5 productivity apps I swear by, and one of them unlocks the rest

Productivity apps are the bane of the app world. On one end of the spectrum are the total nerds who could shame a cyborg with their organizing skills, and on the other are those who dump everything into Google Keep just to have everything in one place. I live somewhere in the middle. I’m not pedantic enough to run the most complex Notion server and flex about it on Reddit, nor am I a simpleton who relies solely on a notes app.

I use a bunch of apps every day to improve my productivity. They’re all varied in kind and now form a solid part of a puzzle. If one piece is out of place, my workflow wouldn’t break, but it would definitely distract me, or make me want to pull my hair out, depending on how severe the disruption is.

Every time I set up a new phone, these two are the first apps I install. My password manager of choice, Enpass, is the stepping stone — I wouldn’t be able to log into any other app without it. So, it’s the first thing that goes in. I started using it many years ago and have stuck with it ever since.

While I’m on a lifetime grandfathered plan and it hasn’t given me any trouble so far, the real reason I’ve stayed is that it carries my entire life’s worth of passwords and important files in my pocket, always. Whenever someone needs a document, I just fire up Enpass and hand it over with all the sass that a password manager can afford.

And of course, I need a 2FA code manager too, right? I’ve already gone on record about why I absolutely love Ente Auth and how convenient it’s made my life with encrypted backups. But I’ll say it again: I love it for making my life so damn convenient.

This pair is something I genuinely can’t live without. Nothing on my phones or laptops would work without these, and I use them at least 15 times a day — more often than I say the word “Android” every day.

TickTick is by far the best task management app available for Android (and otherwise). It gets so many things right, is packed with features, and doesn’t even ask you to pay for most of it. I sincerely can’t plan my day without some of its reminder tools like subtasks, granular repeat reminder controls, and habit tracking. It’s the app that’s been logging my reading streak for years, too.

It has more features than I use, but I think that’s how nerd-centric apps should be. Not every feature is for everyone; you should be able to use what suits you and ignore the rest. That’s exactly how I’ve set up TickTick to work for me, like no other app could.

For instance, it has my reading list, complete with the book’s current reading status, the month I finished a book, what form it was in, the author, and the month I finished it in.

I’ve even ditched MS Word for Notion for all my personal writing — essays, short stories, poetry, you name it. Its text formatting is just enough for me: three font styles and some basic markdown options. That’s it. I’m not spending time adjusting fonts or tweaking margins anymore like in Word. I just open it and let my momentary creative spark shine on paper without formatting dimming it down.

I know I said Google Keep was a simpleton’s app, but sometimes that’s exactly what you need. While Notion is for more complex tasks and granular control, Keep is the warehouse where raw material sits before it goes through processing and turns into usable data. My thoughts, random info dumps, things I need to remember, it all goes here.

You also can’t discount its ability to share notes with literally anyone who has a Google account. And when I do share notes with people (say, with my mum), I know it won’t overwhelm them like a Notion clip with a bunch of text, toggles, and indecipherable icons.

What I still despise about Keep, though, is that all the new formatting options still aren’t cross-platform, when we’re more than halfway through 2025.

Take research, for instance. When I’m looking into something personal like a specific kind of diet, I’ll feed it YouTube videos, forum threads, and articles that I find relevant, and ask it to combine all the dense information into something easier to parse. Then I’ll ask it to generate a Notion-style doc, and boom, it’s ready in seconds. No formatting needed.

For writers, an editor is someone who gives you a different perspective that one fails to see while writing. For me, ChatGPT is that second brain, the one I bounce ideas off of, the one that helps me look at things from another angle, and helps me zero in on a direction.

That would otherwise require a brainstorming session with a bunch of people. And we all know how hard it is to align timing and get people even on Google Meet, let alone in the same room.

I could’ve added more mainstream apps to this list, but come on, Gmail and Calendar are part of everyone’s productivity suite at this point. Most people wouldn’t even call them productivity apps anymore.

For me, anything that furthers my cause of staying productive while I fight tooth and nail with procrastination (jk, that battle will now happen tomorrow) earns a spot. These are the apps that help me sail through my work and personal day as if I’m a professional surfer. What’s on your list of productivity apps? Comment below.