Kanban boards can help you find your workflow: instead of a simple list of tasks, your large tasks can be divided into different stages (by columns), and as you move from one stage to another, you can drag tasks to the next Festival. Kanban boards are useful when you're collaborating with team members, or when you're working on a task that requires two or more steps to actually be completed. Until now, Kanban boards have only appeared in the weirdest productivity software (Trello is a famous example.)
But slowly, signage is making its way into many consumer products. They're a staple in the Todoist app, and Google even added a Kanban board view to Google Tasks. The most surprising part, though, is the Reminders app on your iPhone, iPad, or Mac.
How the Apple Reminders app uses Kanban boards
Apple Reminders uses a simplified Kanban approach, just as you'd expect from Apple products. Apple doesn't even call them Kanban boards, and there's no special place to create them. Instead, you create a reminder list with multiple sections and then switch to Columns view. Suddenly, the billboard appeared. Your tasks are now broken down into columns that are visually distinct from each other.
Apple's system works similarly to Todoist, which creates custom views for existing lists. Now, instead of breaking lists down into sections, you see them as columns, making it visually easy to drag and drop tasks as you advance through the process. This is better than the recent implementation of Google Tasks, where each column shows the tasks in a specific list. In order for Google Tasks to work like a real Kanban board, you have to create a different list for each column, which is pretty tedious. Apple's process is more seamless, and unlike Google Tasks, it works on all platforms (running macOS Sonoma, iOS 17, iPadOS 17 or later).
How to Create a Kanban Board in Apple Reminders
I'll introduce you to the Mac app first - I feel this is where the Kanban feature really comes into its own (although it's equally useful on the iPhone). In the sidebar, click the "Add New List" button to create a new list. Give it a name, emoji icon, color, and stick to the standard list options. Then click OK .
Your list is now ready. In the top toolbar, click the Add New Section button and give the section a name.
This will become the column header. Repeat this until all column headers are complete.
Then, go to View > As Columns from the menu bar.
Your list will be instantly transformed into a board. You are now free to add tasks as usual (with due dates, notes, images, attachments). You can easily move tasks from one column to another using drag and drop.
On iPhone, tap the Add List button to create a new list. In the new list, go to the top "Menu" button and select the "Add Section" button. Add the new sections you want. Then, click the Menu button again and select the View by Columns option to switch to the Kanban board view.
On the iPhone, you'll only see one list at a time, but you can scroll horizontally to see all columns. Here you can also drag and drop tasks between lists.
