Best Apps for Productivity

The usual mistake with lists of the best apps for productivity is reading them as shopping lists. You do not need twelve apps. You need one good answer for each job you actually do, and for several of those jobs the answer is already on your phone.

So this guide is organized by job: tasks, notes, calendar, focus and automation. For each one there is a sensible default, a couple of alternatives, and a note on who should look elsewhere. It sits under our wider guide to productivity tools, which covers how to choose and how to judge whether any of this is working.

How we chose

We looked for apps that are actively maintained, available on the platforms most people use at work, and honest about their limits. Facts about plans and platforms come from each vendor’s own pages as of this writing. We have not ranked apps by a score, because a ranking implies one right answer, and there are several depending on your devices and your employer.

Best apps for productivity: tasks

A task app needs to do three things well. It needs to capture quickly, show you today without fuss, and handle repeating tasks without drama. Everything else is decoration.

Todoist

Todoist runs on almost everything, including the web, and its quick-add box understands plain dates such as “every Monday” or “next Friday”. The free Beginner plan allows 5 personal projects, 3 custom filters and one week of activity history at the time of writing, which is enough to find out whether you like it. It suits people who switch between Windows, Mac, Android and iPhone in the same week.

TickTick

TickTick puts tasks, a calendar view, habit tracking and a focus timer in one app. The free plan is usable but capped at 9 lists and 99 tasks per list, and Premium is $49.99 a year according to its upgrade page. It is a good fit if you want your timer and your list in the same place.

Things

Things is Apple-only: Mac, iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch and Vision Pro. Each platform’s app is a one-time purchase rather than a subscription, sync through Things Cloud is free, and there is a 15-day trial. If you are entirely on Apple devices and dislike subscriptions, it is worth the trial. If you have a Windows laptop at work, it is not for you.

For a closer comparison, including Microsoft To Do and the built-in reminders apps, see our guide to the best to do list app.

Notes

Notes apps are judged by one question: can you find the thing again in six months? Formatting, templates and backlinks are pleasant, but search and structure are the job.

Apple Notes and Microsoft OneNote

If your devices are Apple, Apple Notes is fast, syncs through iCloud and handles handwriting on iPad well. If your work runs on Microsoft 365, OneNote is already included and organizes notes into notebooks, sections and pages that map well to projects. Neither will impress anyone at a conference, and both are free with the devices or accounts you probably have.

Obsidian

Obsidian stores notes locally on your device, which means they stay readable without the app and without an internet connection. It is free for personal and commercial use at the time of writing, with paid Sync and Publish add-ons. It rewards people who like to build their own system and punishes people who do not, so be honest about which you are.

Notion

Notion combines pages, databases and shared wikis. The Free plan covers individuals, Plus is $10 per member per month and Business is $20, with the fuller AI features (including AI meeting notes) on Business and above. It is strongest when a team needs shared documents and lightweight project tracking in one place, and heavier than you need for a personal notebook.

Calendar

You probably cannot choose your work calendar. Google Calendar or Outlook is decided by your employer, and that is fine, because both are capable. What you can choose is how you use it and what sits on top of it.

Fantastical

Fantastical works with Google, Microsoft 365, Exchange and iCloud calendars, and adds natural-language event entry and a clearer week view. It runs on Mac, Windows, iPhone and iPad, among others, with a free tier and a Flexibits Premium subscription for the full feature set. It is a quality-of-life upgrade rather than a necessity.

Notion

Notion’s free plan lets you connect multiple calendars, which is a reasonable choice if your team already lives in Notion and you want meetings and the documents behind them in the same place.

The habit matters more than the app. Block time for focused work in the same calendar where other people book meetings, or they will book over it.

Focus

Focus tools are the least exciting category and frequently the most useful. The cheapest one is the notification setting you have not changed yet.

Built-in Focus settings

iPhone, iPad and Mac have Focus modes that silence chosen apps and people, and Windows has Focus sessions alongside Do Not Disturb. They cost nothing and are already installed. Set one up for working hours before you buy anything.

Freedom

Freedom blocks distracting websites and apps on a schedule, and its block lists sync across Mac, Windows, iPhone, iPad, Android and Chromebook. Its Locked Mode stops you from ending a session early, which is the feature that matters for anyone who has ever turned off a blocker at 10:15 to check one thing. Locked Mode is part of the paid tier.

If you would rather block sites only in the browser, a free extension such as LeechBlock NG does the job without touching your phone.

Automation

Automation is worth setting up when you repeat the same small task several times a week. It is not worth it for a task you do twice a year, however satisfying the diagram looks.

Zapier

Zapier connects a large catalog of web apps with “if this happens, do that” workflows. The free plan at the time of writing includes 100 tasks a month, workflows limited to one trigger and one action, and checks for new data every 15 minutes. That is enough to test a single useful automation, such as saving email attachments to a folder.

Make

Make covers the same ground with a visual editor that suits branching, multi-step workflows. People who find Zapier too linear often prefer it, and people who find diagrams tiring often do not.

Apple Shortcuts and Power Automate

On Apple devices, Shortcuts automates actions across apps without a separate subscription. In Microsoft workplaces, Power Automate does the same job and may already be part of your company’s license. Check what your IT team allows before you build anything that touches company data.

Tracking and AI

Two categories sit across all of the above. A time tracker tells you whether the system is giving you more focused hours, and our guide to choosing a time tracking app explains the options. AI assistants can draft, summarize and handle some admin, and our guide to AI productivity tools covers where they help and where they waste time.

How to check whether an app earns its place

The test is simple and slightly uncomfortable. After a month with a new app, open it and look at its history. How many tasks were completed rather than created? How many notes did you open again after writing them? How many focus sessions finished? If the honest answer is “not many”, the app has become a place you visit, not a tool you use.

Also check the opposite direction. If you uninstalled it today, what would you lose? If the answer is “nothing I could not rebuild in an afternoon”, it may not be worth a subscription.

What I would do

I would choose by device first. On a mixed Windows and Android setup, I would use Todoist for tasks, OneNote for notes, the work calendar as it is, and Windows Focus sessions before paying for a blocker. On an all-Apple setup, I would trial Things, use Apple Notes until it genuinely failed me, and set up a working-hours Focus mode on day one. I would leave automation until I had noticed the same chore three weeks running. Then I would add exactly one Zap, not five.