Start with how you work
Most people choose a productivity app because a colleague recommended it, then abandon it within a month. The problem is rarely the app; it is the mismatch between the tool and the work. A five-person design studio, a solo freelance writer and a PhD student need different things. Before reading the rankings, decide whether your main need is coordinating other people, tracking your own tasks, or capturing and connecting ideas.
We used each app for at least two weeks on real projects, migrated existing data in and out, and tested the mobile apps on both iOS and Android.
Project management
Asana — best for cross-team planning
Asana handles complexity gracefully. Projects can be viewed as lists, boards, timelines or calendars, and dependencies between tasks are clear. Its AI features summarise project status and suggest next steps, which is helpful for managers juggling several teams. It can feel heavy for very small groups.
Trello — best free option for simple boards
Trello, owned by Atlassian, made the kanban board mainstream. Cards move between columns, and that is most of what you need to learn. The free plan is enough for small teams and personal projects. Once you need reporting or timelines, you will feel its limits.
Linear — best for software teams
Linear is fast, keyboard-driven and opinionated about how software teams should plan cycles and track issues. Developers consistently prefer it to heavier tools. Outside of product and engineering work, it offers fewer advantages.
ClickUp — the everything app
ClickUp tries to replace your tasks, docs, goals and chat in one place. It is extraordinarily flexible, which is both its strength and its weakness: setting it up well takes time. Teams that commit to configuring it often love it.
Note-taking and knowledge apps
Obsidian — best for private, long-term notes
Obsidian stores your notes as plain Markdown files on your own device. That means no lock-in: if Obsidian disappeared tomorrow, your notes would still open in any text editor. Backlinks and a graph view help you connect ideas over years. It is free for personal use, with optional paid sync.
Notion — best for shared wikis and databases
Notion blends documents and databases, making it ideal for team wikis, content calendars and lightweight CRMs. Notion AI can draft, summarise and answer questions about your workspace. Offline support has improved but still trails local-first apps, and exporting complex databases can be messy.
Logseq and Apple Notes — honourable mentions
Logseq is an open-source outliner favoured by people who think in bullet points and daily journals. Apple Notes, meanwhile, is far more capable than its reputation suggests, with tags, smart folders and solid search, and costs nothing on Apple devices.
Todoist — best personal task manager
Todoist's natural-language input ("submit invoice every last Friday") is still the best in its class. It is light, cross-platform and integrates with calendars and email. Many people pair it with Obsidian or Notion for notes.
| App | Type | Best for | Free plan | Data portability |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Asana | Projects | Multi-team planning | Yes | CSV export |
| Trello | Boards | Simple workflows | Yes | JSON export |
| Linear | Issues | Software teams | Yes | CSV / API |
| ClickUp | All-in-one | Customisers | Yes | CSV export |
| Obsidian | Notes | Personal knowledge | Yes | Plain Markdown |
| Notion | Docs + databases | Team wikis | Yes | Markdown / CSV |
| Todoist | Tasks | Personal to-dos | Yes | CSV export |
A complete free productivity stack
You can build a capable toolkit without paying anything. Use Trello for shared projects, Obsidian for notes, Todoist's free plan for tasks, Zotero for references, Photopea for images and the free tier of ChatGPT or Claude for drafting. Add LanguageTool for proofreading. Upgrade one piece at a time, only when a limit genuinely slows you down.