Self-Hosted Alternatives to Todoist

Why Replace Todoist?

Todoist charges $5/month (Pro) or $8/month (Business) per user. For a small team of 5, that’s $480/year minimum — money that buys a capable mini PC to run your own task system indefinitely.

Beyond cost, Todoist stores every task, project, and note on their servers. They’ve changed pricing tiers multiple times, reduced free-tier limits, and there’s no data portability guarantee if they change direction. Your productivity system shouldn’t depend on someone else’s business model.

Self-hosted alternatives give you full control over your data, unlimited users at zero marginal cost, and the ability to customize workflows to match how your team actually works.

Factor	Todoist	Self-Hosted
Monthly cost (5 users)	$25-40/month	$0 (run on existing hardware)
Annual cost	$300-480/year	$0-60/year (electricity)
3-year cost	$900-1,440	$150-200 (hardware amortized)
Task limit	Varies by plan	Unlimited
Project limit	300 (Pro)	Unlimited
Data location	Todoist servers (US/EU)	Your server
API access	Rate-limited	Unlimited
Offline access	App-dependent	Full control

Best Alternatives

Vikunja — Best Overall Replacement

Vikunja is the closest self-hosted equivalent to Todoist. It supports lists, kanban boards, Gantt charts, and calendar views — all in a single app. The interface is clean and fast, with keyboard shortcuts that make rapid task entry feel natural.

Where Vikunja shines over Todoist: unlimited everything (projects, labels, filters), CalDAV sync for native calendar integration, and a powerful API for automation. It also supports task dependencies, time tracking, and file attachments.

Vikunja runs as a single Go binary with a PostgreSQL or SQLite backend. Resource usage is minimal — under 100 MB RAM idle.

Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Vikunja

Planka — Best for Kanban Workflows

If your Todoist usage is primarily board-based (dragging tasks between columns), Planka is a lightweight Trello/Todoist hybrid that nails the kanban experience. It’s visually appealing, fast, and does one thing well.

Planka lacks some of Todoist’s advanced features (no Gantt charts, limited filtering), but its simplicity is the point. Setup takes 2 minutes, the UI needs no explanation, and it runs on under 200 MB RAM.

Read our full guide: How to Self-Host Planka

AppFlowy — Best for Notion-Style Task Management

If you use Todoist alongside Notion for project documentation, AppFlowy combines both. It’s an open-source Notion alternative with built-in task databases, kanban views, and rich document editing.

AppFlowy is newer than the other options and the self-hosted server is still maturing, but it’s the right choice if you want tasks embedded in a larger knowledge management system rather than a standalone task app.

Read our full guide: How to Self-Host AppFlowy

Feature Comparison

Feature	Todoist	Vikunja	Planka	AppFlowy
List view	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
Kanban boards	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Gantt charts	No	Yes	No	No
Calendar view	Yes	Yes	No	No
CalDAV sync	No	Yes	No	No
Subtasks	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Labels/tags	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Filters	Advanced	Advanced	Basic	Basic
Time tracking	No	Yes	No	No
File attachments	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Mobile app	Excellent	Good (PWA)	PWA	In development
Keyboard shortcuts	Excellent	Good	Basic	Good
Natural language input	Yes	No	No	No
API	Rate-limited	Unlimited	Basic	Limited
Recurring tasks	Yes	Yes	No	No
Reminders	Yes	Yes	No	No
Docker deployment	N/A	Single container	Single container	Multi-container

Migration Guide

Export from Todoist

1. Open Todoist in a browser and go to Settings → General → Export
2. Download your data as a CSV file — this includes tasks, projects, due dates, and priorities
3. For API-based migration, generate a Todoist API token at Settings → Integrations → Developer

Import to Vikunja

Vikunja has built-in Todoist import:

1. Navigate to your Vikunja instance
2. Go to Settings → Import → Todoist
3. Enter your Todoist API token
4. Vikunja pulls all projects, tasks, labels, and due dates automatically

This is the cleanest migration path. Projects map to namespaces, labels transfer directly, and task priorities are preserved.

Manual Migration (Other Apps)

For Planka or AppFlowy, manual recreation is required:

1. Export from Todoist as CSV
2. Create your project/board structure in the new app
3. Add tasks manually or use the app’s API to bulk-import from CSV

For teams with hundreds of tasks, write a quick script using Vikunja’s or Planka’s REST API to automate the import from CSV.

What You Give Up

Be honest about the trade-offs:

• Natural language input — Todoist’s “Buy groceries tomorrow at 5pm p1” parsing is genuinely excellent. No self-hosted alternative matches it.
• Mobile apps — Todoist’s native iOS and Android apps are polished. Self-hosted options offer PWAs or less mature native apps.
• Integrations ecosystem — Todoist connects to 70+ services natively. Self-hosted apps rely on APIs and tools like n8n for automation.
• Collaboration polish — Real-time collaboration, comments, and activity feeds work seamlessly in Todoist. Self-hosted equivalents exist but are less refined.
• Zero maintenance — Todoist just works. Self-hosting means you own updates, backups, and uptime.

For solo users or small teams who primarily need task lists and boards, the self-hosted options cover 90% of the functionality. The gap is in polish and ecosystem integrations, not core features.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can Vikunja sync tasks with my calendar app?

Yes. Vikunja has built-in CalDAV support, which means tasks with due dates appear in any CalDAV-compatible calendar app — Thunderbird, iOS Calendar (via DAVx⁵ on Android), Apple Reminders, and more. This is a feature Todoist doesn’t offer natively. Set up the CalDAV connection once and tasks sync bidirectionally.

Do self-hosted task managers have mobile apps?

Vikunja offers a progressive web app (PWA) that works well on mobile — add it to your home screen for an app-like experience. Planka also works as a PWA. AppFlowy has mobile apps in development. None match Todoist’s polished native apps, but the PWA experience is functional for quick task management on the go.

Can I import all my Todoist tasks into Vikunja?

Yes. Vikunja has a built-in Todoist importer — enter your Todoist API token and it pulls all projects, tasks, labels, due dates, and priorities automatically. This is the cleanest migration path from Todoist. For Planka or AppFlowy, you’d export from Todoist as CSV and recreate tasks manually or via API scripts.

Is there a self-hosted equivalent to Todoist’s natural language input?

No self-hosted task manager matches Todoist’s natural language parsing (“Buy groceries tomorrow at 5pm p1”). Vikunja supports setting due dates and priorities through its UI, but you can’t type a sentence and have it automatically parsed into structured task data. This is the biggest feature gap between Todoist and self-hosted alternatives.

Can multiple team members collaborate on tasks in real-time?

Vikunja supports shared projects, task assignments, and comments. Planka has real-time board updates when multiple users are viewing the same board. AppFlowy supports collaboration through its document and database features. None are quite as polished as Todoist’s team collaboration, but the core workflow — assign tasks, add comments, track progress — works across all three.

How do self-hosted task managers handle recurring tasks?

Vikunja supports recurring tasks with flexible repeat patterns (daily, weekly, monthly, custom intervals). Planka and AppFlowy do not support recurring tasks natively. If recurring tasks are central to your workflow, Vikunja is the only self-hosted option that handles them. For complex recurrence patterns, pair with n8n to automate task creation on schedules.

Related

• Best Self-Hosted Task Management Tools
• How to Self-Host Vikunja
• How to Self-Host Planka
• How to Self-Host AppFlowy
• Self-Hosted Alternatives to Trello
• Self-Hosted Alternatives to Notion
• Docker Compose Basics