A Notion alternative for just your to-do list
Using Notion for your to-do list and finding it heavy? Notion is a powerful workspace of docs and databases, and its free plan is generous, but a daily task list in it means loading a database and maintaining a system you built. NanoDo is a free iPhone app that does the opposite: three things a day, on your lock screen, with nothing to build. Pro is a one-time €4.99.
| NanoDo | Notion | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free · €4.99 Pro | Free plan; Plus ~$10/mo |
| One-time, no subscription | Yes | No |
| Works without an account | Yes | No |
| Daily three-things ritual | Yes | No |
| Lock-screen focus task (Live Activity) | Yes | No |
| Beyond Apple (Android, Windows) | No | Yes |
| Projects, labels & power features | No | Yes |
Where Notion is the better choice
Notion is the better choice if you want one place for notes, wikis, databases and projects, and you enjoy building the system that holds them. For teams and for people who like to design their own tools, little else is as flexible, and the free plan covers most personal use.
Where NanoDo fits
NanoDo fits if you only ever used Notion for a task list and the rest was overhead. It is prebuilt and unchangeable on purpose: three things a day, on your lock screen. The app is free, and Pro is a one-time €4.99.
Notion can be a to-do list, but it isn't one
Notion is a workspace: pages, databases, templates, relations. You can absolutely build a task manager in it, and plenty of people do, with a database, a couple of views and some properties. The strength is that it bends to almost any shape you can imagine. The cost is that you have to imagine the shape, build it, and then open a fairly heavy app to a database every time you want to jot down three things. For notes and projects that flexibility is a real gift. For a daily list it can be a lot of app wrapped around a short list.
Building a system versus being handed one
The deeper difference is who does the work. Notion hands you a blank, endlessly flexible canvas; the system is yours to design and to keep tidy, and tinkering with it can quietly become the task instead of the tasks. NanoDo hands you a finished object with almost nothing to set: three slots, a lock-screen task, a fresh day tomorrow. You cannot reshape it, which is the whole point. On the days you just want to do the three things rather than improve the system that tracks them, unchangeable stops being a limitation and starts being a relief.
When to keep Notion
If your tasks live next to your notes, your wiki and your projects, splitting them into a separate app is a step backwards, and you should keep Notion. NanoDo does not sync with it, import from it or replace it. It is only the right move for the narrow, common case where Notion had quietly become both the place you kept a to-do list and the reason the list felt like work. If that is you, a small single-purpose app on your lock screen is a relief. If it is not, Notion's free plan is genuinely hard to argue with.