For event organisers · The master timeline

Three years of build-up on one screen — years to weeks, one zoom.

Timeline Master holds the full event journey as rows you can trust: every milestone, deadline, decision and planning window, with a phase, a focus area, an owner and an honest date — an exact day when you know it, a quarter when you don't. Zoom the same timeline from years to weeks. Overdue turns red by itself. Built for the build-up a spreadsheet was never shaped for.

The council gets years, the OC gets quarters, the run-in gets weeks — all from the same rows. That is the whole product.

Test it free — no account → Own It 99 € - One-time purchase

Built from real master timelines / 25+ years of event workWorld championships, city games, annual events

What needs to happen when, from first meeting to final report — one timeline answers.

Three things it does

Three jobs. Nothing else.

One timeline, five zoom levels

The quarter sheet and the 169-column week sheet were the same timeline kept as two files that disagreed. Here it's one set of rows: years for the council, quarters for the OC, weeks for the run-in. Change a date and every view already knows.

Honest dates

Q3 2027 is a real date here — drawn a quarter wide, not rounded to a guessed day. Sharpen it to a month, then a day, as the event nears. The timing says what's fixed, what's a target and what's still rough — so nobody defends a date that was never real.

Red is earned, never painted

Anything past its date and not done turns red with the days counted; the next 30 days turn gold. The today-line crosses every lane and the countdown to your main event runs in the toolbar. No question marks in brackets standing in for a status.

Don't take my word for it. Break the demo.

The free test is the full tool on a real example: a three-year city winter games timeline, 58 items across seven phases and fourteen focus areas — a live countdown, three deadlines already blown, a decision stuck since June. Zoom the Overview from years to weeks. Open ▶ Now / Next.

Open the free test →

No account. No email. Nothing saves. Two minutes tells you more than this page can.

Excel vs Timeline Master

The same six jobs. Side by side.

The job	Your spreadsheet	Timeline Master
The phases	CONCEPT painted into eight cells, PLANNING into five — some with a trailing space, so Excel thought they were different phases.	A phase is wherever its rows are. Its date range and "◉ Now" marker are computed, never painted.
A date you don't know yet	"21.2.–4.3.2029 (TBC)" — the risk lives in the brackets. A question mark is not a status.	"Q3 2027" is a real date, drawn a quarter wide, marked target or rough. Sharpen it when reality arrives.
Zooming in and out	The week sheet grew to 169 columns. Zoom out meant a second file; zoom in meant scrolling past October.	One set of rows, five zoom levels — years to weeks. The views never disagree.
Overdue	"OPERY 28.9. SIIRRETÄÄN" — the reschedule typed into the cell. Nothing turns red on its own.	Past its date and not done turns red with the days counted; the countdown runs in the toolbar.
The milestones	"17 Milestones Reached (see comments)" — filed inside a cell comment no meeting ever opened.	Milestones are rows, filtered into their own view, month by month with days-to counters.
Each team's slice	Everyone reads the whole grid to find their three rows.	Fourteen focus areas, each with its own lane, owner and "next up" computed.

See the difference in the free test →

You know this file

The phase row was painted by hand. Cell by cell.

Twenty-two quarter columns, and the phase written into each one: CONCEPT eight times, PLANNING five — some with a trailing space, so even Excel thought they were different phases. One sheet ends in IMPLEMENTATION, the template says DELIVERY.
Milestones lived as prose in merged cells: "24 months to Opening Ceremony (21.2.2027). 17 Milestones Reached (see comments)." Seventeen milestones — filed inside a cell comment no meeting ever opened.
The weekly version grew to 169 columns. Zooming out meant building a second file; zooming in meant scrolling sideways past October. Same event, three timelines, none of them agreeing.
Risk management by punctuation: "Coordination Group (?)", "21.2.–4.3.2029 (TBC)". A question mark in a cell is not a status — but it was the only one the sheet could hold.
"OPERY 28.9. SIIRRETÄÄN" — a moved meeting, recorded by typing the move into the cell. The other hundred changes lived in "Päivitetty 16.5.2016" at the top, doing the work of a version history.

These are not invented examples. They are from master timelines that ran world championships, city games and annual events. The timeline logic was right the whole time — phases, focus areas, milestones, honest dates. The grid held everything and showed nothing. Timeline Master keeps the logic and builds in the drawing, the zooming and the chasing.

📄 Lahti2029_MasterTimeline_v1-3.xlsx — 22 quarter columns, phases painted by hand

📄 Toimintasuunnitelmat MASTER.xlsx — 169 columns and growing

Phase row, cells B10–V10CONCEPT ×8 · PLANNING ×5 — painted, not computed

Milestone cell, K11"17 Milestones Reached (see comments)"

Main event date"21.2.–4.3.2029 (TBC)" — the risk lives in the brackets

Template row 7"Right Holder Activitites" — the typo outlived three events

Cell AE6"OPERY 28.9. SIIRRETÄÄN" — the reschedule is inside the cell

Who it is for

Built for the person who owns "what happens when".

Timeline Master is for the director or programme lead holding the master timeline of a multi-year event — the one picture the council, the OC and every team read from, and the one asked "where are we?" in every steering meeting.

This is for you if

You run events with a long build-up — championships, city games, congresses, annual events
You keep the timeline as painted phase cells and a separate 100-plus-column week sheet
You need years for leadership and weeks for the run-in from the same source
You want overdue, decisions and what-starts-next to surface without hunting columns

This is not for you if

You need a full project-management platform: task lists, dependencies, resource planning. This is the master timeline, not a task manager
You need multi-user simultaneous editing today — one owner edits, everyone else views live
Your painted quarter grid has never disagreed with your week sheet. Then keep it. You are the exception

What is included

One timeline. Five views.

The 📋 Timeline is the working table: one row per item, grouped by phase, IDs assigned automatically per focus area (MKT-001, REP-004). Getting started, Concept, Planning, Preparation, Implementation, Live, Wrap-up — rename the phases, add your own. Same for the fourteen focus areas. A phase's date range is computed from its rows; nothing is painted.

The other views draw from the same rows: the 🗺 Overview visual timeline (zoomable years to weeks, today as a red line), ⭐ Milestones, 🧭 Focus areas, and ▶ Now / Next for the steering meeting.

Unlimited events and timeline items
Five views from one timeline: table, overview, milestones, focus areas, Now / Next
Honest-precision dates: day, month, quarter, half-year or year — fixed / target / rough
Zoom from years to weeks; today-line, phase bands, main events in gold
Phases and focus areas fully renameable — works for any event type
Overdue, due-soon and starts-soon computed daily; countdown to your main event
Every team its own lane with "next up" computed
Item library — 30 standard master-timeline items; paste rows from your old sheet
Now / Next board · view-only share links · A3/A4 PDF · Excel/CSV
Runs in the browser — laptop, tablet, phone. Nothing to install
All updates to the current version included

Timeline Master. Lakeside Winter Games 2028 T−577 d ▶ Now / Next

Q3 26Q4 26Q1 27Q2 27Q3 27Q4 27

Concept Planning Preparation

Commercial

Partner sales window

Pricing decision · 8 d late

Venue & spaces

Venue agreements

Decision: structures

Staff & volunteers

Recruitment opens

Training plan

Marketing

Plan 27–28

Campaign starts

Reporting

Report #4 · 31.12.

Report #5

TODAY

Also included

The steering meeting: what's late, what's next.

▶ Now / Next is the full-screen board for the monthly steering meeting: overdue at the top in red with the days counted, decisions that are waiting, windows that should start in the next 45 days, and the ten nearest key dates — each with its focus area and owner. Leadership items carry a gold ★. Pick one focus area and the board becomes that team's lane.

Between meetings, 🔗 Share makes two view-only links — the working table for the team, or the visual overview for leadership. The data travels inside the link. No account needed, nothing to install.

See it in the free test →

Timeline Master. Lakeside Winter Games 2028 09:02:47

T−577 d to Opening Ceremony · 49 open · 3 overdue · 3 decisions open

Overdue — 3

★ Decision: ceremonies scale and venue · Management · Jesse · 22 d late Progress report #3 to rights holder · Reporting · Jesse · 7 d late Volunteer programme lead hired · Staff · Elina · 36 d late

Needs a decision

★ Sponsor package pricing approved · Commercial · Sara · in 8 d

Starts soon — next 45 days

Operational planning programme · Operations · Mika · starts in 25 d Venue agreements negotiated · Venue · Mika · Q3 2026

Next key dates

★ City council progress briefing · 4.8.2026 OC meeting, September · 15.9.2026

Proof

An event director built this. Not a software company.

I'm Jesse Kiuru. I help event organisers and host cities bid, plan and run better events. Event director of the Lahti 2017 FIS Nordic World Ski Championships. Currently structuring the Winter World Masters Games 2028.

Timeline Master exists because I planned world championships on that quarter grid — painting phases into cells, filing milestones in cell comments, keeping a 169-column week sheet next to it for the same event. The timeline held everything and showed nothing. The examples on this page are from my own files; this is the same logic with the drawing, the zooming and the chasing built in.

270,000spectators, Lahti 2017

3,000workforce coordinated

25+ yrschampionships to conferences

Price

€99. Once. That's it.

A three-year build-up runs on one timeline everyone can read. One deadline that slips unseen — because it was painted into a cell nobody re-checked — costs far more than €99. Test first — buy when it earns its place.

Timeline Master · Full version

€99 one time · no subscription

Unlimited events and timeline items
Five views from one timeline: table, visual overview, milestones, focus areas, Now / Next
Honest-precision dates: day, month, quarter, half-year or year — fixed / target / rough
Zoom from years to weeks; today-line, phase bands, main events in gold
Phases and focus areas fully renameable — works for any event type
Overdue, due-soon and starts-soon computed daily; countdown to your main event
Item library — 30 standard master-timeline items; paste rows from your old sheet
Now / Next board · view-only share links · A3/A4 PDF · Excel/CSV · all updates included

Get Timeline Master · €99 → or test it free first — no account, 2 minutes

Pairs with Commitment Tracker: the timeline says what must happen when — Commitment Tracker chases who owes it. Nine tools in the toolbox — any three for €199.

Questions

Asked before buying.

Can't I just build this in Excel?

You can. I did, for world championships — painting phases into cells, filing milestones in comments, keeping a 169-column week sheet beside the quarter grid for the same event. The timeline held everything and showed nothing. If yours shows the whole build-up at a glance, keep it. This is for everyone else.

Do I need to install anything?

No. Timeline Master runs in the browser — laptop, tablet or phone. Your events save automatically to your account.

Is this a project management tool?

No, on purpose. No task lists, no dependencies between every row, no resource planning. Those live in other tools. This is the master timeline: what needs to happen when, across the full event journey, on one screen the whole organisation can read.

We're a conference, not a winter games. Does it fit?

Yes. The phases and the fourteen focus areas are defaults, not rules — rename them, delete them, add your own. A nine-month conference timeline zooms to months and weeks; a four-year games timeline zooms to years and quarters. Same tool, same rows.

What if I only know the quarter, not the date?

Then write the quarter. "Q3 2027" is a valid date here and draws a quarter wide — the timeline stays honest about what is known. Mark it rough or target, and sharpen it to a day when reality arrives.

What does "free test" mean exactly?

The full tool on an example event — a three-year city winter games with 58 timeline items, three overdue rows glowing red and a countdown running to the opening ceremony. Open the Overview and zoom; then open ▶ Now / Next. Nothing saves — 100 people can test at once and never see each other's changes.