Author: Smin Rana

My Journey Through Task Management Hell

I’ve been here before. Too many times, actually. The cycle is always the same: discover a new task management tool, feel that initial rush of excitement, meticulously set everything up, use it religiously for a few weeks, and then… nothing. The app becomes a graveyard of unchecked boxes, a monument to good intentions that somehow never translated into sustained action.

The last one was Taskwarrior. I loved it, genuinely. There’s something deeply satisfying about managing your life from the terminal, feeling like you’re operating at a level of efficiency that graphical interfaces just can’t match. The command-line interface felt powerful, the tagging system was elegant, and the ability to script and automate was exactly what I thought I needed.

But here’s the thing: after a few weeks, I couldn’t see where I was going.

I had tasks. Lots of them. They were organized, prioritized, tagged with surgical precision. But when I looked at my terminal, all I saw were items to complete. There was no narrative, no arc, no sense of “this is where you are, and this is where you’re heading.” It was like having a perfectly organized toolbox but no blueprint for what I was building.

The realization hit me hard: I don’t just need a tool to track tasks. I need a system that shows me why these tasks matter, what happens when I complete them, and most importantly, where all of this effort is taking me.

What I Actually Need (And Maybe You Do Too)

After reflecting on my pattern of tool abandonment, I’ve identified what I actually need from a task management system. It’s not just about features or aesthetics or even efficiency. It’s about something deeper:

I need to see the story of my progress.

Let me break that down into specific requirements:

1. Clear Visibility of Important vs Everything Else

I need an immediate visual distinction between what matters right now and what’s just noise. Not everything is equally important, but most task managers treat everything with democratic indifference. I need a system that screams at me: “This matters TODAY. That other stuff? Later.”

2. A Visible Backlog That Doesn’t Haunt Me

Here’s a paradox: I need to know my backlog exists, but I don’t want it staring at me every day, inducing guilt and anxiety. The backlog should be there when I need to pull from it, invisible when I don’t. It should be a resource, not a burden.

3. Connection Between Action and Outcome

This is the big one. When I complete a task, I need to see how it connects to something larger. Did that move a project forward? Did it get me closer to a goal? What actually changed in my world because I checked that box?

Most task managers give you the dopamine hit of checking a box and then… silence. The task disappears into the void of “completed items,” and you’re left wondering if you actually accomplished anything meaningful.

4. Tangible Rewards and Progress Tracking

I hate to admit it, but I’m motivated by gamification. Not in a shallow way, but in the sense that I need feedback loops. I need to see that my consistent effort is accumulating into something. Points, levels, streaks, visual progress bars, whatever it takes to make the invisible work of daily discipline visible and rewarding.

5. Flexibility Between Terminal and Visual Interfaces

Sometimes I want the speed and efficiency of a command line. Other times, especially when I’m planning or reflecting, I need a visual overview. I need a system that works both ways without feeling like I’m using two different tools.

6. The “Why” Built In

Every task should have a shadow that asks: “Why does this matter?” Not as a philosophical exercise, but as a practical reminder. When motivation wanes, I need to quickly reconnect with the purpose behind the work.

With these requirements clear, I started researching. Two tools kept appearing in my search: Todoist and Amazing Marvin. Both promised to be more than just task managers. Both claimed to solve the exact problems I was facing.

Let me tell you what I found.

Todoist: The Elegant Motivator

Todoist has been around since 2007, which in tech years makes it practically ancient. But unlike many legacy tools, it hasn’t stagnated. It’s evolved into something streamlined, beautiful, and surprisingly motivating.

First Impressions

The first thing that strikes you about Todoist is its cleanliness. The interface is minimal without being sparse, intuitive without being condescending. You can start using it immediately, no tutorials required. This is both its strength and, potentially, its weakness.

The Inbox Philosophy

Todoist starts with an Inbox, a concept borrowed from GTD (Getting Things Done). Everything goes here first. Then you organize. It’s simple, but it forces a discipline: capture first, organize later. This solves one of my chronic problems, losing ideas because I couldn’t decide where to file them immediately.

Projects and Sections: The Organizational Backbone

Here’s where Todoist starts to reveal its power. You can create projects (like “Work,” “Personal,” “Learning”), and within each project, you can create sections. This two-level hierarchy is enough for most people without being overwhelming.

For example, my “Work” project might have sections like:

• Active Clients
• Business Development
• Administration
• Professional Development

Each section holds related tasks. It’s straightforward, but it works.

Priority Levels: The Visual Hierarchy I Needed

Todoist has four priority levels, color-coded:

• P1: Red (urgent and important)
• P2: Orange (important)
• P3: Blue (normal)
• P4: White (low priority)

This is exactly what I needed. At a glance, I can see what demands my immediate attention. My Today view becomes a prioritized battlefield where red tasks scream for attention, and everything else knows its place.

The Game Changer: Todoist Karma

This is what sets Todoist apart from most productivity tools. Karma is a points-based gamification system that tracks your productivity over time. You earn points by completing tasks, maintaining streaks, and hitting daily and weekly goals.

You progress through levels:

• Beginner (0-499 points)
• Intermediate (500-999)
• Advanced (1000-2499)
• Professional (2500-4999)
• Expert (5000-9999)
• Master (10000+)

There’s also a productivity trend graph showing your performance over weeks and months. This is the progress visibility I was craving. It’s not just about today’s tasks; it’s about the accumulated pattern of your productivity.

When I complete a task, I don’t just check a box. I see my Karma increase. I see my daily goal meter fill. I see my streak continue. It’s a small thing, but it creates a feedback loop that actually works.

Filters and Labels: Power User Territory

For those who want more control, Todoist offers filters and labels. Labels are tags you can attach to tasks across different projects. Filters are saved searches that let you create custom views.

For example, I could create a filter that shows all P1 and P2 tasks due in the next three days across all projects with the label “urgent.” This becomes my custom “Emergency Dashboard.”

This is where the terminal user in me gets excited. There’s complexity available for those who want it, but it’s hidden from those who don’t.

The Terminal Experience: Todoist CLI

Todoist offers an official CLI, and third-party developers have created even more powerful ones. From the terminal, you can:

todoist list
todoist add "Write article" --priority 1 --project Writing
todoist complete <task-id>
todoist sync

It’s fast, efficient, and satisfies that command-line itch. But here’s the thing: it’s not as powerful as Taskwarrior. The CLI feels like a convenience feature rather than the primary interface. For pure terminal work, it’s somewhat limiting.

Natural Language Processing: Tiny Magic

Type “Write proposal tomorrow at 3pm #work p1” and Todoist understands:

• Task: Write proposal
• Due date: Tomorrow
• Time: 3pm
• Project: Work
• Priority: 1

This might seem trivial, but it removes friction. Ideas flow directly into organized tasks without breaking your mental flow.

Collaboration Features

Todoist supports sharing projects and assigning tasks to other people. For team work or shared household projects, this is valuable. You can comment on tasks, attach files, and see activity history.

For someone working solo, this might not matter. But having the option means Todoist can grow with your needs.

What Todoist Gets Right

The Outcome Visibility Problem: Todoist partially solves this through Karma and progress tracking. You can see your productivity trend over time, which creates a narrative of progress. However, it doesn’t explicitly show how individual tasks connect to larger outcomes.

The Backlog Management: The project and section system lets you create a “Someday/Maybe” project where tasks can live without cluttering your daily view. The Today view only shows what you’ve explicitly scheduled or flagged, so your backlog doesn’t haunt you.

The Reward System: Karma is genuinely motivating. It’s not just about completing tasks; it’s about building a productivity identity. Reaching “Expert” level feels meaningful, even though it’s just a digital badge.

Cross-Platform Flexibility: Works seamlessly across web, desktop, mobile, and terminal. Your tasks are always in sync, always accessible.

What Todoist Doesn’t Do Well

Limited Customization: Todoist has an opinion about how task management should work. If you agree with that opinion, it’s perfect. If you don’t, you’re out of luck. You can’t change the view layouts, can’t add custom fields, can’t fundamentally alter the workflow.

Shallow Task Metadata: You can’t attach rich context to tasks beyond due dates, priorities, labels, and comments. If you want to track time estimates, actual time spent, energy levels required, or custom statuses, Todoist doesn’t support this natively.

No Time Blocking or Scheduling: Todoist knows when tasks are due but doesn’t help you schedule when you’ll actually do them. If you want to time-block your day, you’ll need another tool.

The “Why” Isn’t Built In: While you can add descriptions to tasks, there’s no dedicated field for “why this matters” or goal-linking. You have to create this structure yourself using projects and labels.

Pricing

Todoist has a free tier that’s surprisingly generous: 5 projects, 5 collaborators, basic features. The Pro tier ($4/month) unlocks unlimited projects, reminders, labels, filters, comments, and file uploads. The Business tier adds team collaboration features.

For individual use, Pro is probably what you’d want for the full Karma system and advanced features.

Amazing Marvin: The Productivity Laboratory

If Todoist is an elegant, opinionated tool, Amazing Marvin is a productivity laboratory where you’re both scientist and subject. It’s not a task manager; it’s a customizable productivity system that happens to include task management.

First Impressions: Overwhelming Possibility

When you first open Amazing Marvin, you’re greeted with a setup wizard that asks about your productivity challenges and goals. Based on your answers, it enables certain features and strategies. This is both brilliant and potentially paralyzing.

Unlike Todoist’s “start using it immediately” approach, Marvin requires you to think about how you want to work. For someone who’s tried and abandoned many systems, this is actually valuable. It forces you to articulate what you actually need.

The Strategy Marketplace

This is Marvin’s killer feature: a marketplace of productivity strategies you can enable or disable. Each strategy adds specific features to your workspace:

• Time Blocking: Adds a daily schedule view where you can assign tasks to time slots
• Pomodoro Timer: Built-in focus timer with break tracking
• Eating the Frog: Marks your most important task and won’t let you forget it
• Day Wrap Up: End-of-day review ritual
• Reward Points: Custom gamification system
• Energy Tracking: Track how much energy tasks require
• Time Estimates: Estimate and track actual time spent
• Autopilot: Automatic task scheduling based on your patterns

And dozens more. You can enable exactly the strategies that resonate with you and ignore the rest. Your Marvin becomes uniquely yours.

The Master List and Daily Planning

Marvin separates your master list (all tasks) from your daily plan (today’s tasks). This is the backlog solution I needed. Your master list exists, organized by project and category, but it doesn’t overwhelm your daily view.

Each morning (or the night before), you consciously plan your day by dragging tasks from your master list to your daily plan. This creates intentionality. You’re not just reacting to due dates; you’re actively choosing what gets your time and energy.

Projects, Categories, and Custom Fields

Marvin’s organizational system is more flexible than Todoist’s:

• Projects: Top-level containers for related work
• Categories: Cross-project labels (similar to Todoist labels, but more powerful)
• Custom Fields: You can create your own metadata fields (text, numbers, dropdowns)

Want to track “Impact Level” or “Energy Required” or “Context” (home, office, errands)? Create a custom field. This is the deep customization that Todoist lacks.

The Visual Dashboard

Marvin’s default view shows your day in a vertical timeline. If you’ve enabled time blocking, you can see your entire day scheduled out. If you’ve enabled the Pomodoro strategy, you can start focus sessions directly from tasks.

The sidebar shows your projects, categories, and various smart lists (overdue, upcoming, waiting for, etc.). It’s more visually complex than Todoist, but the complexity serves a purpose: complete visibility.

The Reward System: Build Your Own

Unlike Todoist’s fixed Karma system, Marvin lets you design your own reward system. You can:

• Set point values for different task types
• Create custom achievements and badges
• Set daily and weekly point goals
• Track streaks for any behavior you want

This is both more powerful and more work. You have to decide what behaviors you want to reward and how. For someone who knows themselves well, this is perfect. For someone still figuring out what motivates them, it might be too much freedom.

The “Why” Built In: Goals and Parent Tasks

Marvin has a dedicated goals section where you can define long-term objectives. You can then link tasks to specific goals. This creates the outcome connection I was craving.

Additionally, tasks can have parent tasks, creating a hierarchy:

• Goal: Launch new product
  • Parent Task: Complete market research
    • Task: Interview 10 potential customers
    • Task: Analyze competitor pricing
    • Task: Write positioning document

When you complete a child task, you see progress on the parent task. When you complete a parent task, you see progress on the goal. The connection between action and outcome is explicit.

Time Tracking and Estimation

If you enable these strategies, Marvin becomes a time-tracking powerhouse:

• Estimate how long tasks will take
• Track actual time spent
• See discrepancies between estimates and actuals
• Get better at estimating over time
• See if you’re overcommitting your days

This addresses the “where am I going” question temporally. Am I making realistic plans? Am I improving at time estimation? The data tells you.

Autopilot and Smart Scheduling

This is where Marvin gets genuinely intelligent. If you enable Autopilot, it will:

• Automatically schedule tasks based on due dates, priorities, and your available time
• Reschedule incomplete tasks
• Suggest when to work on different types of tasks based on your patterns

It’s like having a personal assistant who learns your work style and makes suggestions. You maintain control but get intelligent defaults.

The Terminal Experience: Lacking

Here’s Marvin’s weakness: there’s no official CLI. The tool is web-based (with desktop apps that are essentially browser wrappers). For someone who loves terminal workflows, this is a dealbreaker.

Third-party developers have created some API integrations, but they’re limited and not officially supported. If command-line access is essential to your workflow, Marvin isn’t your tool.

What Amazing Marvin Gets Right

Complete Customization: You can build exactly the system you need. Every person’s Marvin looks different because it reflects their unique productivity needs and preferences.

Explicit Outcome Tracking: The goals and parent task system creates clear connections between actions and outcomes. You always know why you’re doing something and what it contributes to.

Sophisticated Backlog Management: The master list/daily plan separation, combined with smart lists and filters, means your backlog is organized and accessible without being oppressive.

Built-In “Why”: Goals, task descriptions, and the ability to add notes and context mean you can always reconnect with purpose.

Comprehensive Reward Options: Whether you want points, badges, streaks, or just visual progress bars, you can design the reward system that motivates you.

Time and Energy Awareness: The ability to track time, estimate effort, and note energy requirements helps you plan realistically rather than aspirationally.

What Amazing Marvin Doesn’t Do Well

Complexity Overload: With great power comes great… decision fatigue. There are so many options and strategies that it’s easy to spend more time configuring Marvin than actually working.

Steeper Learning Curve: Unlike Todoist’s immediate usability, Marvin requires investment to understand and set up properly. This initial friction might be too much for some people.

No Terminal Interface: For command-line enthusiasts, this is a significant limitation. Everything happens in the browser or desktop app.

Less Polished UI: Compared to Todoist’s sleek minimalism, Marvin’s interface feels busier and less refined. It’s functional, but not beautiful.

Smaller Ecosystem: Todoist has more integrations, a larger community, and better third-party support. Marvin is more niche.

Pricing

Amazing Marvin doesn’t have a free tier. It costs $12/month or $120/year (essentially $10/month). There’s a 30-day free trial, which is generous given the complexity.

The price is higher than Todoist Pro, but you’re paying for extreme flexibility and customization.

The Direct Comparison: Todoist vs Amazing Marvin

Let me put these tools head-to-head across the dimensions that matter most to someone like me (and maybe you):

Ease of Getting Started

Winner: Todoist

Todoist wins this handily. You can start using it productively within minutes. The interface is intuitive, the basic features are immediately accessible, and you don’t need to make many decisions to get value.

Marvin requires configuration, strategy selection, and mental investment before it becomes useful. This isn’t necessarily bad, but it’s definitely more work upfront.

Customization and Flexibility

Winner: Amazing Marvin

Not even close. Marvin lets you customize almost everything: view layouts, workflows, reward systems, custom fields, and which features you even see. Todoist has an opinion about how task management should work; Marvin lets you have your own opinion.

Visual Clarity and Design

Winner: Todoist

Todoist is simply more beautiful. The minimalist design, smooth animations, and thoughtful use of color create an experience that feels premium. Marvin is functional but cluttered by comparison.

For some people, aesthetics don’t matter. For others (including me), the visual experience affects how much we want to engage with a tool daily.

Showing Where You’re Going

Winner: Amazing Marvin

Marvin’s explicit goal-linking, parent task hierarchies, and progress visualization create clear narratives of advancement. You can see exactly how today’s work contributes to long-term objectives.

Todoist’s Karma shows productivity trends, which is valuable, but it doesn’t connect specific tasks to specific outcomes as clearly.

Backlog Management

Winner: Tie (Different Approaches)

Both solve the backlog problem, just differently.

Todoist uses projects and smart filters to keep your backlog organized but separate from your daily view. It’s simpler but effective.

Marvin’s master list/daily plan separation is more explicit and forces daily planning discipline. It’s more structured but requires more engagement.

Choose based on whether you want passive organization (Todoist) or active planning (Marvin).

Reward and Motivation Systems

Winner: Depends on Your Psychology

Todoist’s Karma is fixed, clear, and immediately satisfying. You complete tasks, you get points, you level up. It’s simple and it works.

Marvin’s customizable rewards let you design exactly what motivates you, but you have to know what that is and build it yourself.

If you respond to external, standardized gamification: Todoist. If you want to design your own motivation system: Marvin.

Terminal/CLI Access

Winner: Todoist

Todoist has an official CLI and several third-party options. It’s not as powerful as dedicated terminal tools like Taskwarrior, but it exists and works.

Marvin has essentially no terminal interface. If command-line access is important, this eliminates Marvin from consideration.

Time Management Features

Winner: Amazing Marvin

Marvin’s time blocking, scheduling, Pomodoro integration, and time tracking make it a comprehensive time management system, not just a task manager.

Todoist knows when things are due but doesn’t help you schedule when you’ll actually do them or how long they’ll take.

The “Why” Factor

Winner: Amazing Marvin

Marvin’s goal system, parent tasks, and flexible note-taking make it easier to maintain connection between tasks and purpose.

Todoist can do this with careful use of projects, labels, and descriptions, but it’s not built into the core experience.

Cross-Platform Experience

Winner: Todoist

Todoist works seamlessly across web, Windows, Mac, Linux, iOS, Android, and even integrates with smart watches and voice assistants. Everything syncs instantly.

Marvin works on web, Mac, Windows, and has mobile apps, but the mobile experience is more limited. It’s primarily designed for desktop use.

Price-to-Value Ratio

Winner: Depends on Usage

Todoist Pro at $4/month is cheaper and sufficient for most people. You get a polished, reliable tool with good features.

Marvin at $10-12/month is more expensive but offers far more customization. If you use even half of its features, the value is there.

Free tier consideration: Todoist has one, Marvin doesn’t.

Community and Resources

Winner: Todoist

Todoist has been around longer, has more users, and consequently has more tutorials, integrations, templates, and community resources.

Marvin has a dedicated community, but it’s smaller and more specialized.

So Which One Should You (Or I) Choose?

After researching both tools extensively, here’s my thinking:

Choose Todoist If:

• You want to start being productive immediately without configuration overhead
• You appreciate minimalist design and visual elegance
• You respond well to standardized gamification (Karma system)
• You want strong mobile and cross-platform support
• You need terminal access to your tasks
• You want a tool that gets out of your way and just works
• You don’t need deep customization or time blocking
• You’re looking for a productivity tool under $5/month

Todoist is the elegant, opinionated choice. It’s excellent at what it does, which is helping you capture, organize, and complete tasks while maintaining motivation through a clever reward system. It won’t do everything, but what it does, it does beautifully.

Choose Amazing Marvin If:

• You’re willing to invest time in building your perfect system
• You’ve tried many tools and know specifically what you need
• You want explicit connections between tasks and long-term goals
• Time blocking and scheduling are important to your workflow
• You want to track time, energy, and other custom metadata
• You value flexibility over polish
• You work primarily on desktop rather than mobile
• You’re willing to pay more for comprehensive customization
• You don’t need terminal access

Amazing Marvin is the productivity laboratory for people who want to optimize their personal productivity system. It’s more complex, more expensive, and requires more engagement, but it’s also more powerful and adaptable.

My Decision (And Maybe Yours)

For me personally, I’m leaning toward trying Todoist first, with the intention of possibly switching to Amazing Marvin later if needed.

Here’s my reasoning:

My pattern has been tool abandonment after a few weeks. This suggests I might need a simpler system to build consistency before layering on complexity. Todoist’s immediate usability and built-in Karma motivation might be exactly what I need to establish a sustainable habit.

The terminal access is valuable to me, and Marvin doesn’t offer it.

If after three months with Todoist I find myself wanting more customization, better time blocking, or explicit goal-linking, I’ll have the discipline and data to set up Marvin properly. I’ll know what I actually need rather than what I think I need.

But if you’ve already tried simple systems and know you need more structure, or if you’re certain about your productivity requirements, starting with Amazing Marvin might make more sense. The 30-day trial is generous enough to properly explore its capabilities.

The Real Meta-Lesson

After writing this entire analysis, I’ve realized something important: the tool probably isn’t the problem.

Both Todoist and Amazing Marvin are excellent. They solve the specific problems I identified. They provide visibility, structure, rewards, and outcome-tracking. They can help me see where I’m going.

The real issue is whether I’m willing to show up consistently, regardless of the tool. The best task management system in the world can’t create motivation or discipline from nothing. It can support and amplify your efforts, but it can’t replace them.

So my actual plan is this:

1. Choose one tool (starting with Todoist)
2. Commit to using it daily for 90 days minimum, no exceptions
3. Don’t tool-hop or get distracted by other options during this period
4. Evaluate honestly at the end whether the tool serves my needs
5. Adjust or switch only after giving it a genuine chance

The tool matters, but commitment matters more. With that in mind, either Todoist or Amazing Marvin could work. The question is which one will I actually use consistently?

That’s what I’m about to find out.

Why I Fell in Love with Taskwarrior

There’s something deeply satisfying about managing your entire life from the terminal. No mouse clicks, no pretty animations, no distractions. Just you, your keyboard, and a command-line interface that responds instantly to your every command. When I discovered Taskwarrior, it felt like I’d found the productivity tool I’d been searching for my entire life.

Taskwarrior is a free, open-source task management system that lives entirely in your terminal. It’s been around since 2006, maintained by a dedicated community of developers who understand that sometimes the most powerful tools are the ones that strip away visual complexity and focus purely on functionality.

The first time I typed task add "Write article about productivity" and saw the task instantly added with a satisfying confirmation message, I felt that rush of efficiency that only command-line tools can provide. This wasn’t just task management. This was task management for people who live in the terminal, who think in commands, who value speed and power over aesthetics.

Within a week, I had migrated my entire task list to Taskwarrior. I spent hours reading the documentation, learning the filtering syntax, creating custom reports, and fine-tuning my workflow. I was convinced I’d finally found the one tool I’d use forever.

Spoiler alert: I didn’t.

But before I explain why Taskwarrior ultimately didn’t work for me, let me tell you why it’s genuinely brilliant and might be exactly what you need.

What Makes Taskwarrior Special

The Command-Line Philosophy

Taskwarrior embodies the Unix philosophy: do one thing and do it extremely well. It manages tasks. That’s it. No calendars, no notes, no project management boards, no collaboration features. Just pure task tracking with a power and flexibility that graphical tools struggle to match.

Every interaction happens through the task command. The basic workflow is elegantly simple:

task add "Buy groceries"
task list
task 1 done

Three commands, and you’ve captured a task, viewed your list, and marked something complete. For basic usage, Taskwarrior is as simple as any tool out there.

But here’s where it gets interesting: beneath this simple surface lies an incredibly sophisticated system capable of handling complex workflows, advanced filtering, custom attributes, and automation that would make most graphical tools jealous.

The Data Model: Tasks as Structured Data

Unlike many task managers that treat tasks as simple text with a few metadata fields, Taskwarrior treats every task as a structured data object with dozens of potential attributes:

• Description: What the task is
• Project: Which project it belongs to
• Tags: Multiple categorization labels
• Priority: High, Medium, Low
• Due date: When it’s due
• Scheduled date: When you plan to work on it
• Wait date: When it should appear in your list
• Until date: When it expires
• Depends: Other tasks this one depends on
• Annotations: Notes and comments
• UDAs (User Defined Attributes): Custom fields you create

This rich data model means you can organize and filter tasks with surgical precision. Want to see all high-priority tasks in the “work” project that are due this week and tagged “urgent”? Easy:

task project:work priority:H due:week +urgent list

This level of filtering power is what makes Taskwarrior feel magical. Your tasks aren’t trapped in rigid categories or views. They’re data that can be sliced and examined from any angle you can imagine.

Projects and Tags: Flexible Organization

Taskwarrior’s approach to organization is beautifully simple yet powerful. Projects are hierarchical labels you assign to tasks, represented with dot notation:

task add "Review pull request" project:work.development
task add "Client meeting prep" project:work.client.acme
task add "Replace air filter" project:home.maintenance

This creates a natural hierarchy without forcing you into rigid structures. A task can belong to exactly one project, creating clean organization.

Tags, on the other hand, are free-form labels you can attach to any task, and a single task can have multiple tags:

task add "Research competitors" project:work.strategy +research +urgent +weekly_review

The combination of projects (hierarchical, single assignment) and tags (flat, multiple assignment) gives you the best of both organizational paradigms. You can think of projects as “where this task lives” and tags as “what kind of task this is.”

The Filtering System: Query Language for Your Tasks

This is where Taskwarrior transforms from a simple task manager into a personal database query system. The filtering syntax is both intuitive and extraordinarily powerful.

Basic filters are simple:

task list                    # All pending tasks
task project:work list       # All tasks in work project
task +urgent list           # All tasks tagged urgent
task due:today list         # All tasks due today

But you can combine filters with boolean logic:

task project:work or project:personal list
task priority:H and due.before:tomorrow list
task project:work.client and +urgent and -waiting list

You can search descriptions:

task /meeting/ list         # Tasks containing "meeting"
task description.contains:proposal list

You can use relative dates:

task due:today list
task due:tomorrow list
task due:eow list          # End of week
task due:eom list          # End of month
task due.after:2days list

You can filter by status:

task status:pending list
task status:completed list
task status:deleted list
task status:waiting list

This query language means you can create exactly the views you need. Want to see all high-priority tasks across all projects that are due in the next three days but not tagged “someday”? Done:

task priority:H due.before:3days -someday list

The power here is that your task list becomes queryable. You’re not limited to predefined views or rigid filtering options. You can ask questions of your data and get instant answers.

Custom Reports: Your Personal Views

Taskwarrior comes with several built-in reports (list, next, minimal, long, etc.), but the real power comes from creating your own custom reports.

Reports are defined in your .taskrc configuration file. For example, here’s a custom report that shows only work tasks due this week, sorted by priority:

report.workweek.description=Work tasks due this week
report.workweek.columns=id,priority,project,tags,description,due
report.workweek.labels=ID,Pri,Project,Tags,Description,Due
report.workweek.sort=priority-,due+
report.workweek.filter=project:work due:week status:pending

Now you can run task workweek and see exactly this view. You can create as many custom reports as you need, each one a saved perspective on your task data.

This is programming your task manager. Instead of hoping the app has the view you need, you define it yourself.

Dependencies and Task Relationships

Taskwarrior supports task dependencies, meaning you can specify that certain tasks must be completed before others can begin:

task add "Design database schema" project:app.backend
task add "Implement API endpoints" project:app.backend depends:1
task add "Write API tests" project:app.backend depends:2

Now task 2 is blocked until task 1 is complete, and task 3 is blocked until task 2 is complete. When you complete task 1, task 2 automatically becomes unblocked and ready to work on.

This creates explicit workflows and helps you see the critical path through complex projects. You’re not just managing independent tasks; you’re managing task networks.

Recurrence: Automated Task Creation

Taskwarrior handles recurring tasks elegantly. You can create tasks that automatically regenerate at specified intervals:

task add "Weekly team meeting" project:work due:friday recur:weekly
task add "Review monthly finances" project:personal due:28th recur:monthly
task add "Change air filter" project:home.maintenance due:2024-03-01 recur:quarterly

When you complete a recurring task, Taskwarrior automatically creates the next instance with the appropriate due date. You define the pattern once, and the system handles the repetition forever.

Annotations: Adding Context Without Clutter

Sometimes you need to add notes or context to a task without changing the task description itself. Annotations let you do this:

task 1 annotate "Client prefers afternoon meetings"
task 1 annotate "Remember to bring mockups"

Each annotation is timestamped and stored separately from the task description. This keeps your task list clean while preserving important context.

Context Switching: Multiple Workflow Modes

Taskwarrior supports contexts, which are saved filter sets you can switch between instantly. This is perfect for different working modes:

task context define work project:work
task context define personal project:personal
task context define urgent +urgent priority:H

Now you can switch contexts:

task context work      # Now all commands automatically filter to work tasks
task list             # Shows only work tasks
task context personal # Switch to personal context
task list            # Shows only personal tasks
task context none    # Back to seeing everything

This is brilliant for focus. When you’re in work mode, personal tasks don’t clutter your view. When you’re in personal mode, work doesn’t distract you. It’s like having multiple task lists that you can switch between instantly.

Some aliases I use in my .zshrc file

alias tn='task next'
alias ts='task start'
alias td='task done'
alias tc='task calendar'
alias tl='task long'
alias tp='task project'
alias ta='task all'
alias tts='task timesheet'
alias tr='task recurring'
alias tt='task'
alias tdt='task due:today list'
alias te='task next limit:3 rc.report.next.columns=id,description rc.report.next.labels= rc.verbose=nothing | sed "s/^/- [ ] /"'

Sync and Backup: Your Data, Your Control

Taskwarrior stores all your tasks in plain text files (JSON format) in ~/.task/. This means:

• Your data is portable and human-readable
• You can backup your tasks with any file backup system
• You can version control your tasks with Git
• You can write scripts to manipulate your task data directly

Taskwarrior also supports Taskserver (now called Taskchampion), a sync server you can self-host or use through third-party services. This lets you sync tasks across multiple devices while maintaining complete control over your data.

For privacy-conscious users, this is huge. Your tasks aren’t stored in someone else’s cloud. They’re files on your machine, synced to servers you control.

Hooks and Extensions: Programmable Task Management

This is where Taskwarrior becomes genuinely programmable. You can write hook scripts that execute at specific points in the task lifecycle:

• on-add: Runs when a task is added
• on-modify: Runs when a task is modified
• on-launch: Runs when Taskwarrior starts
• on-exit: Runs when Taskwarrior exits

These hooks can be written in any language (Python, Bash, Ruby, etc.) and can modify task data, trigger external actions, or enforce business rules.

Want to automatically tag all work tasks added during business hours as “work_hours”? Write an on-add hook. Want to send yourself an email when a high-priority task is added? Write a hook. Want to integrate Taskwarrior with external services like Slack or Todoist? Hooks make it possible.

This programmability means Taskwarrior isn’t just a task manager. It’s a task management platform you can build on.

The Taskwarrior Ecosystem

Timewarrior: Time Tracking Companion

The same team that built Taskwarrior also created Timewarrior, a complementary time-tracking tool. They integrate seamlessly:

task 1 start          # Start working on task 1
timew                 # Automatically starts tracking time on task 1
task 1 stop          # Mark task complete
timew                # Stops time tracking

You can then generate reports showing where your time actually went:

timew summary        # Summary of tracked time
timew day           # Today's time tracking
timew week          # This week's time tracking

The combination of Taskwarrior and Timewarrior gives you complete visibility into both what you need to do and where your time actually goes.

Third-Party Tools and Interfaces

Because Taskwarrior’s data is open and well-documented, the community has built numerous complementary tools:

• Vit: A visual interface for Taskwarrior that runs in the terminal
• Taskwarrior-tui: Another excellent terminal UI
• Taskwarrior-web: A web-based interface
• Mirakel: Android app with Taskwarrior sync
• Tasktastic: iOS app with Taskwarrior sync
• Bugwarrior: Imports issues from GitHub, GitLab, Jira, etc. into Taskwarrior

This ecosystem means you’re not locked into a single interface. You can use the command line when you want speed, a TUI when you want visual scanning, a web interface when you’re on someone else’s computer, and mobile apps when you’re away from your desk.

Integration Possibilities

Because Taskwarrior is scriptable and uses plain text storage, you can integrate it with virtually anything:

• Export tasks to generate todo.txt files
• Import tasks from email using procmail filters
• Create tasks from calendar events
• Send task summaries to Slack channels
• Generate weekly reports as PDFs
• Sync certain projects to Trello or other team tools

The possibilities are limited only by your scripting ability.

Why Taskwarrior is Brilliant

Let me be clear: Taskwarrior is an exceptional piece of software. After using it intensively, I’m genuinely impressed by its design and capabilities. Here’s what it gets absolutely right:

Speed and Efficiency

Taskwarrior is blindingly fast. Commands execute instantly. There’s no loading time, no sync delay, no waiting for animations. You think the command, type it, and see the result immediately. For someone who lives in the terminal, this speed is intoxicating.

Adding a task takes less than two seconds. Completing a task is instantaneous. Filtering through thousands of tasks happens faster than you can blink. This velocity creates a feeling of effortless productivity.

Flexibility and Power

The combination of projects, tags, custom attributes, filters, reports, and hooks means Taskwarrior can adapt to virtually any workflow. Whether you practice GTD, Kanban, Agile, or your own custom methodology, Taskwarrior can accommodate it.

You’re not fitting your workflow to the tool’s limitations. You’re configuring the tool to match your workflow.

Privacy and Data Ownership

Your tasks are yours. They’re stored locally in plain text. You control the backups. You control the sync (if you even want to sync). There’s no company reading your tasks for advertising purposes, no terms of service that might change, no risk of the service shutting down.

This level of data sovereignty is rare in modern productivity tools.

No Vendor Lock-In

Because your data is in an open, documented format, you can always export it, transform it, or migrate to another system. You’re never trapped. This psychological freedom is valuable even if you never exercise it.

Scriptability and Automation

The ability to automate task management through scripts, hooks, and integration with other command-line tools means your task system can be as smart as you can program it to be.

Want to automatically create a daily review task every evening? Write a cron job. Want to import your GitHub issues as tasks? Use Bugwarrior. Want to generate a weekly report and email it to yourself? Write a script.

This programmability transforms task management from a manual process into an automated system.

The Learning Curve is a Feature

This might sound counterintuitive, but Taskwarrior’s learning curve is actually valuable. It forces you to think deeply about how you want to organize your work. You can’t just dump tasks into an app and hope for the best. You have to consider projects, tags, priorities, and workflows.

This deliberate design creates intentionality. You’re not just using a task manager; you’re designing your personal productivity system.

Why Taskwarrior Ultimately Failed Me

With all these strengths, why did I eventually stop using Taskwarrior after a few weeks? The answer is complex and personal, but I think it reveals important truths about what makes a task management system sustainable.

The Visibility Problem: I Couldn’t See Where I Was Going

This is the big one. Taskwarrior is excellent at showing me what tasks exist, what’s due, what’s blocked, and every other piece of metadata I could want. But it doesn’t show me where I’m going.

When I opened Taskwarrior, I saw a list of tasks. Even with custom reports, even with careful filtering, I was looking at items to complete rather than progress toward goals. There was no narrative arc, no visual sense of advancement, no “you’re 60% done with this project” feedback.

I could see that I had completed tasks. I could run reports showing completion rates. But these were statistics, not stories. They didn’t answer the fundamental question: “Am I making meaningful progress on the things that matter?”

This lack of outcome visibility meant that Taskwarrior felt like an inventory system rather than a navigation system. I knew what I had, but not where I was headed.

The Motivation Gap: No Built-In Reward System

Taskwarrior has no gamification. No points, no levels, no streaks, no badges. When you complete a task, you see a confirmation message, and the task disappears from your pending list. That’s it.

For some people, this purity is perfect. The satisfaction of completing work should be its own reward, and artificial gamification is unnecessary manipulation.

But for me, and I suspect for many people, those external motivators matter. Seeing my Karma increase in Todoist, watching my completion percentage rise, maintaining a streak – these things create psychological momentum that pure task completion doesn’t.

Taskwarrior treats every completed task the same. Whether I knocked out a five-minute email or finished a three-week project, the system’s response is identical: “Task completed.” The emotional flatness of this response meant I didn’t get the motivational boost that helps sustain long-term engagement.

The Context Switching Cost

This is subtle but important. When you use Taskwarrior, you’re leaving whatever you’re doing, opening a terminal, typing commands, and processing text output. Even though these actions are fast, they require a mental context switch.

For quick task capture, this friction can be a barrier. If I’m in the middle of writing and think “I should remember to email Sarah,” opening a terminal and typing task add "Email Sarah about project timeline" project:work +communication due:tomorrowbreaks my flow more than clicking a quick-add button in a GUI tool or using a global hotkey.

The irony is that Taskwarrior is objectively faster than most GUI tools, but the context switch makes it feel slower for in-the-moment task capture.

The Mobile Problem

I don’t always have access to a terminal. When I’m on my phone, walking around, or using a shared computer, Taskwarrior isn’t accessible. The mobile apps that sync with Taskwarrior exist but are third-party and less polished than the command-line interface.

This means my task system fractured. Some tasks went into Taskwarrior when I was at my desk. Others went into my phone’s notes or reminders when I was mobile. Then I had to manually consolidate them, which created friction and broke the capture habit.

For a task system to work for me, it needs to be universally accessible. Taskwarrior’s terminal-centric design makes this difficult.

The Review Problem: No Built-In Reflection

GTD emphasizes regular review of your task system. Taskwarrior can support this through custom reports, but it doesn’t encourage or structure it. There’s no “weekly review mode” that walks you through your projects, no prompt to reflect on completed work, no system for identifying tasks that have been pending too long.

I found myself accumulating tasks without regularly reviewing whether they still mattered. My task list grew but never got healthier. Taskwarrior would faithfully show me everything, but it wouldn’t help me ask: “Should this still be here?”

The Overwhelming Flexibility

This is perhaps the most paradoxical problem. Taskwarrior’s incredible flexibility meant I could configure it to work perfectly for me, but this also meant I spent more time configuring than doing.

I’d create custom reports, then refine them. I’d adjust my tagging system. I’d write hooks to automate workflows. I’d experiment with different priority schemes. All of this was intellectually satisfying, but it was also procrastination disguised as productivity.

The tool that was supposed to help me work became a project itself.

The Solo Experience

Taskwarrior is fundamentally a single-user system. While you can sync data and share it, there’s no native collaboration, no shared projects, no ability to assign tasks to others or see their progress.

In practice, much of my work involves other people. Some tasks are waiting on colleagues. Some projects are team efforts. Some deadlines are shared commitments.

Taskwarrior could track my individual pieces of these collaborative efforts, but it couldn’t represent the collaboration itself. This meant maintaining a disconnected view of work that’s actually interconnected.

Who Should Use Taskwarrior?

Despite its limitations for me, Taskwarrior is genuinely excellent for certain types of people and workflows. You should seriously consider Taskwarrior if:

You’re a Terminal Power User

If you already spend most of your day in the terminal, if you think in commands rather than clicks, if you value keyboard efficiency above all else, Taskwarrior will feel like home.

For developers, system administrators, writers who use Vim or Emacs, data scientists working in Jupyter or RStudio, and anyone else who lives in text-based interfaces, Taskwarrior integrates seamlessly into your existing workflow.

You Value Privacy and Data Ownership

If the idea of storing your tasks in someone else’s cloud makes you uncomfortable, if you want complete control over your data, if you prefer self-hosted solutions, Taskwarrior is one of the best options available.

Your tasks live in plain text files on your machine. You control the backups, the sync, and who has access. This level of sovereignty is increasingly rare.

You Want Programmability

If you’re comfortable writing scripts, if you want to automate your task management, if you see your task system as something to program rather than just use, Taskwarrior’s hooks and integration capabilities are unmatched.

You can build incredibly sophisticated workflows that would be impossible in most GUI tools.

You Work Solo

If most of your work is individual rather than collaborative, if you don’t need to share tasks or assign work to others, Taskwarrior’s single-user focus isn’t a limitation.

For independent consultants, freelancers, researchers, and solo entrepreneurs, Taskwarrior can be perfect.

You’re Self-Motivated

If you don’t need gamification or external rewards, if the satisfaction of completing good work is sufficient motivation, if you’re disciplined enough to maintain a task system without psychological tricks, Taskwarrior’s pure approach will appeal to you.

Some people find gamification manipulative or childish. For them, Taskwarrior’s straightforward “here are your tasks, now do them” philosophy is refreshing.

You’re Willing to Invest Setup Time

If you’re willing to spend hours or even days learning the system, reading documentation, experimenting with configurations, and building your perfect setup, Taskwarrior rewards this investment with a task management system tailored exactly to your needs.

This isn’t a tool you’ll master in an afternoon, but the mastery is genuinely valuable.

When to Avoid Taskwarrior

Conversely, Taskwarrior might not be right for you if:

You Need Mobile-First Access

If you primarily capture and process tasks on your phone, if you’re rarely at a desktop computer, if you need your task system available at all times regardless of device, the mobile experience with Taskwarrior is too limited.

You Want Visual Motivation

If you respond to progress bars, completion percentages, streak tracking, achievement badges, or other visual motivation systems, Taskwarrior’s text-only interface won’t satisfy this need.

You Need Team Collaboration

If your work is primarily collaborative, if you need to assign tasks to others, share projects, or see team progress, Taskwarrior’s single-user design is a fundamental limitation.

You Want Immediate Usability

If you want a tool you can start using productively within minutes, if you don’t want to read documentation or configure settings, if you prefer opinionated tools that just work out of the box, Taskwarrior’s flexibility requires too much upfront investment.

You’re Not Comfortable with Command Lines

This seems obvious, but it’s worth stating: if terminals intimidate you, if you strongly prefer graphical interfaces, if the idea of typing commands to manage tasks feels unnatural, Taskwarrior isn’t for you.

There’s no shame in this. Different people work differently.

Making Taskwarrior Work: Lessons Learned

Even though Taskwarrior ultimately didn’t become my permanent solution, I learned valuable lessons about what makes a task system sustainable. If you decide to try Taskwarrior, here’s my advice:

Start Simple, Add Complexity Gradually

Don’t try to build the perfect configuration on day one. Start with basic commands: add, list, done. Get comfortable with the fundamentals. Only add projects when you need them. Only create custom reports when the built-in ones become limiting.

The temptation with Taskwarrior is to over-engineer your setup because it’s so configurable. Resist this. Build your system organically as actual needs emerge.

Create a Daily Review Ritual

Schedule a specific time each day (I used end-of-workday) to review your task list. Run a report showing what you completed, what’s upcoming, and what’s overdue. This creates the reflection that Taskwarrior doesn’t enforce but absolutely requires.

Without regular review, your task list becomes a growing pile of noise.

Use Contexts Religiously

Define contexts for different modes of work and switch between them deliberately. This prevents overwhelm and creates focus.

I had contexts for: work, personal, planning (for weekly reviews), urgent (high-priority across all projects), and waiting (tasks blocked on others).

Combine with Timewarrior

The combination of task management and time tracking provides the outcome visibility that Taskwarrior alone lacks. When you can see not just what you completed but how long you spent on different categories of work, patterns emerge.

This data helps you understand where your time actually goes versus where you think it goes.

Build External Motivation Systems

Since Taskwarrior doesn’t have built-in gamification, create your own. Write a script that tracks weekly completion rates and sends you a summary email. Create a chart showing tasks completed over time. Build a streak tracker.

The scriptability means you can add the features you need.

Use Annotations Liberally

Don’t let task descriptions become paragraphs. Keep them concise, and use annotations to add context, notes, and updates. This keeps your task list scannable while preserving important information.

The Verdict: A Powerful Tool for the Right Person

Taskwarrior is brilliant software. It’s fast, flexible, private, and extraordinarily powerful. For terminal enthusiasts who value data ownership and programmability, it’s among the best task management tools ever created.

But it’s not for everyone, and that’s okay. Great tools can be wrong for particular people or workflows without being bad tools.

For me, Taskwarrior excelled at task tracking but failed at motivation and outcome visualization. It showed me what to do but not why it mattered or where I was going. The lack of built-in rewards and the terminal-only interface created friction that eventually broke my habit.

Yet I’m genuinely glad I spent those weeks with Taskwarrior. It taught me what I actually need from a task system: not just organization, but motivation, visibility, and a sense of progress toward meaningful outcomes.

If you’re considering Taskwarrior, I encourage you to try it, especially if you’re a terminal user. The 30-day trial costs nothing but time. Configure it thoughtfully, use it genuinely, and see if it matches your workflow.

It might be exactly what you need. Or it might teach you, as it taught me, what you actually need from a productivity system.

Either outcome is valuable.

Resources and Next Steps

If you want to explore Taskwarrior:

• Official website: taskwarrior.org
• Documentation: taskwarrior.org/docs
• Community forum: Groups discussion boards
• GitHub: github.com/GothenburgBitFactory/taskwarrior

Consider also exploring:

• Timewarrior for time tracking
• Vit or Taskwarrior-tui for visual interfaces
• Bugwarrior for integrating external issue trackers

And remember: the best productivity system is the one you’ll actually use consistently. Taskwarrior might be that system for you, or it might help you discover what you really need. Both outcomes are worth the exploration.