Microsoft To-Do vs Todoist: Which is the best To-do list app

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Asif Ahmed
Asif Ahmedhttp://techtippr.com
Founder and Cheif Editor of Techtippr, Get in touch with me on Twitter or Enjoy my Stories on Instagram. I think they are interesting. :-)

A few days ago, I wrote a comparison article discussing the differences between Microsoft To-Do and Any.Do, both of which are helpful task management apps to help you with your workflow. You can go read that article for better clarity about why the Microsoft To-Do App is better than Any Do,

For the people who do not want to spend more time reading another article, here is a tl;dr version.

Andy.Do is a great app, but Microsoft To-Do lets you do more. If you are not looking for an app to manage your work, and it’s just personal stuff you want an app for, then Any.Do is a perfect fit.

I picked up Microsoft To-Do over it, and now let’s see how to compares with another great To-Do app called Todoist. In this article, we will be comparing Microsoft To-do and Todoist.

Watch the Video

Which is the best task management app for You? Todoist vs Microsoft To-Do

Both the apps let you create task easily, Both have file updateBoth the apps are great at what the do, with some minor differences. The best one for you will depend on what what you want and how easy the apps makes it for you. Both the apps allow you to add tasks and projects. Both are completely free to use and can sync your tasks across all the platforms.

I remember I used the Todoist app several years ago, but then I moved to Wunderlist. Wunderlist for perfect for me. Later Microsoft acquired it, and they decided to shut it down.

But I was still using it until several weeks ago when I finally decided to get myself familiar with Microsoft Do-To, which many elements borrowed from Wunderlist.

It was a challenge to use Microsoft to do it initially, but now I feel I have figured out how to use it in the best way possible.

Key Features of Microsoft To-Do List

Things like cross-platform support, clean user interface and the ability to access it from mobile phones, true for both the applications so we will not talk about that.

Instead, what I will talk about is how easy it is to create tasks in Microsoft to do and add reminders. The app is completely free to use. There is no Pro plan

And not just a reminder. You can also put recurring reminders. This means Microsoft To-do helps you take action on recurring tasks such as paying bills and other monthly or bi-weekly. Microsoft To-Do is probably the only third party Task management app that offers recurring reminders for free. If you use it on Android, it’s the only app that works flawlessly. Though iOS users can find recurring remidners in the native Reminder App as well.

To get your things organized, it lets you create different lists under which you can add various tasks to have a listing for a particular project and then have all the tasks appear inside that list.

I have a list for all my websites grouped under Work dolfer and other projects and a checklist for miscellaneous stuff, where personal tasks go.

Each task has further options to add Subtasks and some more information like, Due Date, Reminder, Repeat and Notes.

You can also add a file attachment, which is helpful if you have a piece of paper where you have written down something, you can add it to the task. There are different use cases for this.

There is also a collaborative feature, which means you can assign a task to someone else. You can consider other amazing apps in the collaborative part, such as Trello or Slack, but it’s a nice touch to have such features in a to-do list app.

Maybe you can use this feature to share a list with your spouse or other people when working on a collaborative project once in a while.

While getting started the user interface might look a bit complex. There are 6 tabs, and 3 of them are a little confusing to understand.

  • My Day
  • Important
  • Planned
  • All
  • Flagged Email
  • Tasks

All and Tasks are self-explanatory, but the other four are a little confusing.

‘My Day’ took a while for me to understand how to use it. 

You can add tasks to it directly (#1 in the image above), or add other add from the other lists as there is an option to add a task to ‘My Day.’

Tasks do not show when the reminder date or due date is of today, which seems unusual. It would make sense to see all the tasks due for today in ‘My Day’. Sadly, it only can be done manually.

‘ Important’ tab is where all the Important tasks will appear.

You can tap on the Star (#2 in the image above) to make it appear in ‘Important.

‘Planned’ is where tasks with reminder dates will appear.

When you put a reminder date (#3 in the image above), it will appear in the ‘Planned’ tab, making it easier to see upcoming tasks. You can sort your task as tasking pending for ‘Today’, ‘Tomorrow’ ‘Next 7 Days’ and All.

Key Features of the Todoist App

Todoist is also a cross-platform app, has clean user Interface, dark mode, and light mode. And it is easy to create tasks in Todoist mobile app and add subtaks to it.

You can organize your lists in different folders called Projects, and they are similar to Lists in Microsoft To-Do.

You can add as many projects as you want, and then you can add as many tasks to these projects.

It is also less confusing as there are no different tabs like in Microsoft To-Do.

There is Inbox, which is like ‘My Day’ in Microsoft.

You can directly add Tasks in it or move Tasks (#1 in the image above) from another project to Inbox.

But, unlike Microsoft To-Do, the tasks get moved to Inbox in Todoist

You can set different levels of priority (#2 in the image above), which is equivalent to ‘Important’ in Microsoft To-Do.

You can also put due dates on the tasks quickly (#3 in the image above).

Todoist follows Natural Language Processing, meaning, You can either tap on one of the options or write today, tomorrow, or a specific day, while typing the tasks, and it will automatically set it.

You can type every week, every month, and you can set it to appear on a recurring basis. (sadly the Reminder feature is not available in the free version).

Choose between List view and Board View

Todoist also has a kanban style board view for the tasks, which is great for seeing all the tasks at different stages. You can add sections like To-do, Doing, Done, and move tasks in different sections as the work progresses. Something like Trello.

Use Templaes for Getting Started with Taks Management Faster

Another nice feature that I came across, which is missing in Microsoft To-Do is, you can export or import a project as a Template, you you can use the Templates from their website, it has a huge repository of Templestes rating from Review Meetings, to Habit tracker, to Book writing etc,.

This can be useful in creating projects faster. If your work requires you to do similar projects and the steps to complete them, you can export the project as a template.

And then import the template every time you have to deal with a new project. This can help you write down tasks, steps faster. Despite having these cool productive features, Todoist is quite limiting when offering essential features in their free plan.

For example, Putting reminders, adding labels to tasks, fall under the premium version. However, Todoist offers it at just $3 per month (billed annually).

For me, the Reminder notifications is a must have for a Task management app, I want to be notified about what’s due and what needs to be done. And this is why I opted for Microsoft To-Do despite it missing several cool features. Video

Conclusion

I find Todoist has more features than Microsoft To-Do. It also has a broader user case. But my most used feature is reminders and recurring reminders. I like it when the To-Do app notifies me about a due task. The premium version of Todist unlocks many features and becomes so much better than Microsoft To-Do. So, if you can afford to pay $3 per month for a task management app, go for Todoist.

If you do not use or need the Reminder feature in your to-do list app, you can use the free version of Todoist since the Free version of Todoist is pretty much at par with Microsoft To-Do, without the Reminders feature.

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