The key to a successful business is to get more done in less time. Many entrepreneurs have misbelieved that putting in extra hours everyday can rocket company’s productivity. However, overwhelming workload has been proven to create nervous breakdown and burnout at work.
If you are reading this article, chances are you’ve been looking for a change and try to figure out if there is a way to boost productivity at work. Good news is there are thousands of powerful apps to help you get more done in less time, and we’ve handpicked some of our favorite productivity apps for you.
Top 10 best productivity apps for business in 2024
The key features of productivity apps will focus on team collaborations, communications, project management and help you streamline your workflow. If you’re looking for a specific project management software, we also have some of the top-notch tools for you to select.
1. Quire
If you’re looking for an app that can improve team productivity, a project management software is a must. Based on the review on Capterra or G2Crowd, Quire is one of the top rated productivity apps for business owners.
The intuitive and simple user interface is always a dealbreaker for anyone who comes across a new project management tool. Quire developer team has spent years of effort to strive for a delicate balance between simplicity and powerful features. The elegant and intuitive interface is one of the aspects that Quire users appreciate the most.
You can get your teams on board with Quire set up each member with different roles and permissions. Quire allows you to create and manage all of your tasks categorized into different projects. With the hierarchical structure, all of your complex projects can be neatly organized and easily collaborated with other team members.
A lot of the productivity apps adopt to-do list as one of the key features. However, Quire brought the flat to-do list to another level and introduced an infinite nested task list - unlimited tasks and subtasks that help you break down big ideas into smaller and digestible tasks.
If your team has been working with a whiteboard with sticky notes for a long time, Quire exceptional Kanban board is a perfect option. Unlike other project management software, with Quire you can tackle your projects and get focused with both Kanban board and nested task list as a perfect duo.
The best thing with Quire is, you can switch between nested task list and Kanban board at anytime to get the best of both worlds. Quire is one of the very few, if not saying the first project management platform allow this.
A good project tracking and planning software must have the simplest and most straightforward workflow to let teammates collaborate seamlessly with each other. Your team will always stay in sync with Quire real-time collaboration feature. You can access your projects using your mobile phones and web browsers at anytime. Not many task management solutions can keep your data updated in real-time!
To put in a nutshell, Quire is not only an cloud-based project management software, Quire can help to drive your business to success!
Some more amazing features that make Quire your best investment:
- Nested Task list: Breakdown big tasks and organize with structured list.
- Kanban Board: Focus on selected crucial tasks in a short period of time.
- Sublist: For one to-do list, create as many sub-lists as you wish to focus on which matters the most to you.
- Timeline: A beautiful Gantt chart that helps to map out team schedules in the most intuitive way.
- Multiple Assignees: Assign a task to the people who are responsible for it.
- Schedule: Set start date, start time, due date, recurring date for a task to track the process.
- Project Template: Save time - duplicate a project or task to use as a template.
- Reports: A visual overview of how well each of your projects and members is performing.
- Smart Folders: View and organize tasks from different projects in one place.
- External Team: Outsource your tasks and assign to third parties without them seeing everything on your projects.
- Share Links: Send an invitation link to your clients so they can access your project without signing up.
- Smart Keyboard Shortcuts: Tons of nifty shortcuts that allow you to work on your project without reaching the mouse.
- File Sharing: Easily upload a file or attach a file from Google Drive to your tasks.
- Integrations: Github, Slack, Google Drive, etc.
- Export and Import data: Pain-free migrating your data or export your projects to save as a local backup.
Pros
- Interchangeable infinite nested task list and Kanban Board
- Comprehensive collaboration features including multiple assignees and scheduling.
- User-friendly and minimalist interface.
- Cross-platform operations: iOS, Android mobile apps
- Smart search feature to locate every piece of information.
- Integrations with Slack, Google Drive, iCal, Google Calendar, etc.
Cons
- Lack of various theme options
- No built-in chat (can use task-based comments are updated in real-time instead)
Pricing
2. Pocket
If you’re glued to your devices all the time to view and browse many interesting articles, links, videos, photos, etc. but having so little time to look into these, Pocket is the productivity app that you need.
Pocket lets you store all of the links, articles, videos, and so much more for later exploration. You don’t have to remember the URL link or anything, Pocket will save all of the data for you. This productivity app becomes one of the favorite software for busy entrepreneurs because of its cool feature.
Pros
- Save from multiple resources including web browsers and apps
- Search feature: title, URL, author, full-text, etc.
- Automatically synchronize with multiple devices
- Backup feature
Cons
- Lack of integration with third-party apps
Pricing
3. Google Drive
Most of the time you lost momentum at work by wasting the time to find the right materials. Google Drive provides you a channel to store everything, from your documents, presentations to photos.
You don’t have to print everything out and keep them in a file cabinet. With Google Drive, you can access all of your files from anywhere, as long as there is an internet connection. Especially, when you have access to G Suite apps, including Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, everything will be united at one place for you to manage them.
Pros
- Free plan comes with a huge storage space
- File management
- Easily access to files for editing and collaborating with other users
- Files backup
Cons
- Requires to have Gmail account
- No password protection for shared files
Pricing
4. Slack
When it comes to a slick and efficient productivity tool for team communication, Slack stands out to be one of the most popular ones. With more than 8 million daily active users, Slack is the best productivity app that a lot of project managers swear by to centralize communication in their organizations.
You can set up different channels for different teams to chat and video call, even share the screens if needed. Also, Slack can be integrated with most of the project management software, which allows you to tag and assign respective team members directly on Slack channels.
Pros
- Distinct communication channels
- Audio and video calls
- File uploads
- Third-party application integrations
Cons
- Complicated user interface
- Huge learning curve
Pricing
- Starting from $6.67/user/mo
5. Zoom
If you’re the head of a dynamic team, chances are you have to make a lot of conference calls. Zoom can be a real asset to glue your remote team together. Zoom allows you to effortlessly share screens and whiteboards with the other team members along with tons of collaboration features.
A lot of managers also use Zoom to effectively hold webinars, online conferences and demo sessions with customers. There’s no doubt that Zoom is one of the best productivity apps for teams.
Pros
- Group video call
- File sharing
- Schedule a call and automatically send invitation
Cons
- Complex set up
- Can use up a lot of CPU memory
Pricing
6. CamScanner
CamScanner is the next app that we would like to introduce in this best productivity apps list. You may have to scan a lot of documents everyday but who has the time to go to the copy room to scan every five minutes? CamScanner makes scanning super easy and you can edit the scanned document on your digital device right away.
Just take a snapshot of your document and the app will enhance the image quality and background automatically. You can export the file in multiple formats. CamScanner also has OCR feature to let you extract texts from your scanned image.
Pros
- OCR feature for editing and searching PDF
- Synchronize with multiple devices
- Mobile apps for iOS and Android
- Support wireless printing and global faxing
- Multiple edit image features
Cons
- Can get very expensive through a lot of in-app purchases
Pricing
7. Office365
Being one of the most popular productivity apps, Office365 provides a wide range of tools including Outlook, OneDrive, OneNote, Word, Excel, Microsoft Teams, PowerPoint, SharePoint, etc. Obviously anyone with a computer has been using at least one of the tools that Office365 offers.
Each app in Office365 bundles comes with a handful of features that benefit team collaboration and boost personal productivity. Also, if you’re using all of the tools in Office365, they can be synced easily across all of your devices.
Pros
- Real-time synchronize
- Offline access to all of the apps
- Multiple tools
Cons
- Quite expensive to get all the access to every app
Pricing
- Starting from $59.99/year
8. TeamViewer
TeamViewer isn’t a new product to the market, however, after many years, TeamViewer is still one of the productivity apps that many teams swear by to help them solve the problems. TeamViewer allows you to access and remotely control the devices as you have been transported over.
You can hold webinars with audio, video, whiteboard, chat or file sharing. You can collaborate with up to 300 people at once. TeamViewer also allows you to share screens across mobile devices.
Pros
- Remotely control devices and share screen
- Highly secured with passwords
- Impressive collaboration tools
Cons
- Relatively high cost
- Does not work through the proxy servers
- Require good internet connection
Pricing
9. MindMeister
If you’re working with a dynamic team, you must deal with a lot of brainstorming and ideas gathering. MindMeister is a powerful online mind mapping tool that allows team to visualize the ideas and share with each other in real-time. For years, MindMeister has become one of the best productivity apps for teamwork.
Since MindMeister is a cloud-based platform, you can ideate from anywhere at anytime and sync back with your team. Many educational institutions use MindMeister for students to generate ideas and be creative when brainstorming.
Pros
- Cloud-based platform
- Mind mapping presentations and templates
- Customized themes
- Due dates and priorities
- File attachment
- Assign tasks
Cons
- Not so many integrations
- No desktop app
Pricing
10. Buffer
If you are very active on social media, you must download Buffer to help you manage all of the content for your social media accounts. You can share content and stay connected with all of the social media apps using one app only.
Also, if you're working as a content manager, Buffer also shares the data analysis of your accounts so that you can adjust the content accordingly. This top-notch productivity app can really help you improve the SEO on your social media accounts.
Pros
- 2-step account login for better security
- Scheduling tweet
- Multiple social media accounts management
- Data analytics and insights
- RSS feeds connectivity
Cons
- Relatively expensive for freelancer
Pricing
