Todoist was already a powerful task management app with collaborative features but with the 3.0 update (dubbed Todoist Next), Todoist has been completely rewritten from the ground up. The updated version is clearly inspired by the iOS 7 design language and is a joy to use on iOS devices. But it’s also available on many more platforms including the usual suspects – Android, Mac, Windows and also provides extensions for Chrome, Firefox, Thunderbird, Outlook and Gmail.
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White and red colours dominate Todoist’s apps just like its website. White represents the blank slate on which you can build up your projects and tasks. The icons throughout the app are red. Even though Todoist feels right at home on iOS devices, it manages to look good on every single platform with its modern interface. And while it looks nearly the same on different platforms, there are subtle differences in behaviour. iOS and Android apps use popup menus for every action while the web does everything inline. Todoist does away with the concept of unification for the sake of unification. The chosen UI elements and actions are the best suited for a given platform. Of course, this can take some time getting used to. For example, creating a sub project has a whole menu on iOS and Android with options to select different levels, while on the Web all you get are two arrows beside the text field that indent the text box. When you think about the choice, it make sense, but it can be confusing at first.
Adding a project is straight forward. Just click the red + button, give it a name, assign a color for better organisation and you’re done. If it’s a sub project, you can click the Sub-project option and select the level you want (1-4). After selecting the relevant project, tap the + button to add tasks. The project will already be selected but you can change that if you wish so. You can assign some optional fields like due date, priority or a sub task after that. Todoist also allows you to add reminders and labels to any task. This requires a paid subscription which costs $3/month or $29/year. If you are going to use Todoist for your business or managing a number of projects with colleagues, $29 dollars is like a fair price to pay. Features like comments and assigning tasks to different members are here present as well. When you are done with the tasks, swiping through one makes it disappear. The latest version of Todoist also brings in a bit of gamification on the table. It starts you off with 500 karma points and as you add and complete tasks, it grows.
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I’d recommend using Todoist in landscape mode on your iPad or Android tablet because while the portrait mode is just the phone UI blown up, the landscape mode gives access to the fully featured sidebar as well. I tested Todoist on the web, Nexus 4 and the iPad with two different accounts. No matter where you are making changes, the updates and notifications to your team members will be instantaneous. Todoist sends you emails for every single update which can get annoying fairly quickly. Thankfully you can turn of email notifications (and karma points) from the settings easily.
Compared to other feature rich task management apps Todoist might feel bare boned. But if all your are looking for are some basic features, a service that syncs extremely fast coupled with some beautiful pixels, you can’t go wrong with Todoist. Shelling out $3 a month gets you extra features like reminders, notes, labels and filters. Todoist is available for Mac directly, iOS on the App Store (universal), Android on Google Play, Web and Windows for free.