Top 6 Productivity Apps as Your LifeOS

Brief Summary

This video presents a selection of apps designed to serve as a "life OS," helping users manage tasks, notes, habits, relationships, and long-term planning in a centralized manner. It covers Lunatask, ByDesign, Craft, Twos, Me.bot, and TimeStripe, detailing their unique features, strengths, and target users.

• Lunatask: Combines task management, notes, habit tracking, journaling, and relationship management.
• ByDesign: Integrates notes, to-dos, and calendar with a focus on simplicity and natural language input.
• Craft: A visually appealing alternative to Notion with local AI capabilities.
• Twos: A free, highly customizable note-taking app with AI integration.
• Me.bot: An AI-driven tool that manages to-dos and notes, automatically categorizing and linking them.
• TimeStripe: Focuses on long-term life planning using a timeline view.

Intro

The video introduces the concept of a "life OS" as a single tool to capture ideas, manage commitments, and plan time efficiently, avoiding the need to switch between multiple apps. The presenter will share some of his favorite apps that can serve as your life OS.

Lunatask

Lunatask is presented as an all-in-one tool that combines a task manager, notes, habit tracker, journal, and relationship manager. Its task manager is clean and intuitive, allowing users to create areas for personal, work, and family goals with deadlines. Lunatask offers flexibility with task management methods like priority lists, Kanban, and the Eisenhower matrix. It also features a daily calendar with drag-and-drop scheduling and a scratchpad for quick notes. While it lacks advanced features like tables and bidirectional linking, it includes a habit tracker, journal, and a relationship tracker to manage personal contacts.

ByDesign

ByDesign is highlighted for its simplicity and integration of notes, to-dos, and calendar functions. The home screen provides a clear overview of the day's tasks, calendar events, and habits, including overdue tasks. A progress bar motivates users to complete their task list. Note-taking is integrated with task management, allowing users to attach files, create checklists, and build simple databases. Documents can be organized by folders and tags. Tasks can be scheduled by dragging and dropping them onto the calendar, which offers various viewing modes. The app supports natural language input for setting task details, and includes AI-powered goal planning that adjusts plans based on missed tasks. It is available for $4 a month with annual billing or $6 monthly.

Craft

Craft is described as a well-designed alternative to Notion, allowing users to create documents with customizable styles and fonts. For task management, to-dos can be added to the inbox or created within documents with deadlines and reminders. The calendar allows users to drag and drop tasks to build their schedule. Craft's AI assistant, with local LLM, runs AI features on the device, helping users organize documents and generate task lists without sending data to external servers. It is recommended for those seeking more power and flexibility than Apple Notes and Reminders.

Twos

Twos is presented as a free, simple note-taking app similar to Google Keep, with more features than it appears to have at first glance. Its core is a daily note where users can jot down memories, tasks, or events. For larger projects, Twos allows users to create lists that function as project notes. It also includes a calendar that displays schedules with to-dos and events. The app features AI integration for explaining concepts, breaking down tasks, correcting grammar, and providing smart suggestions. It also offers an AI chat feature for summarizing notes or extracting specific information. Despite being free, Twos is highly customizable but can be overwhelming due to its unique interface.

Me.bot

Me.bot is introduced as an AI-driven tool similar to ChatGPT that manages to-dos and notes. Users can input thoughts, ideas, plans, and tasks, which Me.bot automatically categorizes. Journal entries are labeled as moments or thoughts, while tasks are converted into to-dos with start dates and reminders. The app offers assistance in completing tasks, such as suggesting restaurants for dinner plans. Its note-taking capabilities include analyzing and connecting notes, identifying patterns and links between ideas, and providing summaries of relevant entries. Me.bot also organizes notes by topics and identifies important people, creating folders for them.

TimeStripe

TimeStripe takes an interesting approach to life management by focusing on time horizons rather than daily tasks. It allows users to plan their lives across different time scales, from daily tasks to life goals. The timeline view visualizes the entire life plan, and users can create different boards for various areas of life or projects, using available templates. It is suitable for both task management and note-taking. While it may take time to learn, TimeStripe is ideal for strategic life planning and those who prefer a long-term approach to organizing their lives.