Things 3 vs Apple Reminders: which should you use on your Mac?

How much do Things 3 and Apple Reminders cost?

Reminders comes with every Mac, iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch, so it costs nothing. Things is a one-time purchase on each platform, with no subscription, and its sync service is free.

Buy Things for all three devices and you pay $79.97 in the US, once. It supports Family Sharing, so people in your family group can use your purchase at no extra cost. Prices differ by country, so check Things’ official store page before you buy. Things for Mac needs macOS 13.3 or later.

The hidden cost of Reminders is that its best features depend on iCloud. More on that under sync, below.

Which is faster for adding tasks?

Apple Reminders: type the date into the reminder

In Reminders, you write a reminder the way you’d say it, like “Pay bills on Saturday” or “Water the plants every Wednesday at 5 p.m.”, then click the date suggestion that appears. This is built in and doesn’t need Apple Intelligence.

What Reminders lacks is a capture window that pops up over any app. On macOS Tahoe 26 and later, Spotlight fills part of that gap: press ⌘Space, start typing, and run the Add Reminder action. Spotlight also lets you give actions short Quick Keys, and Apple’s own example is “ar” for Add Reminder. Siri can add reminders, too.

Things 3: Quick Entry from anywhere

Things is built around quick capture. Press ⌃Space in any app and the Quick Entry window appears. Type the to-do, save it, and you’re straight back to what you were doing. Turn on Quick Entry with Autofill in Things › Settings › Quick Entry (it asks you to install a small helper app), and ⌃⌥Space also saves a link to the Safari page, Mail message, or Finder file in front of you. You can change both shortcuts there.

The trade-off: Things doesn’t pick dates out of the title. Natural language works in the When field (⌘S) and the Deadline field (⇧⌘D), where shorthand like tues 8am or 17d (17 days from today) works. Since macOS Tahoe 26, Spotlight can create Things to-dos as well.

So Things wins for grabbing a thought in the middle of something else, and Reminders wins for typing a task and its date in one line.

How do Things and Reminders organize your tasks?

Things 3: Areas, Projects, and headings

Things gives you a clear hierarchy. Areas hold the big parts of your life, like Work or Family. Projects sit inside areas, show a small progress pie, and can be split into phases or milestones with headings. Each to-do can have a checklist, tags, Markdown notes, a When date for when you plan to start, and a separate Deadline.

Day to day, you work from Today, with a This Evening part for later, Upcoming for the week ahead, and Someday for ideas on hold. Today and Upcoming can also show events from the calendars you choose, so your plan and your schedule sit side by side.

Apple Reminders: lists, sections, and Smart Lists

Reminders is flatter but flexible. You make lists, gather them into groups, split them into sections, and switch any list to a Kanban-style column view (macOS Sonoma 14 and later). Reminders can have subtasks, tags, flags, priorities, dates, and locations, and custom Smart Lists collect everything that matches the rules you set. Grocery lists sort items into categories on their own, and since macOS Sequoia 15 your reminders also show up in Calendar.

If you think in projects with phases, Things’ structure fits better. If you mostly juggle lists, like errands, groceries, and a handful of work tasks, Reminders already does the job.

What’s new in Reminders in macOS Tahoe 26 and macOS 27?

Reminders picked up useful features in the last two releases, most of them tied to Apple Intelligence on supported Macs.

• Suggested reminders (macOS Tahoe 26 and later): share text from another app, like a recipe in Safari or action items in an email, to Reminders, and Apple Intelligence suggests reminders you can add one at a time or all at once.
• Auto-Categorize (macOS Tahoe 26 and later): choose File › Auto-Categorize, and related reminders are sorted into sections within the list.
• Spotlight actions (macOS Tahoe 26 and later): add a reminder from Spotlight without opening the app.
• “Describe a reminder” on iPhone: iOS 27 fills in a reminder’s date, time, and place from a plain description. Apple’s macOS 27 Reminders guide doesn’t list it for the Mac, so don’t count on it there yet.

The Apple Intelligence features need a supported Mac and a supported language and region. Apple’s Reminders guide has the current details.

Things moved forward too. On macOS Tahoe 26, its New To-Do and List controls can live in Control Center or be pinned to the menu bar, Spotlight can create to-dos, and its widgets follow the new Clear and Tinted styles.

Widgets, the menu bar, and notifications on Mac

Since macOS Sonoma 14, both apps put interactive widgets on your desktop, so you can check off a reminder or a to-do without opening anything. Here’s how the rest of the Mac experience compares.

In Things, a reminder belongs to the When date, not the deadline. If a task has a hard due date and you want a nudge, set a When date with a time as well.

If the point is to see your list without opening an app, a widget is the easiest win with either one. Our guide to putting a to-do list on your Mac desktop walks through the options, and menu bar to-do lists for Mac covers the menu bar.

Sharing, sync, and privacy

Sharing

This is the clearest difference. Reminders can share a list with other iCloud users who’ve updated their reminders. Once they accept, everyone can add and edit, and you can assign reminders to people on the list. Things has no shared lists or assigned to-dos. It’s built for one person.

Sync and accounts

Reminders syncs through iCloud with your Apple Account, across Mac, iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, and iCloud.com. Smart Lists, subtasks, tags, list groups, and sharing need updated iCloud reminders, a one-way upgrade, and reminders kept in Google, Exchange, or Yahoo accounts miss some features. Apple explains the upgrade. If you’d rather not lean on iCloud, see what works in Reminders without iCloud.

Things syncs through Things Cloud, which is free and needs only an email address (there’s no Sign in with Apple). On a single device, you don’t need an account at all. Things runs only on Apple devices, with no Windows, Android, or web app.

Privacy

With iCloud’s standard protection, Reminders data is encrypted in transit and on Apple’s servers, with Apple holding the keys. Turn on Advanced Data Protection and Reminders becomes end-to-end encrypted. Cultured Code says Things Cloud encrypts your data in transit and at rest on its servers.

Things 3 or Apple Reminders: which should you choose?

Choose Apple Reminders if…

• You share lists with a partner, family, or roommates.
• You want alerts when you arrive at or leave a place.
• You’d rather not pay, and you already use iCloud.
• You sometimes need your list on a Windows PC, through iCloud.com.
• Your tasks are mostly errands, groceries, and simple to-dos.

Choose Things 3 if…

• You plan your own projects and like Areas, Projects, and headings.
• You want a start date and a separate deadline for each task.
• You capture a lot from other apps and want links saved with it.
• You use only Apple devices and are happy to pay once.
• You never need to share a list.

Switching from Reminders to Things

Things for Mac can import everything at once: choose File › Import › Import From Reminders. Your reminders stay where they are in Reminders. Lists become projects and due dates become When dates, but repeat schedules, flags, priorities, image attachments, and location alerts don’t come across, and lists inside list groups don’t import (drag them out of the group first). The 15-day trial gives you time to test it on real work.

If neither feels right

Maybe you need your list on Android or Windows too, or you want neither a paid planner nor iCloud. Our roundup of Apple Reminders alternatives for Mac compares seven options, and how to choose a to-do app for Mac covers what to look for.

In MacTodo: To-dos are free and stay on your Mac, with no account. Type “Pay rent monthly !! #Work” into the to-do list, see today in the menu bar, add from any app with ⌃⌥Space, and check things off with to-do widgets on your Mac desktop. There’s no iPhone app and no shared lists, so it only suits a list that lives on your Mac. If you use Things too, its Quick Entry with Autofill also defaults to ⌃⌥Space, so change one of them in Settings.