Is the TickTick habit tracker free?

TickTick includes habit tracking on its free plan, but with a cap on how many habits you can track — more habits and deeper stats sit behind TickTick Premium, a paid subscription. Limits can change, so check TickTick's pricing page for current details.

What's a good free alternative to TickTick for habits?

Trace (tracebyme.com) is a free online habit tracker with no habit limit, streaks with partial wins, habit stacking, and a 365-day heatmap — and it also handles one-off and recurring tasks in the same daily agenda, plus multi-currency money tracking with invoices. It works in any browser with no install.

Should I use TickTick for both tasks and habits?

If you live in TickTick for project to-dos and only want to track a couple of habits, staying in one app is reasonable. If habits are the main event — streak history, stacking, more than a handful of routines — a dedicated tracker that treats habits as first-class will serve you better.

TickTick Habit Tracker Review: Good, Until You Hit the Limits (2026)

June 13, 2026 · 6 min read · by the Trace team

TickTick is one of the best to-do apps you can install, and tucked inside it is a habit tracker — check-ins, streaks, a little monthly calendar. If you already live in TickTick, turning it on feels like free money. Then, somewhere around week three, you start noticing why "habit tracker inside a to-do app" is a compromise.

What TickTick habits do well

Credit where due: TickTick's habit module is clean. Habits show up alongside your tasks, you can set times of day, attach reminders, and log a check-in from your phone or desktop. For two or three simple habits, with everything else you manage already in TickTick, it's a perfectly good setup — and that's exactly who should stick with it.

Where it stops

The free plan caps your habits

TickTick's free tier limits how many habits you can track; the full habit experience — more habits, richer stats — is part of TickTick Premium, a recurring subscription. (Limits change; check their pricing page.) So the "free habit tracker you already own" quietly becomes another subscription the moment your routine grows past a handful of habits.

Habits are a side feature, and it shows

TickTick is a task app first. Habit analytics are shallow compared to a dedicated tracker — there's no real year-at-a-glance heatmap of your whole routine, no partial credit on hard days, no habit stacking. A missed day is just a missed day; the app has no opinion about how streaks survive real life.

All-or-nothing check-ins

The fastest way to lose a habit is a broken streak you can't argue with. Did 20 minutes of your 40-minute workout? In most trackers, including TickTick's, that's a zero. Over months, those unfair zeros are what make people quit the tracker — not the habit.

Trace: habits as the main event — tasks still included

Trace is a free online habit tracker that flips TickTick's proportions: habits are first-class, and tasks come along instead of the other way around.

No habit limit — free means free, whether you track three habits or thirty.
Streaks with partial wins — log 50% on a busy day and keep the chain alive.
A forgiving two-day rule — one miss won't break a three-month streak; two in a row will.
Habit stacking — anchor new habits to ones you never skip (how stacking works).
365-day heatmap — your whole year on one screen.
Tasks in the same agenda — one-off and recurring to-dos beside your routines, so you don't lose TickTick's main benefit.
Money tracking built in — multi-currency accounts, subscriptions, credit-card due dates, invoices attached to expenses.
Works in any browser — phone, laptop, PC. No install, syncs automatically.

Fair trade-offs, stated plainly: TickTick is the stronger pure task manager — nested projects, collaboration, calendar views. Trace's tasks are deliberately simpler. If your life is 90% projects and 10% habits, keep TickTick. If habits and daily consistency are the point — and you'd like your money on the same screen — that's Trace.

TickTick vs Trace for habits, at a glance

Price: TickTick — free plan with habit cap, Premium subscription. Trace — free, no habit limit.
Habit depth: TickTick — basic streaks and stats. Trace — partial wins, two-day rule, stacking, 365-day heatmap.
Tasks: TickTick — excellent, full project management. Trace — simple one-off and recurring tasks in the daily agenda.
Platforms: both work across devices; Trace needs no install at all.
Money, subscriptions & invoices: TickTick — no. Trace — built in.

Habits first, tasks included, money too

Try Trace free Free · no card · works in any browser · syncs across devices

Frequently asked questions

How many habits can I track in TickTick for free?

TickTick's free plan caps the number of habits; the exact cap has changed over time, so check their current pricing page. Trace has no cap.

Can Trace replace TickTick completely?

If you use TickTick's deep project features — subtasks, shared lists, calendar sync — keep it for projects. Trace replaces the daily layer: habits, routines, day-to-day tasks, and money in one agenda.

Does Trace have reminders?

Yes — optional daily reminder notifications, kept deliberately gentle. The two-day rule means a missed day costs you a grace marker, not your whole streak.

Does Trace work on a PC?

Yes — it's browser-based, so it runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux with no install. See our guide to habit tracking on PC.

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