I always thought productivity apps helped me increase my productivity. After juggling numerous apps designed to save me time, I decided it was time for a change. The real productivity boost was when I decided to delete productivity apps and start over.
Creating the Illusion of Productivity
Every productivity app claims to be the best available. It promises to save you time, keep you organized, and transform your daily life. The truth is most of these apps just end up wasting time. Sure, you might have a dozen productivity apps scattered across your phone, tablet, and computer. But, what time are you saving?
For me, I felt more like an app manager than anything else. I’d spend hours every week entering tasks, connecting apps, bouncing back and forth between apps, and happily customizing my experience.
All those hours were just wasted time. It was the illusion of productivity. Instead of getting anything done, I was just updating my apps all the time.
Honestly, I spent more time figuring out which app to use for a given task, designing systems to help my apps work better together, tweaking templates, changing color codes, choosing icons, and so on than I did working.
Productivity Apps Don’t Make You Productive
Productivity apps on their own won’t make you productive. Trust me, I tried. It felt great to set up a system in a new app. I loved gamification and the streaks for completing tasks. I thrived on setting up templates and nested organizational trees.
But, with every app, I had to learn a new system. I had to customize an entirely new setup. Even worse, I had to figure out how to integrate this into my existing apps or decide if this replaced another one.
I wasn’t thrilled when I sat down and discovered the hidden cost of all my productivity apps:
- Constantly switching back and forth between apps was destroying my focus
- I spent more time deciding which app to use at any given moment than benefiting
- My apps felt more like tasks than helpful tools
- All my tweaking felt like progress until I realized I wasn’t making any progress
- Every notification ripped my focus away from the tasks I needed to complete
Does this sound like you? I personally had nine productivity apps on my phone. I had a few extras I used exclusively on my PC. My “productivity system” was more of a productivity time suck.
I knew it was time to delete productivity apps and find a system that actually worked versus giving me productivity app overload.
Track Your Productivity
My advice is to track how much time you spend in your productivity apps for a few weeks. Also, track how much time you spend on tasks. Time trackers like TimeTagger and Kimai can help.
If you’re spending hours on your apps, they’re not helping you. Imagine how much you could accomplish with those hours?
When I started tracking my time, I discovered I spent approximately 8–10 hours per week just adding data to my app, customizing the look and feel, and checking notifications. Yes, I was losing the equivalent of an entire work day on something meant to make me more efficient.
My 3 App Productivity System
After some research, I decided to implement a three app productivity system. This was the hardest part for me. I had to narrow down the apps I used to just three across all platforms, including phone, PC, tablet, and web.
The idea is to reduce friction, eliminate app overlap, and simplify overall app management.
This system has several key rules:
- Each app must serve a single purpose and can’t overlap with another. For instance, you don’t need two to-do list apps or multiple note taking apps.
- Apps must sync across all needed platforms
- Apps must be easy to setup and maintain
Depending on your needs, the three apps will vary. For me, I opted for the following purposes:
- To-do list or task manager
- Calendar
- Notes and reference
For most people, this is really all you need. The entire system combines work and personal life into just three easy to manage apps.
After doing this, I only spend about an hour a week on my apps. So, I’m saving at least seven hours per week.
Delete Productivity Apps You Don’t Need
Start by deleting any productivity apps that don’t fit the system. I actually made a list of all my apps and their core purpose. I also tracked which ones I used most often. Anything I didn’t use regularly got deleted immediately.
I then started comparing apps with a similar purpose to see which was easiest to use and fit my needs best. By the time I was done, I had deleted seven apps off my phone. I didn’t really love any of my note-taking apps, so I had to find a new one.
The Only 3 Productivity Apps I Needed
I tried several all-in-one apps, but I still felt more productive with three apps with a core purpose. For me, I chose:
You don’t have to use the apps I chose. Ideally, evaluate your apps and systems each week to see if they’re working for you versus against you. I spent about a month developing the system that worked for me. Just avoid the shiny new app syndrome and delete productivity apps that waste time. Believe me when I say you’ll love having extra productive hours not spent just trying to manage apps.
