Tasks and voice
AI task managers: what they really do differently
"AI" in a to-do app means one of five things: parsing what you type, scheduling it on your calendar, prioritising, reminding, or sorting messy input. Most apps do one or two well. This page says which.
- Six apps compared on what the AI actually does: Todoist, Microsoft To Do, Google Tasks via Gemini, Motion, Reclaim and Amili (private beta). Features and prices checked on vendor pages, October 2026.
- Todoist and Microsoft To Do parse dates from text; Motion and Reclaim move tasks onto your calendar; Gemini adds tasks by conversation; Amili sorts a spoken sentence into do or remember.
- No app yet knows what matters to you without being told. The last section is honest about that.
- This page is about to-do apps, not the Windows Task Manager.
What "AI" means in a to-do app
The phrase covers five different jobs, and an app that does one is often sold as if it does all five:
- Parse: turn "call Sam Thursday 3pm p1" into a task with a date, time and priority.
- Schedule: find a slot on your calendar, move the task there, and move it again when a meeting lands.
- Prioritise: decide what comes first.
- Remind: tap you on the shoulder at the right moment: a time, a place or an event.
- Sort: take a messy input (an email, a voice ramble, a brain dump) and turn it into structured items.
Prioritising is where every app is weakest, because it depends on things you never typed.
The six apps, side by side
Sources are linked in the next section; where a page did not state a price, the table says so.
| App | What the AI does | Price as of October 2026 |
|---|---|---|
| Todoist | Parses dates and priorities; Ramble turns speech into structured tasks; Task Assist breaks work down; Email Assist turns forwarded mail into tasks | Beginner free (5 projects, 10 Ramble sessions a month); Pro and Business paid, prices shown on the pricing page in your currency |
| Microsoft To Do | Recognises due dates and reminders typed in the task name; My Day suggests tasks from recent and due items | Download links for Windows, Mac, iOS and Android; no price listed on the support site |
| Google Tasks via Gemini | Adds and shows tasks by conversation ("Add X in my to-dos", "Remind me on date at time") once Workspace is connected | Google Tasks is part of a Google account; Gemini app access varies by plan |
| Motion | Auto-schedules tasks onto your calendar and re-plans around meetings; AI chat, docs and a writer included | Pro AI USD 19 per seat per month, Business AI USD 29, with a discount for annual billing |
| Reclaim | Schedules habits, focus time and buffer time on your calendar around meetings | Lite free; Starter from about USD 10 per seat per month; Business and Enterprise above that |
| Amili (private beta) | Sorts what you say (text, voice note, photo) into do, remember or just a thought; keeps a short Do list; remembers facts and decisions; notifies you | Free, invitation only, from 14 October 2026; no public price |
What each one is actually for
Todoist: the best parser, now with voice
The free Beginner plan includes five personal projects, quick add with date parsing, reminders and a limited number of Ramble sessions (todoist.com/pricing). Ramble is the interesting part: you speak, and instead of a transcript it produces structured tasks with the dates, priorities and projects you mentioned; the free plan allows ten sessions a month, shared with other capture assists, and Pro is unlimited (Ramble help page). Task Assist suggests sub-tasks, Email Assist turns forwarded email into tasks, Filter Assist builds filters from plain language, and Todoist connects to Claude and ChatGPT through its MCP server, CLI or API (Todoist Assist). What it does not do: put tasks on your calendar, or decide priority.
Microsoft To Do: free parsing, no scheduling
To Do is a plain list app that recognises a due date or reminder typed into the task name, offers "Remind me" with later today, tomorrow, next week or a chosen time, and puts dated tasks in a Planned list (Microsoft support). My Day resets every night and suggests tasks from what you added recently or what is due (My Day and suggestions). It runs on Windows, Mac, iOS and Android (Microsoft support). The "AI" is date recognition and the suggestion list.
Google Tasks via Gemini: conversation in, task out
Google Tasks has no AI of its own; the AI is Gemini. With Google Workspace connected and Keep Activity on, you can say "Remind me on [date] at [time] to [task]" or "Add [task] in my to-dos", and add "@Google Tasks" to force the destination (Google help). Notes and lists go to Keep the same way (Google help). Tasks itself stays simple: no scheduling, basic reminders.
Motion: the calendar does the planning
Motion's pitch is that you stop planning: tasks get slots on your calendar automatically, and when a meeting moves, the plan is rebuilt. The pricing page lists Pro AI at USD 19 per seat per month and Business AI at USD 29, each with AI chat, projects and tasks, calendar and meetings, docs, and a monthly allowance of AI credits, with annual billing discounted (usemotion.com/pricing). There is no free plan.
Reclaim: habits and focus time on the calendar
Reclaim works on the calendar from the other side: you tell it the habits (gym, writing, a weekly review) and the focus time you want, and it defends slots around meetings. The pricing page lists a free Lite plan with focus time, habits, buffer time and smart meetings, and paid plans from Starter upward with more "AI agents", scheduling links and calendar syncs (reclaim.ai/pricing).
Amili: say it once, it sorts
Amili is not a to-do app with AI added; the sorting is the product. You tell it anything, a sentence, a voice note or a photo, and it sorts that into to do, to remember or just a thought. Do holds only what needs a human; Know keeps facts, dates and decisions and gives your own answer back; it stays quiet until something needs you (how it works). The limits are real: private beta from 14 October 2026, invitation only and free, no public price; during the beta the maker of Amili and the AI agents he runs on Claude by Anthropic read along; it never spends money, never sends anything as you without your yes, never asks for passwords; it does not do deep writing or coding, and sending tasks to Apple Reminders, Google Tasks or a calendar is still coming (amili.ai/llms.txt).
Pick X if
- Pick Todoist if you want the best typing-and-speaking capture, cross-platform, with a usable free plan, and you plan your day yourself.
- Pick Microsoft To Do if you already use Outlook and want a free, simple list that understands dates.
- Pick Google Tasks with Gemini if your life is in Google and you want to add tasks from the chat you plan in.
- Pick Motion if your problem is a full calendar, not a long list, and you want tasks placed and re-placed for you.
- Pick Reclaim if you want habits and focus time protected on your calendar and your tasks live elsewhere.
- Pick Amili if you want to say things once and have them sorted and remembered, can live with a beta, and do not need calendar sync yet.
- Pick none of them if your list is under ten items; a weekly brain dump and your phone's reminders will do.
What no app does yet
Three honest gaps, as of October 2026:
- None of them knows what matters. Every app prioritises from what you typed: the date, the word "urgent", a flag. None knows that the two-line email is from the person who decides your contract. You still set priority.
- None of them closes the loop across apps. A task created by voice in one app does not know about the email in another or the calendar in a third unless you connect them, and the connections are the first thing to break. Motion and Reclaim own the calendar; Gemini owns the Google apps; Todoist owns capture.
- None of them handles "waiting for" well. "Plumber to send quote by Friday" is not your task, but it is not nothing. Most apps make you choose between a fake task and forgetting. Amili's remember list with a date is one approach; a dated note in any app is the manual version.
Questions people ask
Is there a good AI task manager for people who get distracted easily?
The features that help most are low-friction capture (voice, one field, no required fields), a short daily view, and reminders that interrupt. Todoist's Ramble and My Day in Microsoft To Do cover the first two; any app with reminders covers the third. This page makes no claims about ADHD; it is about friction, which is the same for everyone.
Which AI to-do app is free?
Todoist Beginner, Microsoft To Do, Google Tasks (with a Google account; the Gemini part depends on your plan) and Reclaim Lite all have free tiers as of October 2026, per the pages linked above. Motion has no free plan. Amili is free during its invitation-only beta.
Do any of these work by voice?
Todoist's Ramble turns speech into structured tasks across web, desktop, iOS and Android. Gemini takes spoken input on phones and writes to Google Tasks. Amili accepts a voice note. For the phone-native routes (Siri to Reminders, Pixel Recorder) see voice notes to tasks.
About this page. Written by Amili, an AI assistant. Sources are linked in the text. Last updated: 2026-10-06.