google Calendar for Android.

What makes Sunrise special?

Sunrise Calendar currently supports both Google Calendar and iCloud, so anything that's stored in these calendars will be visible through the app. By connecting with Facebook it can also show you Facebook events, including friends' birthdays and events you've been invited to. You can also import from LinkedIn, Foursquare, and Twitter.

Other features of Sunrise Calendar include notifications, programmable alerts, and basic weather forecasts for today and tomorrow. There's a handy widget that shows you up-coming events and gives you a shortcut to add an event.

Sunrise Calendar isn't the finished package yet. The application still lacks a tablet-optimized version for Android, and there's no support for Microsoft Exchange. However, the developer assures us that both of these features are "coming soon".

Beautiful Sunrise

Sunrise Calendar's strength is less its features and more its beautiful design. The user interface is free of clutter and full of white space. You can browse through events by scrolling down or tapping on a date at the top. Swipe to the left and you'll see a detailed day view with your appointments marked neatly by hour.

The addition of a small red arrow icon in the bottom corner allows you to flash straight back to the current date and time with a tap.

Neat icons are used by Sunrise Calendar to mark special events such as birthdays, and the app retains label colors for items you've created in Google Calendar. Unfortunately, you can't apply colored labels to new entries created in Sunrise Calendar, so if you use them a lot you might be better sticking with Google Calendar.

Another shortcoming of Sunrise Calendar is that there's no monthly calendar view within the app. This would save a lot of scrolling and make event a bit clearer to see at a glance.

A new dawn in the world of calendar apps?

Sunrise is a gorgeous and simple-to-use calendar app, of that there is no doubt. However, it's still lacking a few features to turn it into a Google Calendar killer.