What is the best free to-do list app?

It depends on where you already work. Apple Reminders, Google Tasks and Microsoft To Do come with the accounts most people already have. Todoist, TickTick and Any.do each have a free plan and paid upgrades. Things is a paid app for Apple devices, and its sync service is free.

Which to-do list app is best for sharing with family?

The one everyone already has. Apple Reminders shares lists over iCloud and lets you assign items to people. Microsoft To Do shares lists between personal Microsoft accounts. Any.do has a family board and a shared grocery list. TickTick shares lists too.

Is a kanban board better than a to-do list app?

Not for one person who needs reminders. A board is better when work is shared, waits on someone, or passes between people, because it shows where each item is and who has it.

Does fenbs work as a to-do list app?

Only partly. fenbs is a team board with lanes, kinds and priorities, and AI assistants can work on it. It has no due dates, reminders or recurring tasks, so it does not replace a reminders app.

Best To-Do List Apps for Individuals and Small Teams

The best to-do list app depends on who shares the list: just you, your household, a small team, or a developer and their AI assistant. Todoist, Microsoft To Do, Google Tasks, Apple Reminders, TickTick, Things and Any.do, sorted by fit rather than by opinion.

October 1, 20266 min read

There is no single best to-do list app; there is the best one for who shares the list. If it is only you, pick the app that lives where you already are: Apple Reminders or Things on Apple devices, Google Tasks in Gmail, Microsoft To Do in Outlook, or Todoist and TickTick if you want the same app everywhere. If a household shares it, you need shared lists and assignment, which Reminders, Microsoft To Do, TickTick and Any.do all have. If a small team shares it and items pass from one person to another, you are probably past a to-do list and want a board.

Below, each app is described from its own site and help pages as of October 1, 2026. There is no ranking, because the ranking depends entirely on your situation.

What to check in any to-do list application

Where it runs: phone, desktop, web, watch. An app missing from the device you use most will not get used.
Capture: how fast you can add an item, from email, voice or a share sheet.
Reminders: by time, by place, repeating. This is the main thing a to-do app does that a board does not.
Sharing: whether you can share a list, and whether you can assign an item to a person in it.
What the free plan includes, if there is one, and what moves to paid.

For one person: a personal to-do list app

Things

Things calls itself a personal task manager, and it means personal. It runs on Mac, iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch and Vision Pro, and syncs through Cultured Code’s free Things Cloud service. It is made only for Apple devices. Cultured Code’s support pages say plainly that Things does not support real-time sharing (opens in a new tab) of to-dos or lists. Choose it if you are all-Apple and the list is yours alone.

TickTick

TickTick describes itself (opens in a new tab) as covering tasks, schedules, focus, habits and important occasions, with several calendar views, a Pomodoro timer, a habit tracker and countdowns, on phones, computers, tablets, watches and the web. It suits someone who wants their to-do list, calendar and focus timer in one app. Lists can also be shared, which puts it in the household group below.

Google Tasks

Google Tasks lives inside Gmail, Calendar and Chat rather than in an app of its own. Google’s product page for Tasks (opens in a new tab) says a task with a date and time appears in Google Calendar with reminders, and that you can turn an email into a to-do. If your day is in Gmail, that integration is the whole point. Our Google Tasks guide covers how to use it well.

Todoist

Todoist is built around fast capture: Smart Quick Add turns a typed line into a task. Its free plan, Beginner, includes a small number of personal projects, list and board layouts, a few filter views, a week of activity history and task reminders. Todoist’s help on reminders (opens in a new tab) says that multiple custom reminders on one task need Pro or Business. Projects can be shared with other people, so it stretches to a small group.

For a shared household

Apple Reminders

Reminders comes with every iPhone, iPad and Mac. Apple’s support page on how to share and assign reminders (opens in a new tab) describes sharing a list over iCloud and assigning reminders to people, for example to split up chores or grocery items. If everyone in the house uses Apple devices, this is the one nobody has to install.

Microsoft To Do

Microsoft To Do is Microsoft’s to-do list app. Microsoft’s help on creating and sharing lists (opens in a new tab) lists two cases for sharing: between personal Microsoft accounts, and between accounts at the same workplace or school. Members of a shared list can assign tasks to each other. If your team is on Microsoft 365, read Microsoft To Do vs Planner before choosing.

Any.do

Any.do presents itself as a simple to-do list for you and your team, with time, location and recurring reminders, reminders in WhatsApp, a family board for the household and a shared grocery list that groups items by aisle. It also offers boards for teams, where tasks and subtasks can be assigned. TickTick, covered above, also shares lists and lets members assign tasks in them.

For a small team

Several of these apps can be shared with a team: Todoist projects, Microsoft To Do lists, TickTick lists, Any.do boards and tasks assigned in a Google Chat space. They work while the team’s work is a list of independent items. They strain when items wait on someone, pass from one person to another for review, or when you need to know who changed what. That is the point where a list should become a board, and kanban board vs to-do list walks through the signs and the switch.

For a developer

A developer’s list is usually a mix of bugs, small changes and new features, often in the same repository as an AI coding assistant. Two things matter more than reminders: whether the list can tell a bug from a feature, and whether your assistant can read and update it. Todoist and Microsoft To Do can both be reached by assistants; see the Todoist MCP with Claude and the Microsoft To Do MCP.

This is also where fenbs fits, and only here. fenbs is a team board, not a reminders app. Every task is a feature, an enhancement or a bug, sits in one of four lanes (To Do, Next Up, In Progress, Completed), and has a priority from 1 to 10. AI assistants such as Claude Code or Cursor connect over MCP as members of the board, and the history records who changed what. Your own board is free, and Add many pastes an existing list in as tasks, so moving a list over takes a minute. How it works shows the rest.

What fenbs does not do matters as much for a to-do list: it has no due dates, no reminders, no notifications at a set time, no recurring tasks and no settable assignee. If you need your phone to tell you to call the dentist at 3 p.m., use one of the apps above.

A one-line way to choose

Only you, all Apple: Things or Reminders.
Only you, everything in Google or Microsoft: Google Tasks or Microsoft To Do.
Only you, on several platforms, with a focus timer and habits: TickTick; with fast typed capture: Todoist.
A household: Reminders, Microsoft To Do, TickTick or Any.do, whichever everyone already has.
A small team where work changes hands: a board. If it is your own work, see personal kanban.
A developer with an AI assistant: a board the assistant can read and update.

Comparing fenbs with a to-do app directly? See fenbs vs Todoist. Planning a project rather than a day? Read free project planning software. Or start from the personal to-do template.