Todoist alternatives for Mac and iPhone, with and without a subscription

By Basil, maker of Alcove · Updated 8 October 2026 · 5 min read

Todoist is fast, runs everywhere and is excellent for teams, so it's worth knowing exactly why you're leaving before you pick a replacement. The most common reasons are the subscription, the five-project limit on the free plan, wanting something that feels at home on a Mac, and wanting notes or boards alongside tasks.

I make Alcove, which is one of the options here, so weigh that. Prices were checked on each app's own pages in October 2026.

Todoist alternatives at a glance

If the subscription is the problem

Todoist Pro is $5 a month billed yearly, $60 a year, every year. Three apps here let you pay once instead.

• Alcove: $29.99 once covers Mac, iPhone and iPad, with Family Sharing. After the 14-day trial, if you don't buy, your tasks stay readable and exportable.
• Things 3: bought once per device, $79.97 for all three.
• OmniFocus 4: a universal perpetual licence, $74.99 Standard or $149.99 Pro.

More on this in to-do apps without a subscription.

If you need to stay cross-platform

If you have a Windows PC or an Android phone, the honest answer is that the Apple-only apps won't work for you. TickTick is the closest match to Todoist: natural-language dates, lists, tags, filters and sharing, plus a calendar, habits and a Pomodoro timer, with Premium at $49.99 a year. Microsoft To Do is free everywhere, with My Day, steps and Outlook tasks.

If you want it to feel like a Mac app

Todoist's Mac app is built to match every other platform. Alcove lives in the Mac menu bar: today's tasks, every list, the month, your notes and boards are one click away from any app, and lists can float above your work. Press ⌥ Space anywhere and type a sentence like "Call the dentist Tuesday 3pm 15m #health". See adding tasks from any app.

Things 3 is the other very Mac-like choice, with Quick Entry from any app.

If you want notes and boards beside your tasks

Todoist keeps notes as task descriptions and comments. Alcove has a notebook beside your tasks, with checklists, code and tables that total themselves, and any checklist line can become a task. Its boards keep each task in its list too: a card dropped in Done is finished everywhere. See notes that do the maths and a personal kanban board.

What you lose by leaving Todoist

• Teams. Shared projects, assigned tasks and comments. Alcove and Things 3 are built for one person.
• Integrations. Todoist connects to far more services than any app here.
• Every platform. Todoist runs on almost anything, including the web.

If those matter, TickTick or Microsoft To Do is the safer move. If they don't, a one-purchase Apple app may suit you better.

Moving your tasks across

Todoist can export a project as a CSV file. Two ways to bring it into Alcove:

1. With an AI assistant. Switch on Alcove's MCP server, approve your assistant, and ask it to read the CSV and create the tasks, with their dates and lists. See connecting an AI assistant.
2. By hand. Paste the tasks into an Alcove note as a checklist (a checklist copied from another app arrives as one), then turn each line you want to keep into a task.

Sources

Checked in October 2026:

• Todoist pricing and Todoist Pro pricing update
• TickTick Premium
• Things 3 for Mac on the App Store
• OmniFocus 4 pricing
• Microsoft To Do on the Mac App Store
• 2Do licensing explained

Questions people ask