32 of the Best Productivity Tools You’ll Ever Need

Product Hunt
Product Hunt
Published in
7 min readMar 3, 2016

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There are countless productivity tools out there — how does one choose? We’ve scoured Product Hunt for some of the best time management, calendar, habit change, and goal tracking tools and apps. Check out the full list below — we hope they help you accomplish your big goals in 2016 and beyond.

Habit & Goal Trackers

Daydeed: Track and build habits that stick. This tool is built to nudge you into positive habit building by using reward/punishment UX design.

Momentum: Use Jerry Seinfeld’s productivity hack (“Don’t Break the Chain”) to change your habits for the better.

Productivity: A robust personal time tracker for habits and goals. Measure your daily and lifetime productivity based on how much of what you say you’re going to do actually gets done.

Proud: This app helps you break down tasks down to achieve big goals, use timers based on the popular Pomodoro technique, and decompress in the more stressful moments of your life.

Moodnotes: Capture your mood and improve your thinking habits.

Habit List: Track multiple habit changes at once and discover your habit-changing trends.

Productive for iOS: Organize your life and build great habits with this robust tracking tool. The UX is stunning, as well (especially if you geek out about fancy icons and color palettes).

To-Do & Project Management Apps

Todoist: If you’re looking for a straightforward “to-do” app that also allows you to collaborate with others, this one is worth checking out. Very minimalist aesthetic, but it gets the job done and helps you keep your tasks under control.

Asana: This is one of those tools you can use in a host of different ways. You can track conversations, tasks, deadlines, and productivity for just about everything — from sales leads to web development bugs. Asana makes collaborative work much easier.

Pomotodo: This full workflow management tool allows you to collect ideas, schedule work, finish tasks, and review task history.

FocusList: A tool to plan your day, stay focused, and measure your productivity.

Trello: This tool doubles as a project manager for teams and a to-do list for individuals. All you have to do is drag and drop “cards” into different lists to organize your projects and track progress.

Whiteboard: Manage your daily tasks, whether collaborating with clients and colleagues on projects at work or managing your personal to-dos.

Taco: View all of your tasks on a single screen with this unified task list that allows you to pull in your “to-dos” from over 40 different applications, such as: Evernote, Asana, Todoist, Trello, and more.

Information Collectors

Paper 3.0: Okay, we’re obsessed. Paper lets you draw on photos, create diagrams, charts, and drawings, and create checklists and other notes with ease. It’s as close as we’ve seen to technology mirroring “pen and paper” behavior.

Plan: This tool lets you sync your tasks, notes, and meetings all in one place — and gives you insight into exactly how you’re spending time so you can boost your productivity as you go. A beautiful product that helps you manage your day more effectively.

Evernote: An oldie, but a goodie. If you’re looking for a single place to store all of your notes, presentations, and favorite articles, Evernote is best-in-class.

Time Trackers

RescueTime: Analytics on your daily habits and productivity.

Timely: Makes scheduling and time tracking as simple as it should be. Especially useful for freelancers.

Instant 3.0: Google Analytics for your life. Track time spent traveling, on your phone, sleeping, working out, and more.

Focuster: Prioritize your day by syncing your to-do list with how much free time you actually have.

Trackr: Keep track of the time you spend on websites.

Time Savers

Sunrise Meet: The fastest way to schedule a one-on-one meeting.

Zapier: This tool is so robust, allowing you to connect over 500 of your favorite apps to one another. Examples: create Trello cards from Google spreadsheet rows; post upcoming Google Calendar events to a Slack channel; and automatically share MailChimp campaigns on your LinkedIn profile.

Workflow: Automate things you do every day on your iPhone and iPad.

CheatSheet: You will save, like, a gazillion hours with this tool that enables you to view Mac keyboard shortcuts in your current application.

Paper Tools

Self Journal: This notebook is a 13-week planner that gives you space to account for your time by the hour each day, as well as write down what you’re most grateful for, what your big wins are, and what you learned. This tool is great if you’re looking for something that doubles as a planner and a reflection journal.

Productivity Planner: This is a task-centric planner. Each day, you’re given space to write down your top 3–5 tasks in order of importance — and check them off one by one. At the end of each week, there’s a page for a “weekly review” to reflect on your completed tasks, wins, and lessons learned.

PowerSheets: These intentional goal-setting worksheets will keep you focused and productive throughout the year. These are a fun way to plan and plot your goals and dreams at a higher level (seasonally and monthly).

Productivity Inspiration

My Morning Routine: Ever wonder how the most accomplished people spend their mornings? Now you can find out. Check out the detailed routines of writers, entrepreneurs, frequent travelers, and more.

Blinkist: Ain’t nobody got time to read all the books we want to read from cover to cover. Blinkist is like CliffsNotes for over 1,000+ best-selling nonfiction books, allowing you to “read” each one in just 15 minutes. Don’t worry, we won’t tell. ;-)

Momentum: Replace your new tab page with focus goals and inspiring quotes.

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