A thorough comparison of three powerful productivity apps — which will take the throne?
A thorough comparison of three powerful productivity apps — which will take the throne?
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Sep 5, 2024
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There are literally hundreds of productivity apps, but some of the biggest players in this field are Notion and Obsidian.
Anytype, on the other hand, isn’t as well-known, but it’s definitely growing in popularity, so I’ve decided to include it in this little comparison to answer the big question:
What is the best productivity app?
The plan
First, we’ll run through the overall core features of each app, just to get a feel for their major similarities and differences.
Then, we’ll put all three of them to the test and see how they actually function, how easy they are to work with, their intuitiveness, and their structure.
How will I do that?
Well, I’ve written out a structure for an average person’s productivity/note-taking needs, and I’m going to create that structure in all three apps.
After that, I’ll tell you how long it took, how easy it was, what features helped, etc.
And then, at the very end, I’ll give you my verdict on which one wins the title of ultimate productivity app.
Let’s start.
A bird’s eye view
First off, Notion
Let me make something clear really fast: I’ve been using Notion for multiple years. I have never used Obsidian or Anytype before.
Does that make me a bit biased? Will it definitely be easier for me to craft the test-page in Notion than in the other apps? Well, yes to both.
But after using Notion for so long, pushing it to it’s limits and finding those limits, I’m starting to branch out, to explore, to see if maybe there’s an app out there so good it’s worth it to switch over.
Anyways, if you don’t know what Notion is, here’s the rundown:
- The Gist: Notion is a productivity/note-taking app that utilizes blocks, databases, and pages so you can build whatever workflow you want.
- Pricing: Freemium — the free plan is pretty much everything you need on an individual level, but if you want to use it for teams, you’ll probably have to upgrade($10/month for Plus, $15/month for Business)
- Platforms: Browser/website(which I personally use), desktop app(Mac and Windows), mobile app(Apple and Android)
- Strengths: Powerful and feature-rich, minimalistic and easily-customizable interface, constantly adapting and adding features, sync across devices
- Weaknesses: Weak security(shouldn’t store sensitive information here), no official offline mode(some offline functionality for already-loaded pages), can be laggy(especially on the mobile app)
If you want to learn more about Notion, I have a whole playlist of articles on it, or you can start here.
Now onto Obsidian
Obsidian is what you could call Notion’s arch nemesis — they’re always being compared to one another, with the sheer amount of Notion vs Obsidian articles probably enough to fill a 10-book series.
They’re pretty similar in that people use them for organizing ideas, projects, and notes, but they also have different functions.
Some say that Obsidian is better for longer-form works and personal learning, while Notion is a better platform for sharing and short drafts.
Others see Notion as a more all-in-one app, while Obsidian is much more targeted for note-taking and learning, for grasping concepts, not building systems.
- The Gist: A note-taking and idea-holding app that allows you to record and explore your thoughts(called notes), which are all connected to each other(visible through a graph).
- Pricing: Freemium — free for personal use, and $50/year for commercial use(which comes down to a little over $4 per month); you can purchase add-ons like sync($4/month) and publishing your sites($8/month)
- Platforms: Desktop app(Mac, Windows, and Linux), mobile app(Apple and Android)
- Strengths: Stored on your device(for offline use and more security), hundreds of community-made plugins, can think in a more natural ‘non-linear’ way
- Weaknesses: Have to pay to sync across devices or publish your ‘site’, poor multi-user functionality, can be confusing and code-heavy
Finally, Anytype
Anytype, which released in June of 2023(7 years after Notion and 3 years after Obsidian), is an app centered around ‘trust and autonomy’.
What do they mean by that? Well, all your data is stored in your ‘vault’ on your device, locked by an encryption key so no one can access it(even you, if you forget your key!).
While I’m not a computer guru and half of the words on their website don’t make sense to me(peer-to-peer sync on local networks???), I get the overall message: your data, your computer, no one stealing anything.
- The Gist: Productivity app pretty similar to Notion with databases(called collections), views, and pages, but decentralized(again, don’t really know what that means…) and far more secure; object-based
- Pricing: Freemium — free ‘explorer’ plan with limits, and $99/year for a ‘builder’ plan for more features
- Platforms: desktop app(Mac, Windows, Linux), mobile app(Apple and Android)
- Strengths: Super secure, open-source/code, extremely fast loading times, beautiful interface, local
- Weaknesses: pretty complicated/learning curve, if you lose your key, you lose everything
Time for testing
Now that we’ve brushed over the highlights of each app, it’s time to put them to the test and actually use them.
This is the structure I will be trying to build in each app:
Essentially, I’ll have a dashboard/home page/hub that connects to a notes page/idea bank and a projects page.
In the projects page will be all my projects, which will have my tasks for each project, which will combine to a master to-do list in my dashboard.
First, let’s start with Notion.
Test 1: Notion
Unsurprisingly, setting up this workflow in Notion took under 10 minutes.
Here’s the finished product:
Yeah, it’s not too pretty, but customizing Notion is a whole time-consuming beast of it’s own.
Here’s how I set it up:
First, I created a Dashboard page(shown above).
Then, in that Dashboard, I created a Notes page:
It’s just a table database with a few basic properties, and I also created a very barebones notes template.
That was it for the Notes — for the projects, I created a ‘Projects’ page that also had a database.
And, like the Notes, I created a template for projects.
The only semi-advanced part of this structure, which I intentionally built into this test-workflow to see how apps could function beyond just the basics, is the to-do list.
There’s a master to-do list on the Dashboard page, and it’s also in every project.
Each project is filtered to only show it’s own tasks, so by clicking on ‘Project A’ you will only see Project A’s tasks.
However, to get an overall look at all tasks, you can go to the Dashboard.
Yes, there’s a lot of functionality missing from this setup, but it is a pretty functional skeleton for what could be a full workflow.
Observations
Again, I’ve used Notion for years, so this was far from my first experience with it.
It’s a solid, fairly intuitive, and pretty powerful app, and while there are a lot of features, you only need a handful of them(create pages, create databases and properties, and maybe use relations) to create most setups.
If Notion sounds interesting to you, read this guide to setting up your own full Notion setup, where I go much more in-depth into the nitty gritty features.
Test 2: Obsidian
First opening up Obsidian is scary — it gave me flashbacks to the overwhelming fear of when I first started using Notion.
I had to use this 12-minute video(highly recommend it!) to get me started, but once I did, I was able to build the above workflow in about 20–25 minutes.
So, in total, everything took around 45 minutes, from watching the video to building the workflow to just finicking around with the software, lost and confused.
I started with a simple ‘home’ file(because my Notion-dashboard instincts are now hard-wired into me), and from there, just kept creating.
I definitely didn’t touch on all the features, but I got a pretty good feel for the software and was able to create a good amount of connections and notes/files.
With my notes, it kind of went crazy — while in a platform like Notion, you can organize your notes in one database, Obsidian setups are pretty much entirely notes, which makes it hard to compartmentalize.
That’s okay, though. Different apps don’t just call for different features, but entirely different structures, systems, and organization mindsets. More on that below.
For the projects, I was able to kind of organize it, with each project having it’s own note.
In order to create the to-do list functionality, I looked toward this article, and basically just ended up creating a to-do list note that linked to my projects.
There were definitely better ways to build a task management system, but they required more complicated things like plugins, so I just kept it simple.
(In the future, however, I’ll probably dive way deeper into Obsidian and it’s features.)
Observations
Let me just start with this: Notion and Obsidian are not the same.
They are, in fact, two very different apps, and it’s surprising to me that they’re compared to each other so often.
Of course, I’ve heard the whole ‘They’re really different’ spiel before, but I’d never actually believed it — until I tried Obsidian.
Here’s the thing.
Think of your brain. It has all these ideas, these thoughts, all connected to each other in weird, weird ways(think of your train of thought and how random it is).
With Notion, you’re taking that web of thoughts and flattening it, streamlining it, compressing it into something more understandable and simple — that’s what I’m used to.
With Obsidian, you’re laying your thoughts out. You’re not trying to simplify your mind, you’re simply placing it into an external software.
It’s honestly a bit mind-blowing. You use your mind in a whole different way.
Transitioning from Notion to Obsidian is like going from a city with dozens of neatly interconnected streets to an open, sprawling field — there’s less rigidity, less features, it’s just a lot more open.
And of course the pinnacle of that is the graph feature.
Creating the notes and linking them to each other — that was pretty fun. Opening up the graph view after a few minutes of note-creation and seeing what I had made?
Amazing.
Test 3: Anytype
Learning(I watched this video) and creating with Anytype took about half an hour — and let me just say, it was one of the most confusing 30 minutes of my life.
More on that in the observations.
My setup consisted of a ‘Home’ page that was connected to a ‘Notes’ set(basically a bunch of objects filtered by type, like project, notes, pages, etc.).
I once again created a very basic Notes template:
For my Projects, it’s simply a collection(like a database in Notion)
Each project opens up to it’s own ‘Project’ page where I added some tasks.
This is the cool part — all the tasks across your whole setup go into one little ‘Tasks’ widget on your sidebar.
That was probably my favorite feature in Anytype — no fancy relations needed, my must-have for productivity workflows was already built in.
Observations
Anytype is like finished Notion with some Obsidian mixed in.
Let me explain.
The features — down to the ‘/’ for adding in stuff — are very, very similar to Notion, and as a Notion-user I was able to do some stuff intuitively.
But it’s not just a Notion-copy — it also has it’s own features, namely the Tasks widget, that make it feel like Notion got ‘finished’, got completed, with core features that the real Notion doesn’t have.
Oh, and it also has a graph view pretty much just like Obsidian.
Okay, well, then if it’s so similar to Notion, which I’ve used for years, and Obsidian, which I just learned, then why did I say it was ‘the most confusing 30 minutes of my life’?
Good question.
Here’s the thing — the learning curve is steep.
I’m not even exactly sure why, but it’s just the little things. It took me way too long to discover how to link things to each other(type ‘@’ to mention objects inside other objects), for example.
However, while the learning ‘curve’ feels more like a vertical line, once I overcame it, everything just clicked.
It was like 25 minutes absolute struggle, 5 minutes absolute euphoria.
After you get used to the various features, keyboard shortcuts, buttons, basic concepts, it becomes one of the most intuitive things ever.
It just takes a bit of time to get there.
One more thing — while yes, Anytype’s interface is great, there are some features that I really love, and it’s very intuitive once you get a hang of it, there’s just something about it that doesn’t click with me.
I…don’t really like it.
Now, of course, everyone has different preferences, different subconscious organization methods that will click better with different softwares, but for me, I don’t think Anytype’s the one.
Final Verdict
Wow. We took a look at three productivity apps and created setups in each of them.
That was a lot.
Now, though, comes the big reveal: which one was the best?
First, I’ll give the answer that you probably don’t want, but probably need.
It really, really just depends.
They are different apps.
It’s less like deciding which computer model to buy, and more like choosing if you want a computer, phone, or tablet.
- Notion is for people who want to be very organized in a clean-cut, easily navigate able manner. It’s more for project management.
- Obsidian is for people who want to explore themselves, who want to be able to map out their thoughts and stumble upon new connections — note-taking, and maybe content creation. It’s less simple to navigate, but much more natural.
- Anytype is both a mix of Notion and Obsidian and an entirely different beast. With a steep learning curve paired with strangely incredible intuitiveness, it’s like a Notion sibling — similar, but different. Same, but not. And also it’s own entire being.
Now, let me tell you another answer, one that might satisfy you more. It answers a slightly different question: Which one did I like the most?
And I have a very definitive answer for you, an answer that honestly really surprises me.
Obsidian.
I loved using Obsidian.
It just felt so amazing, so liberating, so freeing.
Now, am I going to be migrating to Obsidian? Am I leaving Notion for Obsidian?
Well, no. Probably not(although Obsidian does have an awesome Importer feature I might look into).
Two reasons: one, I’m not dissatisfied with Notion. It’s a perfectly good app that is fulfilling all the things I want it to fulfill. I don’t have any desire to leave it.
And two, Obsidian and Notion are two really different apps. They require different workflows, and most importantly, different organization views and philosophies.
So while I’m very enamored and interested in the Obsidian-organization-way, I am still, at heart, a Notioner. Changing to Obsidian would be more than just switching apps, but switching how I think.
And I’m not quite yet ready to do that.
Hopefully, this article helped you learn a bit more about these three softwares, and maybe helped you decide which one you want to use(or change to!).
If you’re still not sure, just remember that you’re not marrying one of these apps — they’re all free to try, so in theory, you can try them all.
Experiment, learn, research, and see which one best fits you, your workflow, and your organization philosophy.
