OmniFocus 4: What’s New & How Does It Compare? (Review)

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Grab my free OmniFocus 4 cheat sheet: peterakkies.ck.page/omnifocus-cheat-sheet
Recently, the Omni Group released OmniFocus 4. This new version has been in the works for years. Because it’s been in beta for a long time, I’ve done previous videos about OmniFocus’s development direction.
I was keen, though, to try out the final release of OmniFocus 4 with fresh eyes. And while OmniFocus can still improve in many ways, I’m thoroughly enjoying using OmniFocus 4. If only they could work on a few things… let me show you and explain.
TIMESTAMPS
================================
00:00 Introduction & Context
01:29 What’s New?
10:40 OmniFocus’s Strengths
15:34 What Needs to Improve
21:49 Comparison to Other Apps
24:05 Pricing
24:54 Who Is OmniFocus 4 For?
COURSES & RESOURCES
================================
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Things 3 - peterakkies.ck.page/things-cheat-sheet
Todoist - peterakkies.ck.page/todoist-cheat-sheet
OmniFocus - peterakkies.ck.page/omnifocus-cheat-sheet
Apple Notes - peterakkies.ck.page/notes-cheat-sheet
Apple Reminders - peterakkies.ck.page/reminders-cheat-sheet
Weekly Reviews - peterakkies.net/freebies/weekly-review-cheat-sheet
Free Mini-Courses:
Which Task Manager is Right for You? - whichtaskmanager.com
The Essentials of Big-Picture Productivity - peterakkies.net/freebies/bpp-essentials
Full-Length Courses:
Things 3 - peterakkies.net/courses/things-3
Todoist - peterakkies.net/courses/todoist
OmniFocus - peterakkies.net/courses/omnifocus-3
Apple Notes - peterakkies.net/courses/apple-notes
Big-Picture Productivity (setting & achieving goals) - bigpictureproductivity.com
List of Tools, Apps, & Services I Recommend:
peterakkies.net/tools
CONNECT WITH ME
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Опубликовано:

9 янв 2024

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Комментарии : 95

@roderictaylor 2 месяца назад

I honestly think the best thing the Omni Group could do to make Omnifocus more approachable and easier to use for newcomers, would be to purchase your Omnifocus 4 course from you and make it freely available to users. I'm taking it now, and it is so helpful. I don't think I'd have the patience to figure out Omnifocus's quirks and the way it does things on my own. If I do end up becoming an Omnifocus user, it will be because of your course.

@PeterAkkies Месяц назад

Thanks so much Roderic, that means a lot 🙏🏻

@Bruno-yb6sr 6 месяцев назад

It's a frank review. I expected a review encouraging everyone to upgrade, especially after you said you have been in contact with Omnigroup’s team for years. I watched it to learn more about OF4, but now I want to know more about your channel. You got a sub. Again, thanks for your honesty.

@PeterAkkies 6 месяцев назад

Thank you for your kind words, Bruno. I try to call it like it see it, with some compassion and benefit of the doubt. OmniFocus is still a good product that I enjoy using, but the Omni Group need to up their game to stay with the competition.

@bigmig4574 6 месяцев назад

Excellent and fair critique and this is a real shame. I was a user / fan of Omnifocus 2 & 3 when first using GTD principles but they have been left behind in a rapidly changed and competitive landscape. Feels like they need to introduce new talent into their concept and design team.

@manuelv.4684 5 месяцев назад

Hey, what better alternatives can you recommend if you feel they've been left behind by competition? Really curious!

@Guipvideotek 6 месяцев назад

Thank you for the review. Highly thoughtful and honest as usual. After 7 years of (trying hard to consistently) use Omnifocus, I was just so fed up with my failures… moved to Things 3 last November and after seeing this video, I am so happy I ditched OF and didn’t place any hope in its v4 ! The UX is what makes me want to (literally) throw up when I see OF but what I realised after weeks of using Things is how unhelpful the management of dates in OF is. It’s kinda « under the hood » but that’s a game changer. Worth losing sequential projects, geotags & attachments altogether JUST for that!

@hugocast 6 месяцев назад

As soon as you said "Let's imagine you are a lawyer working on 50 cases..." it reminded me of MacSparky 😄Maybe that explains why he has really stuck with OF during the years. Great video! Thanks for going over all the new features!

@jsyap11 5 месяцев назад

I read OF as OnlyFans…

@burts6896 4 месяца назад

Inspectors are outdated? No. They are a sensible design choice. I think OmniGroup uses them really well. Yes, they take up some space which is why you can hide them with a key press. The presenter hopefully could at least recognize that inspectors provide rapid data access with great muscle memory relative to other alternatives, such as in-line editing, or context specific menus. The UX principle of master+detail views works really well. The test of text heavy productivity software is not if it simply looks pretty, but rather if it works well and economically. I don’t think it is an insult to say that OmniFocus has borrowed from database GUIs; it is a compliment. If I wanted a free-form task manager, I would probably just use markdown files or a paper notebook. OF caters to people who like the structure.

@SharonRosen 6 месяцев назад

Thank you for saving me the effort, time, and money of upgrading. You convinced me in just the first few minutes. I'm so disappointed they didn't make the software better after all these years.

@aziaonac 4 месяца назад

Hello Peter thanks for your videos, I learned how to use Omnifocus with your course and l absolutly love it!

@PeterAkkies 3 месяца назад

Wonderful, thanks for sharing!

@timothyverbunt2763 5 месяцев назад

Very helpful video. Thank you! 🙏

@Sebastiaosegundo 6 месяцев назад

Thank you for so much, Peter! You're a master!

@ChrisCote 6 месяцев назад

Thank you for this review. Original Things user who absolutely loves it, but would like some of the more advanced capabilities and features (locations, attachments, perspectives or saved searches, more levels of depth, color differentiation for priorities, review function, etc.) that OF4 or Todoist offer. I'd give up some of the beauty and ease for more power. Todoist offered enough of these that I gave it a run over the summer. While I liked a lot of the additional capabilities, no do/start dates, bugs, and the unintuitive subtasks and repeating tasks/subtasks made me excited to try OF4 out as I'd tried OF3 in the past and could see the potential. Man, that dissipated immediately. I realize they pushed the boundaries of SwiftUI as they went, and it may benefit future users through fast development as you noted, but euf... I just didn't see enough additions, refinement, or stability to make it worth the switch. I think OG will look back on this as a huge missed opportunity that squandered years, existing loyalty, and the potential to attract new users. Bummer. Now, let's getting going on adding new substantive features at the core, Things!

@BuddhaNatureOfTheGrind 6 месяцев назад

This is a great video. As a long-time user, it's annoying that version 4 landed with a "meh."

@bosiefoobar 6 месяцев назад

blimey, that review is spot on

@christopherbratt161 2 месяца назад

Remarkably good review. Outstanding.

@PeterAkkies 6 месяцев назад

Grab my free OmniFocus 4 cheat sheet: peterakkies.ck.page/omnifocus-cheat-sheet

@petrstichauer 6 месяцев назад

Hi Peter, great review. Small detail: you can add almost everything (except attachments😊) to the outline of each individual project. Navigate to Settings > Layout > Outline and there is "Fluid defaults". This is the way to get rid of the inspector.😉 Have a great day all. Bye.

@PeterAkkies 6 месяцев назад

You’re right, but the outline becomes huge. There are better ways for them to design it.

@stewartluscott-evans2216 6 месяцев назад

I was a long-time OF user through versions 2 and 3, but moved to Thing 3 two years ago, primarily to reduce the temptation to tinker. I do miss the way defer dates work, sequential projects, and, most importantly, the project review capabilities of OF. I've been trialling OF4 for the past couple of weeks, and although there is much to love, as there always was, I just can't see this version reversing what (in the absence of any hard numbers) seems to have been a material drift of users away from OF to Things & Todoist in recent years. Now they are on Swift, they need to rapidly up their game on the UI and ditch the inspector to bring OF into the 2020s. If Things were to introduce some of those killer features, I'd never even look back.

@danscoular 6 месяцев назад

Same here, though I hated defer dates, and much prefer Things 3’s start/due implementation.

@collaborati 6 месяцев назад

Peter, great review. I upgraded from OF2 so naturally it’s a big improvement. Question: what outline app are you using for your notes on the right side of the screen?

@PeterAkkies 6 месяцев назад

Thank you! That’s Notion.

@KI4ASK 6 месяцев назад

Thanks for the review Peter. Years ago I used OmniFocus mostly because I watched one of your videos and you were using it. When you moved to Things, I held on to OF a little bit longer. A year ago I switched to Things. I do miss some of the features of OF but never liked the interface. Watching this has convinced me to stay with Things 3. I’m not sure what the OF developers have been doing the past two years, but this is not a good upgrade so I’ll pass on it.

@MARKEVER72 4 месяца назад

Thanks for your amazing reviews. I have the 3 version and it’s enough for me; the update is very expensive for few improvements. I want to know your opinion about if is better THINGS or OMNIFOCUS. I have both and I love them. Thing is more useful and simple OmniFocus is for having many many things to do

@reenaesmailcomposer 6 месяцев назад

Thank you for this thorough review! I've been using OF since 2009 -- probably since OF1! I also love the new Forecast view capabilities -- but I have one question that I cannot seem to figure out: How is the Forecast View sorted? Is there a way to sort it by Tag? I'd love to see a an explanation of how the Forecast view options like flexible/organized, keep sorted, preserve hierarchy work!

@PeterAkkies 6 месяцев назад

Thanks Reena. You can sort the Forecast view in different ways now. One way is in the order that your tasks otherwise appear in the Projects view. Another way is to manually sort items. I’ll be explaining all of this in detail in my OmniFocus 4 course.

@jumbolarge108 6 месяцев назад

I’m surprised you didn’t mention the lagginess on iOS. In its current form it is an absolute donkey to use, especially for task reordering in large projects.

@PeterAkkies 6 месяцев назад

I’m hoping that will get fixed soon

@davidbourne6478 5 месяцев назад

About 4 years ago I bought omni focus 3 for iPad. This meant I got a 50% upgrade discount and paid $37.50 across all devices for omni focus 4. One time payment. No Subscriptions. This was a great deal for me!

@juliusmulius8335 5 месяцев назад

Could you please make an video about amplenote? This would me help thank you for your content

@maxvanbalgooy2847 3 месяца назад

Thanks, Peter! Automation needs serious improvement to easily create a frequently-used list of tasks for a project, such as organizing travel, preparing a presentation, writing a proposal, or creating a video. Writing shortcuts using Apple Script or another coding language is a major obstacle.

@uurrah 6 месяцев назад

As a Version 2, 3 and now 4 user, I was hoping for more with Version 4. My hope is that being built on Swift, new developments can happen quicker and spread across all platforms. Something I still long for is integration with an Agile project management tool to work with others but won’t hold my breath/projects for it to come.

@7775Kevin 5 месяцев назад

I don't think we will ever see any real change no matter what they are using to build the app. I think they are stuck in old ways of thinking and they can't or won't change

@Sebastian-ge4yz 6 месяцев назад

I absolutely share your review perspective. For me, Omnifocus 4 is the next step straight to the graveyard of productivity apps for the Omnigroup. What I really like is the built-in “review mode”. But that's all. All the other "new" stuff is old and outdated. 😞 R.I.P. Omnifocus

@eyeintheskystudios 5 месяцев назад

So Peter...what is your go-to? T3? OF3? Something else? A mix of everything? :D Great video!

@PeterAkkies 5 месяцев назад

I switch between several apps because I want to stay proficient with all of the, so I can teach them. I don't recommend others switch apps very often, though.

@alexmarsh3748 3 месяца назад

The syncing and performance issues between devices has been a thing since the first version of Omnifocus. It's criminal that you still have to run the manual sync. I've paid for every version of Mac and iPhone Omnifocus since 2009. Gave up the endless tinkering and fiddling and moved to things 3 in 2020. Thanks for the honest, frank review, won't be going back.

@mike_qbik 6 месяцев назад

Spot on. Its still designed by dinosaurs who want to be young. Very unatractive. And comes from someine who used Omni software since version 1. This is easy pass for me.

@iChnax 6 месяцев назад

Thanks for the review. I think it's a bit hard to request all the pro features, OF has, and at the same time insisting on a super-simple UI, that's not intimidating new users. Indeed, in my opinion OF does already too much of this by hiding some fields. I'm not a big fan of that! E.g. notifications. I was looking for them: could not locate them, not in contextual menues, not in Menu bar, not in inspector -- unless you find that little button to show all fields in the inspector. Really?! If I didn't know, notifications exist, I would have never found. That's not a good UI either, even if less intimidating than showing all the options by default. In comparing to competing apps, there is one point missing, that's big for me: OF is the only one that lets me sync on my own server. All others want to have my data on their servers. Even if their reduced feature set in favour of a cleaner interface was enough for me, forcing me to scatter my data all over the world and giving up control over it, would still be a no-go. I can hear you answering: "most of normal users don't have a server or care". Right. It's shame enough if "we power users" don't know better than to have "normal" users get used to ugly things for simplicity/laziness. But removing all saner options, because "normal people" won't use them, is really crossing the red line! (sorry, people @cultured code, as much as I liked "Things", but NO!) I agree about the missing "do"-Date. (or a date on which the flag would turn on, automatically). But now the notifications seem to be a feasible work-around: Add a notification for when you want to start working on it (and maybe a second, when it's *really* about time to start ;-) and have tasks show on notification dates in forecast.

@krsnabantai 6 месяцев назад

drop a video where you showing the apps you use in your day to day life

@macpretorians 6 месяцев назад

I was really looking forward to your OmniFocus 4 review. Of course, as always, I learned a lesson from this material for myself. But I think you are not objective about OmniFocus 4. That's just my opinion. But you are clearly leaning towards Todoist. Everyone has their own habits, of course, but for me, OmniFocus can only compete with Things 3. For me, the OmniFocus 4 is exactly what I wanted and I am moving around this system now with my eyes closed.

@PeterAkkies 6 месяцев назад

Thanks for watching. If I lean towards any app, right now that would be Things 3. But Todoist is developing by far the fastest. And OmniFocus still has a lot that I really like. Who can be “objective”, anyway.

@lexsemenenko 6 месяцев назад

How do you, Things 3 users, deal with lack of attachments? 1 of 3 tasks for me has an attachment. So essential but missing. I had high hopes for OF 4, but now sad.

@PeterAkkies 6 месяцев назад

You just have to keep them somewhere else. It's not ideal. I hope Cultured Code adds attachment support to Things. In the meantime, if attachment support is really important for you, go with OmniFocus or Todoist.

@johnmimo8452 5 месяцев назад

I think attachments will be with Things 4. Has cultured code announced a Things 4 Version?

@PeterAkkies 5 месяцев назад

No, no news@@johnmimo8452

@danscoular 6 месяцев назад

I used OF2 and 3 until I moved to Things 3 four years ago. Sounds like a counting game. I can’t see that that much has changed between OF 3 and 4, although if you’re a devotee you might ask why it needs to. I think in this video you answer why. However I am thinking about it again, for multiple clients. That said, when I was an OF user I spent hours customising and tinkering the thing, and I never satisfactorily managed defer dates.

@Vam1500 5 месяцев назад

I am happy with Omnifocus 3. Do I have to upgrade?

@PeterAkkies 5 месяцев назад

No you can keep using OmniFocus 3 for now

@podnuh 6 месяцев назад

When will your new OF course be ready?

@PeterAkkies 6 месяцев назад

Thanks for asking. I don’t want to predict. I finalized the lesson plan and might start recording next week.

@donaldtashner9089 6 месяцев назад

Long time user. I take a simplified approach. Not a power user. But , not worthwhile to switch to another app. even if it would be a better fit for my needs

@left0verture 6 месяцев назад

I started on OF2 and moved to v3 but for me, it was killing flies with a shotgun. Constantly tweaking your system can be fun, and there are a lot of people who seem (Omni) focused on doing that, but I’m not one of them. I just want a low-friction app to keep stuff from falling through the cracks. For me, Things is that app. I’ll keep an eye on OF and the others but nah. Not this version.

@InHisThirties 3 месяца назад

Is it worth having Omnifocus if you already have Todoist

@PeterAkkies 3 месяца назад

I would use one or the other but not both. Which one to use depends on your preferences and requirements-take a look at my free course "Which Task Manager is Right for You?" peterakkies.net/freebies/which-task-manager

@InHisThirties 3 месяца назад

@@PeterAkkies I see. I stick to Todoist because of the cross functionality between pc and Mac. However, The one downfall I see is the inability to use personal work spaces. I'd love to have a work workspace and a personal life workspace like things 3 or omnifocus would allow. Unfortunately, the additional Todoist workspace is geared exclusively to cater to teams.

@MrSilviut 4 месяца назад

I don't think that it's necessary for app developers to constantly come up with updated UI just for the sake of updated UI. I don't mind at all that OmniFocus looks the way it did. Anyways, these UI just go round and round in circles between elaborate and minimalist.

@valentinoserusi8337 3 месяца назад

you should be more prepared when review, - is true that inspector exist, but actually whit all keyboard shortcuts don't need to use menu or inspector you can easy defer due or anything else from keyboard shortcuts and show hide different field from visualization to editing mode, so inspector use is not necessary at all, OF require a learning curve that will reward a lot. - what need actually need is to fix a way to reschedule easier from ios, like personalized swipe, and change deffer and due dates. (natural language on mac is not so needed as the keyboard shortcuts work very good and you can type deffer/due date and add tags, flag, project ecc, you can even add subtask from quick add on both mac whit keyboad shortcuts, ios whit drag&drop) the real missing here is the collaboration between OF users!(and could be great have iOS reminders sync instead importer so will be possible collaborate whit all apple user at least at the first level of subtask) collapsable subtask on widget is also a must, and should be showed indented too performance are now much better.

@PeterAkkies 3 месяца назад

@jera1297 6 месяцев назад

I don’t care about Omni focus, but just watching because you uploaded. 😄

@rickyg9498 5 месяцев назад

Thanks for the video. A lot of good from Omnifocus. But just like Things 3, its unfortunate they dont create a Windows program. The Omnifocus Web is treated like the red-headed stepchild when it comes to attention...so bad.

@jesperweiland 6 месяцев назад

Great video, but I will never get used to this old school, overwhelming UI. Things3 lacks a lot of features but is a great pleasure to use 🎉

@bigtelco4705 28 дней назад

OmniFocus has a lot going for it: Quick entry, MacOS and iOS integration, real next actions, defer dates, reviews and sequential projects. But, the UI is still excruciating to use: during the Beta I commented over and over that they needed to lose the Inspector, but to no avail. Even just moving items around on a list (tasks, tags, etc.) is still finicky and FAR worse than Things or Todoist. This is even bad on the Mac and still worse in iOS. Still no natural language support? While I don't agree with all of Cultured Code's design choices-- I understand them. With the OmniGroup, they have lost the thread. They have improved some capabilities--but the UI is just as painful as before. If Cultured Code would just create an engine to save searches (Shortcuts do not do the job!) or create some custom views, and would put task controls above notes (if I have a long note it creates a lot of unnecessary scrolling), it would blow everything else away. In terms of general usability, the major downfall of OF 3, they haven't really made much progress--at least not progress that represents several years of work.

@everythingisfake7555 5 месяцев назад

there is no reason why any newcomers should use omni over the more well known apps, if you want to do general task management (AVOID OF), if you want to do more serious PM, why would you use OF which is a task manager

@silentroach 6 месяцев назад

So powerful and so ugly 😢 wish they really will hire designers instead of designing it by themselves

@pineapple8407 6 месяцев назад

Done with Omni. Done with paying for apps that developers disable so they can sell you a new version.

@user-pj2ts5qy2n 5 месяцев назад

So you want to fund indefinite development with a single one time purchase? Or you want a subscription? Omni has a subscription option that keeps you current. Or is there another sustainable business model for apps you’re thinking of?

@pineapple8407 5 месяцев назад

@@user-pj2ts5qy2n You’re not real bright. Read what I said again.

@pineapple8407 4 месяца назад

@@user-pj2ts5qy2n 👎 nope. Just don’t disable what people already paid for so you can shill your new version. Should people be forced to buy a new car when your old one paid for is working good? Got it Einstein?