Things 3 vs Todoist in 2026: an honest comparison

Things 3 and Todoist are usually the two finalists when someone is shopping for a serious todo app. They are also fundamentally different products, even though they look similar at a glance. Picking between them is mostly a question of which trade-offs you prefer.

This post walks through where each one wins, where each one loses, and which kind of user is the right customer for each. No “Todoist is the winner” verdict at the end, because there is no winner. There is only the one that fits how you work.

Pricing

The first and biggest difference. Things 3 is sold as one-time purchases on each Apple platform: $49.99 on Mac, $9.99 on iPhone, $19.99 on iPad. Buy once, own forever. Apple Watch is included with the iPhone version. There is no free tier.

Todoist is a subscription. The free tier limits you to five active projects and basic features. Pro is $5 a month or $48 a year. Business is $8 a month per user. There is no perpetual license.

Over five years, Things 3 on all three Apple devices costs $79.97. Todoist Pro for five years costs $240. That is a real $160 gap before you factor in any price increases on the Todoist side.

The trade-off: subscriptions fund ongoing development, including features and infrastructure that one-time pricing cannot easily support. Todoist’s web app, mobile parity, sharing, and cloud sync all exist because the subscription pays for them. Things 3 has no shared lists and no Android app, in part because the math of one-time pricing does not support those features.

If price-over-time is the only thing you care about, Things 3 wins by a wide margin. If price-over-time is the only thing you care about, you should also consider whether you are actually shopping for a serious app.

Platforms

Things 3 is Apple-only: Mac, iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch. No Windows, no Android, no Linux, no web.

Todoist is everywhere: Mac, Windows, Linux, iPhone, iPad, Android, Apple Watch, Wear OS, browser extensions, and a web app. The web app is arguably the most polished version of the product.

If you ever need to add a task from a Windows work laptop, an Android tablet, a Chromebook, or a friend’s borrowed device, Todoist is the only option in this comparison.

If you only ever touch a Mac and an iPhone, Things 3’s narrow surface area is actually an asset. The app does not have to make compromises to feel native on a platform it does not really care about.

Design

This is where Things 3 has its strongest argument. Cultured Code, the developer, has built one of the most carefully designed task apps in the history of the category. The typography, the animations, the empty states, the way completed tasks slide off the screen, all of it is considered. The Mac app feels like a Mac app. The iPhone app feels like an iPhone app.

Todoist is fine. It is not ugly. But it has the same visual design on every platform, which means it does not feel especially native on any of them. The Mac app is essentially the web app in a window. This is a reasonable choice for a cross-platform product, but it is not a beautiful one.

If you are the kind of person who cares about software craftsmanship, Things 3 will reward you every time you open it. If Todoist’s UI bothers you the first week, the bother will compound over years of use.

Features

Both apps cover the basics. Tasks, projects, due dates, repeat rules, tags, search, and a global quick-add hotkey are present in both.

Where they diverge:

Things 3 has Areas (groupings above projects), an excellent Today view, daily and evening sections, a Magic Plus button for quick task creation anywhere, and the best-in-class organizational hierarchy (Inbox, Today, Upcoming, Anytime, Someday, Logbook).

Todoist has filters and labels as first-class objects, priority levels, comments on tasks, shared projects, sub-tasks at any depth, karma points and productivity stats, an inbox that integrates with email forwarding, native templates, and dozens of third-party integrations.

If your taxonomy lives in your head and you just want a clean place to put it, Things 3 wins. If your taxonomy is complex and you want the app to enforce it with filters, labels, and rules, Todoist wins.

Sharing and collaboration

This is binary. Todoist supports sharing projects with other people. They can see your tasks, add tasks, and check things off. It is built for this.

Things 3 does not have any sharing or collaboration features. None. It is a single-user app by design.

If anyone other than you needs to see a list, you cannot use Things 3 for that list. Period.

Natural-language dates

Both apps support typing dates inline, like “tomorrow at 9am” or “next Friday.” Both work well in English. Both stumble occasionally on edge cases.

Todoist’s parser is slightly more flexible, especially for recurring rules. “Every other Tuesday” works in both. “Every weekday at 3pm” works in both. “First Monday of the month” works in Todoist; it requires more clicking in Things.

Practical difference: minimal. Both will handle anything most people actually type. If you want a deeper look at how natural-language parsing works in todo apps, the post on date parsing covers what to look for.

Sync and reliability

Things 3 syncs through Cultured Code’s own Things Cloud (free, included with purchase) or, optionally, iCloud and local Wi-Fi. Things Cloud is fast and has been reliable for years.

Todoist syncs through Doist’s own servers. Also fast, also reliable. Better at handling slow networks or offline edits.

Both are essentially solved problems. Neither breaks.

Which one is right for you

A few specific verdicts based on common user patterns.

You only use Apple devices and want one polished app you keep for a decade. Buy Things 3. The price is high once and zero forever. Five years from now you will still like it.

You work across operating systems, or you need to share tasks with anyone. Buy Todoist. There is no realistic alternative if cross-platform is a hard requirement.

You like the idea of Things 3 but the $50 Mac price is too much. Honestly, your alternatives in the “beautiful Mac todo app” category are limited. Apple Reminders is free. TickTick is cheaper but less polished. Neither is a true Things 3 replacement.

You like the idea of Todoist but the subscription bothers you. TickTick is the cheaper option with most of the same shape. Or look at TodoBar (more below) if your actual need is just capture and dates, not the full project taxonomy.

A word on smaller alternatives

Both Things 3 and Todoist assume you want a complete personal task system: an Inbox, a Today view, Areas, projects, tags, the works. Some people want that. Some people want a place to write down “call the dentist” and have it remind them at 4pm without first sitting through a forty-minute setup video.

If your real need is capture, not a workspace, both Things and Todoist are overkill. A menu bar app like TodoBar lives in the menu bar, has the global hotkey and the natural-language dates, and asks for a one-time payment. The trade-off is no projects, no areas, no sharing, no iPhone app. It does exactly the part of the workflow you probably actually use, and skips the rest. Free for up to 10 active tasks, so easy to try.

The most common mistake is to pick the most powerful tool in the hope you will grow into the features. Most people do not. Picking the smallest tool that fits your day, and switching up only when you actually hit its limits, is usually the better strategy.