5 Productivity Apps I Can’t Live Without

I’m a productivity junkie. There, I said it. GTD. Inbox zero. I’ve tried and tested them all. If you could see my App Store history you’d get it. Heck, if I were married I’d have a private account to hide my purchases. Still reading? I’m guessing you’re a productivity junkie too. According to the Mayans, the world is going to end in a few days so we all need to make the most of the time we have left.

The five apps on this list are ones that have stuck with me. They’ve proven their worth. Whether I’m standing at my desk (yes, standing) or on the the train, one, if not all of these apps are open. Every single day. I hope they do for you what they’ve done for me – get more done. Faster than the day before.

1. Cinch

I’m lucky enough to have one of these bad boys. Big enough to turn heads, but more importantly have two apps running side-by-side. This is one of those times where size does matter.

Cinch helps relieve my inner OCD – having two windows side-by-side without wasting a pixel of screen real estate. With Cinch I can precisely resize a window simply by dragging to the left, right, or top edge of my screen.

2. Alfred

I have a love-hate relationship with my mouse. It’s constantly fighting for my attention with my keyboard. My keyboard usually wins thanks to Alfred. Alfred App that is.

You can do just about anything with Alfred. Launching apps, opening files, searching your hard drive, and my favorite feature, accessing your clipboard history (Powerpack required). Just set-up your keyboard shortcut – it’s ‘COMMAND + SPACE’ for me – and give your mouse a break.

3. Clear

A new to-do app appears everyday. I’ve lost count of how many I’ve tried. I don’t need workflow or location-based alerts. I’m a simple guy. I just want to organize my tasks into lists. Lists that are synced across my three devices. Clear does this, beautifully. It’s unobtrusive, incredibly simple, and damn good looking. What’s not to love?

I have four lists – Personal, Today, Tomorrow, and Shopping (I cook a mean chicken schnitzel). ‘Tomorrow’ is essentially my backlog of to-dos. Every morning I look at my backlog and add no more than 3-5 tasks to my Today list. That’s it. There’s nothing else to it.

4. WorkBox

There’s rarely a minute of my working day when I don’t have a Confluence tab open in my browser. Confluence is the lifeblood of Atlassian and I use it for everything I do at work. Seriously. Everything.

WorkBox is not a standalone app, but a new feature that has changed the way I use Confluence. Put simply, WorkBox helps me keep tabs on my most important work in Confluence without getting trapped in my email inbox.

5. Hipchat

I have a phone on my desk. I can’t remember the last time I used it. Whenever I have a question that needs an answer, work I want feedback on, or a interesting article to share with my team, I Hipchat. Group and 1-on-1 chat rooms keeps me connected with my team in San Francisco and Sydney, in real-time.

That’s it. Five apps that save me time. Five apps that help me GTD. Five apps I can’t live without.  Are there any apps that you can’t live without?

Happy holidays. Here’s to a more productive 2013.