Good luck Steven. I looked at Nirvana before coming to Nozbe, and I liked what I saw, but too many features I wanted are still in preview/beta. When they get it all out of preview they will be strong competition.

Agree w Michael that Nirvana/2 are certainly v interesting and I track them for when my Nozbe account comes up for renewal. However its wrong to say that they have iPhone and Android Apps – they simply don’t. What Nirvana & Nirvana 2 have is a browser version/view of their website and that’s different (if the distinctions slowly become less over time). It’s a much stronger view then ever the Nozbe mobile broswer version, but not an app.

They seem to have stoped work on Nirvana and just concentrate on Nirvana 2 now – however it is described by them as feature incomplete. So not everything in Nirvana seems to be in Nirvana 2 yet, though Nirvana 2 does have things that Nirvana doesn’t. It’s not ideal but if, like you, Nirvana 2 hits the button for somebody then great – they have a bargain. I’m not sure I’ve seen anything to justify the “2x times cheaper” price comment. I don’t think we know at all how well a finished Nirvana 2 will stack up against Nozbe (which itself is inevitably a moving target in terms of functionality and price).

I have to say one of the attractions of Nirvana is a more collegiate approach to support with the technical folks directly responding.

I am using both Nirvana 2 and Nozbe for quite a while now, but i decided to stay with Nozbe for a while now (and go for the paid version). What pushed me to go for Nozbe is the far better RSS and iCal integration with Outlook. Nirvana has no reporting / integration options at this moment. Also i think Nozbe seems to be more stable than Nirvana 2 (for me Nirvana seems to have some sync issue with the different browsers i use) But i must agree that Nirvana seems to be the better GTD implementation and is improving (especially with the recent implementation of recurring tasks). So like mentioned earlier, i will continue to watch both of them, i think these 2 are the best in GTD implementation.

BruceMarriott, yeah in terms of price I’ve read response from developer on their forum that are aiming for the same price as evernote once it becomes final, around 5$.

In Nirvana I have all the features I need and used in Nozbe and then some more which improve productivity for me so I just had to switch. I don’t like to switch apps but there was no reason to continue using Nozbe because it lacks functionality I really need and also the interface is not very good compared to Nirvana. I mean if I’m using an app all the time it does matter how looks.

The functionality I really like in Nirvana is filtering actions and anything basically by multiple criteria, it does make a huge difference in productivity for me. I already add ( and get done) more actions to Nirvana simply because of this.
Then start and due dates are also very useful and make a lot more sense than just due dates in Nozbe.

Anyway I have to say that Nozbe is a very good app and it served me well too

Also wanted to add that the big issue is that all of those essential (imo) feaures I requested here were already requested since 2009 and never got done so there is a good chance they won’t be done any time soon and it doesn’t really make sense to wait while also paying for Nozbe every month when you get all of the Nozbe features you need and more and a much better designed interface for free and wneh there is going to be a premium option is going to cost 2x times less :)

And I don’t really mind paying a good price for a quality GTD app either.
As much as I like Nozbe I’m just left with no good reason to keep using it

Overhaul?...now im curious

I’m actually a big fan of the web interface. Yes, it could be prettier, but the strength of Nozbe over apps like Nirvana is that it does not try to look like Mail.app or another desktop application. It reminds me more of 36 Signals Apps that were built for the web. Anyway, I do hope that works continues on the interface, but I also hope that the general philosophy remains the same.

I’m a fan of the current web interface as well with its ‘chunky’ 37 Signals look.

With reguard to Nirvana I think I’d say they are coming up very quickly indeed. It’s more then just functionality – its about community and understanding futures. While here a month old list of what Nozbe is working on languishes in an old thread, and because of this unlikely to be updated, I see Nirvana much more astute and aware of community. A page of release notes – updated regularly (5 times in the last month). A page about “What Next” – again updated as they cross things off. And direct involvement in the forum by the technical people means answers and explanations are thought through more. Personally I’d dump “Productive” Magazine and use the energy to organise stronger communication, support and dialogue with the paying user base.

Personally I’d dump “Productive” Magazine and use the energy to organise stronger communication, support and dialogue with the paying user base.

i second that – bruce – you have it right on the button – couldnt have said it better my self.

i liked what you said about them also having the various technical people taking part in the conversation with users to create a more thoughtful conversation overall.

Just wanted to explain what I meant by apps.
Nirvana has a full offline support for web app.
For example when you go offline you can use all features of Nirvana, ie add, move, delete, edit tasks and so on. You can even close the browser and reboot computer and then while still being offline run Nirvana again, all changes are saved. It works exactly like a desktop app.
I haven’t really tried android version musch but it’s probably the same thing. But I might be wrong so it’s up to you to check it out.
Anyway the native apps for Nirvana are sure to come. Nozbe has no point to market native apps as a real advantage for the long term.

Michael,
“You can’t have everything and we will be pushing towards adding more useful stuff but not stuff that clutters the interface.”

Sure you can’t have everything, doesn’t mean you can’t have essential features like filtering everything by multiple criteria.

When you do GTD and want to choose an action you filter by context then time then energy then priority (priority by intuition) you can also filter by area of focus.
When you have an electronic system it doesn’t make sense to be able to filter by just one criteria when you have all criterias predifiened.
When you filter by all criterias you will go down from a list of 50-100 tasks to a list of 5-10 for example. But when you filter by just one criteria you might not filter anything at all in the worst scenario.
This leads you to adding less tasks to Nozbe and then having less options of what to do and overall less productivity and to not having a really trusted system..
Simply get things done doesn’t mean that the app has to be simple.
The app should be easy to use aswell as advanced.
Do you see my point? And it’s just one feature! It was requested since 2009. I won’t go into others of course.

“we will be pushing towards adding more useful stuff but not stuff that clutters the interface.”

It really is very vague statement and doesn’t really provide any idea of what you are going to add though. Who likes to be left in the dark about what’s coming? Maybe if I knew that all the feautres I need will be implemented I wouldn’t have moved to Nirvana but with such statements I have no idea at all. Should I wait 2 more years for this feature or will it never be implemented? Who knows… I’d rather just move.

Also about cluttering the interface.
It’s great that you agree that it’s outdated but I also wanted to point out thatt it is more cluttered while also being less feature rich at the moment.
And I don’t see any feature that is useless in Nirvana to be honest while it also has a less cluttered and more untuitive, faster interface.

About team-centric features – I use GTD for personal productivity and don’t really need them. But in Nirvana you can use a dedicated “waiting for” with contacts list for tracking delegated tasks while Nozbe doesn’t even have a dedicated “Waiting” list. Nozbe doesn’t have start dates and a “Tickler” either. It doesn’t have “Someday”. Sure you can create projects but it’s a hack and then you can’t have someday projects and so on. It’s just an overall not a very good approach.
Nozbe misses essential GTD components.
Wouldn’t it make more sense to have a proper GTD implementation in the first place?

I hope this comment will help you to make a better app! Good luck!

When I first started my Nozbe subscription almost 2 years ago, it was effectively a choice between Nozbe and Toodledo. But things have moved on. Credit to Nozbe, it has moved on more than many of the other offerings from 2 years ago.
But communication remains stubbornly poor and lacking in transparency, particularly roadmaps. And rightly or wrongly there seems a certain arrogance in Nozbe communications. A kind of “we know whats best for you” attitude.
Its probably the difference between a company trying to establish itself and one that feels like its done the hard work. I get the feeling Nozbe probably has some large customers that generate a lot of revenue and perhaps they are their prime focus.

And then back to my old criticism – the cost. 2 years ago Nozbe was sufficiently better than Toodledo for me to pay the extra, but its not sufficiently better than Nirvana or Producteev.

Actually the list of things you mentioned are in toodledo, except they have a really ugly interface. Why not try them too? For me, start date is the most important so I don’t have to concentrate on stuff before they become valid. And filtering in contexts too. Toodledo has alll kinds of filtering available, perhaps too much. Just can’t stand their weird color interface.

When I was looking for a decent GTD app, I spent several weeks trying Toodleoo, RememberTheMilk, etc. But none of them really ‘got’ the whole GTD concept.

Then I tried Nozbe… and within 15 minutes of first using it, I had upgraded to a year’s subscription. Written by a GTD disciple for GTD. Spot-on.

I’ve just been evaluating Nirvana2, but I cannot get on with it. It is not as easy to use as Nozbe, and it’s not intuitive. I want to spend my time getting stuff done, and not planning.

So, Nozbe remains The One. It’s in a class of its own – but it just needs a few simple tweaks such as multi-level filters to massively increase my productivity.

And it needs a roadmap of course. If Nozbe had managed my expectations with a road-map, I wouldn’t have been tempted to even try Nirvana2. Michael: please take note.

Looked at Nirvana, and even joined, but this product is REALLY in beta yet, huge function gaps with no clear idea if/when they will be delivered. Vaporware at this point.

Sorry to dig this one out of the grave.

With the competition, like RTM and Nirvana, who everybody has tried as some point right? (they are free), Nozbe must be the easiest to use. I dabbled with RTM for a while, but you can’t reorder tasks, thats just absurd. Nirvana is still work in progress, and you feel that you are a beta tester.

With this desktop app, when drag-drop, calendar etc etc is sorted, I hope Nozbe continues to upgrade further still, as we pay quite a lot of money to use this!

My question is – should we expect the same features that are on the web for the desktop app? And even more?

Re: Amit’s “I dabbled with RTM for a while, but you can’t reorder tasks, thats just absurd.”

So is Nozbe’s inability to alphabetize tasks and their seeming refusal to address this. Is it really so hard to program??

Anybody home?