EisenhourDecide what matters.
Block the time.
Most to-do apps make lists. Eisenhour makes decisions, then turns them into hours on a real calendar, and shows you where your life actually goes.
Two questions sort everything. Then the app does what matrix apps never do.
Is it important, and is it urgent? That is the Eisenhower method, seventy years old and still right. Eisenhour asks those two questions and then gives the answer a place on your day.
Decide what deserves your time
Capture in seconds, triage later. Every task lands in one of four quadrants: do it now, schedule it, delegate it, or question it.
- Steps, due dates and a focus timer on every task
- An inbox for the things you have not decided about yet
- Q2, important but not urgent, is where the app gently pushes you
Turn priorities into a plan
A plan is a calendar, not a list. Drag a task onto the day in fifteen-minute steps, beside the Google, work and iCloud events already on your phone.
- Day, three-day, week and month views, swipe between days
- Blocks repeat daily, weekly, monthly, or on the days you choose
- Copy a block out to a real calendar so your plan shows up everywhere you look (Pro)
Protect time for real focus
The hours you meant to spend and the hours you did are different numbers. A timer logs every session, and a heatmap shows the year.
- 10, 25, 60 minutes or your own length, with five chimes and a lock-screen alarm
- Pick the task you are working on, and its life area gets the credit
- Forgot the timer? Log the time after the fact, streak intact
Make time for every part of life
Set a weekly target for each area of your life and watch the hours and streaks grow, so work stops quietly winning.
- Every task and every focus session belongs to an area
- Weekly targets, progress bars and streaks per area
- Performance reports over any range (Pro)
Create cards worth sharing
Your details in a shape you can hand to someone. Build a business or personal card and share it as an image, or as a PDF with tappable links.
- Work, personal, side business: one card free, more with Pro
- Send any task too, steps and all, as plain text
- The dark theme, shown here, comes with Pro
Real screens, real data.
Everything below is the shipping app on an iPhone, nothing mocked up.
Navy, for the evenings
Cream is the default for everyone. Pro adds the navy theme, the same one the icon and the shareable card wear, across every screen.
Everything stays on your phone.
Eisenhour is local-first. There is no account to create, no server to trust and nothing to track. The App Store privacy label says Data Not Collected because there is nothing to collect.
No account
Open the app and start. Nothing to sign up for, nothing to remember.
Rides your iPhone backup
Your tasks, focus history and cards are on the device and come along with your normal iCloud backup.
Your calendars, read in place
Events are drawn from the calendars already on your phone. Nothing is uploaded, nothing is connected.
One file to take with you
Export the whole thing as a single file, and import it on a new phone (Pro).
The method is free. Pro is one purchase.
No subscription, no trial that turns into a bill. Buy Pro once and it is yours, on every iPhone signed into your Apple ID, with Family Sharing.
| What you get | Free | Pro |
|---|---|---|
| Plan any day | Today | Any day |
| Life areas | 2 | Unlimited |
| Cards | 1 | Unlimited |
| Focus history | 4 weeks | Full year |
| Performance reports | — | ✓ |
| Export and import | — | ✓ |
| Copy blocks to external calendars | — | ✓ |
| Dark theme | — | ✓ |
Unlocked, forever. Price shown in US dollars; the App Store shows yours.
Free forever: the matrix and triage, steps and due dates, time blocking with repeats, seeing your real calendars beside your plan, the focus timer, a card to share, and sharing any task.
- Restore on any new phone with one tap
- Family Sharing enabled
- Buy it when a gate matters to you, not before
Version 1 is the method. What comes next.
Eisenhour started as a private tool its author ran his working life on for years. Version 1.0 is that tool, done properly. Before planning what follows, we read seven thousand App Store reviews of planner apps to learn what people want done and what they dread. The first list is below. The second is at the end, and it is a promise.
The small things a week of real use asked for
A reminder when a block starts, so the plan taps you on the shoulder. Add a task straight into a quadrant, or long-press a tile. Swipe right to finish a task. A morning nudge for yesterday's unfinished blocks: move them to today, or let them go. Share today's matrix as an image or a PDF. Finished blocks step back on the calendar.
The lock screen, the iPad, your Reminders
Home screen widgets with today's blocks, the matrix counts and an add-task button. The focus timer as a Live Activity, on the lock screen and in the Dynamic Island. A real iPad layout. One-way import from Apple Reminders into the Inbox. Type "dentist tomorrow 3pm" and it lands on the right day at the right time.
Sync across devices, and the wrist
An optional way to keep an iPad or a second iPhone in step, and the focus timer on Apple Watch. Local-first stays the rule: the phone remains the source of truth and sync is something you switch on, never something you need.
Plan your day with an assistant
An MCP server so an assistant such as Claude can read your matrix, propose a plan for tomorrow and file the tasks you dictate on a walk, with your say-so on every change. Anything that needs a server would be a separate, small subscription that pays for the server. Pro itself stays a one-time purchase.
What will never come. No subscription for Pro. No account. No ads. No pop-ups asking for a rating. And your data stays on your phone, in your own backup, whether you pay or not. Every unhappy review we read was about one of these, and none of them will ever be about Eisenhour.
Real reviews, quoted by name
Every review here is on the App Store under the same name and date. We add them by hand with each release, and we answer every one there.
★★★★★
One productivity app that does it all
The inbox, the matrix, the calendar, the focus timer and the area balance, named one by one as the reason it works, with one request: tap a quadrant to add a task right there. It is in 1.0.2.
Short answers.
Does it work without an internet connection?
Yes, entirely. The only network use is the App Store purchase and the price lookup on the Pro screen.
Which calendars does it show?
Any calendar already on your iPhone: iCloud, Google, Exchange and work calendars, whatever the Calendar app can see. Eisenhour reads them in place after you allow access, and never uploads them.
Is Pro a subscription?
No. It is one purchase of $29.99 (or your local equivalent), yours forever, with Family Sharing and Restore on any phone signed into your Apple ID.
What happens to my data if I switch phones?
It comes along with your iCloud backup like any other app's data. Pro users can also export everything as one file and import it anywhere.
Is there an Android or web version?
Not yet. Eisenhour is built for the iPhone first, and the Apple platforms are the focus for the next releases.
Built by a professor who ran his life on it.
Eisenhour is made by Pedram Jahangiry, who teaches machine learning and finance and spent years running his own days on exactly this system as a private tool. This is that tool, turned into the app it deserved to be.