Akiflow vs Any.do: Power Users vs Simplicity Seekers in 2026?

Akiflow launched around 2020 targeting a specific type of person: busy professionals with back-to-back meetings who need to squeeze actual work between calendar blocks. It's not really a task manager in the traditional sense. Think of it more as a unified workspace where your calendar, tasks from other apps, and time-blocking all live together.

The whole point is answering 'when will I do this task' not just 'what needs doing'. Honestly took me about a week to wrap my head around the workflow, but once it clicked, I got why people pay the premium price.

Any.do has been around since 2011 and hasn't changed much in philosophy - keep task management stupidly simple. You get lists, you check things off, done. They added some AI features recently (planning your day, smart suggestions) but honestly? Feels more like marketing than genuinely useful.

The app looks nice, works fine for basic stuff, but there's nothing here you couldn't get from Apple Reminders or Google Tasks for free. The calendar view they added is bare-bones compared to what Akiflow does.

This is where Akiflow absolutely crushes it. You see your actual calendar alongside tasks, and you can drag any task right into a time slot. Meeting at 2pm? Block 1-2pm for the report you need to finish before it.

Multiple calendars from work and personal? They all show up in one unified view, color-coded how you want. The focus mode is clutch - it highlights the current time block and dims everything else so you're not distracted by the 47 other things demanding attention. I've tested a bunch of time-blocking apps and this is the smoothest implementation.

Any.do has a calendar view, but calling it 'calendar management' is generous. It's more like a list view with dates. You can see what's due when, and it syncs to your phone's calendar, but there's no real time-blocking. No dragging tasks into specific hours.

No unified multi-calendar view. If you're looking for actual calendar-based planning, this isn't it. Fine for seeing 'what's due this week' but that's about where it ends.

The integrations are a huge part of why you'd pick Akiflow. It pulls tasks from Todoist, ClickUp, Asana, Jira, Notion, Gmail, Slack - basically wherever your work actually lives. Instead of checking five different apps, everything shows up in Akiflow and you can schedule it all from one place.

The Gmail integration is particularly well done - turn emails into tasks with one click, including the email content as notes. Slack messages too. If you're deep in the productivity tool ecosystem, Akiflow ties it together nicely.

Any.do has integrations with Google Calendar, Outlook, WhatsApp, and a few others, but it's pretty limited compared to what power users expect in 2025. No Slack integration. No connection to project management tools.

The WhatsApp integration is actually the most useful part - you can add tasks through WhatsApp messages, which is handy if you're on mobile a lot. But overall, this is designed to be a standalone app, not a hub for your entire workflow.

Akiflow is expensive, no way around it. $19/month if you pay annually, $34/month if you go month-to-month. No free tier, just a 14-day trial. For context, that's like 3-4x what most task apps cost. You're paying for the time-blocking engine, the unified calendar, and all those integrations.

Worth it if your time is legitimately valuable and you're managing a complex schedule. Not worth it if you're just tracking personal to-dos. I tested it for about 3 months and kept the subscription because it genuinely saved me hours per week in calendar tetris.

Any.do has a free version with basic features, which is fine for simple lists. Premium is $5.99/month or $59.99/year, gets you unlimited lists, reminders, recurring tasks, and some theming options. Honestly, the free-to-paid jump doesn't add that much value.

You can get most of what Premium offers from free alternatives. The pricing makes sense for a basic task app, but when you compare feature-to-price ratio against tools like TickTick (more features, similar price), it's hard to recommend paying for this.

The mobile apps are decent but clearly the desktop experience is where Akiflow shines. On mobile you can capture tasks, check your schedule, and do quick edits. The command bar works but feels cramped on a phone screen.

Time-blocking from mobile is technically possible but kind of fiddly - you're better off doing that planning from desktop. Honestly, I mostly use the mobile app for quick task capture and checking what's next on my schedule. Syncing is fast though, which matters when you add something on the go and need it to show up on desktop immediately.

Mobile is actually where Any.do works best. The app is clean, fast, and makes sense on a small screen. The 'shake to remove completed tasks' gesture is oddly satisfying. Voice input works fine for quick task capture.

Widgets look good on both iOS and Android. The grocery list mode is handy for shared shopping lists. If most of your task management happens on your phone (commute planning, grocery lists, quick reminders), Any.do's mobile experience is solid. The desktop app feels like an afterthought by comparison.

Not going to sugarcoat this - Akiflow has a learning curve. First few days you'll wonder what you've gotten yourself into. The command bar shortcuts, the time-blocking workflow, figuring out which integrations to connect - it takes time. They have tutorials and onboarding, but you need to actually commit to learning the system.

Week two it starts clicking. By week three you're flying through your day way faster than before. If you're not willing to invest that initial time, this will frustrate you and you'll bounce off it.

Zero learning curve. You open it, you see lists, you add tasks. My mom could figure it out in 30 seconds. That's both the strength and limitation of Any.do - it's instantly familiar because it doesn't try to do anything complex.

No new workflow to learn, no power user features to discover. What you see in the first 5 minutes is basically the entire app. Fine if that's all you need. Boring if you were hoping for depth.