If you are searching for Todoist alternatives, there is a decent chance the problem is not Todoist. It is a genuinely excellent task manager. The problem is usually the mismatch between how these apps expect you to work and how your brain actually works, and switching to another app with the same mismatch just restarts the cycle: enthusiastic setup, two good weeks, quiet abandonment.
So instead of a feature shootout, here are seven alternatives matched to the reason the last app did not stick. Full disclosure: we make one of them. We will be honest about the other six anyway, because you deserve a list that is actually useful.
TickTick: if you want one app for everything
The closest like-for-like swap. TickTick does tasks, a calendar, habits, and a built-in Pomodoro timer in one place, and its free tier is generous. The trade is surface area: more features means more to keep tidy, and it still relies on you to open it. Best if your last app failed because you were juggling three apps and wanted one.
Things 3: if you want calm and you live on Apple
The most beautiful task manager ever made, a one-time purchase, and deliberately quiet. It is also Apple-only and its philosophy is that a clean list is enough. Best if your last app failed because it felt like operating software instead of writing things down.
ADHD Notes: if things vanish the moment they leave your screen
This is ours, so weigh accordingly. It is built for one failure mode specifically: the follow-up that leaves your head the instant it is out of sight. Every task carries its context (who it involves, the notes, the history), and you can say "bring this back in three days" and forget it on purpose; it resurfaces at the top of your day. Free to start. Best if your last app failed because remembering to check the list was the part that broke. There is a fuller side-by-side with Todoist if you want the honest trade-offs.
Sunsama: if you want a daily planning ritual
Sunsama is less a list and more a guided morning ceremony: pull in today’s tasks, estimate them, plan the day, shut down in the evening. People who love it really love it. It is among the pricier options and the ritual only works if you show up for it. Best if your last app failed because you never decided what today was actually for.
Motion: if you want the calendar to decide for you
Motion auto-schedules your tasks into your calendar and reshuffles when things slip. That removes the "when will I do this" decision entirely, which some brains find freeing and others find bossy. Also on the pricier end, aimed at calendar-driven professionals. Best if your last app failed because a list without times is just a wish.
Obsidian: if the real problem is notes, not tasks
Sometimes the task app keeps failing because you are trying to make it hold knowledge: research, ideas, references. That job belongs to a vault like Obsidian, which is superb at keeping and linking what you know, and silent about what you owe. Many people run a vault for knowledge next to a task system for loops; we wrote about why the vault alone still forgets things.
Paper: if every app has failed
An index card with three things on it, rewritten each morning, has outlived more productivity systems than any app on this list. No sync, no badges, no setup energy. Its one flaw is the same silence as every list: it will not tap you on the shoulder. But if you are burned out on software, start here and add tools back only when the card stops being enough.
How to actually choose
Do not pick by feature count. Pick by the failure mode: too many apps means TickTick, too much friction means Things or paper, no plan for today means Sunsama or Motion, knowledge overload means Obsidian, and things vanishing out of sight means the one built around bringing them back.
That last one is us. See how ADHD Notes works, free to start.