Time blocking is a clever calendar management system that helps users make the most of the time for personal and work life. With time blocking you can organise time effectively and create a productive system for yourself. Productivity gurus like Ali Abdaal and many more like to use these techniques to block these periods of time out.
Here are the winners:
Best Overall - Akiflow
Best Runner Up - Morgen
Best for AI Planning - Motion
Best for Value - Todoist
Best for ADHD - Sunsama
Best for Mindfulness - Sunsama
Best for Teams - Motion
Best for Students - Todoist
These are our recommendations from years of toiling with these types of apps.
Akiflow is a one of the best time blocking apps on the market.
It is available on a wide range of devices, great for busy professionals and has so many rewarding features for time blockers.
These are the reasons why we name it one of the best overall time blocking apps on the market.
Time Slots - This works by allowing you to create a slot of time to add any task of any type into it. Think of this as the ultimate planning tool for time blockers who want the control of planning, but also a way to block time and drag a bunch of similar tasks in. Think of creating a time slot for "administration" and just bringing all tasks into there related to that said type of task.
Task Consolidation - Akiflow has a special feature called Task Consolidation. It's a way to import tasks, in real-time, from other apps you might use for work, eg. ClickUp, Asana, or an email app like Gmail, this allows you a dashboard for time blocking tasks from other apps. Incredibly effective for those who want to house all their to-do's in one app.
Good for manual controlling of your time blocked sessions.
Easy to drag tasks in and organize them in - whether or not they are imported or added in Akiflow.
Good integrations with Google and Outlook calendar and other services too.
Handy "Rituals" feature for reflecting on your daily tasks.
Can be expensive for many people.
Projects are brilliant for advanced planning.
Busy professionals who need help consolidating their time blocking in one app.
Those with ADHD who want to avoid context switching between apps.
No free plan with Akiflow
$19 per month, annual pricing.
$34 per month, billed monthly
Morgen is a wonderful time blocking tool that wins our second spot.
A calendar app at heart, Morgen has some powerful AI features for time blockers and some great Akiflow-like features too.
Morgen appeals to many time blocking lovers for their AI planner abilities. And here's why it's great:
AI Planner - A unique feature that helps you select periods of time that you typically do work. For example: 9am - light admin tasks, it will then allocate tasks that meet that criteria inside your task list. Perfect for automating what's in your task list, and prepares them without stress. This is like a real-time updated list of tasks that you need to do and how you typically like working.
Consolidation - Like Akiflow, you can bring in tasks from other apps. The choices of apps are a little less than Akiflow, but nonetheless, a great way to time block and get tasks into the system. This works well and can be organized in the task administration area to help add more context.
AI Planner feature rocks if you want a 50:50 balance between AI and your own control.
Good for calendar management and has lots of great calendar settings like sets.
Helps you schedule meetings with external parties.
People don't always get on well with the design.
Doesn't have time slot like feature that they have in Akiflow.
Great for those who want to test AI planner to schedule their tasks.
Suitable for those who want a reliable and easy to use calendar app with good time blocking features.
Morgen is not free to use.
Morgen is $15 per month.
Motion is more of a calendar scheduling and AI tool.
However, it still uses time blocking and may be a good choice for those who enjoy the AI-assisted way of living. Motion hasn't got a ton of features; it's mostly based on organizing your time and calendar. Motion will help you build your schedule based on your activity and preferences and ensure you fit in all you need to do without causing burnout or overworking. You can also automatically reschedule tasks and track priorities here. Motion uses time blocking to manage the tasks you need to get done. You can manually input tasks this way and Motion can also automatically shuffle things around if you need.
Sunsama is built to help you create a more meaningful and productive schedule.
It helps users be more intentional about their daily planning, working within their means and avoiding overdoing it. You can also pull tasks from other applications to consolidate them all in one place, much like with Akiflow. Again, this allows you to manage everything you need in one place and one unified calendar.
Routine is for centralizing tasks in one place to help you stay on top of things you need to get done and create a unified space of calendars and tasks all in one.
Routine also offers an easy-to-use interface and plenty of task management options. Connect all your calendars and tasks apps into one space to click and drag tasks, quickly add new tasks, set times, and due dates, add tags, and more. You can even add notes to tasks to further the experience.