ProgressProgress

For people outgrowing a to-do app

The Todoist alternative for tasks that outgrow a list

Quick-capture tasks, yes — plus the board, notes, and calendar those tasks actually belong to.

Todoist is a superb personal to-do app — fast capture, natural-language due dates, recurring tasks, and a UI that stays out of your way. Millions of people run their day through it, and for good reason. But once tasks stop being personal errands and start being a project — a client engagement, a launch, a team initiative — a flat list stops being enough. Tasks need a board to show where things stand, notes for context, files to reference, and a calendar to see them against real deadlines. Progress starts where Todoist tops out: one workspace per project, with the quick-capture feel still intact.

progress.app / acme-launch
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What Todoist does well

Todoist earns its following. Adding a task takes seconds thanks to natural-language parsing ("every Monday at 9am"), the apps are fast and available everywhere, and features like filters, labels, and Karma give personal productivity systems real teeth. For one person managing their own life and errands, it's hard to beat.

Where Todoist gets stretched for people outgrowing a to-do app

Tasks have no home once they're not just yours

A Todoist project is really a nested list. There's no board to see what stage things are at, no shared notes doc, nowhere to attach a file, and no calendar view of the actual project — just due dates. The moment work involves a team or a client, people fall back to a separate tool to hold the context the task list can't.

Collaboration is thin

Todoist supports shared projects and assigning tasks to people, but there's no real-time chat, no comment thread that feels like an actual conversation, and no meetings. Any real discussion about the work happens in Slack, email, or a call — disconnected from the task that prompted it.

Nothing to show a client

Todoist is built for individuals and small teams managing their own work, not for anything client-facing. There's no booking page, no e-signature, no way for someone outside the list to see progress. If the work involves a client at all, that's a second stack of tools from day one.

 ProgressTodoist
Quick task captureBoard cards, fast to add, with checklistsBest-in-class — natural-language due dates
Kanban boardBuilt in — drag cards across stagesNone — flat lists, with sections at most
Notes & documentsBuilt in, with version historyNone — task descriptions only
CalendarBuilt in, synced with Google CalendarDue-date view only; can sync out to a calendar app
Team chatBuilt-in channels + DMsNone — comments on individual tasks only
Client-facing tools (booking, e-sign, meetings)Built inNone — not built for this

Why people outgrowing Todoist pick Progress

Every Progress project starts as a board, so the move from a flat task list feels natural — cards instead of line items, columns instead of due-date filters. But each card sits inside a workspace that also has notes for context, files for reference, a calendar synced to Google, and real-time chat — plus, when the work touches a client, booking pages, e-signature, and video meetings with AI notes. You don't lose the speed of adding a task; you gain everywhere that task needs to live once it's part of something bigger.

The Progress kanban board with real cards, labels, and checklists
The board — drag-and-drop kanban with labels, checklists, and card templates.

Switching from Todoist

There's no one-click importer yet, so the honest path is to start a project in Progress and rebuild your active task list on the board — most people find that a natural moment to prune anyway. If you've got a large project's worth of tasks to bring over, reach out through in-app support and we'll help move them by hand.

Common questions

Is Progress a good replacement for personal task management?

Not really its strength. Todoist is tuned for fast, personal task capture — natural-language dates, filters, labels, recurring tasks — and it's genuinely great at that. Progress is built around projects with a team or client attached. If all you need is a personal to-do list, Todoist is still the better tool for that job.

Can I use Progress and Todoist together?

Some people do — Todoist for personal errands and daily life, Progress for the project work that involves other people. There's no integration between the two today, so tasks don't sync automatically between them.

Does Progress have natural-language due dates or deep recurrence rules?

Board cards in Progress support due dates, but Progress doesn't have Todoist's natural-language parsing ('every weekday except holidays') or the same depth of recurrence options. If that's central to how you capture tasks, it's worth knowing going in.

What does Progress cost?

Progress is free during the open beta. Pricing hasn't been introduced yet, and beta users will hear about it first when it is.

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