Sunsama vs Todoist (2026): Daily Planner or To-Do List? Prices and AI Compared

Short answer: Choose Todoist if you need a dependable, low-cost list for everything you have to do, with a free plan and light AI help ($59.99/year for Pro on the US App Store). Choose Sunsama if your problem is overcommitting each day and you want a guided planning and shutdown ritual on your calendar ($17/month billed yearly, no free plan). Plenty of people use both: Todoist as the master list, Sunsama to plan the day.

All prices and features below were checked on the official pages and the US App Store on October 16, 2026.

The core difference

Todoist is a to-do list. It’s built for capturing tasks fast, organizing them into projects and filters, and reminding you. Its AI helps you break down tasks and capture them by voice.

Sunsama is a daily planner. It pulls tasks from your other tools into one list, has you drag them onto your calendar, and guides you through planning in the morning and shutting down at the end of the day. Its homepage lists guided planning and rituals, daily shutdown and highlights, timeboxing, focus mode and analytics (Sunsama).

Side by side

	Sunsama	Todoist
Free plan	No	Yes, Beginner
Paid price	Pro $17/month billed yearly, $22 monthly	Pro $59.99/year or $6.99/month (US App Store)
Trial	14 days, no credit card	Free plan instead
AI	“AI + MCP + Zapier” listed in Pro	Task Assist, Filter Assist, Email Assist, Ramble
Planning style	Guided daily plan on your calendar	Lists, boards, filters; calendar layout in Pro
Integrations	Pulls in tasks from Todoist, Asana, Notion, Jira, Gmail and more	Email, calendar and more
Privacy note	SOC 2 compliant (per pricing page)	SOC 2 Type II certified (per pricing page)
Best for	Professionals who overplan their days	Anyone who needs one reliable list

Sources: Sunsama pricing, Sunsama, Todoist pricing, Todoist on the US App Store.

Price: Todoist is far cheaper

Sunsama Pro costs $17/month billed yearly ($204/year) or $22/month billed monthly, in USD. Sunsama says it charges a subscription instead of offering a free plan so it never has to sell customer data, and it describes its price as about $1 per workday (Sunsama pricing).

One inconsistency to know about: the FAQ on the same pricing page still says Sunsama costs $25/month per person ($20/month for yearly plans) when explaining teammate costs. The plan box shows $17 and $22. We’d go by the plan box and confirm at checkout.

Todoist’s free Beginner plan includes 5 personal projects, Smart Quick Add, task reminders, list and board layouts, 3 filter views and limited Ramble sessions. Pro adds 300 personal projects, calendar layout, task duration, custom reminders, 150 filter views, Task Assist, deadlines and unlimited Ramble. The US App Store lists Pro at $59.99/year or $6.99/month. The web pricing page shows prices in your local currency, so the number you see may differ (Todoist pricing).

Over a year, Sunsama on annual billing costs about $144 more than Todoist Pro on the App Store.

AI features

Todoist documents several AI tools: Task Assist for breaking down tasks (Pro), Filter Assist, Email Assist, and Ramble, which turns what you say into tasks. Ramble is limited on the free plan and unlimited on Pro.

Sunsama lists “AI + MCP + Zapier” as part of Pro, and supports MCP so outside AI assistants can connect to your Sunsama data. The pricing page doesn’t explain the AI features in detail, so we can’t compare them feature for feature.

Neither app auto-schedules your whole day the way Motion does. If that’s what you want, see Sunsama vs Motion or Motion alternatives.

Daily planning experience

Sunsama’s value is the ritual. Each morning you choose what you’ll work on, estimate how long it takes, and see whether it fits on your calendar. Each evening you review and shut down. If you regularly end the day with half your list untouched, that structure is the point.

Todoist leaves planning to you. You can sort by date, priority or filter, and Pro adds a calendar layout and task durations. It suits people who are already decent at choosing what to do and mainly need nothing to slip through.

Using them together

Sunsama lists Todoist among its integrations (Sunsama). A common setup is to capture everything in Todoist, including with Ramble on the go, then pull the day’s tasks into Sunsama and plan them onto your calendar. You pay for both, so it only makes sense if Sunsama’s ritual changes how your days go.

Platforms

Sunsama is available on the web and as an iOS app on the App Store; we didn’t confirm other desktop apps on the pages we checked. For Todoist we confirmed iOS and web for this comparison. Check each vendor’s download page for your devices.

Which should you choose?

Choose Todoist if:

• You want a free plan or the lowest price.
• You need projects, filters and reminders for work and home.
• Voice capture with Ramble appeals to you.

Choose Sunsama if:

• You overcommit and want a daily check against your calendar.
• You pull tasks from several work tools and want one daily list.
• You’ll actually do a morning and evening ritual, and $204/year is acceptable.

Consider alternatives if:

• You want AI to schedule for you: Motion or Morgen.
• You want a task inbox with time blocking: Akiflow.
• You want cheap AI time blocking on top of Todoist: Trevor AI, which offers a free tier.

See every option in the AI planners category.