Microsoft To-Do debuts new look on the web, 'Planned' smart list feature

By Dan Thorp-Lancaster
published

To-Do now has a new design on the web, and it's looking pretty fresh.

Microsoft's To-Do apps on mobile aren't the only ones getting some love this week. The company debuted a new look for its web app, sporting a simplified design and a new feature: "Planned" smart lists.

The most notable change is that new design, which eschews some of the design elements found in the other To-Do apps in favor of a more simplified look. Overall, it's quite a bit cleaner, but also blander than its prior iteration. But for an app that's meant to help you focus on your tasks for the day, that's probably not a bad thing.

In addition to the new look, you'll also find a new "Planned" section grouped alongside your "My Day," "Important," and "Tasks" smart lists in the left-hand menu. The new section is meant to give you a quick overview of your upcoming tasks for the next five days, along with a further look at thing coming later down the line.

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The new "Planned" section isn't yet available in the other To-Do apps, but it's likely not far off.

To check out all of what's new, you can head to To-Do on the web (opens in new tab). Today's refresh also comes alongside updates to the Android and iOS apps, which bring a much smaller set of features to the table, like faster syncing and UI tweaks.

Dan Thorp-Lancaster
Dan Thorp-Lancaster

Dan Thorp-Lancaster is the former Editor-in-Chief of Windows Central. He began working with Windows Central, Android Central, and iMore as a news writer in 2014 and is obsessed with tech of all sorts. You can follow Dan on Twitter @DthorpL and Instagram @heyitsdtl. 

17 Comments
  • Microsoft has so many Task tracking solutions I have no idea when to use which. The most important feature for me, is to sync with outlook tasks. I wish outlook tasks would be more robust and have more planning features.
  • Eventually To-Do will be the last standing one. I think that's the plan. Take times.
    And, when the time comes, MS will provide exporters / importers I suppose.
  • I totally agree!
  • Yea I agree. Boils down to you just got to pick one and stay with it, as least for now. (I use To-Do and I like it). And as Hirox said, Microsoft says they will integrate To-Do into many services, which would be sweet. And that takes time. Many, many improvements in the last six months or so, which brings confidence.
  • I heard a little birdy say that Cortana support is comming. In fact I bet reminders ties into stickey while Cortana lists ties into todo which I fully expect at some point can export to one note. As for sticky and reminders im thinking they should export as one note quick notes somehow. Finally todo is outlook tasks on 📱 and for Windows Proper.
  • The new look definitely matches that of Outlook.com, so I'm assuming these two will soon be integrated.
  • Todo does sync with outlook tasks. It has for 3 months now.
  • May I ask, how do I connect to my business Office365 Outlook software Tasks? I have almost 2,000 tasks.
  • Unfortunately there's a difference between Office.com and Office 365. Office.com Tasks are integrated. I believe Office 365 products tend to lag because they can't immediately implement any changes that may change fundamental aspects of the features (integration with office.com tasks affected how office.com tasks were handled to allow for the "steps" feature).
  • For the same reason I switched from TO Do to Wunderlist. Its still better than TOdo for nw. I have set up a flows to sync outlook tasks to wunderlist 1ce per day and also To get wunderlist tasks as an email to me 1ce a day. I suggest u take a look at flow
  • Wunderlist, while probably not for awhile, will eventually get retired and ToDo will replace it. I mean, the Wunderlist team is who is developing ToDo.
  • To do already syncs with outlook tasks, doesn't it? It has for a while now
  • Now where is the Progressive Web App of it?
    The Win10 app doesn't match this.
    Has the same data but different ui than in Outlook.com tasks; very interesting. Hope Msft is on its way to drop the Live.com and Office.com domains and have their services as a subdomain of Microsoft.com; much clearer and cleaner.
  • The Win10 app doesn't match this ?
    How ?
    For me that's exactly the same, the only difference i could spot is that in the web i can disable smart lists, while i can't have the dark mode.
  • Gladly the win10 app is a native UWP, much lighter and faster than a JS app
  • I wouldn't mind seeing live.com go away, however it's very unlikely office.com will go away. Their Office products are a very powerful brand. Also, Office.com Tasks and Microsoft ToDo aren't the same thing. They share the same data, but they're different views of that data for different ways of using that data. They're not meant to look the same.
  • By the way the new "Smart Lists" feature has been on Uwp including mobile for a while. As for the planned one go into my day and click the text bubble or the light bulb icon in the header pic.