Project Planner vs Hinata

Most projects stall not because you lack motivation — but because "finish the project" is too vague to ever act on. You open a blank to-do list, dump in a dozen tasks, and within a week it's either abandoned or buried under newer ones. Milestones is built around a different idea: every project deserves structure, and structure is what makes finishing possible. A smarter way to plan Milestones introduces a three-tier hierarchy — Projects, Milestones, and Tasks — that mirrors how real work actually happens. A project isn't one thing; it's a series of phases. Each phase has its own focus, its own deadline, its own definition of done. Milestones makes that structure explicit so you always know where you are and what's next. Break goals into phases Every project is divided into named milestones — the chapters of your work. Whether you're building an app, writing a thesis, planning an event, or launching a side project, milestones give you a natural way to chunk the journey into stages you can actually complete one at a time. Track progress visually Each milestone has its own live progress bar showing task counts and completion percentage. At a glance, you can see how much you've done, how much is left, and which phases are moving. No more guessing whether you're close or far. Focus on what matters right now Mark one milestone as Active. It pins to the top of your project, pulses with a live indicator, and becomes your single point of focus. Everything else stays visible but secondary — giving you clarity without losing context. Organized from every angle Milestone statuses — Draft, Planning, In Progress, In Review, Released — give each phase a clear stage in the lifecycle. Tasks are sorted into To Do, In Progress, and Done sections automatically. Tag tasks to group related work across a project. Store unscheduled ideas in the project backlog so nothing falls through the cracks. Designed to look as good as it works Give every project its own icon — choose from a curated set of symbols or use your own photo — paired with a custom color. Your project list becomes a visual dashboard that's satisfying to open every day. Manage projects with AI Milestones includes a built-in MCP server — connect Claude and other AI agents on your Mac to create projects, add tasks and move milestones forward just by asking. Your project planner, now AI-native. Built for iPhone, iPad, Mac & Apple Vision Pro On iPad, Mac and Vision Pro, Milestones expands into a full three-column layout: your project list, milestone list, and task list all visible at once. On iPhone, everything is one tap away. Sync seamlessly across both with iCloud. Whether you're a developer shipping a product, a student finishing a dissertation, a designer managing client work, or anyone with a goal worth finishing — Milestones gives your projects the structure they've always needed.

Hinata is an open-source app for planning projects and tracking issues. It connects to a Hinata Server that you or your organization run, so your team's work stays on your own infrastructure. There is no per-user price and no limit on boards. The same app runs on phones, tablets and computers, fits its layout to the screen and has a light and a dark theme. It speaks English, German, Chinese, Hindi, Spanish, Japanese, French, Russian and Arabic, and lays out right to left in Arabic. PLANNING AND BOARDS • Scrum and Kanban boards: drag cards between columns, set WIP limits, group the board by epic, assignee or project • Board, backlog and timeline views of the same work • Sprints with capacity, story points, burndown and velocity • Issues in a hierarchy from epic to story to sub-task, with dependencies and labels. You can watch, clone, archive or move them to another project • Print an issue, or export it as PDF, Excel, Word or XML • Gantt chart with dependencies, milestones and the critical path • Project templates: copy a project and set deadlines relative to the project's date, in calendar or working days TIME AND ABSENCES • A timer that works as a stopwatch, a countdown or a Pomodoro • Log time in a list, a calendar or a weekly timesheet, and hand in your timesheet for approval • Request time off, have it approved and see who is away in a shared team calendar • Working hours, public holidays and leave balances in one place • Time reports with a summary, single entries and workload, plus CSV import and export WORKING TOGETHER • Comments with replies, emoji reactions and voice messages • Attach files, photos and videos and open them in a full-screen viewer • A knowledge base with spaces, sub-pages and Markdown articles. Type @ to link an issue, an article or a colleague • Project reports with burndown and breakdowns by state, priority and assignee, exported as PDF, CSV or JSON • A dashboard you arrange yourself, and a weekly summary of what your team finished • A command palette that searches projects, issues, people and articles • Notifications in the app, by e-mail and as push for assignments, @mentions and due dates. You choose the days and hours when e-mail and push may reach you • Git integration with GitHub, GitLab and Bitbucket FOR ORGANIZATIONS • Projects and teams with their own workflows, keys and members • An organization admin role for working hours, approvals, absences, holidays and billing • Sign in with a password and optional two-factor authentication (TOTP), or through SSO with OpenID Connect, OAuth 2.0, SAML or LDAP • Self-registration with e-mail verification, and password reset • Save several servers and switch between them. Each one keeps its own secure session ACCESSIBILITY Text colors meet WCAG contrast, touch targets are large and controls have labels for screen readers. Nothing gets cut off at twice the normal text size. YOUR DATA STAYS ON YOUR SERVER Hinata collects nothing for itself. Everything you create is stored on the Hinata Server you connect to. Push notifications go through Firebase Cloud Messaging and use only a device token. The app has no tracking and no analytics. You need a Hinata Server to sign in. hinata.ahmadre.com explains how to host one yourself. PERMISSIONS AND WHY HINATA ASKS FOR THEM • Notifications: assignments, @mentions, replies to your comments and due dates • Microphone: voice comments, and sound in videos you attach • Camera and photos: take or pick photos and videos to attach to issues Hinata asks for each permission the first time you use the feature that needs it.