What Is Dynalist?

Dynalist is an outliner tool that was founded by Shida Li and Erica Xu. The company was created after the two founders found that Workflowy, another outliner, was lacking in certain features to help them get work done. Inspired by the idea of creating a more powerful tool, the pair created Omniflow in 2015, which was later renamed Dynalist.

Being an outliner software, Dynalist can be used as a collaborative note-taking tool to help you take notes hierarchically. Much like Workflowy, the main idea behind Dynalist is for you to be able to organize information in a way that helps you with recall, much like a second brain. If you’re interested in finding out more about the second brain, check out our review on building a second brain.

In recent times, Li and Xu recently released Obsidian.md as their flagship product. Following this, they also made an announcement via a Dynalist blog post that they won’t be updating Dynalist as frequently from now on as the company will be focused on developing Obsidian.

What Are Some Features of Dynalist?

Dynalist is an outliner software that is available on most platforms. It has features to help you with note-taking and also with project and task management. On Dynalist, you can list down your ideas hierarchically and keep breaking them down to gain a firm understanding and understand things better. What’s more, Dynalist is also available on all devices, meaning that you can take notes and manage your to-do lists from anywhere.

To help you manage your notes, Dynalist lets you group similar concepts together using tags to help you filter through your notes. Besides that, Dynalist has pretty standard features that you would expect to see in an outliner app. Some of these features include:

• Markdown formatting
• Tags
• Colored labels
• Headings (H1, H2, H3)
• Internal linking 
• Basic collaborative features

In terms of task and project management, Dynalist has standard features to help you manage your to-do lists. Task management is done by creating a checklist on Dynalist. After populating your checklist with tasks, you can set due dates and also set a task to repeat if it’s a recurring one.

However, Dynalist lacks the ability to assign tasks to your teammates, which means that the only way to assign tasks is to communicate the task to them via another application.

Dynalist also supports integration with Google Calendar so that you can sync your to-do list and view them on your Google Calendar.

What Is Dynalist Good For?

Dynalist is a simple outliner application that can be used to manage simple tasks. Here are some good use-cases for Dynalist:

• Note-taking
• Personal Knowledge Management tool
• Simple personal task lists
• Personal project management
• Basic collaborative note-taking

What Are Some Limitations of Dynalist?

One of the main limitations of Dynalist is that it lacks solid collaboration features. Even though it is a good outliner for personal use, Dynalist lacks a built-in chat function and also doesn’t have an assign task feature. In contrast, Taskade offers unlimited chat and video conferences for free to enable you to communicate and collaborate on one single app, making Taskade a better free alternative to Dynalist.

Furthermore, the developers of Dynalist have shifted their focus to developing Obsidian.md, which means that Dynalist will not see many major new features in the future.

How Much Does Dynalist Cost?

Dynalist offers its product in two simple plans.

Dynalist Free

• Unlimited items and documents
• Internal linking
• Markdown formatting
• Tags
• 5 bookmarks
• Sharing and collaboration

Dynalist Pro ($7.99/user per month)

• Google Calendar integration
• Tag pane
• Recurring tasks
• Unlimited bookmarks
• Custom CSS
• Dropbox & Google Drive backup
• Priority support

What Is Taskade?

Taskade is an online productivity and collaboration tool that was founded by John Xie, Dionis Loire, and Stan Chang in 2017. The Y Combinator-backed startup aims to help remote teams and individuals get work done faster and smarter.

Taskade is where remote teams get work done. With Taskade, you can organize projects and tasks, change between multiple project views, automate repetitive workflows, collaborate via built-in video chat with your team, and more, via an all-in-one unified workspace. 

Get a headstart on your projects and find a suitable structure for your notes via Taskade’s versatile collection of templates. Simply choose from a wide variety of templates and add them to your projects to get started instantly!

Taskade is a supercharged productivity app that both individuals and teams can use to collaborate on projects in real-time.

Taskade is the best free Dynalist alternative. Get started instantly for free today.

Key Features of Taskade

• Project Views. Visualize your projects in several different ways. Cycle between the List, Mind Map, Org Chart, and Board views to work the way you want. 

  • List View. This is the default view on Taskade. Create new lists here.
  • Board View. This view lets you work horizontally like a Kanban board. Visualize your workflow and tasks in this full-width view.
  • Mind Map View. This view lets you work in a horizontal tree-structured manner and map out what you have in mind.
  • Action View. Work in table view and stay organized with your task due dates, and more.
  • Org Chart View. Break down larger tasks into smaller ones to help you get things done.

• Zoom In, Zoom Out. Get a bird’s-eye view of the workflow by zooming out on all project views, or zoom in to focus on a specific area.
• Fold/Unfold. Fold (collapse) a parent task/bullet element to hide its subtasks. Indent outline elements with ⌨️ Tab and unfold lists with ⌨️ Shift+Tab.
• Real-time Communication. Chat and video conference with your team while collaborating in real-time on the same page. 
• 500+ Templates. Choose from 500+ templates across 26 categories to improve your productivity and workflows. Customize existing templates or create new ones across your workspaces.
• Multi-Select. Select and format multiple blocks or bulk assign them as tasks to other team members. You can also copy, paste, or indent selected blocks.
• Customize Sub-Tasks. Customize the format of your sub-tasks at individual levels. Choose from headings, numbered lists, shapes, and more.
• Recurring Tasks. Add due dates with start and end times to tasks within your project and set them to repeat daily, weekly, monthly, or even yearly.

• Move Tasks. Move and copy selected tasks to other projects across any workspace. You’ll receive a pop-up notification on completion.
• User Roles & Permissions. Manage collaborators and assign user roles/editing privileges (Owner, Admin, Editor, Checker, Viewer).
• Sort Tasks. Sort sub-tasks/children elements by completed/uncompleted stats or the due date. Task sorting can be accessed from a convenient pop-up menu.
• Search. Search within projects or globally across workspaces and subspaces. Instantly browse and jump between projects anywhere in the Taskade.
• Keyboard Shortcuts. Navigate projects, create content blocks, reorder elements, and complete tasks using a set of handy keyboard shortcuts.

• Team Calendar. Aggregate all tasks and projects in a shared calendar. The Taskade calendar integrates with Google (two-way), Apple, and Outlook. 
• Reorder Tasks. Lists in Taskade aren’t set in stone. Reorder tasks and find them a new home with intuitive drag-and-drop mechanics.
• Project History. See all the changes made by you and other collaborators. Click on the entries to navigate to the edited items within the project.
• Version History. Taskade saves snapshots of your project so that you can restore a previous version of your project with a single click.

• Export and Print. You can export your projects as plain text or markdown files. Attach them to emails, presentations, or for print.

• Cloud File Upload. Share files directly from Google Drive, Dropbox, Instagram, and Box in your projects with our integrations.
• Breakdown Larger Tasks. Organize your thoughts with Taskade’s unlimited hierarchy to break down large projects into tasks.
• Quick Search. Use CMD / CTRL + K to jump between any projects within Taskade web and apps.

For an exhaustive list of Taskade’s features, click here.

Taskade Pros

• Free-forever plan is loaded with features
• Real-time collaboration within the same project 
• Free built-in video call and chat function in each project
• Customizable templates to give you a headstart
• Work and chat in the same window, in the same app
• Frequent updates based on user/your feedback and suggestions
• Tabbed workflow for working with multiple Projects

Taskade Cons

• No custom APIs (yet)

Taskade Pricing

Taskade Free Plan

• Unlimited Tasks & Projects
• Unlimited Members & Guests
• Unlimited Folders & Teams
• Templates, Calendar, Repeat Tasks
• Real-time Collaboration
• Built-in Free Chat and Video Call

Taskade Unlimited Plan - Starts from $5/month

• Everything in Free, plus:
• Version History
• Advanced Permission
• Cloud Upload Integration
• 2-Way Calendar Integration

Click here for more information.

Is Taskade Right for You?

Taskade can be used by individuals and teams working from anywhere. Use Taskade individually or collaborate with your team for weekly agendas, team meetings, note-taking, project management, product roadmaps, and more. 

Make use of customizable board views to visualize your projects into digestible smaller tasks. Multiple board views are available even on Taskade’s free plan, allowing you to get more work done the smarter way. 

Collaborate with your team in real-time with free and unlimited chat and video conferencing available on every project. Automatic syncing ensures that your data is always up to date across devices.

Our customizable templates are available even with our free plan. Find the perfect template to help you get started with your project, and customize it to fit your needs!

Taskade is the simplest way to create task lists, checklists, and workflows. Being accessible from most platforms means that you can manage projects and get more work done the smarter way with Taskade.

Taskade is the best free Dynalist alternative. Try Taskade for free today.