Prime Timetable

Prime Timetable provides automatic and manual scheduling for schools, universities, and similar institutions. Users can plan multiple weeks at flexible times, drag cards in master or individual views, and divide classes into groups for electives. Its generator can apply constraints such as pinned cards and forbidden time slots, then optimize teacher and student loads, gaps, room use, and building moves. Timetables can be viewed from any device, customized, printed as master or individual schedules, and exported to formats and apps. Data can be imported by copy and paste; the site does not name specific integrations. The maker says schedules are backed up every 24 hours and that the service is used in over 120 countries. The free plan is for evaluation, includes premium support, and requires an internet connection. Commercial plans enable offline work. Basic is for small and medium schools and supports up to 40 teachers; Premium is aimed at larger and campus schools and supports up to 100. Commercial plan prices depend on the selected duration, which can be one to five years.

Prime Timetable offers flexible scheduling, constraint-based generation, and timetable publishing for educational institutions. The free plan is evaluation-only and online-dependent, while commercial plan prices vary by chosen term.

Prime Timetable suits schools, universities, and similar institutions that need manual or automatic scheduling. Basic is aimed at smaller schools, while Premium is intended for larger and campus schools.

Overview

Prime Timetable is a scheduling workspace for institutions that need to coordinate classes, teachers, student groups and rooms across a school or campus. It is best suited to schools and universities with competing timetable rules and staff who need both automated generation and manual control. The main trade-off is that the free plan is limited to evaluation, while paid access requires choosing a term of one to five years.

Key features

Planners can arrange multiple weeks at flexible times, move timetable cards in master and individual views, and split classes into groups for electives. That combination supports schedules with different student pathways while leaving room to adjust the result directly. For a small institution with a simple timetable, however, this depth may be more than it needs.

The automatic generator works with pinned cards and forbidden time slots, and can optimize teacher and student loads, gaps, room use and building moves. Teacher and room constraints, conflict detection and multi-campus support make it suitable for schedules where staffing, space and campus movement must be considered together. These controls are useful when planners can define the rules clearly; the tool’s value depends on those constraints reflecting the institution’s real requirements.

Timetables can be viewed from any device, customized, printed as master or individual schedules, and exported to formats and apps. Data can be brought in by copy and paste, but no named integrations are described. The maker says schedules are backed up every 24 hours, a useful recovery measure for an operational timetable.

Commercial plans allow offline work; the free plan requires an internet connection. The service describes encryption for traffic, vulnerability safeguards, network protections, access policies, audit logs, and physical and procedural security measures. Its cloud data centres are in the US, and its US hosting provider is ISO/IEC 27001:2013 certified. Student data is not used for advertising or sold, and is kept only as long as needed to provide the educational service. After subscription termination, current system data and associated encrypted backups may be retained for up to one year.

Pricing

Free: free. This plan is for evaluation, includes the web app for all devices and premium support, and has a 30-day trial period. It is a way to assess the workflow, not a continuing free option; it also requires an internet connection.

Basic: custom pricing, billed for a chosen term of one to five years. It targets small and medium schools, includes the web app for all devices and premium support, and allows up to 40 teachers. That cap makes it the more focused commercial choice for smaller institutions, but schools expecting to exceed it should consider the higher tier.

Premium: custom pricing, billed for a chosen term of one to five years. Aimed at larger and campus schools, it raises the limit to 100 teachers while retaining the web app and premium support. The larger allowance and campus focus suit broader deployments, though the term commitment makes the total cost important to weigh before choosing a plan. For both paid plans, the total price appears after selecting a plan and duration.

Platforms

Prime Timetable supports Android, iOS, Linux, macOS, web and Windows. The free plan is web-based and requires an internet connection; commercial plans enable offline work.

Who it's for

Prime Timetable is a strong fit for schools, universities and similar institutions that need to coordinate teacher and room constraints, electives, multiple weeks or campuses. It is particularly relevant when a planner wants to combine generated schedules with direct edits and publish individual as well as master timetables. Small teams should check the 40-teacher Basic limit, while larger institutions should compare their staffing needs with Premium’s 100-teacher cap. Organizations seeking a permanent free plan or short paid commitment should look elsewhere.

Pros and cons

• Pro: Generation can account for pinned times, unavailable slots, loads, gaps, rooms and building moves, giving planners meaningful control over competing constraints.
• Pro: Manual editing, elective groups, multi-campus support and individual timetable publishing cover needs that a basic calendar does not address.
• Pro: Commercial offline work and daily backups support continuity for institutions relying on schedules day to day.
• Con: The free plan is evaluation-only, lasts 30 days and needs an internet connection, so it cannot serve as an ongoing no-cost timetable system.
• Con: Paid plan prices depend on a one-to-five-year term, and the teacher caps of 40 and 100 may constrain institutions near or above those sizes.
• Con: Data centres are in the US, and terminated subscriptions can leave system data and backups retained for up to one year, considerations for institutions with specific data-location or deletion requirements.

Alternatives

School Scheduling Software is a useful starting point for comparing tools in this category; Exam Scheduling Software is the more relevant directory for readers focused on exam timetables.

Choose Peñalara GHC if you want a freemium option with a free plan and support for Android, iOS, web and Windows. TimetableMaster is another freemium choice, with listed support for API, desktop and mobile platforms as well as web.

aSc Timetables may suit readers who want an unlimited free trial before buying; its trial does not allow exports. Consider Untis if you prefer a paid system with pricing provided through a sales request.

GC Education Analytics K–12 Master Scheduler is a free, web-based option for readers seeking a no-cost scheduler. SchoolGrid offers a free evaluation for one school, with staff entry and roster import, up to 15 drafts and a 30-day scheduling and publishing period.

For open-source options, UniTime is free and supports self-hosting, with commercial support available for a fee. FET is a free choice for readers who need a desktop scheduler and do not require stated usage limits.

Verdict

Prime Timetable is the right choice for schools and universities that need flexible, constraint-based scheduling, campus-aware optimization and published timetables across devices. Its strongest reason to choose it is the balance of automatic generation and manual control; its strongest reason to look elsewhere is the evaluation-only free plan and multi-year commitment for paid use. Institutions should match their teacher count to the 40- or 100-teacher cap and confirm that the selected term and data-retention terms suit their needs.