A to-do list app that runs on your Obsidian vault.
Your to-dos are already in your vault as markdown checkboxes. What you are missing is an app that treats them like a real to-do list on your phone: one tap to check something off, a widget on the home screen, a reminder before a deadline. TaskForge is that app. It opens the same files Obsidian opens.
Free to download on iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Android.
Get Free - iOS & Mac 
Get Free - Android The list is in your vault. The app for it is not.
If you keep your to-dos in Obsidian, you have probably hit this wall. The checkboxes are right there in your daily note or a tasks file, but Obsidian on the phone is a notes editor, not a to-do app. To check something off you open the app, find the note, scroll to the line, and tap a tiny box. There is no list of everything that is due today and no way to glance at it from the home screen.
People patch this with Dataview queries, the Obsidian Tasks plugin, or a second to-do app they copy tasks into by hand. The queries help on a laptop. None of it gives you a checkbox you can tap from your pocket, and a plugin cannot put a widget on your home screen or fire a reminder while Obsidian is closed. That is not a gap anyone built badly. The Obsidian plugin API does not hand plugins the operating-system features a to-do app needs.
TaskForge takes the other route. It is a separate app you install from the App Store or Google Play, and it reads your vault folder directly. The to-do list it shows is built from the exact same lines you would edit in Obsidian.
What TaskForge is
TaskForge is a native app for iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Android. Point it at your Obsidian vault and every task in it shows up as a list you can sort, filter, and check off. There is no account to make and no copy of your data sitting on a server. When you tick a box in TaskForge, the space in the markdown turns to an x in the file. When you add a task, a new line lands in the file. Open Obsidian afterward and the change is already there, because it was always the same file.
One line is the whole to-do
- [ ] book the dentist 🔁 every 6 months 📅 2026-07-15 ⏰ 09:00
What you get on top of the file
The list lives in your vault. These are the things a markdown checkbox cannot do on its own.
-
A to-do list, not a note
Every checkbox across your vault collected into one list you can sort by due date or priority, group by project or tag, and filter down to just what is due today. Save a filter and it becomes a list you can reopen, like a Today list or a Work list.
-
Tap to complete, from anywhere
Check a task off with one tap in the list, from a home screen widget, or straight from the notification. The x writes to your markdown before you put the phone down. No opening Obsidian and hunting for the line.
-
Home and lock screen widgets
Put your list on the home screen of an iPhone, iPad, Android phone, or Mac. The widgets are interactive, so you complete and add tasks without opening the app. Obsidian cannot do this from a plugin.
-
Reminders that fire when the app is closed
Add a time to a task and TaskForge sends a notification at it, even if Obsidian and TaskForge are both shut. The Obsidian Tasks plugin does not send notifications itself; it points you to a separate community plugin, and that one needs Obsidian running.
-
Quick capture that parses dates
Type "call the plumber tomorrow" and the task arrives with tomorrow's date already set, written into your vault as a markdown line. Quick add reads natural-language dates, priorities, and tags as you type.
-
Calendar and kanban views
See the same to-dos on a day, week, or month calendar, or as a drag-and-drop kanban board grouped by status or priority. Drag a task to Thursday and the due date inside the file changes to match.
It reads the format you already use
TaskForge handles two ways of writing tasks in a vault. The first is the Obsidian Tasks plugin style, with emoji metadata on the line: 📅 for a due date, ⏫ for priority, 🔁 for recurrence. The second is the TaskNotes style, where each task is its own note with the details in YAML frontmatter. If you already use either one, point TaskForge at the vault and your list appears with nothing to reformat.
Both are plain text in your folder, so any editor can open them and any AI tool with file access can read them. That is the point of keeping a to-do list in a vault instead of a closed app: the list outlives whatever app you read it with.
Pricing
TaskForge is free to download on iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Android, and the free tier covers the core to-do list. Every install gets a one-week trial of Premium, so you can try widgets, notifications, and kanban first. After that, Premium is a one-time purchase of $39.99, or $1.99 a month if you would rather not pay up front. There is no required subscription.
Who should pick something else
TaskForge is the right app if your to-dos already live in an Obsidian vault, or you want them to, and you want a real list on your phone without moving the data to a cloud service. It is the wrong app in a few cases, and it is worth being honest about them.
- You do not use Obsidian and have no interest in keeping a vault. A standalone to-do app like Todoist or Things, with its own sync, is simpler than managing a folder of markdown files.
- You need team features: shared projects, comments, assigning tasks to other people. TaskForge is built for one person's vault, not a shared workspace.
- You work mainly on Windows or Linux desktop. TaskForge runs on iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Android, so a Windows-first setup is not covered yet.
- You are happy ticking checkboxes inside Obsidian on a laptop and never want them on a phone. If that is the whole job, the Obsidian Tasks plugin on desktop already does it, and you do not need a second app.
Questions people ask
Is there a to-do list app that works with Obsidian?
Yes. TaskForge is a native to-do app for iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Android that reads the markdown checkboxes in your Obsidian vault and shows them as a real list. You complete, add, and reschedule tasks in the app, and the changes write straight back to your vault files. There is no separate database and no account.
Do I need the Obsidian Tasks plugin to use TaskForge?
No. TaskForge reads your vault files on its own, so it works with or without any Obsidian plugin. If you already use the Obsidian Tasks plugin or TaskNotes, TaskForge reads that exact format and your list appears with nothing to reformat. If you only have plain checkboxes, those work too.
Can I check off Obsidian to-dos from my phone without opening Obsidian?
Yes, and this is the main reason people install it. TaskForge gives you a tap-to-complete list, interactive home screen widgets, and notifications you can complete a task from. The checkbox in your markdown file updates the moment you tap. Obsidian's own plugins cannot draw a home screen widget or complete a task from one, because the plugin API does not expose those system features.
Where do my to-dos live? Does TaskForge store them in the cloud?
They stay in your Obsidian vault as plain markdown files on your device. TaskForge has no server and uploads nothing. Your list syncs across devices through whatever you already use for your vault: iCloud, Obsidian Sync, or any other file sync. Stop using TaskForge tomorrow and the to-dos are still sitting in your notes.
Can I get reminders for my Obsidian to-dos?
Yes. Add a time to a task and TaskForge sends a notification at it, even when both Obsidian and TaskForge are closed. The Obsidian Tasks plugin does not send notifications by itself; it directs you to a separate community plugin, and that one only works while Obsidian is running. A native app is what gets a reminder onto your lock screen.
How is this different from just using the Obsidian Tasks plugin?
The plugin is excellent for querying and editing tasks inside Obsidian on a desktop. It runs inside Obsidian, so it cannot put a widget on your home screen, fire a notification when the app is closed, or give you a one-tap mobile list. TaskForge is a separate native app for exactly those jobs, and it reads the same files the plugin writes. Many people run both: the plugin on the laptop, TaskForge on the phone.
Give your Obsidian to-dos a real app.
TaskForge is free to download on iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Android. Your list stays in plain markdown, in your own vault.