THE BEST TASK APPS

How to use Microsoft To Do

A go-to guide for setting up Microsoft To Do for success.

Slater Katz

Published in

unproductive me

6 min readApr 4, 2020

Microsoft has a knack for doing things well, and Microsoft To Do is no exception. The easy-to-use task app is simple, friendly, customizable, and has just about every feature you’d need in a task app.

Microsoft says To Do will help you focus from work to play. It certainly has helped me, and it may even be able to help you too.

Let’s walk through how to set up Microsoft To Do and all the fun things you can geek out over.

Creating Groups and Lists

Before adding any tasks, I recommend setting up Groups and Lists. These will keep your projects organized. Here’s how to think about each:

Groups: Individual spaces for different areas of your life.
Lists: Groupings of what you need to do in each space.

If you’ve used Things, Microsoft To Do’s Groups are similar to Things’ Areas. The difference is there isn’t a Groups page in Microsoft To Do like there is for Areas in Things.

Another limitation of Microsoft To Do’s Groups is, unlike Things’ Areas, you can’t add tasks to a Group — you can only add tasks to Lists. That means a Group without a List is essentially useless.

The good news is Microsoft To Do’s Lists and Things’ Projects are pretty much the same.

Groups

To make a Group in Microsoft To Do, simply tap the notebook-looking icon in the right-hand corner of the menu pane. Be warned — it will create one right away without any prompt.

In my Microsoft To Do, I created three Groups:

Work: This is where I keep everything related to my 9–5 job.
‍Slater: This is where I keep tasks related to running my life.
Hey: An app I’m working on with my boyfriend and our friend.

Three Groups works for me because there are three spaces in my life right now. Other ideas for Groups you might want to use are:

Family
School
Side hustle
Health
Romance
Travel

Fun fact: You can only delete groups from the mobile app.

Lists

I think of lists as groupings of tasks. Sometimes they’re related to a project or goal, and other times they’re straight lists, like a grocery list. You can also create lists that live outside a Group. This makes it a very flexible feature.

To add a List to a Group, be sure to drag it on top of your desired Group. If you move it underneath, it will still be a standalone list.

Adding tasks

Now that we’ve organized Microsoft To Do with Groups and Lists, it’s time to start adding tasks. You can start adding tasks in any section, but I recommend starting by adding tasks to your individual Lists.

To add a task, simply go to your desired List and write your task in the bottom field.

Once you’ve added a task, you can click on it to add detail. Details you can add include:

Mark as important
Steps (think of these as subtasks)
Add to My Day (we’ll cover this in a bit)
Create a reminder
Add a due date
Make it a recurring task
Add a file
Write notes

Here’s what it looks like in practice:

Sections in Microsoft To Do

Aside from your Groups and Lists, there are four sections in Microsoft To Do:

My Day: An overview of what you need to get done today.
Important: A consolidated list of every task marked important.
Planned: An agenda-like view of tasks to do in the coming weeks.
Tasks: Where tasks outside of your Lists live.

My Day

My Day is kind of what it sounds like: An overview of what your day looks like task-wise. There are a couple ways to add to My Day:

“Add to My Day” button in a task’s details: If you choose to follow through on that button, that task will automatically be added to My Day.
The 💡 button in the My Day section: This will suggest tasks that you might want to add to My Day. Don’t ask how it works — I don’t know 🤷🏻‍♀️

I use a mix of both methods. The downside to My Day is, come tomorrow, your tasks vanish from My Day, and you need re-add them in addition to whatever else you want to work on.

Important

This section is pretty self-explanatory. If you’re looking for a quick overview of your top priorities, this is the place to go.

Planned

Curious what your coming weeks look like? The Planned section tells you everything you need to do from today to next week. It’s helpful when you’re trying to assess your workload.

Tasks

For tasks that don’t correspond to any List, you can add them to your Tasks section. Tasks here work just like in your Lists, so feel free to add reminders, due dates, files, and more.

Fun features to know about

There’s more you can do with Microsoft To Do. I’ve found these tips and tricks to come in handy, and I hope you do too.

Themes

Choose from 23 themes to make Microsoft To Do your own. I’ve found this feature pretty nice — I love to switch it up!

This feature is pretty cool. You can share a List with anyone you know. If they have a Microsoft account, you all can collaborate on a list. This is perfect for group projects and shared households.