Are you using macOS, but it doesn’t seem to be the system that makes productivity easy? You’ve missed some great tools which can help you operate Mac OS X more efficiently. The Mac has great customization options, but it seems difficult initially to find out which apps are superior to others for productivity. That’s why I decided to put all the Mac task app comparisons in one article.
The key to perfect task management is astute planning and timely execution. Often, we fail to get the desired result due to either lack of structured formation or wrong implementation of the planning. If you wish to handle your to-dos immaculately and derive the required result painlessly, you need to have the best task management apps for Mac.
To-do lists don’t need to be complicated—some people use pen and paper for the job, after all. And yet there are seemingly infinite to-do list apps out there. Why? Because keeping track of and organizing your tasks is an intensely personal thing, and everyone wants to do it a little differently. This makes designing a to-do list incredibly difficult: it’s impossible to offer one design that makes everyone happy. Make the most of your to-do list with ZapierAutomate your tasks. And it’s particularly hard to make Mac users happy. They, perhaps more than users of any other platform, are picky and expect things to look and work a certain way. Applications that don’t feel like they were designed for macOS are distracting because things like keyboard shortcuts, notifications, and menus don’t work the way they do in other applications. That disrupts your workflow, which defeats the entire point of productivity software.
I thought about all of these things while I tested every macOS to-do list app I could get my hands on. There’s an incredible range of options out there, all looking to serve different kinds of users. Which one you prefer may well boil down to personal taste. In my opinion, the very best Mac to-do lists apps need to do five key things:
- Offer multiple ways to organize tasks, such as tags, lists, due dates, or projects.
- Make it fast to add new tasks without opening the app, ideally using a keyboard shortcut.
- Remind you about self-imposed deadlines.
- Offer a clean interface, with native macOS features like notifications, widgets, and integration with the menu bar.
- Sync tasks to your phone.
With these criteria in mind, here are the best to-do list apps you can find for macOS. All offer free trials of some sort, so try out anything that looks useful to you.
Microsoft OneNote
As far as functionality is concerned, I put “Microsoft OneNote” right on top with the best in the business. Creating and managing tasks, to-dos, and notes is a breeze with this feature-rich app.
You can also add pictures, your PowerPoint doc or PDF, links, and web articles to your notes. Ideally, organize your notes to meet your workflow.
Tag your tasks to access them with ease and track all the things that matter a lot to you. It lets you sync your files with OneDrive, OneDrive for Business, and SharePoint.
Price: Free
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nTask
nTask has done all the research on how to build a killer task management app. And for this reason, a single app brings all the cool features of different tools in one app. The developers have paid enough attention to its aesthetics to create appealing task management software.
A flexible app on your Mac, you can quickly make checklists, collaborate with teams, arrange meetings, share files, and presents up-to-date Gantt Charts.
As a team leader, you can easily assign tasks and track those tasks from your desk. Integration with Slack is a notable feature of nTask. Another noteworthy feature is cloud integration.
Price: $3.99 per user, per month
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Things 3
“Things 3” has always appealed to me as a top-notch task manager. With this app, you can create a project for each of your goals and add the required steps to accomplish them.
You will be able to group your projects by areas of responsibility like “Family”, “Work”, or “Health”. Keep track of all of your goals so that you stay at your pace. View your calendar events alongside your to-dos and plan your time appropriately.
The app lets you create repeating to-dos for things you do more often. As it works with all the major features like Touch Bar, Today Widget, Calendars, Siri & Reminders, Share Extension, Handoff, and AppleScript, you will always be in complete control of your tasks.
And yes, the support for several languages like English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Spanish, and Traditional Chinese further enhances the reputation of Things 3.
Price: $49.99
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Clear
Clear is dead simple and makes task management a painless experience! You can make separate lists to keep everything fully organized. Use various themes and tools to customize your lists.
To ensure you don’t fail to carry out any necessary thing in time, set reminders. Even better, you can take full advantage of iCloud integration to sync your data across macOS and iOS devices.
Price: $9.99
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OmniFocus 3
“OmniFocus 3” provides you the desired flexibility to deal with all of your impending tasks. Hence, you can do more with less stress!
The app lets you keep all of your to-dos in one list, or you can use multiple folders, projects, groups, and actions to put everything in the right order.
You can select a fluid view that shows and hides fields or go for Custom Columns for scannable, tabular lists. Use the forecast perspective to check out your due items for each day alongside events from your calendar.
What’s more, OmniFocus 3 is compatible with multiple international languages including English, Dutch, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Spanish, etc.
Price: $39.99
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Todoist
What I have found appreciable in Todoist is the neat user interface, which is primed for hassle-free task management. With this app, you can perfectly manage your tasks, sub-tasks, projects, and sub-projects.
Based on your need, you will be able to prioritize your tasks for the day or week ahead. You can keep an eye on the deadlines with due dates and recurring dates.
Another notable feature of this app is its compatibility with multiple platforms including iOS, macOS, Android, and more. Furthermore, Todoist is integrated with several major services like Google Drive, Cloud Magic, Sunrise Calendar, Toggl, IFTTT, and Zapier.
Price: Free
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Evernote
“Evernote” helps you stay organized by keeping all of your to-dos, notes, or tasks in the perfect order. You can take notes, create to-do lists, and also save things you find online to catch up with them at your own pace.
You will be able to take notes in a wide range of formats like text, sketches, photos, audio, video, PDFs, web clippings, etc. Create personal checklists to never forget any necessary things.
Take the advantage of various tools to create agendas, write memos and prepare sensational presentations. You can also annotate documents with comments and thoughts during team meetings. Sync all of your data across your devices to keep them secure and easily accessible.
Price: Free
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Simplenote
The thing that has made me want “Simplenote” is the range of easy-to-use features. If you don’t want to go for an expensive task manager but still wish to use a highly-user friendly app to assist you in getting your work done with the needed efficiency, you should keep it in consideration.
The app lets you effortlessly create notes, tasks, and to-dos. You can put all of your tasks in the perfect order and be able to track them. Furthermore, Simplenote lets you synchronize with the cloud to access them from any of your devices.
Price: Free
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Any.do
“Any.do” provides a more streamlined user experience. Creating and managing task is quite upfront. The app comes with a clean UI that allows you to comfortably view and track your notes and tasks.
You can print, export, and share your lists with friends. Sync your files with cloud services to keep them safe.
Though Any. do to-do is available for free, you can upgrade to the premium version to have unlimited access to all the important features like themes, files, and collaboration for $2.99 a month or $26.99 a year through.
Price: Free
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GoodTask 3
GoodTask 3 is a fully-featured task or project manager for Mac. The app syncs with the default Reminders and Calendars to let you manage them with ease.
You can quickly edit your tasks thanks to the bulk editing and deleting features. You will be able to duplicate, change due dates, and add tags to easily access any tasks.
The dark theme lets you comfortably use the app at night. And with Today’s widget support, you can keep track of your tasks more conveniently.
Price: $19.99
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TickTick (Mac, iPhone, iPad, Watch, Android, Windows)
TickTick is a straightforward to-do application you can run on every platform on earth. Unlike other cross-platform applications, however, TickTick feels like a native Mac application. Some of these are good design choices, but some features make TickTick stand out: menu bar icon with a miniature version of your list, integration with appointments from Calendar, and native notifications. There’s also a keyboard shortcut for adding tasks from anywhere.
Organizing your tasks isn’t complicated: you have lists, tags, due dates, and that’s about it. But there are a few features here that other applications don’t offer, including a built-in Pomodoro timer. Try out TickTick if you’re looking for something straightforward, particularly if you need to sync over to non-Apple devices.
With TickTick’s Zapier integrations, you can automatically create tasks in TickTick whenever you do things like save a message in Slack or start a new email.
Our Criteria for Task Management Software for Mac
What do we look for in a tool while evaluating whether it’s a good fit or not? Here is a quick walk-through on which factors we consider while deciding on a task management app.
- User Interface: Does the app allow and put the user in control and give them the ability to do things in a free manner?
- Consistency and Standards: There are certain things that have become convention; there is normally little to no advantage in trying to break this “tradition”.
- Aesthetic and Minimalist Design: Does the app for task management for MAC make sure that everything presented to the user is essential and mandatory?
- Integrations, Integrations, Integrations: In order to ensure that cloud silos don’t pop up; task management apps for MAC need to make sure that they focus on creating easy to deploy integrations within the customer’s ecosystem.
- Functionality and Features:
- Scheduling and Allocation
- Forecasting
- Task Productivity
- Value for Money: What do you get in exchange for investing dollar value into the task management app for MAC?
That’s all for now!
Conclusion:
Todoist is an elegant app that will surely improve your productivity. Task Management has always been hard until Todoist came. It’s an excellent task manager which will make you work smarter.