Week on, week off
Seven nights at one house, then seven at the other. You swap on the same day every week.
Parent A: 7 nights · Parent B: 7 nights · repeats every 14 days · 4 handoffs a month.
What it is like
This is the simplest 50/50 schedule to explain and the one with the fewest handoffs. Four a month instead of a dozen. For a lot of families that alone is the reason to pick it.
The cost is the length. Seven days is a long time for a young child to go without a parent, and it can be a long time for the parent too.
Suits
Older kids and teenagers, who often prefer fewer disruptions and have their own schedules to keep. Parents who both live within the same school run. Households where handoffs are the tense part of the week, since this minimises them.
Harder if
Your kids are under about six. Many families in that situation add a midweek dinner or a single overnight in the off week, which takes the edge off without adding much complication.
The mistake people make
Not thinking about the swap day. It decides everything else. Friday after school is the most common choice because it gives each parent a full weekend with the kids and moves the handoff away from a school morning. Sunday swaps tend to split weekends in a way nobody enjoys.
Try it with your own dates
Runs entirely in your browser, generated from the same logic as the app. No account, no data sent anywhere.
Putting it on a calendar
Once you have picked something, the app will build it. Choose the pattern, set the start date, and it writes the whole schedule into a shared calendar both houses can see. Change it later and it rebuilds without you redoing the year by hand.
One calendar is free, which is all this needs.