Daily habit trackers: what they record, and where Dayboard stops

Habit trackers differ less in how they look than in what they write down each day. Some record a tick. Some count a streak and set it back to zero when you miss. Some keep a score that a missed day only dents. Which of those keeps you going is personal, and it is the first thing worth deciding.

We make Dayboard. Its Habit Tracker is the smallest kind there is, a list you tick for today, and we would rather say that plainly here than have you discover it three weeks into a new routine. What follows is how we see the options. The facts about other apps come from their makers' own pages, read on 5 October 2026 and linked, and the opinions are marked as ours.

Four things a habit tracker can record

• A tick for today. You did it or you did not, and that is all the app knows.
• A streak. The number of days in a row, and a rule for what a missed day does to it.
• A score. A measure of how established the habit is, which rises and falls gradually.
• An amount. Eight glasses, twenty minutes, five thousand steps.

The apps below combine these in different ways, and several let a habit be due a few times a week instead of every day. In our view the differences that matter show up on the day you miss one.

How five well-known apps do it

Prices are in US dollars as published on 5 October 2026. They change, so check the linked page before you decide.

Streaks

The App Store description states the idea in two sentences: "Track up to 24 tasks you want to complete each day. Your goal is to build a streak of consecutive days." Tasks linked to Apple's Health app are marked done automatically (Streaks on the App Store).

Loop Habit Tracker

Loop keeps a score as well as a streak. Its makers describe it like this: "Every repetition makes your habit stronger and every missed day makes it weaker. A few missed days after a long streak, however, will not completely destroy your progress." It supports schedules "such as 3 times per week or every other day", needs no account, and is free and open source with no ads (Loop on GitHub).

Habitica

Habitica "uses retro RPG elements to gamify your tasks and goals". You check a task off and "receive gold, experience, and items that can be used in-game", and you can join a party with friends. The app is free, with optional subscriptions from $4.99 a month (Habitica on the App Store).

Habitify and TickTick

Habitify is a tracker that runs on phones, computers and the web. Its free plan lets you "track up to 3 active habits at a time", with paid plans for more (Habitify help). TickTick is a task manager with a habit section built in. Its free plan includes 5 habits (TickTick Premium).

What Dayboard's Habit Tracker is, exactly

It is a widget headed "Today's Habits", with today's date. You add a habit by name and click the circle beside it when it is done. A Reset link unticks everything you have ticked today.

That is the whole of it.

Inside the app, the widget is described as a place to "remember small, recurring things you don't want to forget today". That is an accurate description of what it does. If you want a record that builds over months, it is the wrong tool, and one of the apps above will serve you better.

Why it is on the board anyway

Dayboard exists because our founder wanted the things he needed during the day in one place, not spread across tabs and tools. The Habit Tracker follows the same reasoning on a small scale. A few things you mean to do today, such as a walk at lunch, sit on the same screen as your tasks, your notes and your calendar, so you see them every time you look at your day.

Nothing stops you from using both kinds of tool. If your tracker has a web version, you can add it to a Quick Links widget and it is one click from your board. Dayboard then holds today, and the tracker holds the record.

Paper is a habit tracker too

A grid on paper, with one row for each habit and one box for each day of the month, records a tick and shows a streak at a glance. It has no reminders and it will not count for you. A page on the wall can be harder to ignore than an app, though, and it costs nothing to try for a month.

How we would choose

• If seeing an unbroken run is what keeps you going, look at a streak-based app.
• If one bad week tends to end your attempts, look at one that keeps a score instead.
• If you want the numbers, pick one that records amounts.
• If you only want today's two or three in front of you while you work, a list on your daily board is enough, and ours is free to try.

Habits and checklists overlap. If what you have is a routine of steps you repeat each day, our post on daily checklist apps covers the ways an app can bring a list back.

Questions people ask