Amazing Marvin vs Ellie Planner: Comprehensive Comparison

Overview

In today's fast-paced world, choosing the right productivity tool can make all the difference. This comprehensive comparison between Amazing Marvin and Ellie Planner will help you understand which tool best fits your workflow and productivity needs.

⚡ Quick Summary

What is Amazing Marvin?

Amazing Marvin is a highly customizable task manager, daily planner, time tracker, project management tool, calendar, habit and goal tracker designed to reduce procrastination, minimize stress, and boost productivity through behavioral psychology principles. It offers extensive customization options allowing users to tailor the app's appearance, behavior, workflows, and features to fit personal needs, making it feel like a 'make your own productivity app.' The app is particularly praised for its focus tools and advanced features that help users with ADHD and complex workflows.

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🌟 Key Features of Amazing Marvin

• ✦Extensive customization with toggleable plug-ins and multiple views

• ✦Built-in timers (Pomodoro/Sandlock) and time tracking

• ✦Full calendar integration with 2-way Google Calendar sync

• ✦Habit and goal tracking with behavioral psychology features

• ✦Weekly scheduler with visual timeline and time blocking

• ✦Analytics and stats with productivity charts and graphs

What is Ellie Planner?

Ellie Planner is a minimalist daily planner and time-blocking app that combines tasks and calendar events to help users plan and visualize their day. It features drag-and-drop task scheduling, a brain dump area for quick capture, and built-in time tracking with analytics. The app includes AI assistant capabilities for task organization and scheduling optimization.

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🌟 Key Features of Ellie Planner

• ✦Time Blocking with Drag-and-Drop: Core feature allowing users to drag tasks from a Kanban-style list directly into their calendar view for visual time blocking and day planning.

• ✦Brain Dump & Task Management: Quick capture inbox area combined with comprehensive task management including lists, priorities, due dates, labels, subtasks, and recurring tasks.

• ✦Built-in Timer and Analytics: Time tracking capabilities with analytics on how you spend your time, providing insights into productivity patterns and time allocation.

• ✦AI Assistant: AI-powered features for bulk task creation, smart organization, time estimation, automated scheduling, finding free time, and priority guidance (Pro feature).

• ✦Calendar Integration: Syncs with Google, Apple, and Outlook calendars to provide a unified view of appointments and tasks in one interface.

• ✦Cross-Platform Access: Available on web, iOS, Mac, and Windows with native apps and browser-based access for flexible planning anywhere.

📊 Feature Comparison

🔗 Integrations

Amazing Marvin

Zapier, Make, Integrately, Google Calendar, Slack, Notion, Todoist, Google Tasks, Trello, Microsoft Outlook, Evernote, ClickUp, TickTick

Ellie Planner

Apple Calendar, Google Calendar, Microsoft Outlook, Slack, Notion, Zapier

💰 Pricing Comparison

Amazing Marvin

$12/mo or $300 lifetime

$12/month subscription, $300 lifetime plan, or $96/year annual option. Student discount 50% off. 14-day free trial available.

Ellie Planner

Free Plan available. Pro: $9.99/month, $99.99/year, or $299.99 lifetime.

Free Plan: $0 with unlimited tasks and braindump. Ellie Pro: $9.99/month, $99.99/year, or $299.99 one-time lifetime purchase.

💡 Things to Consider

When Choosing Amazing Marvin

• →Steep learning curve - expect time investment to master the extensive customization options

• →Mobile app experience is weaker than desktop, particularly on Android

• →Best suited for advanced users or those with ADHD rather than simple task list needs

When Choosing Ellie Planner

• →You Value Visual Time-Blocking: Ellie Planner excels at drag-and-drop task scheduling into calendar views, making it ideal if you prefer visual daily planning over text-based task lists.

• →You're Willing to Pay for Core Features: The free plan is quite limited, so you'll need Pro ($9.99/month) for time-blocking, calendar integration, and most useful features - consider if this fits your budget.

• →You Use iOS/Web/Desktop: Best experience is on iOS and web platforms. Skip if you need Android support or prefer fully native desktop applications over web-based interfaces.

⭐ User Reviews

Amazing Marvin

"Amazing Marvin receives high praise for its extensive customization and powerful features, particularly from ADHD users and those with complex workflows. Users love the flexibility and transformative productivity boost, with ratings like 4.9/5 on AlternativeTo. However, it has a steep learning curve that can be overwhelming initially, and the mobile app (especially Android) needs improvement compared to the desktop version."

Ellie Planner

"Ellie Planner is praised for its intuitive, minimalist interface and effective time-blocking capabilities with drag-and-drop functionality. Users appreciate the brain dump feature, calendar integration, and responsive indie developer support. However, the free plan is quite limited, pricing is considered high compared to alternatives, there's no Android app, and it offers fewer advanced features than comprehensive tools like Sunsama. Best suited for individual users who prioritize visual time-blocking and simplicity over complex workflows."

🎯 Conclusion

Both Amazing Marvin and Ellie Planner are excellent productivity tools with their own strengths.

Amazing Marvin excels in Extensive customization with toggleable plug-ins and multiple views, while Ellie Planner shines with Time Blocking with Drag-and-Drop: Core feature allowing users to drag tasks from a Kanban-style list directly into their calendar view for visual time blocking and day planning.. The best choice depends on your specific needs, workflow preferences, and budget.

We recommend trying both tools to see which one fits better with your productivity style.