Choose Todoist when your main job is capturing commitments and deciding what to do next across projects. Choose Trello when a group needs to see work move through shared stages. Both support boards; the useful distinction is how you organize attention and ownership, not whether the app has a particular layout.
This comparison uses official documentation checked on 2026-10-17. Recommendations are editorial judgments about the documented workflows. We have not run a comparative usability or migration test. How we prepare comparisons.
Feature differences that affect the decision
| Decision | Trello | Todoist |
|---|---|---|
| Basic organization | Boards contain lists and cards; a list can represent a stage | Tasks live in projects, with list and board layouts |
| Capturing incoming work | Inbox collects items before organizing them into boards | Smart Quick Add captures tasks; Today and Upcoming support date-based review |
| Shared status | Move a card between stage lists; keep its discussion with the card | Organize project sections and assign tasks to collaborators |
| Repeating commitments | Check the automation or repeat mechanism required for your board | Recurring dates distinguish schedule-based and completion-based repetition |
| A wider project view | Premium adds timeline and dashboard views | Pro adds calendar layout and task duration; Business adds team controls |
The first two rows explain our recommendation: begin with Todoist for a person managing commitments across several projects; begin with Trello for a team reviewing one work queue together. Either can be adapted to the other job, but configuration effort should earn its place.
Free-plan limits and the reasons to pay
As checked on the official Trello pricing page, Free allows ten boards and ten collaborators per Workspace, with a 10 MB per-file limit. Standard adds custom fields and advanced checklists; Premium adds the views described above. Paid Workspace membership and multi-board guests affect billing, so count collaborators by their actual role.
Todoist's pricing page lists five personal projects, three filter views, reminders, and list/board layouts on Beginner. Pro expands personal projects and filters. Business adds a shared team workspace, roles, and centralized billing. A personal Pro subscription should not be treated as the team administration plan.
If you only need a few personal projects, try Todoist Beginner before assuming reminders require payment. If eleven people need one shared Trello Workspace, the Free collaborator limit already rules out that particular setup. These are plan-fit decisions; they do not establish which product is cheaper for every group. Use the cost worksheet for the required paid tiers and billing period.
Recurring tasks: the important scheduling distinction
Todoist documents every for recurrence based on the scheduled date and every! for recurrence based on completion. For daily recurrence, its documentation notes that the next date follows completion whichever option you choose. See the recurring-date guide.
That distinction matters for a weekly report tied to Friday versus a maintenance task needed a week after it was last done. A Trello board's repeating-card or automation setup needs a separate check: recreating a card is not automatically the same behavior as advancing a recurring due date. Do not move a routine until its next occurrence is correct after a late completion.
Export: task titles are not the whole project
Trello's export documentation says board members can export JSON; CSV board exports require Premium. CSV omits comments. The ordinary board JSON includes the latest 1,000 actions, so use the documented Workspace export when you need all comments. Trello also says these files cannot simply be imported to recreate a board.
Todoist's CSV guide says ordinary project CSV exports omit completed tasks. Its separate Google Sheets export option can include completed tasks while omitting other attributes. Pick the path for the information you need; the word CSV alone does not establish equivalent recovery.
For a team that makes decisions in card comments, preserving those comments should be an acceptance requirement. For a personal task list, active tasks and dates may be sufficient. Neither is a universal portability winner.
A five-task test that can change the recommendation
Create this fictional sample in both products; the expected results below are acceptance criteria, not observed outcomes.
| Sample | Pass condition |
|---|---|
| Capture an unexpected request on your phone | It appears in the place you review next |
| Schedule a one-off commitment | It appears on the intended day without duplicating it |
| Complete a recurring task late | The next date matches the routine you intended |
| Hand a blocked task to a teammate | They identify the next action and current owner unaided |
| Export a task with a discussion | The information your group requires is recoverable |
Keep setup notes as well as task results. If Todoist passes your personal planning work but a team cannot follow its project conventions, keep that finding separate. If Trello makes stages visible but your daily commitments remain scattered, a good board has not solved the original problem.
Our recommendation by use case
- Personal commitments and recurring routines: start with Todoist, then check the recurrence you actually use.
- A shared request, approval, or production queue: start with Trello and define what each list means before adding automation.
- Briefs, decisions, and structured reference material are the main problem: read Notion vs Trello instead of forcing either task workflow to become your knowledge base.
- Dependencies, workload, or consolidated project reporting drive the move: broaden the shortlist with Trello alternatives.
If both pass, prefer the setup your users can maintain with fewer manual conventions. If neither passes an essential requirement, choose neither. Browse productivity or project management for the next candidate.
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