Calling a live show from a printed spreadsheet works right up until someone changes the schedule.
Now the keynote is five minutes long, lunch moved ten minutes, a video was cut, the CEO is already walking toward the stage, and half the crew is looking at yesterday’s PDF with weird notes scribbled all over the place.
That is the problem show calling software is trying to solve.
A good rundown gives the show caller one place to see what is happening now, what happens next, how long each segment should take, and what every department needs to know. The best tools also let the rest of the production team follow those changes without constantly asking, “What cue are we on?”
There is no single piece of software that makes sense for every event. Some shows need a collaborative production platform. Others need excellent timing. Plenty of events still run perfectly well from a carefully built spreadsheet.
MeyerPro has firsthand experience using Shoflo. For the rest of this list, we looked at current product documentation, software reviews, and discussions among people working in live events and production to find tools worth knowing about in 2026.
Here are six that stood out above the rest. Hope we can help make the decision a little easier.
1. Shoflo Rundown by LASSO
If you have worked around corporate event production for a while, there is a good chance you have encountered Shoflo.
MeyerPro has used it for live event rundowns and show calling, and its biggest strength is fairly easy to understand: everyone can work from the same living version of the show.
Instead of sending an updated spreadsheet every time something changes, the rundown updates across devices. Durations can automatically change later start times, crew members can follow the show caller’s position, and different people can be given different levels of access.
Shoflo is now part of LASSO, which acquired the company in 2025. The rundown product remains available and includes live synchronization, automatic timing calculations, show caller tracking, timer views, templates, and built-in prompter tools.
It also has the strongest independent review history of the dedicated tools on this list. Capterra currently shows Shoflo at 4.8 out of 5 from 47 reviews, with reviewers frequently mentioning live changes, sharing, and ease of use as strengths.
Best fit: Corporate events and production teams that want an experienced, shared rundown built specifically around live shows.
2. Rundown Studio
Rundown Studio feels like one of the more direct modern alternatives to Shoflo.
It is built specifically for show callers, producers, and broadcast teams, with collaborative rundowns, real-time edits, automatic timing calculations, cue tracking, and a teleprompter built into the platform.
One particularly useful feature is the ability for everyone following the show to automatically stay on the cue the show caller is currently running. If a segment goes long and future start times need to move, the rundown recalculates them instead of leaving someone to fix a column of times manually.
It can also import work from Google Sheets or Excel and connects with tools like Bitfocus Companion through an API and WebSocket.
That makes it interesting for teams that like the familiarity of a spreadsheet during prep but want something purpose-built once the show goes live.
Best fit: Show callers who want a focused rundown platform without turning the software into an entire event-management system.
3. Ontime
Ontime takes a slightly different approach.
It is free and open source, and it can run as a desktop application, on your own network, through Docker, or through its hosted cloud option. The same rundown can feed operator views, stage timers, backstage schedules, countdown displays, and other production screens.
That makes it especially interesting for technically minded production teams.
You can build the rundown inside Ontime or bring information over from Excel or Google Sheets. During the event, changes and delays can update across the different views being used by crew and presenters.
Ontime also shows up regularly in production and technical-theatre discussions, particularly among people looking for a capable alternative to paid rundown and timing platforms.
The thing to understand is that Ontime has historically been especially strong around timing and distributing show information. If your main problem is keeping stage timers, backstage displays, operators, and the run of show aligned, that can be exactly what you need.
Best fit: Technical teams that want flexible rundown and timing tools without committing to a paid platform.
4. Cue Manager
Cue Manager goes beyond a basic run of show.
Its rundown tools include real-time cue sheets, cue calling and following, over/under timing, recorded cue-call timestamps, schedules, checklists, attachments, team chat, and integrations with platforms including Current RMS, Rentman, and Bitfocus Companion.
That broader feature set could make it appealing when the rundown is only one part of a larger production-management workflow.
For example, the show caller can move through cues while crew members follow that position in real time. Cue Manager can also track whether the show is running early or late and calculate a projected finish time as the event progresses.
Those are small things until you are halfway through a general session wondering whether the 11:45 lunch release is now going to be more like 12:17pm. I’m hungry.
Cue Manager has a smaller independent review footprint than Shoflo, so we would not present it as something MeyerPro has personally vetted. But its current feature set makes it a legitimate option worth comparing.
Best fit: Teams that want rundowns, cue tracking, schedules, checklists, and other production-management functions in one system.
5. StageTimer
StageTimer started from the timing side of live production, and that is still where it makes the most sense on this list.
Its newest version has expanded into whole-show timing. The software can now track whether the overall event is running over or under, preserve actual cue timing, handle multi-day rundowns, and help adjust the remaining program when things begin to slip.
That is a very real show-calling problem.
Say the opening keynote goes seven minutes long. You could stare at the original schedule and mentally subtract seven minutes from the rest of the morning, or use a system that is already tracking where the show actually sits against the plan.
StageTimer can also feed timing displays to presenters and production positions, which makes it useful even when another tool is handling the more detailed production rundown.
I would think of this as a timing-first option, rather than a direct replacement for every feature in Shoflo or Rundown Studio.
Best fit: Shows where keeping speakers, sessions, and the overall program on time is the biggest challenge.
6. Google Sheets or Excel
Yes, spreadsheets still belong on the list.
There is a reason so many production teams have used them for years.
They are familiar. They are flexible. Pretty much everybody knows how to open one. Columns can be built around exactly what the show needs, and a Google Sheet can be shared with the production team without teaching everyone a new platform.
A basic live event rundown might contain:
- Scheduled time
- Duration
- Segment
- Speaker
- Audio cue
- Video cue
- Lighting cue
- Stage notes
- Show caller notes
For a straightforward event, that can be enough.
The limitation becomes obvious when the show starts changing.
A spreadsheet does not automatically know which cue the show caller is on. It may not recalculate the program the way dedicated rundown software does. Different people can be looking at different tabs, versions, or exported PDFs. Building timers, backstage views, cue following, or production integrations usually requires additional work.
That does not make spreadsheets bad.
It means the complexity of the tool should match the complexity of the show.
If your entire program is one keynote, a coffee break, and a panel, building an elaborate production platform may solve a problem you do not actually have.
So what is the best show calling software?
There is not one answer.
For a full collaborative live-event rundown, Shoflo and Rundown Studio are the first two I would compare.
If timing, backstage displays, and technical flexibility are the priority, Ontime deserves a serious look.
Cue Manager makes sense for teams that want more production-management tools around the rundown, while StageTimer is especially interesting when keeping the show on schedule is the main problem.
And for a smaller event, Google Sheets or Excel may still be completely adequate.
The software matters, but the rundown underneath it matters more.
A beautifully designed platform cannot fix a run of show that nobody has completely thought about.
What good show calling software should actually do
Ignore the feature list for a minute.
The real test is whether the software makes it easier for the crew to answer a few basic questions during the show:
Where are we right now?
What happens next?
Are we running early or late?
Did something change?
Does everyone who needs that change know about it?
If the tool makes those answers easier, it is doing useful work.
If operating the software becomes harder than calling the show, you may have chosen too much software.
The rundown is still the important part
Live events change.
Someone talks too long. A panelist disappears. A video gets pulled. Lunch is not ready. The CEO wants to go early. A sponsor asks for one more announcement.
The point of show calling software is not to prevent those things from happening.
It is to give the production team one reliable place to understand what happens next when they do.
That is why the best rundown is not necessarily the one with the most features.
It is the one the crew can trust while the show is moving.
Planning a live event with a complicated run of show?
MeyerPro supports corporate events with show calling, stage management, audio, video, playback, graphics, cameras, LED screens, and technical production in Seattle, Portland, and beyond.