"Productivity app" is the most fertile category in the App Store and the most disappointing. Most installs gather dust within two weeks.
Five categories
- Capture
- Plan
- Focus
- Learn
- Habit
You probably need one or two, not all five.
Capture
Apple Notes
Free, fast, encrypted, syncs perfectly. For 80% of people, this is enough.
Obsidian
Free for personal use. Right choice if you have 200+ notes you want linked.
Notion
Powerful, sluggish, expensive at scale. Best for teams. If you customize Notion more than you use it, you've fallen in.
Plan
Todoist
Cleanest todo on the market. Natural-language input that just works.
Things 3
iOS/Mac only. Most beautiful interface. One-time purchase.
TickTick
"Todoist with extras" (Pomodoro, habit tracker, calendar).
Sunsama
$20/month. Forced daily planning. For people who chronically over-commit.
Focus
Hopopop
Our app. Cognitive friction at unlock: a math problem or trivia question before each blocked app opens. Best for people who've tried 2+ blockers and given up.
Freedom
Cross-device blocker. Best for context-switchers (phone + laptop).
Forest
Plant a tree, kill it if you check your phone. Cute, gamified, surprisingly effective short-term.
Cold Turkey Blocker
Desktop-first, "nuclear" blocking. For serious deep-work needs.
Learn
Anki
Free or $25 one-time iOS. King of spaced repetition. Interface from 2003, that's actually fine.
Readwise / Reader
$10/month. Captures highlights, surfaces them via spaced repetition. Compound interest on reading.
Habit
Streaks
$5 one-time. iOS only. Simple, beautiful, no subscription.
Habitify
Cross-platform Streaks alternative with more analytics.
Way of Life
Red/green/gray squares. Visual simplicity is its strength.
The honest 30-day stack
- Capture: Apple Notes (free)
- Plan: Todoist or Things
- Focus: Hopopop or Freedom
- Learn: Anki, only if you have something to memorize
- Habit: Streaks or paper
$0 to $15/month. The trap: tool optimization. Pick one, use it 30 days. Boring beats clever.
Try Hopopop on your phone.
The blocker that works your brain. Available on iOS and Android.