How to Use Todoist: A Complete Beginner's Guide (2026)
Todoist is a task manager built around one idea: get everything out of your head and into a system you trust, fast. The whole app is designed so that capturing a task takes a couple of seconds and organizing it happens automatically as you type. This guide walks you from an empty account to a working daily system.
1. Capture Everything with Quick Add
The fastest way to add a task is Quick Add. Press Q from anywhere (or click Add task) and type naturally:
Email Sam the proposal tomorrow at 9am #Work @email p2Todoist parses that single line into:
- Task: “Email Sam the proposal”
- Due: tomorrow at 9am
- Project: #Work
- Label: @email
- Priority: p2
This is the core skill in Todoist. Learn the symbols and you’ll never touch a form: # for project, @ for label, p1–p4 for priority, + to assign to someone, and plain-English dates (tomorrow, every Friday, next month).
2. Organize with Projects and Sections
Projects are your big buckets — one per area of responsibility: Work, Home, Errands, a specific client. Create them in the sidebar with the +.
Sections divide a project into groups. Inside a “Website Redesign” project you might have sections for To Do, In Progress, and Review — or Design, Copy, and Dev. Switch a project to Board layout and sections become Kanban columns.
A good starting structure for most people:
| Project | Holds |
|---|---|
| Inbox | The default catch-all — everything lands here first |
| Work | Job tasks, grouped into sections by area |
| Personal | Life admin, appointments, errands |
| Someday | Ideas and non-urgent things, no dates |
Don’t over-build it. Start with three or four projects and add more only when the Inbox gets unwieldy.
3. Add Dates, Times, and Recurrence
Click a task’s date field (or type it in Quick Add) to schedule it. Add a time (at 3pm) when it needs a reminder or should appear on your calendar.
For anything that repeats, type a recurrence in plain English: every Monday, every weekday, every! 30 days. When you complete a recurring task, Todoist automatically schedules the next one — see How to set recurring tasks in Todoist for the full syntax.
4. Prioritize with p1–p4
Todoist has four priority levels:
- P1 (red) — must happen today, high stakes
- P2 (orange) — important, this week
- P3 (blue) — nice to do
- P4 (none) — default, no flag
Set priority in Quick Add (p1) or by clicking the flag icon. Higher-priority tasks float to the top of your lists automatically. Resist the urge to mark everything P1 — if everything’s urgent, nothing is.
5. Tag with Labels
Labels (@label) cut across projects to mark context or type: @email, @phone, @quick, @errands, @waiting. A task can live in #Work but be tagged @quick so it shows up when you’ve got five minutes free. Labels become powerful when paired with filters — see How to add labels in Todoist.
6. Build Custom Views with Filters
Filters are saved searches that pull matching tasks from every project into one view: today & p1 (urgent today), @errands & overdue, no date & no labels (things you forgot to organize). They’re the difference between a list app and a real system. Full syntax in How to use filters in Todoist.
7. A Simple Daily Workflow
Here’s a routine that keeps the whole thing honest:
- Morning — open Today. It shows everything due. Re-prioritize, reschedule what won’t happen, and pick your P1s.
- Throughout the day — capture, don’t organize. New task pops up? Quick Add it to Inbox and move on.
- Work top-down. Knock out P1s first; check things off as you go.
- Evening — process Inbox. Spend two minutes giving each captured task a project, date, and label.
- Weekly — review. Open Upcoming, clean out completed clutter, and look at your
no datefilter for anything stranded.
That loop — capture fast, organize lightly, review weekly — is the entire methodology. The features above just make each step faster.
Connect Todoist to the Rest of Your Stack
Todoist syncs with Google Calendar, Slack, Gmail, and dozens of other tools, so tasks can flow in from where they’re actually created — see How to connect Todoist to Google Calendar to put timed tasks on your calendar.
When the List Itself Becomes the Work
Todoist makes capturing and organizing fast, but a busy life still generates more tasks than any system processes on its own — triaging the Inbox, chasing the recurring stuff, keeping projects current. Carly is an AI assistant that connects to 200+ apps including Todoist and can sort, schedule, and act on your tasks for you, so the system runs even when you don’t have time to tend it.
More on Todoist: How to use filters in Todoist · How to add labels in Todoist · How to use sections in Todoist · Todoist alternatives · Best to-do list apps
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