“I need a digital planner app that helps me make planning more efficient but still preserve the paper planners effect.“

“I’m new to keeping everything digitally organized. I need something beginner-friendly.“

“As a person already tethered to her laptop, tablet, and smartphone, I want a digital planner tool syncing to all my devices.“

“Is there a free yet richly-featured planner app?“

That’s the sharing of many people I found on the internet during my research for user needs to digital planner apps. There are many more.

Based on them, I made this roundup list of 13 options. I also dive into the specific features, pricing, pros, and cons of each option, as well as who it’s best suited to.

So, if you’re struggling to find the right planner app for your needs and need a little bit of help, look no further.

Which is the best digital planner app for you?

1. Upbase

Best for individuals and small teams.

Upbase offers a free-forever version with unlimited tasks and users.

It’s specifically designed for individuals and small teams (“individuals,” in this case, consists of beginners, professionals, solopreneurs, and freelancers).

You might be wondering, “How can a single app be suitable for both non-experienced and experienced users?”. The key point lies in its user interface.

Upbase has an intuitive and simple interface, which makes setup and operation very logical. As a customer said, “We had our first brand and project lists set up within 15 minutes and moving forward quickly.”

And whether your projects are simple or complicated, Upbase’s 6-level hierarchy can handle them all while, at the same time, keeping its UI organized and easy to navigate.

This also means you won’t have to waste time figuring out how to use the app; instead, you can focus on being productive.

Simple doesn’t mean limited.

Upbase is full-featured to help you stay organized and productive.

This versatile app can meet your needs nicely, whether it’s for time management, goal setting, planning/scheduling, task management, project management, or note-taking.

You doubt that? Let’s see what features Upbase offers:

Upbase’s coolest features

For task management

Upbase offers rich features such as:

• Four color-coded priority levels, attachments, activity logs, and notes that support various types of formats using slash commands.

• Start and due dates, start and due times, and recurring tasks.

• Sub-tasks with various subtask details

• Task tags with a robust filter system.

For task planning and scheduling

You’ve got multiple calendar and planner pages, including:

• Daily planner (1) and daily calendar (2).

• Weekly planner

• Weekly calendar

• Monthly calendar

Oh, do you use Google Calendar, too? No problem, Upbase offers a two-way sync with this calendar app. So, you can sync, view, and edit tasks and events across the two applications.

Upbase allows you to connect with as many Google Calendar accounts as you want, with the synced calendars being private to their owner.

But the best part is: Upbase preserves and displays the original color codes of synced events on its calendar – something other competitors can’t do.

Read more: Best digital planner that syncs with Google Calendar.

For note-taking

You’re offered a quick-access notepad with slash commands.

This feature helps you quickly jot down important information during meetings, and phone calls, or capture thoughts and ideas.

For time management

Aside from the time-block feature, Upbase offers customizable Pomodoro timers with multiple ambiance sounds.

These timers will help you stay focused and productive by breaking your work into manageable intervals.

For collaboration & communication

For small teams that want to keep all the shared tasks and projects organized, Upbase provides comprehensive collaboration features.

They include:

• Chat: this is a real-time chat tool supporting both 1:1 chat and group chat.

• Docs: a document tool where you can create native docs or embed your Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides. You can also organize them into folders and subfolders.

• Files: a file tool where you can upload files or embed your Google Drive folders, and group them into folders if needed.

• Messages: a built-in message board where you can post important announcements, brainstorm ideas with your team, etc.

If there are any of these tools that you don’t use, just hide them to keep the interface clean and clunky-free.

• Watchers
• Task assignee(s)
• Comments & @mention

Besides, you can invite guests into your workspace to collaborate with them. A big plus is Upbase gives you granular-control over which items in your workspace that guests can see.

Also-cool features

• Daily journals: If you want to get insight into how you can improve your productivity, use this tool to reflect on your workday.

• Bookmarks

• Dark mode

Limitations

• No yearly planning pages

Pricing

2. Todoist

Best for freelancers or someone who works on several simple projects at a time.

There are good reasons why Todoist is among the best digital planner apps for this user group.

First of all, it’s the intuitive interface.

Todoist is quick to set up and easy to navigate. When logging in, you’ll be directed to the Today page, which displays all your tasks for the current day.

Read Full Review: Todoist Review.

The three other pages are:

• Upcoming: shows you how tasks are scheduled for a future week
• Projects: where you can view all your projects and tasks in each project
• Inbox: contains tasks that have not been in any project (yet).

Another benefit of Todoist is its drag-and-drop interface, making task creation, planning, and scheduling quicker.

The app also offers various task management features that allow you to prioritize tasks, set due dates, add sub-tasks, tag tasks, and share projects.

Besides, you can visualize tasks by list or board views, integrate with Google Calendar (or other apps), and create custom filters and labels.

Regarding task-planning capabilities, Todoist has a unique feature, called Smart Schedule, that can automatically create tasks based on your input.

For example, if you enter a task that needs to be completed every Monday morning, Todoist will automatically create the task for you every Monday morning.

Todoist is free to start, but if you want to enjoy additional features like reminders, you need to upgrade to the paid version.

Todoist key features

To sum up, here are Todoist coolest features:

• Smart Schedule
• Easy-to-use interface
• Custom filters: The app helps you quickly find specific tasks or projects.
• Reminders & notifications: Remind you of events or due dates, so that no task is forgotten. You don’t have to manually look for them in the app, either.

Limitations

• No monthly calendar views: Todoist only offers a weekly calendar view.
• Reminders are paid features: Reminders, especially location-based reminders, are among Todoist strengths, but they are only in the paid plans.
• Weak collaboration capabilities: There’s no real-time chat or collaborative files/documents. And you can assign a task to just one collaborator.

Pricing

3. Any.Do

Best for personal use.

Any.do’s free version is perfect for personal planning.

It has an incredibly user-friendly interface, with little to no learning curve, and offers a sufficient feature set to work well as a standalone daily planner or weekly planner app.

You might be also interested in:

• Best daily planner app | Our 13 Picks

• Which is the best daily checklist app for your needs

• “My Day” – a page for you to create daily tasks.
• “Next 7 Days” – to make to-do lists for the upcoming seven days.
• “All my tasks” – where you get an overview of all your tasks.
• “My lists” – which allows you to organize to-dos into specific lists.
• Color tags – to visualize tasks and quickly filter them when in need. Free users are given only one tag – which is “#Priority,” while paid users have more tags plus labels.

Any.do’s to-do list feature set is not as rich as Todoist. You can’t customize tags. Subtasks are just basic checklists with no due dates, priorities, or labels. And you can only sort tasks by list or time.

In turn, Any.do features time blocks on the My Day page (which Todoist doesn’t have) and offers reminders for free.

Furthermore, Any.do’s mobile version offers a Calendar view with different timeframe options: Day, 3 Days, Week, and Month, switched by a simple button.

Here, you can set calendar notifications, modify calendar colors, or connect from your Google Calendar. On the weekly pages and monthly pages, you can click on a specific date to access that day’s to-dos or add new events.

Read more: Which Is The Best Weekly Planner App For You? Our 11 Picks.

That’s all you can do as a free user.

To utilize additional features or collaborate with others, you can upgrade to one of Any.do’s paid versions.

Any.do key features

• A drag-and-drop interface
• Task reminders
• Time blocks
• “My day”, “Next 7 days”, and “All my tasks” pages
• A color-coded calendar view, with various time frame options.

Limitations

• Subtasks are just basic checklists with no fields
• Very few sort/filter options
• The free version offers only one color tag
• Recurring tasks are paid features, while many competitors offer them for free.

Pricing

4. Trello

A great digital planner app for freelancers and micro teams.

Trello is a great step up from paper or digital planners.

This productivity tool allows you to create multiple workspaces and organize projects as Kanban boards in each. (Trello workspaces are by default private, but you can set them public or add collaborators.)

Projects in each workspace can be broken down into lists and cards. As a nice bonus, the drag-and-drop feature makes it fast and easy to move cards and prioritize tasks.

Read Full Review: Trello Review.

You can customize each card with due dates, assignees, and labels for quick filtering when in need, as well as set reminders, add notes, attach files, and create a checklist.

But making Trello stand out are:

1) Automation: including the ability to create rules that trigger specific actions when certain events occur. This streamlines workflow for busy teams and makes it easier to keep track of progress.

2) Power-Ups: a way to make the most of your boards, by connecting to an external productivity tool or a third-party service, and giving you access to an array of features. For example, setting up automated workflows, creating custom fields, time tracking, and much more.

An also-notable feature is the calendar view, which allows you to see upcoming deadlines and visualize your progress.

Overall, Trello is a great option for task planning and project management. It provides a simple way to help you stay organized and easily track progress, as well as assign tasks and collaborate with others.

Trello key features

• Kanban Boards
• Unlimited free Power-Ups
• No-code automation (aka Butler)
• Start & due dates; due times
• Various collaboration features: watchers, multiple assignees, comments, and tagging.

Limitations

• No native real-time chat: Instead, you have to integrate with a third-party chat tool.
• Due dates and assignees for subtasks are paid features, while many other project management apps offer them for free.
• Trello’s structure is not deep enough to handle complex projects and tasks.

Pricing

5. Notion

A free digital planner app with robust note-taking functionality.

But.

Because of its high customization, Notion has a steep learning curve, and the first-time setup might be quite time-consuming. It might also take you some time to get a grip on the app.

That’s probably the biggest disadvantage of Notion, especially for beginners who never use a digital planner app before. However, when it comes to digital planning functionality, Notion is worth a try.

Fact: Notion started as a note-taking tool, but then it evolved into a work management platform. Various organizational tools – such as task management, content collaboration, custom databases, etc. have been added to Notion.

Now, it’s still one of the most powerful note-taking apps on the market while, at the same time, being a potent all-in-one space where you think, write, and plan.

Talking about planning functionality, the app has a range of features.

A great example is its calendar view, which allows you to see upcoming events and tasks easily, as well as adjust it as needed.

You can also set reminders and alerts so that you don’t miss important deadlines.

Too lazy to set up everything from scratch? Notion offers plenty of templates for digital planning, from daily planners to project planners to student planner templates. So rest assured, you’ll find the perfect planner here.

Notion also offers a centralized space where you can store all your notes, files, and documents for quick access and share them if needed.

Recently, the app launched a hot feature, called Notion AI.

This is an artificial intelligence assistant designed to help you write better and faster, save time by automating tedious tasks, effectively analyze relevant data, etc.

Notion key features

• Shareable calendar view with lots of customization.
• Database Blocks: Notion’s database blocks let you create custom databases with columns and fields that you can customize and organize. You can also use these blocks to quickly search through data and find the information you need.
• Collaboration Features: Notion offers a number of collaboration features such as commenting, sharing, and task assigning.
• Notion AI – Notion is designed for taking notes, so users can quickly capture ideas and share them with their team.
• Rich text editors, with powerful formatting options.
• A template gallery that contains hundreds for specific purposes.

Limitations

• Steep learning curve.
• It’s time-consuming for the initial setup.
• The free plan does not allow for unlimited file uploads, plus there’s a 5GB max per file limit.

Pricing

6. Asana

Best for distributed teams < 15 members that need a better way to organize, plan, and collaborate remotely.

Asana is among the most powerful digital planner apps out there.

It offers a comprehensive suite of tools to help manage and organize the team’s work, track progress, and view results in real-time.

With Asana, you’ve got a variety of views to plan and monitor your team’s work, such as Kanban boards, Gantt charts, and calendar views.

Read Full Review: Asana Review.

You can customize these views to suit the needs of your team’s workflow, or you can use the pre-made templates to get started quickly.

Asana also makes it easy to collaborate between departments.

Its goal-setting features enable organizations to set company-wide goals that link up with each individual task. This ensures that everyone, despite working remotely, can work towards shared goals.

Asana additionally offers project timelines, task commenting, private meeting notes, and task dependencies for smoother collaboration.

There’s more.

You’re provided with detailed reporting and analytics to monitor the progress, stay up-to-date on any potential areas of risk, and keep your team meeting shared goals on time.

Overall, Asana is an excellent tool for helping you create plans, manage projects and to-do lists, schedule events, and keep your team aligned.

Asana key features

• Free unlimited projects, tasks, messages, file storage (100MB per file), and activity logs.
• Multiple view options: calendars, boards, lists, timelines, etc.
• Robust mobile apps for both Android devices and iOS devices.
• Built-in reports and analytics (paid features)
• 100+ integrations: i.e. Google Calendar, OneDrive, Dropbox, Box, Microsoft Teams, etc.

Limitations

• It can take a while to learn how to navigate Asana and get the most out of it.
• The free plan allows for 15 collaborators, which means Asana will be an expensive option if your team has more than 15 members.
• You can assign only one person to each task, which can limit collaboration and make sharing difficult.
• No native real-time chat tool

Pricing

7. Google Calendar

One of the most powerful and versatile digital planner apps available.

Google Calendar makes it easy to track and manage multiple tasks, appointments, and events simultaneously.

Aside from its easy-to-use interface, this app allows you to prioritize items, create recurring events, and plan tasks by day, week, and month.

You also can customize and optimize the platform to suit your needs. Such as adding different color-coded labels to tasks and setting location-based reminders.

Additionally, Google Calendar allows you to collaborate with coworkers, friends, and family easily.

You can invite them to events, view their availability, and sync your calendars to avoid scheduling conflicts. You can also use Google Calendar to keep up with company holidays, school breaks, or other important dates.

With its various features and customization options, it can help you get the most out of each day and stay on top of all your tasks and commitments.

Google Calendar’s key features

• Ability to set up multiple calendars by day, week, or month.
• Customizable event reminders and notifications.
• Recurring events.
• Color-coded priorities
• Filters based on criteria like location, dates, keywords, etc.
• Multiple time zones: perfect for coordinating with people in different locations.
• Goals: that helps you stay on track with tasks that need to be done.

Limitations

• It can be difficult to set up complex tasks.
• There are no advanced features like project management or task prioritization.
• Limited customization of events and calendar views.

Pricing

Google Calendar is free with a Google account, and Business Starter for Google Workspace, which includes all Google apps, starts at $6/user/month. This pricing plan could change depending on the type of package you choose.

8. Planner Pro

Best for organizing personal life.

Planner Pro is a free digital planner app designed with comprehensive features to help you stay organized and keep all of your important information in one place.

The app allows users to list their daily tasks, schedule events, manage projects, and take notes related to them.

Besides, it gives you both a productivity planner and a calendar if you want to take your productivity to the next level.

With Planner Pro, you can record your goals, create to-do lists, keep a bullet journal, make mind maps, and create notes based on your requirements and preferences.

You can additionally set task priorities and reminders to stay on track with your goals.

If you’re working on a project with others or if you need to delegate tasks to family members, Planner Pro allows you to share files, assign tasks, chat about what you’re working on, and get updates on progress.

Not just that, this digital planner app provides settings that cater to the needs of various people, such as students, business people, or stay-at-home parents. This means that you can customize the app to work best for you.

Planner Pro is available for both iOS and Android platforms and works well across all devices. It’s worth noting that the app offers a Pencil Planner Pro Access subscription, which unlocks all of the features of the app.

Planner Pro’s key features

• An integrated calendar feature: that gives you a few options to view your tasks and events by day, week, or month.
• Task manager: including to-do list feature, priority, due date, subtask, note, and attachment.
• Project organizer: including multiple assignees, milestones, reminders, and goal-setting.
• Note-taker: supports multiple types of notes, such as text, voice, or image notes.
• Customization: such as the theme, font size, and background image.
• Goal tracker
• Cloud sync

Limitations

• No desktop version
• The free version of Planner Pro comes with ads, which could be intrusive and distracting for some users.
• High learning curve: The app may take some time for users to get used to all of its features and settings.

Pricing

Planner Pro offers a free version of the app with limited functionality.

The app also offers a Pencil Planner Pro Access subscription, which unlocks all of the features of the app. The subscription pricing for Pencil Planner Pro Access is as follows:

• Monthly subscription: $5.99 per month
• Yearly subscription: $39.99 per year

9. OnPlannners

A website for printable and digital planner templates.

If you want to combine the advantages of tactile paper planners with the convenience and flexibility of digital planning, don’t skip on OnPlanners.

This is a popular website that offers printable and digital planner templates for personal and non-commercial use.

Here, you’ll find a range of planner templates, including meal planners, paper planner printables, daily planner templates, monthly calendars, budget trackers, to-do lists, etc.

All these items are compatible with iPad, Notability, Goodnotes app, Noteshelf, and Xodo.

In addition to digital planners, OnPlanners also offers printable greeting cards, invitations, and digital stickers.

You can pay per item or pay once and get unlimited downloads.

Overall, OnPlanners is dedicated to making it easier for people to stay organized and prioritize their goals and to-dos.

This is a great resource for anyone looking to manage their time better and achieve their objectives, whether for personal or professional purposes.

OnPlanners key features

Printable paper planner templates: that can be downloaded and printed out for personal and non-commercial use.

Customization: including a variety of layout options, designs, and color schemes, that allows users to customize their planner templates to suit their specific needs.

Compatibility with iPad and other note-taking apps.

Limitations

• Dated templates limitation
• Not suitable for large-scale project management
• Businesses and organizations cannot use OnPlanners’ templates for their projects or activities.

Pricing

10. GoodNotes

Best digital planner app with robust note-taking.

GoodNotes was originally designed for only Apple devices (including iOS, iPadOS, and macOS platforms), but has been developed for Windows and Android users.

It also supports syncing data across multiple devices.

GoodNotes is compatible with the Apple Pencil (2nd generation) and 3rd party stylus for the iPad.

Plus, it supports pressure sensitivity, making it an excellent choice if you want to use the Apple Pencil to create your own digital planners.

Not just that, GoodNotes offers the ability to create daily, weekly, and monthly plans with just a few taps. After adding to-do lists, you also can set reminders, add notes, and search for them.

Its handwriting recognition is highly praised, as this feature allows you to search for any term throughout both typed and handwritten notes.

Besides, you can easily sync up your GoodNotes calendar with your preferred app to stay on top of everything.

GoodNotes key features

• Customizable themes and templates to customize your digital planners.
• Rich editing tools: allow you to add images, text, and audio recordings to your notes.
• Built-in search: helps you quickly find information or tasks
• Cloud-syncing capabilities: you can sync notes across your devices
• Various annotation tools, including a pen, highlighter, eraser, and ruler
• Notebooks: allow you to work in both portrait and landscape orientation.
• Bookmarks
• Handwriting recognition
• Task reminders

Limitations

• Unable to link notes between pages.
• You need to tap through multiple pages to navigate to the desired one.
• Not currently support syncing with other third-party cloud storage services.

Pricing

GoodNotes is free to download and use up to 3 notebooks; however, a one-time purchase of $8.99 USD will unlock unlimited notebooks and access to advanced features.

11. Noteshelf

If you don’t like GoodNotes, then Noteshelf might be a good alternative.

Both are popular digital note-taking and planner apps but with different approaches.

GoodNotes treats every imported document as a standalone file, while Noteshelf treats every note (including imported images, scanned documents, and other file types) as a notebook.

While both apps can recognize handwriting, Noteshelf is more advanced and accurate. It can recognize different languages and scripts, whereas GoodNotes only recognizes English.

Or when it comes to user interface design, Noteshelf has a more minimalistic design, with fewer distractions on the screen, whereas GoodNotes has a more traditional notebook-like interface.

Plus, Noteshelf has a wider variety of pre-designed templates available for daily, weekly, and monthly planners that you can customize as per your needs.

Overall, Noteshelf is an efficient app that simplifies note-taking and planning for individuals, students, working professionals, and bullet journalists.

It is currently available for Windows, Android, macOS, iPadOS, and iOS devices.

Noteshelf key features

• Audio Recording
• Customizable Templates
• Ability to recognize handwriting with a high accuracy level
• Movable toolbars: that allow users to easily access their most-used tools and features, improving productivity and efficiency.
• Cross-platform compatibility: Noteshelf is available on multiple platforms, including iOS, iPadOS, macOS, Android, and Windows, making it accessible to a wider range of users.
• Wide range of export options: Noteshelf allows users to export their notes in several formats, including PDF, PNG, JPEG, and MP4.

Limitations

• No free-forever plan or free trial
• Noteshelf does not offer many collaboration features

Pricing

• iOS & iPadOS Apps: $9.99 USD
• macOS: $7.99 USD
• Android: $4.99 USD
• Windows: $4.99 USD

12. Notability

Best for Apple users.

Notability is a versatile digital planner app that can help you manage all aspects of your life.

The app has more built-in templates than other digital planners out there. Whatever you need, a mood tracker, habit tracker, daily planner, or business planner, Notability can offer the perfect template to save you time and energy.

Plus, with its weekly pages, you can see everything you need for the week in one spot.

Like GoodNotes, Notability has robust note-taking capabilities.

It offers a wide variety of templates for your notes that are built into the app, with the ability to import even more from the Notability Gallery.

You can also import PDFs directly into Notability by using the Share icon on the top right of your iPad and then choosing Share to Notability or Save to Files.

Notability offers a free plan, which is good for those just starting out. It’s available for iPhone, Mac, and iPad.

Notability key features

• Note Taker: this allows you to quickly and easily create note cards that you can then use to create tasks and reminders. You can also add images, text, and hyperlinks to your notes.
• Drawing tool: ideal for creating detailed diagrams, mind maps, sketches, and more. You can draw directly on the iPad and export your drawings as PDFs.
• Pre-made templates
• Search
• Audio recording: to take notes easily during lectures, meetings, and other events.
• iCloud syncing: all of your notes are stored securely in iCloud and automatically synced across all your devices.
• Organization tools: you can easily create folders, tag items, and add bookmarks to find your notes quickly.

Limitations

• It can be time-consuming to customize the templates and note view on a per-note basis.
• Notability lacks nested folders, making it difficult to organize large amounts of notes.
• The free feature set is quite limited.

Pricing

Notability is a free digital planner app with some annual subscription options, priced from $14.99 to $15.99 per year. There’s also a monthly subscription option, priced $2.99 per month.

Educational institutions can access the app for free through Apple School Manager.

13. Mydailyplanners

Offering the best digital planners created by professionals.

Mydailyplanners is another popular website where you can find and purchase a variety of digital stickers, notebooks, and digital organizers.

They all are created by graphic design professionals, bringing a great visual appeal, high attention to detail, and high-quality designs.

But what makes Mydailyplanners stand out is their digital planners have reminder settings that can be connected directly to your calendar.

This means that you can easily sync your to-dos, events, and appointments with your Google or Apple calendar without having to enter them twice manually.

Each template consists of interlinked weekly pages, monthly pages, and yearly pages for quick access to any desired section with just one click. From the weekly and monthly planning pages, you can click to access a specific date.

You can set goals, add a to-do list, create notes and annotations, and track progress.

Besides, Mydailyplanners allows users to import images to their planner pages, add digital stickers, and search or filter tools.

Mydailyplanners Key Features

• Reminder settings: Mydailyplanners offers digital planner templates with reminder settings that can be connected to Google or Apple Calendar
• Fully customizable templates: You can add your own text, images, stickers, and other elements to make the planner fit your unique needs and preferences.
• Professional design: Mydailyplanners works with professional graphic designers to create visually appealing and high-quality planner templates.

Limitations

• Some limitations to the extent of customization: For instance, users may not be able to add additional pages or sections to the planners.
• Limited compatibility: Mydailyplanners is designed specifically for use with certain digital planning apps, such as GoodNotes, Penly Android, and Notability. So, users who prefer a different app may not be able to use Mydailyplanners.

Pricing

The pricing of Mydailyplanners varies depending on the type of planner template and the level of customization required.

Conclusion

It’s time to make a choice!

Remember, the best digital planner app is one that works for you, not against you.

With Upbase, you can customize the app to your unique needs, whether it’s for planning, scheduling, work management, time management, or note-taking.

Whether you use it for personal purposes or with your team, or both, Upbase is an excellent performer in helping you stay organized, productive, and on top of everything.

So why not put Upbase to the test today? It’s free!