The 8 Most Popular Free and Open Source Meeting Room Booking Systems

Collaboration is one of the fundamental pillars of organizational success - it promotes synergy between departments, individuals, and even third-party vendors. Collaboration also has far-reaching consequences on employee spawned innovation, accountability of actions, and overall business bottom-line. In this regard, meetings have consistently proven themselves as a viable center of communication and collaboration. 

Despite misgivings in the corporate world, meetings are crucial to sustain business collaboration and efficiency when executed well. “That is how you gain experience, how you can gain knowledge - being in meetings and participating. You learn and grow,” revealed Golfing Champion Tiger Woods. It is therefore essential to ensure the process of arranging and executing meetings is streamlined and flawless. It helps maintain employee productivity and promotes business time conservation. Meeting Room Booking Systems helps organizations do just that.

This blog on free and open source meeting room booking systems will enlighten readers on the importance of meeting room booking management. Also, this blog will highlight the challenges of poor meeting room management. Readers will learn about the many features and benefits of MRBS’ to their organization, irrespective of size, scale, or scope. Learn more about meeting room booking software below. 

Impact of Good Meeting Room Booking Management on Business Operations

Meeting room management is anything but mundane. Significant decisions that impact organizational operations and employee productivity and scope arise from important meetings taken at multiple management levels. Therefore, it becomes critical to implement the best meeting room booking practices to elevate business operations.  

Good meeting room booking management helps business owners and stakeholders churn out faster, accurate, and greatly synthesized decisions based on business conditions. Since most decisions arise via consensus, meetings become the ideal tool to drive collaboration among departments and personnel. Booking the perfect meeting room depends on several factors, viz. capacity, meeting room asset infrastructure, dedicated time slots, etc. The ideal meeting room booking management practice will help companies deliver an ideal meeting room for their stakeholders, thereby contributing to quicker business decision-making.   

The best meeting room booking management will also avoid double-bookings of meeting avenues. It is a process fault that leads to time mismanagement through constant rescheduling. Double-Bookings lead primarily to lower employee productivity, as personnel constantly need to shift and adjust their schedules, impacting on-job performance. Visitor management is another crucial aspect that must be considered in a good meeting room booking management system. Since meeting rooms are present throughout an organization's physical infrastructure, it is critical to have digital directional inputs (Digital Signage). It helps employees reduce time spent commuting to the meeting room itself. Thus, it leads to increased productivity, allowing them to meet operational and financial goals.

It is also important to consider effective communication. Good meeting room booking management conveys room schedules and complementary information like meeting room booking authority, occupancy time-Slot, occupancy duration, meeting room assets, etc. This level of information helps businesses reduce workflow bottlenecks, while simultaneously lowering the cost of operations associated with meeting rooms. Reporting and analytics is also a critical component of meeting room booking management. Optimizing the booking process to reduce redundancies and improve efficiency through intelligent insight pulls organizations in the right direction.

Challenges Arising Due to Poor Meeting Room Booking Management

Estimation reveals that close to 40 per cent of organizations waste about 30 minutes a day looking for meeting spaces. Professionals also spend close to 5 hours arranging approximately 15 meetings, EVERY WEEK. All this points to the fact that even a minor deviation in organizing meetings could affect employee productivity adversely. Some of the challenges arising from poor meeting room management are as follows:

What is a Meeting Room Booking System?

A meeting room booking system is a set of digital applications, tools, and functionality that streamlines the entire process of booking meeting rooms. The software enables organizations to optimize the conference room scheduling process. It generates greater value for participants in meetings via appropriate reminders, navigation aids, etc. Users can control various aspects of the booking phase including the type of meeting room required, time zone cross-checks and multi-language support, and cancellation or rescheduling of meetings. Meeting room booking software also possesses the capability of reporting on various statistics central to the booking process.  

Importance of Meeting Room Booking System in the Digital/WFH Economy 

Employment models have undergone widespread evolution over the last decade. The in-demand modes include Work From Home (WFH), Work From Anywhere (WFA), and newer, more employee-friendly hybrid options. However, the necessity to manage, administer, and regulate digital meeting rooms is even greater. In such scenarios, online meeting room booking systems prove to be an effective tool. The importance of an MRBS in the WFH era are as follows:

Key Features of a Meeting Room Booking System

The unmissable features of any meeting room booking software are as follows:

Crucial Advantages of a Meeting Room Booking System

The best conference room booking software not only bridges the gap to outstanding organizational productivity but also brings along multiple benefits which are as below:

Market Options for Meeting Room Booking Systems

Meeting room booking solutions are vastly in demand, irrespective of the size of the organization, scale of operations, or industry. Free and open source meeting room booking software, free meeting room booking systems, freemium meeting room booking solutions, and premium meeting room booking management system, are few variations. Let us take a look at some of the best free and open source meeting room booking systems available.  

Comparison of the 8 Best Free and Open Source Meeting Room Booking Systems

Best Free and Open Source Meeting Room Booking Systems

#1 classroombooking

classroombooking is a free and open source meeting room booking system designed specifically for schools.The latest version is 2.8.6. One of the biggest advantages of the MRBS is its ability to add custom fields and features as per the organization's necessities. Users can now highlight room resources, the time needed per booking, etc. Furthermore, the meeting room booking solution imposes no restrictions of any kind on the number of rooms that implementers can book.

Source - classroombooking

Some of the best features of classroombookings meeting room booking system are as follows:

• Increased Transparency in room booking and scheduling operations
• Easy to operate online booking interface 
• The free meeting room booking system facilitates Multi-Location room booking and displays the necessary information on the booking page 
• The open source meeting room booking system facilitates Recurring Scheduling
• Internal meetings scheduling and facilitation  
• Automated Scheduling Process enhances instructor and school productivity
• Real-time availability of meeting and classroom help increase booking efficiency and eliminate double bookings
• Custom meeting room booking features that users can add include: Utilization Reports, Visitor Management, etc.
• Supports one-week, two-week or any-number-of-week timetable cycles
• Group similar rooms and resources together
• Integration with Active Directory or LDAP is available
• CSV file import to add users

#2 DeskFlex

DeskFlex is a free meeting room booking system that comes with AI to eliminate the hassle of meeting room reservation. The conference room booking software promises to eliminate no-shows or late booking using its user-friendly design and multiple integrations. Besides just meeting rooms, the online meeting room booking system is multi-purpose - allowing easy booking for large capacity ceremonial halls, seminar event venues, equipment, and facilities, etc. The meeting room booking software is integrable with productivity suites such as Microsoft Outlook, Office 365, and Zapier to name a few. The online meeting room booking software is hardware platform-independent.

Source - DeskFlex

Some of the best meeting room booking system management features of DeskFlex are as follows: 

• Recording and display of real-time availability of monitored meeting room 
• Systematic online booking channels and website integrations
• Meeting room multi-form reporting - including utilization, system, and facility usage, etc. -  to help optimize functional booking process and potential
• Transparency in booking requirements provided by other organizers, facility booking process, etc. 
• Internal meeting scheduling and room reservation using open source employee calendar synchronization
• Detailed visitor management - especially badge printing, schedule notifications, recurring appointment reservations, visitor registrations, etc. 
• Multi-location meeting room booking services
• Facility and equipment checks of all meeting rooms to finalize the ideal venue  
• Reduced interruptions with open source meeting display - showcasing important information to prevent disturbances
• Share scheduled meetings and collaborate in real-time
• Get regular notifications and alerts via text or email 
• Workspace and workflow optimization
• Ability to track room usage duration and frequency

#3 Roombelt

Roombelt is an open source meeting room booking system. The Meeting room booking software primarily deals with digital signage at conference room entrances, specializing on a select set of devices running on iOS, Android, and Philips. The online meeting room booking system is device independent and promises to enhance employee productivity time by providing a simple operating interface. The conference room booking software promotes resource efficiency by cancelling meeting room occupancy if attendees fail to show up more than twice, thereby helping enhance resource utilization.

Source -  Roombelt

The best MRBS features of Roombelt are: 

• Automated processes - including room usage display, reminders on internal meetings, etc. 
• Effective and easy online booking process.
• Dedicated status board displays to determine real-time availability 
• Booking transparency to eliminate double bookings through easy calendar integration. 
• Room utilization reports to help increase the efficient usage of meeting rooms. 
• Reporting and analytics to organization's meeting room usage, corresponding factors.
• Incredible visitor management systems - digital signage, navigation, meeting room occupancy details, visitor identification badges, etc.
• Multi-lingual support
• Custom theme implementation for meetings. 
• Third-party application integrations from Google, Microsoft, etc.
• One tap room booking with multiple calendar views
• Ability to automatically eliminate ghost meetings by requiring a check-in
• Supports multiple floors, buildings and location

#4 Hubbion

Hubbion is a free meeting room booking system. Hubbion helps organizations categorize available meeting rooms by available amenities, allowing users to book an unlimited number of rooms. Furthermore, the meeting room booking solution provides tools for enhanced collaboration.

Source - Hubbion

Some of Hubbion’s best meeting room booking system features are: 

• Simple and efficient online booking system 
• Assured transparency in important meeting room booking information
• Real-time availability dashboard to prevent double bookings 
• Useful multi-location room booking especially for coworking centers
• Utility and utilization reporting for seamless booking optimization
• Internal and external meetings easily facilitated and scheduled
• Ability to filter meeting rooms by amenities, seating capacity, etc.
• Quick view dashboard  to edit or reschedule meetings

#5 Picktime

Picktime is a free meeting room booking system. The online meeting room booking system’s creators kept in mind not only co-working spaces but also organizations of numerous sizes and scopes while crafting the code. The result is a free online meeting room booking system that is not only easy to use but also offers exceptional communication tools between organizers, attendees, and third-party individuals. The company also offers purchasers an incredible degree of customization of features on the conference scheduling software but also initiates appropriate security through user access management and authorization, and platform independence. Picktime’s advanced solution set also offers businesses the chance to set up their booking page and website in three simple steps, enabling Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) to harness the potential of the meeting room booking management system.

Source - Picktime

Some of the best MRBS features of Picktime are: 

• Optimized online booking management workflow 
• Multi-location room booking management 
• Recurring meeting or appointment scheduling and management
• Users can check the real-time availability and status of conference rooms using the central dashboard on the meeting room booking solution 
• Unmatched transparency in meeting room booking process
• Granular meeting room usage analytics and reporting
• Visitor management in the form of meeting alerts, rescheduling, meeting time, etc.
• Internal meetings management to reduce time-wastage through scheduling efficiency increases
• Third-party booking feature for businesses that are customer-service oriented
• Utilization reporting - especially information on room capacity, amenities, etc.
• Supports sync with Google, Outlook, Office 365, Exchange and iCloud calendars 
• Automated time zone conversion as per user location
• Payment processing and invoice generation
• Customizable booking forms 
• Vouchers and discounts to attract more customers

#6 SuperSaas

SuperSaas is a free meeting room booking system. Integration is one of the highlights of this conference room booking software. Companies can deploy it as a customizable client appointment scheduling or meeting room booking system by integrating SuperSaas into their organizational workflow. The software offers flexibility in terms of platform independence and adopts a user-authenticated data access control. Furthermore, the free online meeting room booking system enforces the highest level of data protection and encryption on the customer database - which is then used for promotion and communication. The meeting room booking solution also comes equipped with a payment gateway.

Source - SuperSaas

Some of the most enticing MRBS features of SuperSaas are: 

• Facilitates a streamlined online booking process
• Multi-location meeting room booking
• Meeting room usage analytics to ensure the optimized booking process 
• Transparent and real-time availability monitoring of meeting room schedules to optimize booking process and avoid double bookings 
• Meeting room utilization reporting
• Automated processes - reminder alerts, room utilization reports, meeting room status notifications, etc.  
• Visitor management - mapping customers to appointments, managing payments, reschedule information, etc.
• Ability to automatically add buffer time in between appointments
• Integration and sync with Google Calendar, iCal, Microsoft Outlook, etc.
• Create pricing rules and limited time discounts
• Custom forms and layouts
• Supports multiple currencies and languages

#7 SimplyBook.me

SimplyBook.me is a free online meeting room booking system. The conference room booking software is easily customizable. Organizations can brand it as their own, adapt customized templates, and manage bookings for their clients and themselves easily. The software is integrable on platforms such as Facebook, and as widgets on organization websites to manage bookings efficiently. Simplybook.me also provides two applications - one for clients to manage their bookings, and one for organizations to monitor reservations, and perform other activities.

Source - SimplyBook.me

The best meeting room booking system features of SimplyBook.me are as follows: 

• Simple to scale online booking management system irrespective of business demands 
• Real-time availability monitoring for all meeting rooms to avoid double bookings
• Multi-location meeting room booking management 
• Transparent booking data - current, past, and future booking schedules, meeting duration, etc. 
• Easy to integrate different tools - including meeting room usage analytics, Zapier, payment gateways, etc. 
• Automation of administrative processes - such as customer reminders and alerts, etc. 
• Employee management tools monitor efficiency and task management
• Secure client and customer database management for greater CRM and management efficiency. 
• Third-party booking management 
• Increased visitor management with tools such as calendar syncing, user registrations, etc.
• Send automated notifications and reminders to staff and clients
• Separate client and admin mobile app to book and manage meeting rooms
• In store payments via PayPal and Stripe
• Availability of a wide range of templates and booking widgets that can be customized for business websites.

#8 Meeting Room App

Meeting Room App is a free meeting room booking software, up until the completion of the trial period. The meeting room booking management system integrates easily with a host of productivity applications such as Google Suite, and Microsoft Office 365. Deployment options include an on-premise version and a cloud-hosted module. This  smart MRBS comes with multi-language support, eliminating geographical barriers in reserving meeting rooms.

Source - Meeting Room App

Meeting Room App’s best conference room booking software features include: 

• Efficiency visitor management including - meeting room navigation, notifications, and alerts, etc. 
• Time-saving online booking workflow and interface 
• Meeting room reporting features - including utilization statistics per independent room and organizers
• Real-time availability of meeting rooms on display
• Easy management of internal meetings with transparent scheduling       
• Confirmation tracking using a dedicated button
• Automated reminders, alerts, and notifications 
• Dedicated tools for equipment and catering   
• Customizable meeting room display screen with unlimited app background options
• Easy to use confirmation button and full screen mode
• Room wayfinder and overview to get complete information into bookings

Modern meeting room booking systems are incredibly efficient and offer advanced functionalities to meet the demands. Not only free and open source, but also there are premium options available that can effectively help businesses schedule and book their meeting rooms for business purposes. Some of the premium meeting room booking systems are as follows;

Most Popular Meeting Room Booking Software

Skedda

Trusted by over 17,000 users, Skedda is a leading meeting room booking system that allows businesses to book the right meeting rooms in real-time. Established in 2013,  Skedda allows users to customize the app interface as per their convenience, ensuring easy implementation. This robust meeting room booking solution comes with enough flexibility to be platform-independent and latest encryption protocols to secure data. Robust customer support to quickly resolve issues of customers is also available. Popular features include 2-way sync integration, report generation, comprehensive rule management systems, booking windows and conditions, custom fields, buffer time, repeat bookings, booking cancellation policies, etc. It is available to use for a 30-day free trial and the starter  plan starts from $99 per month.

Envoy

Since 2013, Envoy has been helping businesses of all sizes manage their meeting room bookings and free up unused space with minimal effort and hassle. Through this intuitive solution, users can quickly find an empty meeting room, confirm their bookings, get check-in alerts, file tickets, etc., from a single interface. Space usage analytics, schedule displays, privacy control, color-coded availability, admin alerts, a mobile app, etc., are the popular features of this software for securely scheduling office room meetings. Furthermore, integration with over 100 business tools, including Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Slack, Microsoft Outlook, Kisi, Active Directory, and many more is also supported to streamline the business functions. Besides a free version, the standard plan starts from $109/month per location, billed annually. 

Logitech

Among the popular meeting room booking systems, Logitech holds a special place owing to its technological expertise, customer support, and easy-to-use solutions. Businesses of all sizes from almost every industry can rely on this tool to effortlessly understand room usage, simplify workplace navigation, find available meeting and conference spaces, and extend schedules. In addition, features like wallpaper customization, upcoming meeting view, booking policy setup, maps management, etc., are great to enhance user experience. Apart from these, it also offers advanced security, Google and Microsoft 365 Calendar integration, multi-tenancy, single sign-on, and device management features for better security and ease of use. The software is available  for a 90 day free trial, after which the premium plans start from $199/room per year.

Industry-Wise List Of Top Meeting Room Booking Software

Meeting Room Booking Software for the Healthcare Industry

A medical meeting room booking software is crucial to support collaboration and communication among staff, healthcare professionals, and patients. Such feature-rich solutions help medical professionals in booking the right room at the right time for functions ranging from consultations and surgeries to staff meetings and operation surgeries. Apart from room booking, healthcare professionals can also check room availability through real-time updates, allowing them to stay updated with the status of their meetings and bookings. Leading meeting room booking software for the healthcare industry are as follows;

QGenda 

Since 2006, QGenda has been helping healthcare organizations centralize their medical meeting room bookings, optimize clinical space, gain enhanced visibility into room usage, and make proactive adjustments to the conference bookings. In addition, functionalities to automatically release rooms when providers are not available, proactively identify rooms that need to be allocated, standardize room management, etc., are also offered to ensure increased access to the office spaces. Advanced, built-in analytics and report generation capabilities are also supported to make data-driven decisions. Apart from these, the software seamlessly integrates with healthcare solutions like EHR, HRIS, clinical communication and many more platforms to ensure consistent data flow and operations.

Korbyt

Korbyt, formerly Rendezvous, is another top-notch meeting room booking software that the healthcare industry uses to eliminate inefficiencies and ease meeting room reservations, optimize space and manage resources efficiently. It offers advanced booking features like real-time check-in, automated notifications, integration with existing tools, room availability tracking, etc.,  to streamline the healthcare room booking process. Smart scheduling, mobile booking, advanced security protocols, etc., ensures optimal efficiency and security.

Mazevo

Trusted by over 100 organizations to schedule over 1.5 million bookings, Mazevo is a modern meeting room booking software that empowers healthcare organizations to effectively book meeting rooms and schedule conferences without any hassles. Medical professionals can seamlessly see room availability for meetings and conferences, submit requests for booking, and check their booking status without much effort. Healthcare institutions can also use this innovative solution to schedule rooms or the entire campus, automate email notifications, send confirmations to customers, etc., to coordinate effective utilization of available medical resources. Integrations, event management, billing and invoicing, facility request forms, workflow approval, and academic class scheduling features also help in delivering better care and treatment. 

Meeting Room Booking Software for Corporate Offices

Meeting room booking software is beneficial for corporate offices in easing the  meeting room scheduling processes. Through this software, offices can eliminate the confusion of double bookings, match meetings to space capacity, remove unattended reservations, gain bird's eye view, and ensure proper room planning to meet the demand for reserving meeting rooms. Some widely popular meeting room booking software for corporate offices are as follows;

Robin

Since 2014, Robin has been helping corporate offices centralize their booking-related functions from a single dashboard. It offers an easy-to-use UI to find meeting rooms, check availability, and book resources without moving back and forth.  Its robust analytical capabilities are designed to analyze the usage of existing resources and capacity to serve smart meeting room suggestions for seamless room booking process. Apart from these, AI-powered desk booking, visitor management, automated check-ins, occupancy insights, wayfinding, layout tools, space planning, and many more features are there to further simplify the scheduling and booking processes of corporate offices. Integration with essential tools like HRIS, SCIM, badge systems, Google Calendar, Microsoft Outlook, and many more makes this software unique.

Condeco

With over 6.5 million users worldwide, Condeco is an easy-to-use meeting room booking system with advanced capabilities to optimize space capacity and simplify meeting room booking functions. Through this certified secure room booking solution, organizations can find a suitable meeting room at the right time, schedule, and re-schedule, check if all the attendees are available, and easily make a booking through multiple channels, including Outlook, Condeco portal, and mobile app. Features like bird’s eye view, standard booking grid, quick swapping, wayfinder, meeting room screens, etc., makes it different from the rest. The pricing of the software is flexible as per the enterprise requirements.

Roomzilla

Another prominent software in the list of best meeting room booking software is Roomzilla. Its exquisite set of features are great to streamline the reservation of  corporate meeting or conference rooms. Corporate offices of all sizes and types can benefit from features like quick onboarding, one-click booking, room displays, check-in, sound notifications, etc., to quickly manage meeting rooms. Beside quick booking features, automation capabilities to create and enforce rules and automate cancellations are also offered for ease of use. Both free as well as paid versions of this software are available, starting from $10/resource, paid annually.

Meeting Room Booking Software for the Education Industry

An academic meeting room booking software plays a major role in room scheduling for academic operations. Through these solutions, faculty and staff can easily view, book, cancel, and manage room bookings for classrooms, lecture halls, labs, meeting venues, and so on. Additionally, the meeting room booking software also offers unique functionalities to eliminate discrepancies, enhance resource usage, and improve cost-effectiveness in booking rooms for academic purposes. Some of the leading education-based meeting room booking software are as follows;

Accruent EMS

For the education industry, Accruent EMS is a reliable desk and room booking system to ensure optimal experience for faculty, staff, students, and visitors.  Academic professionals can quickly find and book the spaces for meetings, parent's interaction, classes, lectures, etc., bringing better efficiency and convenience. Self-service, easy modification, reservation, and cancellation, powerful reporting, preventive maintenance scheduling, automated confirmations, real-time requests, space alerts, and many more features are there that make it a great fit for academic institutions. The premium pricing plans of Accruent EMS start from $1325/user per year. The software also enables custom pricing for 5 or more users. 

SchoolBooking

Since 2008, SchoolBooking has been serving result-driven booking software systems to the education industry for better efficiency and productivity. The solution comes pre-equipped with features like advance booking, user/item permissions, booking management, item quantities, custom booking notes, 2-week timetable support, custom timeplans, usage reports, etc., through which schools and universities can easily manage room bookings without any hassle. It also lets schools create online appointments for parent interviews, integrate existing systems with Microsoft 365 and GSuite, and restrict bookings in case of any issues. SchoolBooking is available under custom license.

Ecobook

Another ideal meeting room booking software for the edtech industry is Ecobook. This simple and powerful software is suitable for managing space and resources  across schools and Universities, and educational institutes. Managing seminar rooms, event spaces, auditoriums, venues, classes is much easier with Ecobook. The software is quite unique owing to the features such as a unified calendar, easy navigation, clean timeline view, block out sessions, color coded booking status, upcoming booking check, smart reservations, scheduler-based booking, app notifications, etc. Seamless integration with leading business tools like Office365, Google Suite, Microsoft Exchange, etc., is an added advantage of this tool.

Conclusion  

The meeting room booking system industry will be worth over $18.4 billion by 2030, if it continues to grow with the expected CAGR of 6.5 per cent. However, certain statistics point to a greater need for these MRBS in every organization’s day-to-day operations. At present, booking the right meeting room and scheduling it at the right time plays a crucial role in employee productivity. 

These shortcomings are eliminated by the apt implementation of meeting room booking systems. They not only democratize the booking of meeting rooms, but also play a crucial role in empowering employees, reducing operational costs of running meetings through optimized booking processes, and providing insights into room usage. The future is bright for meeting room booking systems, especially those that provide virtual meeting conduction and come equipped with the latest technologies like AI, ML, deep learning, automation, etc. 

Voice an opinion on this blog by using the comments section. All users with previous usage experience of any of the aforementioned software may leave their reviews on GoodFirms’ official Feedback portal. Organizations looking to purchase the best meeting room booking software can refer to the GoodFirms’ Buyers Guide for meeting room booking systems. Any company looking to increase their digital capabilities beyond just online meeting room booking software may refer to GoodFirms’ exhaustive Software Directory for the same.