TickTick is excellent value, and most people who leave aren't leaving over price. They leave because the feature density becomes its own maintenance burden, or because manual prioritisation was never the part they wanted.
Match your reason to the right tool
| Your reason | Best fit | Why |
|---|---|---|
| The feature count is the problem | Lumin | One input box, three ranked tiers. Nothing else to configure. |
| You want a more polished, calmer app | Things 3 | Best-in-class design on Apple platforms, one-time purchase. |
| You want stronger integrations | Todoist | The largest integration library in the category. |
| You want your calendar defended | Reclaim.ai | Auto-schedules focus blocks and habits around meetings. |
The comparison
| App | What it automates | Price (Aug 2026) | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lumin | AI prioritisation from an unstructured brain dump | USD9/month or USD90/year; 7-day free trial, no card | Deciding what deserves attention first |
| Todoist | Manual lists, projects, labels, filters | Free tier; Pro around USD4–5/month billed annually | You like maintaining a system and want the best-built classic to-do app |
| Things 3 | Manual, GTD-influenced | One-time purchase, around USD80 across Mac and iOS | You're all-Apple, dislike subscriptions and already have a working GTD practice |
| Reclaim.ai | AI calendar defence and habit scheduling | Free tier; paid from around USD10/user/month | Meetings are eating your week and you need focus blocks defended automatically |
| Motion | AI auto-scheduling onto your calendar | Around USD19/month, lower billed annually | Your bottleneck is fitting work into a packed calendar rather than deciding what matters |
| Google Tasks | Minimal manual lists | Free with a Google account | You want the lightest possible list attached to Gmail |
Pricing checked August 2026. Vendors change plans often — follow the link in each row to confirm current pricing before you buy.
Where each one is genuinely better
Todoist
Strength: The most refined manual task manager available. Natural-language date entry, excellent cross-platform sync, huge integration library.
Limitation: You still decide what matters. Priority flags are manual, and the system needs maintaining as projects change.
Choose Todoist instead of Lumin if you like maintaining a system and want the best-built classic to-do app.
Things 3
Strength: The best-designed task app on Apple platforms. No subscription. Fast, quiet, beautiful.
Limitation: Apple-only, no web app, no AI. Requires a genuine GTD habit to pay off.
Choose Things 3 instead of Lumin if you're all-Apple, dislike subscriptions and already have a working GTD practice.
Reclaim.ai
Strength: Excellent at protecting focus time and auto-scheduling recurring habits around meetings.
Limitation: Calendar-first, not task-first. It defends time; it does not tell you what deserves the time.
Choose Reclaim.ai instead of Lumin if meetings are eating your week and you need focus blocks defended automatically.
Motion
Strength: Genuinely automates scheduling. It places tasks into real calendar slots and reshuffles when you slip.
Limitation: Expensive, and it needs accurate time estimates and a well-maintained calendar to work. Heavy setup before value.
Choose Motion instead of Lumin if your bottleneck is fitting work into a packed calendar rather than deciding what matters.
Google Tasks
Strength: Free and sits inside Gmail and Google Calendar where you already are.
Limitation: Deliberately minimal. No prioritisation, no context, barely any structure.
Choose Google Tasks instead of Lumin if you want the lightest possible list attached to Gmail.
Where Lumin is the wrong choice
No team features, no calendar auto-scheduling, no time tracking. It answers 'what first', not 'when exactly'. If any of those is what you actually need, one of the tools above will serve you better. We would rather you bought the right thing than churned in a month.
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Frequently asked questions
Is TickTick better than Todoist?
TickTick is better value and includes a Pomodoro timer, habit tracking and calendar view. Todoist has a cleaner interface and a larger integration library. Neither prioritises for you — that stays manual in both.
What's the cheapest TickTick alternative?
Google Tasks, Microsoft To Do and Apple Reminders are free. They're far more basic, which for some people is the point.
Does anything replace TickTick's Pomodoro timer?
Not within most task apps. If the timer is what you actually value, keep TickTick or use a standalone timer alongside whichever task app you choose.