Things 3 is one of the best-known task managers made specifically for Apple users. Its calm interface, excellent Mac app, Today list, project structure, and one-time purchase make it an appealing alternative to increasingly complex subscription tools.

It is not the automatic winner, though. Todoist works across nearly every major platform and is much better suited to shared work. TickTick combines tasks with a full calendar, habits, Pomodoro sessions, and other planning tools. OmniFocus offers the deepest Apple-focused system for people who want reviews, defer dates, custom perspectives, and serious GTD-style organization.

This comparison looks at all four from a Mac-user perspective: daily planning, project structure, calendar features, collaboration, platform support, power-user tools, and price.

Quick Verdict

Choose Things 3 if you want the most polished personal task manager for Mac and other Apple devices, with a clean daily workflow and no subscription.

Choose Todoist if you need cross-platform access, natural-language capture, integrations, flexible views, or collaboration with other people.

Choose TickTick if you want tasks, calendar planning, habit tracking, focus sessions, and multiple project views in one reasonably priced service.

Choose OmniFocus if you want the most powerful personal productivity system for Apple devices, especially for GTD, project reviews, custom perspectives, and automation.

Feature Comparison

Things 3

Things 3 succeeds because it makes personal task management feel lighter than it does in most competing apps. The core structure is easy to understand: capture tasks in the Inbox, organize projects inside Areas, decide what belongs in Today, and move less immediate work to Upcoming or Someday.

The distinction between a start date and a deadline is especially useful. You can decide when a task should appear without pretending that every planned task has a hard due date. The Today list combines tasks with selected calendar events, while This Evening separates later plans from the rest of the day. Upcoming provides a clean view of scheduled tasks, repeating items, deadlines, and calendar events.

Things is also an unusually good Mac app. Quick Entry lets you capture a task from anywhere, Quick Entry with Autofill can include context from another app, and Type Travel makes keyboard navigation fast. It supports multiple windows, widgets, Shortcuts, a URL scheme, Mail to Things, Markdown notes, tags, checklists, headings, and free sync through Things Cloud.

The limits are deliberate but important. Things has no web, Windows, or Android app. It does not support shared projects or task assignment, and it does not try to replace a calendar, habit tracker, or team project manager.

The US Mac App Store currently lists Things 3 at $49.99 as a one-time purchase. The iPhone, iPad, and Vision Pro versions are sold separately, while the Apple Watch app is included with the iPhone app. There is no subscription, and Things Cloud sync costs nothing extra.

Choose Things 3 if task management is personal, your devices are from Apple, and you value a focused interface more than collaboration or an enormous feature list.

Todoist

Todoist is the strongest general-purpose option in this comparison. It runs on macOS, Windows, Linux, the web, iPhone, iPad, Android, Apple Watch, and Wear OS, with browser extensions and email add-ons as well. That reach makes it much easier to recommend when your devices, workplace, or collaborators are not entirely inside Apple's ecosystem.

Task capture is one of Todoist's biggest strengths. Its natural-language Quick Add can recognize dates and recurring schedules while you type. Projects can use list, board, or calendar layouts, and labels, priorities, sections, filters, subtasks, reminders, durations, and deadlines provide plenty of structure without requiring an elaborate GTD setup.

Todoist is also the clear collaboration winner here. Shared projects can include assignments, comments, and files, while Business adds a separate team workspace, team project folders, roles, permissions, shared templates, and centralized billing. Its catalog of more than 90 integrations gives it another advantage over Apple-only personal task managers.

The free Beginner plan is useful but currently limited to five personal projects, three filters, and one week of activity history. Todoist Pro is listed at $5 per user per month when billed annually, or $60 per year. Pro expands the limits and adds features such as calendar layout, task durations, custom reminders, 150 filters, full activity history, and deadlines.

Choose Todoist if you need one task system everywhere, regularly share work with other people, or want integrations and flexible project views.

TickTick

TickTick covers more parts of personal productivity than the other apps. Alongside standard lists, tags, filters, recurring tasks, reminders, and calendar planning, it includes a habit tracker, Pomodoro timer, Eisenhower Matrix, countdowns, statistics, and white noise options.

Its planning views are unusually broad for the price. TickTick offers yearly, monthly, weekly, agenda, multi-day, and multi-week calendar views, plus list, Kanban, and timeline layouts for tasks. Premium users can set start and end dates and subscribe to third-party calendars. Shared lists and task assignment also make it more collaborative than Things or OmniFocus, although it is less team-oriented than Todoist.

That breadth is both TickTick's main advantage and its tradeoff. It can replace several smaller productivity apps, but the interface has more concepts and controls than Things. Users who only want a beautifully restrained personal task list may find the extra tools distracting. Users who currently maintain separate apps for tasks, habits, calendar planning, and focus sessions may see the opposite: useful consolidation.

TickTick has a free plan, while its official upgrade page currently lists Premium at $35.99 per year. Premium unlocks the full calendar functionality, more capacity, custom filters, change history, progress and historical statistics, checklist-item reminders, calendar widgets, estimated Pomodoro sessions, and additional themes and white noises.

Choose TickTick if you want the broadest personal productivity toolkit without paying for several separate apps.

OmniFocus

OmniFocus is the most powerful and methodical option here. It is built for people who want to capture everything, organize actions into projects and folders, assign multiple tags, distinguish due dates from defer dates, and regularly review projects so the system stays trustworthy.

Forecast combines upcoming actions, flagged items, notifications, and calendar events. The dedicated Review feature periodically surfaces projects for inspection. Location-based tags can show relevant actions nearby, while batch editing, attachments, rich-text notes, repeating schedules, custom layouts, and end-to-end encrypted sync support large personal databases.

OmniFocus Pro goes further with custom perspectives, Focus Mode, Omni Automation, and AppleScript on Mac. A custom perspective can filter and group tasks by project, tag, status, date, or other rules, making OmniFocus far more adaptable than a conventional to-do list. That power comes with the steepest learning curve in this comparison.

OmniFocus is primarily an Apple ecosystem product. A perpetual license is a universal purchase across supported Apple devices: $74.99 for Standard or $149.99 for Pro. The optional $99.99 yearly subscription unlocks the latest Pro version across Apple devices and includes OmniFocus for the Web. Perpetual-license owners can add web access separately for $49.99 per year.

Choose OmniFocus if you are willing to build and maintain a serious personal productivity system and will use features such as Review, defer dates, custom perspectives, and automation.

Which One Should You Use?

Use Things 3 if you work entirely on Apple devices, manage tasks for yourself, and want an app that stays calm and fast even when your project list grows.

Use Todoist if you switch between operating systems, collaborate with colleagues or family, rely on integrations, or want a capable free starting point.

Use TickTick if you want to plan tasks on a calendar, build habits, run focus sessions, and track progress without assembling several different apps.

Use OmniFocus if your productivity method depends on GTD-style reviews, defer dates, detailed contexts or tags, custom views, and automation.

Final Verdict

Things 3 is the best personal task manager for many Apple-only users. It is thoughtfully designed, quick to navigate, and unusually good at helping you decide what to do today without turning every task into a miniature project-management exercise. Its $49.99 Mac purchase is also attractive if you want to avoid another subscription.

Todoist is the best all-round choice. It has the widest platform support, the strongest collaboration, excellent quick capture, flexible views, and a large integration ecosystem.

TickTick offers the most functionality for the price. Its calendar, habits, focus tools, reminders, views, and statistics make it a compelling personal productivity bundle.

OmniFocus is the power-user winner. It costs more and demands more setup, but its Review system, defer dates, perspectives, encryption, and automation are built for workflows the simpler apps cannot match.

My practical recommendation: pick Things 3 for a focused Apple-only setup, Todoist for shared or cross-platform work, TickTick for an all-in-one personal system, and OmniFocus for a rigorous GTD workflow.

Note: Features and US prices are current as of June 2026. App Store prices vary by country, and subscriptions, plan limits, platform support, and features can change. Verify the latest details on each app's official website or App Store page before purchasing.