Three tools, three jobs
| What it holds | Question it answers | Fails when | |
|---|---|---|---|
| To-do list | Undecided work | What is there to do? | The list grows faster than it shrinks |
| Planner | Work placed in time | When does this happen? | The first delay invalidates everything after it |
| Routine app | A fixed sequence | How do I get through this? | The sequence is too long or too rigid |
The categories are not competitors. They handle different stages of the same work, and the mistake most people make is buying a tool for the stage that was not broken.
The to-do list
A list is a memory prosthesis. Its actual job is to catch a thought before it disappears, so that acting on it becomes possible later.
For ADHD it earns its place through capture speed. If getting something into the list takes more than a few seconds, it will not get captured, and an incomplete list is worse than none because you can no longer trust it.
Where it fails is that a list has no opinion about what happens next. Everything is equally present, forever, which is why a long list stops producing action and starts producing dread. A list is not a plan and does not become one by getting longer.
The planner
A planner puts work somewhere specific: on a timeline, in a calendar block, in a day. It answers when.
For ADHD its main value is making time visible. If you cannot feel duration — see time blindness — a day drawn as a strip with things on it is far more informative than the same day described in words.
Where it fails is brittleness. A schedule that assumes accurate time estimates and no interruptions has one point of failure repeated forty times. The standard collapse is to deviate at 09:40 and treat the rest of the day as void, which is why anchors work better than timetables.
The routine app
A routine app holds a sequence you have already decided on and runs it with you: this step now, that step next, this one after.
It answers how do I get through this, and it is the category most people skip — because if you know what to do, it does not feel like you need an app to tell you. But knowing and doing are separate operations, and it is the doing that fails. That is the whole subject of executive dysfunction.
Where it fails is scope. A routine app is useless for one-off tasks, cannot hold your appointments, and does not care what day it is. Ask it to be a planner and it will disappoint.
Diagnosing which one you need
Think about the last week that went badly, and match the sentence.
- "I forgot about it entirely until it was too late." → to-do list, with fast capture.
- "I knew about it and never found time. Where did the day go?" → planner.
- "I knew exactly what to do, had the time, and still did not do it." → routine app.
- "I did it and forgot I did it, so I have no idea whether it is working." → habit tracker, which is a fourth and much narrower category — see tracker versus routine app.
Most people match two. Very few match all four, and installing four apps is its own failure mode.
A workable combination
For most adults with ADHD the useful pairing is one fast capture tool plus one routine runner, with a calendar for anything with a fixed time.
Capture catches thoughts so they stop consuming working memory. The routine runner handles the two or three sequences — morning, wind-down, deep-work start — that determine whether the day begins and ends properly. The calendar holds appointments, which are the only genuinely time-bound things most days contain.
Adding a planner on top helps if time is genuinely invisible to you. Adding a fourth tool almost never does.
Orbit is the routine runner in that arrangement. It deliberately does not hold your tasks or your calendar, because doing so would make it another thing to maintain — and maintenance is what gets abandoned first.