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- Asana vs Todoist. I've used both over the years and am currently using Todoist for most of my tasks and projects. I'm working on a collaboration plan for my department and am looking at both for the team. We are using MS Teams for collaboration and Asana does.
- Todoist misses some of the more important features for business that Asana has, such as messaging and detailed tracking, but Todoist Business does seem to address some of those. In any case it probably requires paid access to use functionally for business, which is a bit beyond my intended uses right now.
Join 25 million people and teams that organize, plan, and collaborate on tasks and projects with Todoist. 'The best to-do list' by The Verge. For instance, on this page you can see Todoist’s overall score of 8.0 and compare it against Asana’s score of 9.2; or Todoist’s user satisfaction level at 98% versus Asana’s 96% satisfaction score. The contrast can help you spot the good and bad points of each service, and choose which matches your requirements better. Asana vs Todoist. Why is Asana better than Todoist? Can sort task lists? Has task status? Can attach files? Has goal tracking? Can archive your old data? Exports to email? 6.23MB smaller app size (Android app)? 0.57MB vs 6.8MB; Scroll down for more details.
This post contains the framework for my coming reviews and comparisons of Asana, Todoist, and Trello, three platforms with free project and task-tracking offerings. I will be updating this post as I progress with additional details, and will link to the final writeup when it is done.
Final update: 4/4/2021: Read about the Winner here.
Keeping track of tasks and projects that are in-progress can be a challenge. I always have a lot going on and am usually learning several new things, and while I am generally great at keeping up with things mentally, working with others requires being able to track and document progress on any number of current ventures.
To that end, I'll be reviewing Asana, Todoist, and Trello, given that these are three of the most popular project management platforms that allow collaboration and also have free versions with most functions enabled.
Project Scope
The goal is to determine which of the three platforms is the most functional for my needs. The primary requirements are as follows:
- The UI/UX must be beautiful and functional. If I'm spend time each day using the platform, it needs to be both enjoyable and efficient. Bonus points if there is an app that meets this criteria as well.
- Task and project creation, progress, and completion should be intuitive. If I have to consult a guide, it's probably not intuitive enough (although I usually do read the guides/tutorials).
- Repetitive tasks need to appear consistently, and should notify me when there are times or due dates attached. Integration with Google/iCal is highly desirable.
- Sharing with/Assigning tasks to others need to be quick and seamless.
- For personal use, a free version should be sufficient. For company use (large number of projects/tasks, file sizes, or users), paid versions with additional features are acceptable. I'd like to grow with the platform, not be forced to grow out of it by the price.
Learning new software can be a nightmare, or a pleasurable experience. Integrating software with the approaches I already take, such as scheduling certain recurring activities for specific days or times, tracking success rates, and so on will be more difficult.
If the platform is built in a way that enables users to intuitively operate within it, then the experience should be good. Since there is some risk involved and I don't want to take the chance of losing progress on valuable projects, I'll be trying each platform out for one week while adding the same daily and weekly tasks into each one, so I can assess how effective they are at the same tasks.
Challenges
There are a few hurdles for me on this project.
- It's going to require commitment every day for a week, along with full documentation of that process for three different platforms. That is a lot of a documentation.
- The process is detail-oriented. While I'll be assessing the overall look and feel of these apps, I want to support those feelings with specific reasons and explanations. I love attention to detail, but this one might require a real painstaking amount. Hopefully love wins out.
- Comparing three platforms with five criteria points means I need to develop a rating system. So, before my final review, I will create a system and explain how I did it.
Research and Inspiration
Monday.com touts itself as the #1 project management platform. However, it is only available as a paid subscription, which was not something I was willing to try. (Edit: Their ads bring you to landing pages that don't list free versions, but their main site actually has one. Perhaps I'll eventually compare the eventual winner of this competition with Monday). They stack themselves up again Asana and Trello, among others, so I thought that those two might be good places to start. I had already heard of both from friends and advertisements, and I had even occasionally used Trello in the past.
So how does Monday rank them?
It looks like Trello has the initial edge, at least according to their competitor, Monday. What about Todoist? While Monday is mum on that one, Todoist is usually the first or second app that pops up in the google play store when I search for to-do list apps, and it is also one I've heard of many times before.
All three have android apps, which is sufficient for me since I do not own any Apple products, but I will research in the final version whether or not they offer support for Apple and Mac.
Some inspiration for this project came from the Flow Genome Project, which I discovered after reading Steven Kotler's The Rise of Superman. The FGP offer a 'Hedonic Calendar' that helps you focus on the activities that bring about a state of flow, peace of mind, or help you recover, and assists you in mapping these out over the course of the weeks, months, and seasons of the year.
I also felt inspiration to tackle this project because I really love being detail oriented, and this is one way to demonstrate that ability. Operations roles may require me to evaluate and select a piece of software or service for my team, and I want my prospective employers to know that I can carry out this process in a logical, detailed style full of documentation.
Pending Action Steps
Here is how the process is going to work:
Day 1 (Completed)
- Download the apps for all three platforms
- Add daily (web version) and weekly (android apps) tasks with varying recurrence rates into all three platforms
- Document this process with screenshots and notes about the ease of use
- Write a blog post to share this on Facebook and Twitter
Day 2 (Completed)
- Integrate the tasks with my Google calendar
- Write a short (2 paragraph max) blog post for each explaining how to do this (I decided to make 3 how-to videos instead and share those in a LinkedIn Article. Videos Links: Asana; Trello; Todoist)
- Mark off daily tasks as completed, documenting whether any notifications or prompts showed up and how effectively they worked
Day 3 (Completed)
- Evaluate the ease of use so far and write a brief assessment for each in a single tweet
- Schedule each of these to post at the same time over three days
- Continue using/evaluating/documenting all three apps
Day 4 (Completed)
- Identify any issues with the tasks that I've scheduled and review their solutions in tutorials, guides, etc. as needed
- Write a short blog post about the quality of these resources at each company
- Continue using/evaluating/documenting all three apps
Day 5 (In Progress)
- Take screenshots of each main screen and create slideshows in a blog post to document UI/UX design
- Home
- My Tasks
- Upcoming Tasks
- Calendar or Kanban view
- Share this post to Facebook and Twitter
Day 6 (Completed)
- Start my final blog post, outlining the criteria scoring that I'll use to judge the platforms
- Add a brief writeup to the final post comparing free features, paid features, and limitations of each platform
Day 7 (Completed)
- Share this post and the final writeup on fb/twitter
Day 8 (Completed)
- Reflect on the process and what I learned as well as what skills it helped me refine and demonstrate
- Make some notes so the writing process is easier next week
Final Step (Coming Soon)
- Add a new task to the winning platform
- Label it 'TAKE A NAP' and schedule it for 1 pm the next day
- Follow through.
Asana And Todoist
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The Verge
Todoist has helped
millions of people completeover 1.5 billion tasks
in 150+ million projects.
millions of people completeover 1.5 billion tasks
in 150+ million projects.
I literally couldn’t do my job or even manage all the business of being a fully functioning parent and spouse without Todoist.
As a software engineer, it’s useful to break down big projects into smaller tasks, and Todoist is perfect for that purpose.
I kept track of all my school tasks in Todoist and, in 2016, I became the first one in my family to obtain a bachelor’s degree.
Todoist has revolutionized the way we run our small business by helping us simplify projects and coordinate tons of details.
Trevor Stephens
General Manager at Topline Builders
Read moreTodoist gave us the focus to scale our company from 2 to 75 employees, $12M in VC financing, and 350+ happy enterprise customers.
Todoist helps me organize all my writing projects. And that makes it an indispensable tool both in business and in life.
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