In today’s fast-paced world, building and maintaining healthy habits can feel like an uphill battle, and staying consistent with our goals seems like a distant dream. We’ve all had times when we download yet another habit-tracking app, hoping it will ‘fix’ our lives once and for all starting the next day, only to abandon it in no time? Sounds familiar?
Well, a big reason to fall off the habit-tracking train is the lack of engagement — boring interfaces, dull to-do lists and no rewards system. But what if there was an app that rewarded us every time we finished a goal and boosted our motivation? Enter innovative habit-tracking apps like Habitica, which transform the journey of self-improvement into a fun experience. And there are more. Here are five apps that will not only help you keep track of your habits, but also make the day-to-day process enjoyable.
Habitica: Gamify your goals
This free habit-building and productivity app will turn your life into a game. Be it health, fitness, school, work or even self-care, Habitica allows you to check off your goals to level up your avatar and unlock exciting in-game features like quests, magic skills and more. With the gold that you’ll earn after finishing your tasks, you can buy in-game or custom rewards, like reading a book or watching your favourite show, treating yourself for all the hard work you’ve put in.
If you enjoy role-playing games and are looking for a fun way to stay motivated, then Habitica is the app for you. Its gamified system makes completing daily tasks feel like an adventure.
Habit Hunter: An RPG-style habit-tracking haven
If you are a gaming nerd and RPGs (role-playing games) are your thing, then Habit Hunter might be your go-to app. Habit Hunter, available on Google Playstore and App Store, will turn your everyday tasks into RPG-style quests. With a compelling story, daily quests, missions and rewards, you will embark on a new adventure every day and level up through achievements.
Besides the coins, experience points (XP), and upgrades as you complete goals, it also offers a pomodoro timer for focussed work intervals, a habit calendar for tracking progress, smart reminders and offline functionality so that you can stay productive anywhere.
Notion: The all-in-one workspace for habit tracking
A list of innovative habit-tracking apps can never be complete without the OG app Notion, known for its customisability and integrative power across multiple apps like Todoist or Google Calendar. Developed by Notions Labs, the versatile app does more than just simple habit tracking; it offers a highly-customisable workspace where users can design their habit tracker according to their taste.
With its detailed pages for habits, daily or weekly tasks, goals, and project planners, Notion lets you track your progress in whichever format you want — be it checklists, calendars or kanban boards — and you can also add images, links and notes to each entry. Through this app, you can also share your tracker with your friends and family, who can collaborate with you on your tasks, making for a wholesome and enriching experience.
Habitify: Sleek and insightful tracking
People with a knack for clean, minimalist interfaces will instantly take to Habitify, an app that helps users focus on productivity without any distractions. When you open the app, you will find your journal, a space created for you, by you. You can add your daily habits, work goals or self-care pointers, and track your progress and streaks in the progress bar.
Additionally, the app lets you build a habit from scratch in the Plant a Tree section where each habit will be linked to a seed which you can plant in your forest. However, failure to water your seed or rather failure to accomplish your habit regularly will lead to the loss of the seed.
Way of Life: A way of maintaining habits without guilt
While most habit-tracking apps show that you have lost progress if you fail to finish a task, Way of Life allows users to mark their habits as “done”, “not done”, or “skipped”, with the days you skip not affecting your progress. For each habit that you add in your journal in the app, you can add notes to explain why you missed a habit, making the process more fulfilling and guilt-free.
What sets Way of Life apart is its streaks or ‘chains’ feature, which lets you to set goals for a particular habit for a specific length of time, following which you can take a much-need break without feeling like you have lost progress. Available on both iOS and Android, Way of Life offers a free version for up to three habits and a premium option for unlimited tracking and backup.
A user's account
For Anirban Saha, a BTech student from Barrackpore, who has been using apps like Notion and Hevy to track his goals for over four years now, the appeal of these apps lies in their power to externalise discipline and reduce cognitive load. “When something is out of your head and in a system, it becomes real, accountable and measurable,” he says. While Notion acts as his “second brain” — managing everything from journaling to study planning — fitness tracker Hevy has helped him shift from casual workouts to a more structured way of training. “The real power doesn’t come from the streaks or reminders,” he adds, “it’s the way these apps help you visualise your habits tracked over time.”
Anirban’s advice to those trying to stay consistent with their goals? “Stop romanticising motivation. Build frictionless systems that evolve with you.” He says that starting small, linking habits to outcomes that bring you thrill and, most importantly, keeping small promises to yourself, can go a long way. After all, as he puts it, “Once you see yourself as someone who follows through, consistency becomes an identity — not a chore.”
