Planning your schedule and day ahead can be one of the ways to reduce your decision fatigue and get you locked into the day ahead. Thousands of to-do list apps can help you do great things, but daily planner apps combine calendar and task management apps into one for ultimate personal scheduling.
Daily planner apps are on the rise, there's no doubt about it!
Gone are the days where Google Calendar and the basic to-do list apps are enough to help structure your week, there are dozens of daily planner apps entering the scene every single month with a goal to be the place people plan and schedule their day. More and more people want to plan their schedule & their calendar in one place. For millions, this can better help them see what's on their agenda and weave in tasks to do, as they go. We've tested over 30+ daily planner apps in the last year, and our recommendations have boiled down to these planner apps.
Daily planner apps help you plan your schedule, routine & tasks that are most important.
They combine tasks (to-do list) and calendar (events/meetings) to schedule your week all-in-one.
There are many benefits to using a daily planner app:
Helps you see everything in your plans in one view.
Allows you to book and schedule new items as they come in.
Reduces app switching fatigue between multiple planning apps.
Anyone can benefit from a daily planner app, but in particular, we'd say students who have a busy study schedule, working professionals who want to see how their meeting schedule & to-do list looks like & casual users who just want more organization weaved into their daily routine. Anyone that is suffering from a lack of clarity of what's on the agenda will benefit.
Here's our top recommendations to save you time:
Best Overall - Motion
Best for Work - Akiflow
Best for Mac - Routine
Best for iPhone - Structured
Best for Android - Structured
Best for ADHD - Structured
Best for Calmer Planning - Sunsama
Let's explore all these options in more detail:
Motion is a daily planner for freelancers, solopreneurs & busy professionals.
It combines a to-do list, calendar, note-taking, and has AI agents to help you do errands and repetitive tasks for you. The goal of using Motion is to help you take the weight out of working out priorities (what's important) and assign smaller, less intense automations over to an AI assistant. For daily planning, it has an algorithm that helps organize your task (based on attributes) into your schedule for you taking the pressure and decision fatigue out of where your task needs to place into your plans. Motion doesn't stop their with their AI - it helps you create a list of tasks extracted from a meeting, or written out, that can help schedule them into your upcoming tasks list. This is perfect if you have regular meetings and want to extract all the action points to do, without any follow-up needed.
For some people, that is incredibly helpful, as it takes away the administration that comes with task planning, for others it might be too much control. The algorithm is designed around the task context you have provided, so it isn't randomly generated and has a process to how it works. Motion connects with Google & Outlook calendar, has an AI note-taker & even documents for turning notes into projects. Project management for teams is much more powerful in Motion than it was before, with views like Gantt, timeline, document & Kanban for organizing workload and sharing it amongst others in your team.
Powerful AI-powered features with an agentic focus.
Great for reducing administration and blockers when planning to-dos.
Extensive ways to add team members & collaborate together.
Scalable to a small team if you use it personally & want to implement at work.
Comes with a time tracking tool which is a handy bonus.
Takes time to learn and embrace all the agentic features (for AI employees plan).
The pricing is one of the most expensive planner apps on the market.
Might not be needed for the average person to use.
For individuals, pricing starts at $29 per month.
There is a $49 per month plan for AI employees/agents.
For teams beyond 3 seats, things are 40% cheaper per user.
Mac, Windows.
iOS, Android & Web
Mid to senior management roles.
Solopreneurs or entrepreneurs.
Fast-paced freelancers.
Small to medium sized teams of up to 25 people.
Casual planners - eg. for home use, personal day planning.
Those moving from a smaller to-do list app.
Much larger teams of 100+ unless they are AI-first companies.
We have tested Motion over the last few years and it continues to evolve each time we do, for the better.
This daily planner app isn't for everyone, we'd typically say it is best for those in jobs or roles that their income is associated with their output - eg. freelancers, solopreneurs, or highly intense senior or management roles. Why? The pricing is much higher than other tools like it, the AI features can go much further and the project management abilities are better for growing teams (up to 25).
So our verdict is that Motion is fantastic, but for those who are willing to take a leap with AI agents, open to paying a bit more and will maximize all of the features that it offers. Motion is powerful and works well, it is reliable, takes time to learn but all-in-all, presents a solid set of features for planning your schedule as a busy individual.
The general sentiment about Motion is positive.
Many people say that it is an expensive tool to consider, but the general features that it offers have gone down well with users. Some of the comments being made about Motion is the subscription upsells and marketing once you are in the funnel can sometimes be a tad too assertive, these were seen on sites like TrustPilot. Looking at Motion alternatives, we've put together some recommendations for you.
Structured is an iOS and Android daily planner app that is perfect for everyday, casual planners.
It has a great routine-based feature that helps you add tasks in a linear fashion. People like this as they can see their full day ahead, including importing calendar events via Google Calendar, Exchange, Outlook and more. This is a handy way to see the schedule for the full-day ahead, but also allow them to re-structure the day as it changes. The app is used by 15M people and has one of the better iOS/Android app store ratings. The AI features are superb and useful in this tool, you can use an image and turn it into a schedule, or just ramble away on your phone and it'll generate a rough schedule based on that - helpful, practical tools. One thing for those with ADHD is that visual schedule but also the way that the timeline runs down so you can see your progress through a task, complete it and allow recurring ones.
For personal user, Structured is awesome and comes with so many well-crafted features on the go use. It's a perfect tool for casual planners, from helping to plan the house clean to everyday routines.
Neat inbox feature for capturing tasks.
A much loved AI feature for quickly organizing a day using your voice.
Well designed look and feel on iPad, iPhone & Android.
Reasonable pricing for the lifetime upgrade.
Great for visual thinkers or those with ADHD.
OCR scanning feature to turn your written schedule into a digital one.
Limited features for Android users (lacks most AI features).
There is a free plan with Structured.
You can use premium monthly for $6.49 per month.
It is cheaper to use yearly at $19.99 or consider lifetime at $64.99 one-off.
Mac, Web
iOS & Android
Casual everyday planners.
People using for home/organization/life planning.
Those with ADHD who like visual schedules/routines.
Work-based task management
It is hard to find huge problems with Structured.
It is reasonable in price, sub-$20 per year or sub-$70 one-off.
Comes with a good set of useful AI features and the basics you need to plan a day.
The free plan is generous and can be upgraded whenever.
Our opinion is that Structured is one of the best valued planner apps on the market right now. We'd recommend it to anyone looking to help plan their tasks at home, looking for a casual to-do app for their routine, or need to see how their routine is laid out in a visual schedule.
Structured gets a lot of good credit from people who want something visual.
It is very popular in the ADHD community as this visual schedule that helps people cycle down the list of things to do, timeline focused. The system is notable in helping people see and plan what's ahead. The AI features in the premium also get a head-nod, for a reasonable price too - many people like how easy the AI works in organizing tasks based on a ramble they go on about their day's plans. Some people complain about recurring bugs on the Android version and feel the lack of dissonance between the quality of the iOS/Mac apps are much better than those of the web and Android editions.
Akiflow is a daily planner with a unique feature for those using lots of apps to plan.
It allows you to connect up other popular apps like ClickUp, Notion, Asana & more. Why is this useful? You can create a dashboard of all incoming tasks, think of your task in ClickUp for work, an email in Gmail with urgency, or maybe an assigned task in Notion. These all add up and switching between those tools is messy, Akiflow wants to be your integrated to-do list, a way to bring in all those tasks into funnel for you.
Alongside all of this, you can add your tasks, time-block them and connect up popular calendar apps like Outlook & Google Calendar for easy meeting joining. It has a meeting scheduling link, AI chatbot assistant and a way to guided plan which is a structured way to organize your next set of tasks. Akiflow is growing in popularity with freelancers and business owners who want a dose of AI organization, with the power of a consolidated view of tasks.
Great "Rituals" feature for guided planning.
Handy AI assistant for chatting and re-organizing your day called Aki.
The powerful way to connect up with other apps to import tasks.
A wide range of integration and providers.
The design isn't as attractive as other apps.
Can be expensive option to consider.
The AI features are still in early stages of development.
There is no free plan on Akiflow.
The cheapest pricing is $19 per month, billed annually.
There is a monthly pricing of $34, each month.
You can use KEEPPRODUCTIVE30 to get 30% off.
iOS, Android.
Mac, Windows, web.
Busy professionals who use lots of project and work apps.
Freelancers who need something more robust.
Solopreneurs or business owners.
Smaller teams (up to 5 people).
Everyday casual planners.
Basic home organization.
Our opinion on Akiflow is a good one.
The ability to bring all your tasks together works well for many people. It's an untapped area at the moment with a handful of apps offering this but one that people will love if they are in teams or organizations. The integrations work well and can be customized for many in the settings. The area that lets Akiflow down is the AI features are good, but still very basic.
The Aki chatbot allows you to communicate with it, but can sometimes be slower and not always suitable for everyday use. This will grow and the team will resolve this, we were previewed with some early AI features by the team and actually they worked well & have a lot of practical potential, so we're interested in where they go. The team move fast and nimble, so no doubt it'll be soon on par with Motion or others.
Many people like Akiflow and have no issues with it.
The price is discussed a lot online as people tend to find the $10+ per month pricing a difficult pill to swallow, but the general sentiment is that it hits the nail on the head for people in organizations that are blown away with lots of tasks in their list as it does a good job connecting all those apps into one inbox. People tend to go with Motion for more AI powers, and Todoist for less price & consolidation, if those alternatives are considered.
Sunsama is a calmer, more relaxed planner app that packs a punch.
This recommendation is unique in many ways, Sunsama offers the combination of tasks, calendar & integrations like Akiflow, but with a much more mindful approach. Sunsama does this by allowing you to use guided planning to help assist what you next day looks like. Many people like this as a structured way to plan out what your next day looks like, reflect on the day before and even log reports on your day's success on Slack. We love how unique Sunsama is and how it offers the ultimate planner app for those looking for something calmer. But why is calmer better? A lot of people are looking to do less, but more intentional tasks and Sunsama wants you to as well. It has features like the ability to set task, time and restricts how much you can load yourself up with - helping quality be the key metric of success, versus quantity of tasks - common with other to-do list apps.
Sunsama brings to life a focused environment for planning, intentional productivity & all with the ability to bring in tasks from other apps. This is the daily planner app for zen focus but still brings all the features you know and love from apps like Akiflow, into a well-constructed look. It does tailor for teams too, which is a lesser-known fact about Sunsama, so do consider it as a team tool too.
A very attractive looking design and feel.
Daily shutdown feature for reflecting on the day and stopping you working.
Great modes for focus & pomodoro timers within each task.
Bring in tasks from other apps like ClickUp, Asana & more.
Auto-scheduling works to help plan tasks without overloading your plans.
Task limits and loading recommendations to stop you stacking your list up too much.
The pricing can be a little bit out of reach for some people.
Less AI features than the other options like Motion & Akiflow.
The mobile versions are not as powerful or as good as the desktop versions (important to note).
There is no free plan on Sunsama.
The monthly pricing is $20 per month.
The yearly pricing brings that down to $16 per month.
iOS, Android
Windows, Mac
Web
Busy professionals
Freelancers or business owners
Those who need a system to help them plan.
Executive or management individuals.
Small teams looking for more mindful practices.
Those with ADHD.
Casual users.
Those who have small budgets.
We think Sunsama is one of the hidden gems in the space.
Coming with features that are anti-to-do list app in nature. Focusing on less rather than more. Sunsama brings a fresh, more mindful approach on tasks in a world of busy, digital AI focused tools. It's not loaded with anything unnecessary and has been in the market for longer than Akiflow & Motion combined as a long-time daily planner tool. Here's some more perspective:
I used Sunsama for around 2-3 years. I moved back to Todoist, as I wasn't using all the features, but the way that Sunsama gave me a good way to zoom out with features like "weekly objectives" and guided planning was very helpful. I think the ability to just not focus on the quantity of tasks I had and putting them in the backlog feature was so good. Being able to take that perspective every day was helpful for effective task management.
The general consensus on Sunsama is positive.
Features that get the most attention are the "daily shutdown" that closes your Sunsama at the end of the day with a message saying "Done for the day" and the ability to import tasks from other apps.
Routine is another hidden gem in this list, a true productivity hub for many people.
It wants to be the "next-generation platform for individuals and teams to get things done faster" and the platform seems to be constantly adapting its features to help users achieve that. Routine is a daily planner app at heart allowing users to add tasks, connect your calendar (Google), track pomodoros, plan and collect up your own notes.
Think of it as a mini-productivity platform for your day. But in a way it sort of is evolving still, what do we mean by that? Routine throws together a lot of features, they want to be for teams and solo users, but there's a lot of features that are done well, but not amazingly. Don't get us wrong, it is a great app that works cross-platform, but as a productivity hub, it'll tick off a decent amount of things you want to use it for - tasks, notes and calendar being for most use cases. Early days in it's journey, it still is a notable free daily planner app that we'd recommend for their combination of features & powers.
Connects with around 8 services for importing in tasks.
Has a way to create meeting notes from your calendar events.
Helps you capture notes alongside your tasks & planning.
We loved the design and featured agenda view.
Comes on all devices and very cross-platform.
Some calendar layouts are locked under premium.
Routine is free to use with no task/note/calendar limits.
Features like calendar views, time tracking & context capture are locked under premium.
Routine starts at $10 per month, per user.
There are plans to add collaborative features.
Linux, Mac, Windows
iOS and Android.
Web
Routine is a great planner app if you want something that handles tasks and is well-designed.
Notably Routine is free to use and has a generous amount of features as part of the free pricing too. Comparing the features you have to Sunsama and others on this list, it isn't as robust, or systems focused, but at the same time, being able to use the agenda view to plan tasks, week calendar layouts & notes, is pretty decent free plan offering for Routine users. This might be one of our contenders for the best free daily planner apps on the market as it has a great free plan that most people will be happy with. For teams, we can't recommend it just yet, as we've not been able to play with this one.
The integrations feature will be loved and thanks to the free plan including unlimited use, it makes life easier. If you love note-taking alongside tasks, this does a good job of light notes and lists for you too. Sometimes it feels like from Routine's website they want to do a million things, let's hope they can keep their focus on the core productivity toolkit.
Timestripe is a strange planner app, but one that is loved by goal focused planners.
We first discovered Timestripe a couple of years ago, and reviewed it, it hasn't changed but has gotten better for team collaboration and more power features for individuals. It is very unique offering users a way to plan their goals for the next 50 years. This zoomed out planning is common in GTD practices and referred to as 50,000ft view, allowing you to zoom out and think blue sky about your goals. Timestripe throws your long-term goals - things like year plans, decade plans - in with your daily goals and sub-tasks. Why is this helpful? It means you can bring your goals into vision with what you do each week.
Timestripe has features like boards for creating dedicate project workspaces for you to plan further, or for your team. It has a feature called "Climbs" designed to help users to habit track easily and baked into your daily goals. You can invite team members and collaborate around boards to help assign workload & plan together. There are so many unique planning features worth noting in this app, but definitely the best for long term thinking.
Great milestone-first thinking for daily tasks & long term goal planning.
Handy habit tracking baked into your goals.
Boards for breakout projects or static goals.
Amazing clock interfaces to help re-frame your time perspective.
Climbs can be overwhelming if you want to stop a habit.
Rated low on Android Google Play Store.
iOS, Android
Mac, Web
There is a free plan with limited features.
Timestripe charges $19 per month, per month.
Or there is a yearly subscription at $9 per month.
You can opt for a 5-year plan which brings it down to $6.50 per month.
People who love to reflect and think longer term about their goals will adore Timestripe.
It's simple once you get started, and takes time to adapt to that way of zooming out, but functions much like a planner app that can help plan those important priorities, calendar events and more. The app does lack AI features, if that was something you wanted, but does come with a great set of clock features for visualizing time differently (if you see it you'll know what we mean).
This app will be one to give you a unique perspective on time and how it impacts your life choices. We wouldn't recommend this for a causal user, for a stay at home Dad they'd find this overwhelming, but someone who uses it for work and likes to think goal-orientated, yes.
Morgen is a daily planner that has a good dose of AI and smart features for your schedule.
It combines task management, integrated tasks (like Akiflow & Sunsama do), calendar and an AI planner mode. This app has a calendar-feel with a way to time-block tasks from the right hand sidebar. Each task can allow you to add context like importance, urgency, and list types, but this powers the AI Planner feature. The AI Planner feature uses your context of each task and helps you set-up a typical routine that works for you - eg. You like to do admin tasks, 5 minute ones on Tuesday mornings - and helps you to plan that in each week, without the need to populate the lists - very practical and well-crafted.
Morgen is cross-platform and has a good set of features that calendar goers will love to schedule their day with tasks.
Scheduling meetings can be done from Morgen.
Great AI planner feature that feels practical to use in a daily routine.
Imports tasks from other apps with lots of apps like Akiflow does.
Might be too pricey for many people to use.
There is no more free plan in Morgen.
Morgen starts from $12 per month, billed annually.
Note the prices do fluctuate between $12 and $15 per month.
For busy professionals planning time.
Those who love time-blocking.
Those who want to try AI features without too much pain.
iOS, Android
Linux, Web, Windows & Mac.
So our time to share opinions on Morgen.
Morgen is a great cross-platform tool. It feels like a calendar app with task management features, but does a good job at planning help. The one thing we loved about Morgen was the AI Planner feature, or "Smart Frames" that does a good job for those who have routine schedules at work to help take the weight of planning away. It also has proactive modes for event clashes and time-blocking, meaning you get constant feedback about how your schedule is being moulded and shaped. It's more manual than say Motion, but it does present some great features for those who want to dip their toe into AI planning, without too much fuss.
Griply is a fairly new planner app and combines tasks, habits & planning your goals.
It is an unconventional daily planner app but one that hits the criteria. You can plan your tasks, schedule them into the calendar view, create habits (unlike the others on this list) and even go into a goals area to help visualize what your goals look like. Whilst Griply is more focused on zooming out, it does a great job of connecting habits, tasks and goals together making them feel like you're working towards a project as part of a goal. This is very much a good daily planner app for iOS and desktop, but also great for holding all of your life plans in one place.
Something we loved during testing was the way that you can view goals, timeline them (premium) and visualize them with an image too. This is a perfect combo between seeing goals and making them a reality.
Well-built iOS app that has high ratings.
Super habit tracking statistics and streak breakdowns.
Great goals timeline feature for visualizing when to start them.
We loved the way you connect up projects/tasks and habits in one to goals.
Lacks Android version.
Might be overkill for goals/habits in one.
iOS
Windows, Mac, Web
Those who want to see work/personal goals in one place.
Those who want to plan but manage habits too.
Budget concious as Griply is good value.
Griply is free to use with limits.
Pricing starts from $29.99 per year.
Or you can buy lifetime (subject to change) at $89.99
Griply is new, it's unique but it comes at the planning system in a great way.
Being able to filter down your goals to tasks, projects and habits and see them all so close is very productive, as you're in mind of what you need to do to achieve your goal. Inside of each goal, you can break a goal down into habits and see a progress chart if your goal is numerical based - like "reach 85KG in weight" - so you can map progress and make things happen if not.
If you want that "all-in-one" view app, this is a good option to consider. One of the recent tools that has impressed us at housing everything in one, but doing it in a good, robust way.
Reclaim AI is a Dropbox owned tool for individuals and teams to schedule using AI, their week.
It helps you to see your week, plan priorities and manage your meetings. Reclaim is a gem if you're looking to connect up Google Calendar and Outlook to get insights on how you spend your time, start time-blocking your priorities and better organizing what's on with others. It has a way
Powerful Google Calendar & Outlook calendar auto-scheduling abilities.
Great habit feature that helps force daily routines into your schedule like yoga, or lunch.
Limited to one calendar service on free plan.
Not as suitable for individuals, better features are for teams.
Owned by Dropbox which might add fear to long-term use if they dissolve it.
Web only.
Reclaim AI is free with limits.
Pricing starts from $8 per user, per month.
There is team pricing and higher priced plans.
Google & Outlook Calendar users
Those who want to try AI scheduling.
Busy individuals who need help scheduling tasks.
Small to medium sized teams for scheduling meetings.
Students (50% off) makes it more approachable.
Reclaim AI is the perfect AI scheduler if you use Google or Outlook calendar.
Dropbox own it, which for some people does fill them with fear - looking back at the past with the likes of Mailbox, but at the same time, it looks like they have embraced it and continue to develop adding Outlook Calendar more recently, which is good news. The best thing is that you can plug in either calendar - limited to one source on free accounts - and just get scheduling priorities. Priority management is very nice inside of Reclaim and it allows you to use auto-scheduling well, adapting to the meetings that land and helping you pick the most important thing to do, without an Eisenhower matrix being there.
Other notable features that we liked was the ability to see your focus analytics - where you spent time being productive. Mostly Reclaim is a good free tool for AI scheduling, but it is more powerful for tool for teams to use to help schedule their team, tools like this and Clockwise are good for AI scheduling for team meetings - things like 1:1 smart meetings, group polls and more that AI is good at helping to do.
What app is best for me and what should I go with:
The best work focused planner app is Akiflow and Motion.
We'd recommend either of these if you want something that'll help you focus, time-block & use AI to manage tasks.
Our top recommendation for iPhone day planning is Structured.
It is great for seeing a visual routine, planning recurring tasks & calendar.
The best planner for Mac has to be Routine.
Routine is a free planner app and works well for Mac with a keyboard shortcut for quick capture.
You can handle tasks, notes and events inside of Routine.
Both Akiflow and Sunsama are good options.
Both have a way to connect up popular apps and import tasks into the system.
This helps you better organize and dashboard your tasks from apps like ClickUp, or Notion.
The best personal daily planner app is Structured.
Structured is great for casual use and personal tasks allowing you to see your visual schedule.
You can add recurring tasks and start doing them.
The best AI focused daily planner app is Morgen or Motion.
Both have great AI planner features for scheduling your task for you.
Motion is better for teams and packs more in but at 2-3x the price of Morgen.
Not as good for daily planning.
Yes, Google Calendar allows you to add tasks and use Google Tasks to plan tasks.
But apps like Morgen, Akiflow & Sunsama are better suited for time-blocking & guided planning.
Here are some other daily planner apps worth sharing too: