Task & Project Management
4.3/5.0
VerifiedPaidLast technical review:
Markdown for AI (.md)

Things

Personal task manager and project organizer for the Apple ecosystem.

Score

4.3/5

Last technical review
2026-10-28
Available plansVisit website (opens in a new tab)

Technical Overview

Things is a personal task and project manager designed specifically for macOS, iOS, iPadOS, watchOS, and visionOS. It helps organize daily activities, structure complex projects using areas and tags, and plan workdays with a dedicated today view. Its architecture prioritizes local execution speed and a minimalist interface, distributed through direct purchases on official Apple app stores without traditional monthly subscriptions.

Analyst Evaluation: Pros and Limitations

Verified Advantages

  • Extremely smooth and fast user interface across Apple devices
  • Clear hierarchical structure for projects, areas, and recurring tasks
  • Encrypted native synchronization via Things Cloud

Technical Considerations

  • Available exclusively for the Apple ecosystem with no web or Windows client
  • Separate platform licensing model without unified multi-platform plans

Technical Capabilities & Features

1/7
Not available:REST & GraphQL API
Not available:SSO / SAML Authentication
Not available:Self-Hosted Option
Included:Full Data Export
Not available:Role-Based Access Control (RBAC)
Not available:Custom Domains & SSL
Not available:Immutable Audit Logs
Scorecard
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Technical Scorecard: Things

83/100
DX & Tech Documentation
Excellent
85/100
Pricing Fairness
Favorable
75/100
Security & Governance
Excellent
80/100
Data Portability & Sovereignty
Excellent
85/100
Performance & Reliability
Excellent
90/100

Time to Value & Fit by Segment: Things

Estimated Time-to-Value< 1 hour (Immediate)

Near-instantaneous deployment with minimal technical friction.

Learning CurveLow (Intuitive)

Rapid onboarding for developers without prior training required.

Fit Index by Organization Size

Startup & Agile Teams1 to 50 members
90%
Mid-Market & Scaleup50 to 500 members
60%
Corporate Enterprise500+ members
30%
Pricing & TCO
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Pricing

Contact Sales/mo

Model: PAID.

Get Things (opens in a new tab)

Billing Risks & Hidden Clauses: Things

Audited Billing Critical Points:
  • Separate purchases required for Mac, iPad, and iPhone versions.
Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) Projection: ThingsPAID
Deterministic cost estimation at 12 and 36 months based on team size, including SSO tax premiums and annual prepay discounts.
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Indie / Solo (1 active user)

Solo developer or independent technical founder.

Base Monthly Cost
$12/month
1 active user
12-Month Investment
$122/year
Includes ~15% savings via annual billing
3-Year TCO Projection (36m)
$366total
Consolidated software licensing expenditure

Estimated Self-Hosted VPS + DevOps Cost

Break-Even Point: Profitable starting at 3 active users

Calculated infrastructure: VPS 1 vCPU / 2GB RAM (~$5) + 0.5h DevOps/mes ($20)

Annual VPS + DevOps Cost$300/year
Differential vs SaaS LicensingSaaS is $178/year
Startup (10 active users)

Agile engineering team in validation and early traction stage.

Base Monthly Cost
$120/month
10 active users
12-Month Investment
$1,224/year
Includes ~15% savings via annual billing
3-Year TCO Projection (36m)
$3,672total
Consolidated software licensing expenditure

Estimated Self-Hosted VPS + DevOps Cost

Break-Even Point: Profitable starting at 10 active users

Calculated infrastructure: VPS 2 vCPU / 8GB RAM (~$15) + 2h DevOps/mes ($80)

Annual VPS + DevOps Cost$1,140/year
Differential vs SaaS LicensingSavings of $84/year
Growth (25 active users)

Scaling company with team governance and granular access control requirements.

Base Monthly Cost
$300/month
25 active users
12-Month Investment
$3,060/year
Includes ~15% savings via annual billing
3-Year TCO Projection (36m)
$9,180total
Consolidated software licensing expenditure

Estimated Self-Hosted VPS + DevOps Cost

Break-Even Point: Profitable starting at 28 active users

Calculated infrastructure: Cluster VPS 4 vCPU / 16GB RAM (~$45) + 6h DevOps/mes ($240)

Annual VPS + DevOps Cost$3,420/year
Differential vs SaaS LicensingSaaS is $360/year
Scaleup (100 active users)

Established organization with enterprise security policies and mandatory SAML/SSO.

Base Monthly Cost
$1,200/month
100 active users
12-Month Investment
$12,240/year
Includes ~15% savings via annual billing
3-Year TCO Projection (36m)
$36,720total
Consolidated software licensing expenditure

Estimated Self-Hosted VPS + DevOps Cost

Break-Even Point: Profitable starting at 78 active users

Calculated infrastructure: Infraestructura HA redundante + Backups (~$150) + 16h DevOps/mes ($640)

Annual VPS + DevOps Cost$9,480/year
Differential vs SaaS LicensingSavings of $2,760/year
Usage Surcharges & Bill Shock Simulator: ThingsWhat usage costs as you scale
Detect overage penalties before they impact engineering budget.
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Prototype / MVP (10 GB)

Included base quota in plan: 20 GB.
Low Risk / Predictable Bill
Base Monthly Rate
$20/mo
Fixed subscription or contracted tier
Overage Penalty
$0/month extra
Usage covered within plan quota
Estimated Monthly Invoice
$20/mo
Total monthly cost before taxes
Technical Mitigation Recommendation:

Suitable for development; verify concurrent connection limits.

Base Production (50 GB)

Included base quota in plan: 20 GB.
Low Risk / Predictable Bill
Base Monthly Rate
$20/mo
Fixed subscription or contracted tier
Overage Penalty
+$5/month extra
Variable surcharge for consumption above plan quota
Estimated Monthly Invoice
$25/mo
Total monthly cost before taxes
Technical Mitigation Recommendation:

Implement table compression policies and temporal partitioning.

Active Growth (250 GB)

Included base quota in plan: 20 GB.
High Risk / Accelerated Overages
Base Monthly Rate
$20/mo
Fixed subscription or contracted tier
Overage Penalty
+$41/month extra
Variable surcharge for consumption above plan quota
Estimated Monthly Invoice
$61/mo
Total monthly cost before taxes
Technical Mitigation Recommendation:

Offload cold backups to standard object storage (S3).

Large Scale (1.000 GB (1 TB))

Included base quota in plan: 20 GB.
Critical Risk / Severe Bill Shock
Base Monthly Rate
$20/mo
Fixed subscription or contracted tier
Overage Penalty
+$176/month extra
Variable surcharge for consumption above plan quota
Estimated Monthly Invoice
$196/mo
Total monthly cost before taxes
Technical Mitigation Recommendation:

Migrate to dedicated instance or self-hosted cluster to curtail I/O fees.

Procurement Strategy & Discounts: ThingsB2B Negotiation Playbook
Corporate executive level with highest authority to approve budgetary exceptions.
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Fair Market Price & B2B Procurement Benchmark

Non-renewal notice: No contract lock-inMedian achieved discount: -12%
Public List Price
Custom / Contact
100% baseline
Audited Market Average
-12% median
~88% of list price
Optimized Target Price
-20% target
Max achievable discount (Q4 / multi-year): -20%
Security & Data Exit
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Compliance & Security Standards: Things

SOC 2 Type IINot reported
ISO 27001Not reported
GDPR / RGPDNot reported
HIPAANot reported
PCI-DSSNot reported
Jurisdiction & Legal Sovereignty
🇩🇪Germany [DE]Immune to US CLOUD Act (EU Sovereign)DPA On Request
SSO Availability (SAML Enterprise)
No SSO Documented
Data Residency
USEUApple
AI Privacy Policy
Not evaluated
Data Liberation & Migration Runbook: ThingsJSON · TXT
Actionable escape runbook and credential export guarantees to mitigate vendor lock-in.
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Supported Structured Export Formats
JSONTXT
Password Hash Portability
Locked: Proprietary Algorithm / No Export

Credential hashes are guarded under proprietary algorithms and cannot be exported.

CLI Command / Rescue Endpoint
Admin Console -> Workspace Export
Exit Protocol & Migration Notes

Standard workspace data export in tabular and JSON formats.

Deployment & Infrastructure Requirements: ThingsDocker
Hardware specs and Docker directives to run on local servers, dedicated VPS, or Kubernetes without telemetry leak to the cloud.
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Minimum Memory1 GB RAM (Recommended)
Compute CPU1 vCPU
Runtime / LanguageTypeScript / Go / Rust
Code LicenseOpen Source
Docker CLI Directive
docker run -d --name things -p 8080:8080 things:latest
Companion Services & Dependencies:
PostgreSQL 15+Redis 7+
Community & Repository
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Technical Reputation of Things

80/100 Technical Trust

Frequent Praises in Production

  • Extremely smooth and fast user interface across Apple devices
  • Clear hierarchical structure for projects, areas, and recurring tasks
  • Encrypted native synchronization via Things Cloud

Reported Production Frictions

  • Available exclusively for the Apple ecosystem with no web or Windows client
  • Separate platform licensing model without unified multi-platform plans
Commercial Treatment & Vendor Lock-in:Self-Service in Dashboard

Cancellation flow is autonomous via billing portal or subscription settings.

Frequently Asked Technical Questions (Things)

Is Things available for Windows or Android systems?

No, Things is developed exclusively for Apple operating systems including Mac, iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, and Apple Vision Pro, with no web version or native client for Windows or Android.

How does synchronization work across different devices?

It uses a proprietary service called Things Cloud to automatically encrypt and synchronize tasks and projects across all applications installed on your Apple devices.

Does it require a recurring monthly subscription payment?

It does not use a monthly subscription model. Each application for Mac, iPhone, or iPad is acquired through an independent one-time purchase tied to the respective App Store.

Direct Alternatives

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