This was a weekend of record-breaking DDoS attacks. Over the weekend, Cloudflare detected and mitigated dozens of hyper-volumetric DDoS attacks. The majority of attacks peaked in the ballpark of 50-70 million requests per second (rps) with the largest exceeding 71 million rps. This is the largest reported HTTP DDoS attack on record, more than 35% higher than the previous reported record of 46M rps in June 2022.
The attacks were HTTP/2-based and targeted websites protected by Cloudflare. They originated from over 30,000 IP addresses. Some of the attacked websites included a popular gaming provider, cryptocurrency companies, hosting providers, and cloud computing platforms. The attacks originated from numerous cloud providers, and we have been working with them to crack down on the botnet.
Record breaking attack: DDoS attack exceeding 71 million requests per second
Over the past year, we’ve seen more attacks originate from cloud computing providers. For this reason, we will be providing service providers that own their own autonomous system a free Botnet threat feed. The feed will provide service providers threat intelligence about their own IP space; attacks originating from within their autonomous system. Service providers that operate their own IP space can now sign up to the early access waiting list.
Is this related to the Super Bowl or Killnet?
No. This campaign of attacks arrives less than two weeks after the Killnet DDoS campaign that targeted healthcare websites. Based on the methods and targets, we do not believe that these recent attacks are related to the healthcare campaign. Furthermore, yesterday was the US Super Bowl, and we also do not believe that this attack campaign is related to the game event.
What are DDoS attacks?
Distributed Denial of Service attacks are cyber attacks that aim to take down Internet properties and make them unavailable for users. These types of cyberattacks can be very efficient against unprotected websites and they can be very inexpensive for the attackers to execute.
An HTTP DDoS attack usually involves a flood of HTTP requests towards the target website. The attacker’s objective is to bombard the website with more requests than it can handle. Given a sufficiently high amount of requests, the website’s server will not be able to process all of the attack requests along with the legitimate user requests. Users will experience this as website-load delays, timeouts, and eventually not being able to connect to their desired websites at all.
Illustration of a DDoS attack
To make attacks larger and more complicated, attackers usually leverage a network of bots — a botnet. The attacker will orchestrate the botnet to bombard the victim’s websites with HTTP requests. A sufficiently large and powerful botnet can generate very large attacks as we’ve seen in this case.
However, building and operating botnets requires a lot of investment and expertise. What is the average Joe to do? Well, an average Joe that wants to launch a DDoS attack against a website doesn’t need to start from scratch. They can hire one of numerous DDoS-as-a-Service platforms for as little as $30 per month. The more you pay, the larger and longer of an attack you’re going to get.
Why DDoS attacks?
Over the years, it has become easier, cheaper, and more accessible for attackers and attackers-for-hire to launch DDoS attacks. But as easy as it has become for the attackers, we want to make sure that it is even easier – and free – for defenders of organizations of all sizes to protect themselves against DDoS attacks of all types.
Unlike Ransomware attacks, Ransom DDoS attacks don’t require an actual system intrusion or a foothold within the targeted network. Usually Ransomware attacks start once an employee naively clicks an email link that installs and propagates the malware. There’s no need for that with DDoS attacks. They are more like a hit-and-run attack. All a DDoS attacker needs to know is the website’s address and/or IP address.
Is there an increase in DDoS attacks?
Yes. The size, sophistication, and frequency of attacks has been increasing over the past months. In our latest DDoS threat report, we saw that the amount of HTTP DDoS attacks increased by 79% year-over-year. Furthermore, the amount of volumetric attacks exceeding 100 Gbps grew by 67% quarter-over-quarter (QoQ), and the number of attacks lasting more than three hours increased by 87% QoQ.
But it doesn’t end there. The audacity of attackers has been increasing as well. In our latest DDoS threat report, we saw that Ransom DDoS attacks steadily increased throughout the year. They peaked in November 2022 where one out of every four surveyed customers reported being subject to Ransom DDoS attacks or threats.
Distribution of Ransom DDoS attacks by month
Should I be worried about DDoS attacks?
Yes. If your website, server, or networks are not protected against volumetric DDoS attacks using a cloud service that provides automatic detection and mitigation, we really recommend that you consider it.
Cloudflare customers shouldn’t be worried, but should be aware and prepared. Below is a list of recommended steps to ensure your security posture is optimized.
What steps should I take to defend against DDoS attacks?
Cloudflare’s systems have been automatically detecting and mitigating these DDoS attacks.
Cloudflare offers many features and capabilities that you may already have access to but may not be using. So as extra precaution, we recommend taking advantage of these capabilities to improve and optimize your security posture:
Ensure all DDoS Managed Rules are set to default settings (High sensitivity level and mitigation actions) for optimal DDoS activation.
Cloudflare Enterprise customers that are subscribed to the Advanced DDoS Protection service should consider enabling Adaptive DDoS Protection, which mitigates attacks more intelligently based on your unique traffic patterns.
Deploy firewall rules and rate limiting rules to enforce a combined positive and negative security model. Reduce the traffic allowed to your website based on your known usage.
Ensure your origin is not exposed to the public Internet (i.e., only enable access to Cloudflare IP addresses). As an extra security precaution, we recommend contacting your hosting provider and requesting new origin server IPs if they have been targeted directly in the past.
Customers with access to Managed IP Lists should consider leveraging those lists in firewall rules. Customers with Bot Management should consider leveraging the threat scores within the firewall rules.
Enable caching as much as possible to reduce the strain on your origin servers, and when using Workers, avoid overwhelming your origin server with more subrequests than necessary.
Defending against DDoS attacks is critical for organizations of all sizes. While attacks may be initiated by humans, they are executed by bots — and to play to win, you must fight bots with bots. Detection and mitigation must be automated as much as possible, because relying solely on humans to mitigate in real time puts defenders at a disadvantage. Cloudflare’s automated systems constantly detect and mitigate DDoS attacks for our customers, so they don’t have to. This automated approach, combined with our wide breadth of security capabilities, lets customers tailor the protection to their needs.
We’ve been providing unmetered and unlimited DDoS protection for free to all of our customers since 2017, when we pioneered the concept. Cloudflare’s mission is to help build a better Internet. A better Internet is one that is more secure, faster, and reliable for everyone – even in the face of DDoS attacks.
Visit 1.1.1.1 from any device to get started with our free app that makes your Internet faster and safer.
To learn more about our mission to help build a better Internet, start here. If you’re looking for a new career direction, check out our open positions.
Here are three of the worst breaches, attacker tactics and techniques of 2022, and the security controls that can provide effective, enterprise security protection for them.
Ransomware as a service is a type of attack in which the ransomware software and infrastructure are leased out to the attackers. These ransomware services can be purchased on the dark web from other threat actors and ransomware gangs. Common purchasing plans include buying the entire tool, using the existing infrastructure while paying per infection, or letting other attackers perform the service while sharing revenue with them.
In this attack, the threat actor consists of one of the most prevalent ransomware groups, specializing in access via third parties, while the targeted company is a medium-sized retailer with dozens of sites in the United States.
The threat actors used ransomware as a service to breach the victim’s network. They were able to exploit third-party credentials to gain initial access, progress laterally, and ransom the company, all within mere minutes.
The swiftness of this attack was unusual. In most RaaS cases, attackers usually stay in the networks for weeks and months before demanding ransom. What is particularly interesting about this attack is that the company was ransomed in minutes, with no need for discovery or weeks of lateral movement.
A log investigation revealed that the attackers targeted servers that did not exist in this system. As it turns out, the victim was initially breached and ransomed 13 months before this second ransomware attack. Subsequently, the first attacker group monetized the first attack not only through the ransom they obtained, but also by selling the company’s network information to the second ransomware group.
In the 13 months between the two attacks, the victim changed its network and removed servers, but the new attackers were not aware of these architectural modifications. The scripts they developed were designed for the previous network map. This also explains how they were able to attack so quickly – they had plenty of information about the network. The main lesson here is that ransomware attacks can be repeated by different groups, especially if the victim pays well.
“RaaS attacks such as this one are a good example of how full visibility allows for early alerting. A global, converged, cloud-native SASE platform that supports all edges, like Cato Networks provides complete network visibility into network events that are invisible to other providers or may go under the radar as benign events. And, being able to fully contextualize the events allows for early detection and remediation.
#2: The Critical Infrastructure Attack on Radiation Alert Networks#
Attacks on critical infrastructure are becoming more common and more dangerous. Breaches of water supply plants, sewage systems and other such infrastructures could put millions of residents at risk of a human crisis. These infrastructures are also becoming more vulnerable, and attack surface management tools for OSINT like Shodan and Censys allow security teams to find such vulnerabilities with ease.
In 2021, two hackers were suspected of targeting radiation alert networks. Their attack relied on two insiders that worked for a third party. These insiders disabled the radiation alert systems, significantly debilitating their ability to monitor radiation attacks. The attackers were then able to delete critical software and disable radiation gauges (which is part of the infrastructure itself).
“Unfortunately, scanning for vulnerable systems in critical infrastructure is easier than ever. While many such organizations have multiple layers of security, they are still using point solutions to try and defend their infrastructure rather than one system that can look holistically at the full attack lifecycle. Breaches are never just a phishing problem, or a credentials problem, or a vulnerable system problem – they are always a combination of multiple compromises performed by the threat actor,” said Etay Maor, Sr. Director of Security Strategy at Cato Networks.
#3: The Three-Step Ransomware Attack That Started with Phishing#
The third attack is also a ransomware attack. This time, it consisted of three steps:
1. Infiltration – The attacker was able to gain access to the network through a phishing attack. The victim clicked on a link that generated a connection to an external site, which resulted in the download of the payload.
2. Network activity – In the second phase, the attacker progressed laterally in the network for two weeks. During this time, it collected admin passwords and used in-memory fileless malware. Then on New Year’s Eve, it performed the encryption. This date was chosen since it was (rightfully) assumed the security team would be off on vacation.
3. Exfiltration – Finally, the attackers uploaded the data out of the network.
In addition to these three main steps, additional sub-techniques were employed during the attack and the victim’s point security solutions were not able to block this attack.
“A multiple choke point approach, one that looks horizontally (so to speak) at the attack rather than as a set of vertical, disjointed issues, is the way to enhance detection, mitigation and prevention of such threats. Opposed to popular belief, the attacker needs to be right many times and the defenders only need to be right just once. The underlying technologies to implement a multiple choke point approach are full network visibility via a cloud-native backbone, and a single pass security stack that’s based on ZTNA.” said Etay Maor, Sr. Director of Security Strategy at Cato Networks.
It is common for security professionals to succumb to the “single point of failure fallacy”. However, cyber-attacks are sophisticated events that rarely involve just one tactic or technique which is the cause of the breach. Therefore, an all-encompassing outlook is required to successfully mitigate cyber-attacks. Security point solutions are a solution for single points of failure. These tools can identify risks, but they will not connect the dots, which could and has led to a breach.
According to ongoing security research conducted by Cato Networks Security Team, they have identified two additional vulnerabilities and exploit attempts that they recommend including in your upcoming security plans:
While Log4j made its debut as early as December of 2021, the noise its making hasn’t died down. Log4j is still being used by attackers to exploit systems, as not all organizations have been able to patch their Log4j vulnerabilities or detect Log4j attacks, in what is known as “virtual patching”. They recommend prioritizing Log4j mitigation.
Security solutions like firewalls and VPNs have become access points for attackers. Patching them has become increasingly difficult, especially in the era of architecture cloudification and remote work. It is recommended to pay close attention to these components as they are increasingly vulnerable.
How to Minimize Your Attack Surface and Gain Visibility into the Network#
To reduce the attack surface, security professionals need visibility into their networks. Visibility relies on three pillars:
Actionable information – that can be used to mitigate attacks
Reliable information – that minimizes the number of false positives
Timely information – to ensure mitigation happens before the attack has an impact
Once an organization has complete visibility to the activity on their network they can contextualize the data, decide whether the activity witnessed should be allowed, denied, monitored, restricted (or any other action) and then have the ability to enforce this decision. All these elements must be applied to every entity, be it a user, device, cloud app etc. All the time everywhere. That is what SASE is all about.
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Security stakeholders have come to realize that the prominent role the browser has in the modern corporate environment requires a re-evaluation of how it is managed and protected. While not long-ago web-borne risks were still addressed by a patchwork of endpoint, network, and cloud solutions, it is now clear that the partial protection these solutions provided is no longer sufficient. Therefore, more and more security teams are now turning to the emerging category of purpose-built Browser Security Platform as the answer to the browser’s security challenges.
However, as this security solution category is still relatively new, there is not yet an established set of browser security best practices, nor common evaluation criteria. LayerX, the User-First Browser Security Platform, is addressing security teams’ need with the downable Browser Security Checklist, that guides its readers through the essentials of choosing the best solution and provides them with an actionable checklist to use during the evaluation process.
The Browser is The Most Important Work Interface and the Most Targeted Attack Surface #
The browser has become the core workspace in the modern enterprise. On top of being the gateway to sanctioned SaaS apps and other non-corporate web destinations, the browser is the intersection point between cloud\web environments and physical or virtual endpoints. This makes the browser both a target for multiple types of attacks, as well as a potential source of unintentional data leakage.
Some of these attacks have been around for more than a decade, exploitation of browser vulnerabilities or drive-by download of malicious files, for example. Others have gained recent momentum alongside the steep rise in SaaS adoption, like social engineering users with phishing webpages. Yet others leverage the evolution in web page technology to launch sophisticated and hard-to-detect modifications and abuse of browser features to capture and exfiltrate sensitive data.
Browser Security 101 – What is It That We Need to Protect?#
Browser security can be divided into two different groups: preventing unintended data exposure and protection against various types of malicious activity.
From the data protection aspect, such a platform enforces policies that ensure sensitive corporate data is not shared or downloaded in an insecure manner from sanctioned apps, nor uploaded from managed devices to non-corporate web destinations.
From the threat protection aspect, such a platform detects and prevents three types of attacks:
Attacks that target the browser itself, with the purpose of compromising the host device or the data that resides within the browser application itself, such as cookies, passwords, and others.
Attacks that utilize the browser via compromised credentials to access corporate data that resides in both sanctioned and unsanctioned SaaS applications.
Attacks that leverage the modern web page as an attack vector to target user’s passwords, via a wide range of phishing methods or through malicious modification of browser features.
What should you focus on when choosing the browser security solution for your environment? What are the practical implications of the differences between the various offerings? How should deployment methods, the solution’s architecture, or user privacy be weighed in the overall consideration? How should threats and risks be prioritized?
As we’ve said before – unlike with other security solutions, you can’t just ping one of your peers and ask what he or she is doing. Browser security is new, and the wisdom of the crowd is yet to be formed. In fact, there’s an excellent chance that your peers are now struggling with the very same questions you are.
The Definitive Browser Security Platform Checklist – What it is and How to Use It#
The checklist (download it here) breaks down the high-level ‘browser security’ headline to small and digestible chunks of the concrete needs that need to be solved. These are brought to the reader in five pillars – deployment, user experience, security functionalities and user privacy. For each pillar there is a short description of its browser context and a more detailed explanation of its capabilities.
The most significant pillar, in terms of scope, is of course, the security functionalities one, which is divided into five sub-sections. Since, in most cases, this pillar would be the initial driver to pursuing browser security platform in the first place it’s worth going over them in more detail:
The need for browser security platform typically arises from one of the following:
— Attack Surface Management: Proactive reduction of the browser’s exposure to various types of threats, eliminating adversaries’ ability to carry them out.
— Zero Trust Access: Hardening the authentication requirements to ensure that the username and password were indeed provided by the legitimate user and were not compromised.
— SaaS Monitoring and Protection: 360° visibility into all users’ activity and data usage within sanctioned and unsanctioned apps, as well as other non-corporate web destinations, while safeguarding corporate data from compromise or loss.
— Protection Against Malicious Web Pages: Real-time detection and prevention of all the malicious tactics adversaries embed in the modern web page, including credential phishing, downloading of malicious files and data theft.
— Secure 3rd Party Access and BYOD: Enablement of secure access to corporate web resources from unmanaged devices of both the internal workforce as well as external contractors and service providers.
This list enables anyone to easily identify the objective for their browser security platform search and find out the required capabilities for fulfilling it.
The Checklist – A Straightforward Evaluation Shortcut #
The most important and actionable part in the guide is the concluding checklist, which provides, for the first time, a concise summary of all the essential capabilities a browser security platform should provide. This checklist makes the evaluation process easier than ever. All you have to do now is test the solutions you’ve shortlisted against it and see which one scores the highest. Once you have all of them lined up, you can make an informed decision based on the needs of your environment, as you understand them.
Any organization that handles sensitive data must be diligent in its security efforts, which include regular pen testing. Even a small data breach can result in significant damage to an organization’s reputation and bottom line.
There are two main reasons why regular pen testing is necessary for secure web application development:
Security: Web applications are constantly evolving, and new vulnerabilities are being discovered all the time. Pen testing helps identify vulnerabilities that could be exploited by hackers and allows you to fix them before they can do any damage.
Compliance: Depending on your industry and the type of data you handle, you may be required to comply with certain security standards (e.g., PCI DSS, NIST, HIPAA). Regular pen testing can help you verify that your web applications meet these standards and avoid penalties for non-compliance.
Many organizations, big and small, have once a year pen testing cycle. But what’s the best frequency for pen testing? Is once a year enough, or do you need to be more frequent?
The answer depends on several factors, including the type of development cycle you have, the criticality of your web applications, and the industry you’re in.
Agile development cycles are characterized by short release cycles and rapid iterations. This can make it difficult to keep track of changes made to the codebase and makes it more likely that security vulnerabilities will be introduced.
If you’re only testing once a year, there’s a good chance that vulnerabilities will go undetected for long periods of time. This could leave your organization open to attack.
To mitigate this risk, pen testing cycles should align with the organization’s development cycle. For static web applications, testing every 4-6 months should be sufficient. But for web applications that are updated frequently, you may need to test more often, such as monthly or even weekly.
Any system that is essential to your organization’s operations should be given extra attention when it comes to security. This is because a breach of these systems could have a devastating impact on your business. If your organization relies heavily on its web applications to do business, any downtime could result in significant financial losses.
For example, imagine that your organization’s e-commerce site went down for an hour due to a DDoS attack. Not only would you lose out on potential sales, but you would also have to deal with the cost of the attack and the negative publicity.
To avoid this scenario, it’s important to ensure that your web applications are always available and secure.
Non-critical web applications can usually get away with being tested once a year, but business-critical web applications should be tested more frequently to ensure they are not at risk of a major outage or data loss.
If all your web applications are internal, you may be able to get away with pen testing less frequently. However, if your web applications are accessible to the public, you must be extra diligent in your security efforts.
Web applications accessible to external traffic are more likely to be targeted by attackers. This is because there is a greater pool of attack vectors and more potential entry points for an attacker to exploit.
Customer-facing web applications also tend to have more users, which means that any security vulnerabilities will be exploited more quickly. For example, a cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in an external web application with millions of users could be exploited within hours of being discovered.
To protect against these threats, it’s important to pen test customer-facing web applications more frequently than internal ones. Depending on the size and complexity of the application, you may need to pen test every month or even every week.
Certain industries are more likely to be targeted by hackers due to the sensitive nature of their data. Healthcare organizations, for example, are often targeted because of the protected health information (PHI) they hold.
If your organization is in a high-risk industry, you should consider conducting pen testing more frequently to ensure that your systems are secure and meet regulatory compliance. This will help protect your data and reduce the chances of a costly security incident.
You Don’t Have Internal Security Operations or a Pen testing Team#
This might sound counterintuitive, but if you don’t have an internal security team, you may need to conduct pen testing more frequently.
Organizations that don’t have dedicated security staff are more likely to be vulnerable to attacks.
Without an internal security team, you will need to rely on external pen testers to assess your organization’s security posture.
Depending on the size and complexity of your organization, you may need to pen test every month or even every week.
During a merger or acquisition, there is often a lot of confusion and chaos. This can make it difficult to keep track of all the systems and data that need to be secured. As a result, it’s important to conduct pen testing more frequently during these times to ensure that all systems are secure.
M&A also means that you are adding new web applications to your organization’s infrastructure. These new applications may have unknown security vulnerabilities that could put your entire organization at risk.
In 2016, Marriott acquired Starwood without being aware that hackers had exploited a flaw in Starwood’s reservation system two years earlier. Over 500 million customer records were compromised. This placed Marriott in hot water with the British watchdog ICO, resulting in 18.4 million pounds in fines in the UK. According to Bloomberg, there is more trouble ahead, as the hotel giant could “face up to $1 billion in regulatory fines and litigation costs.”
To protect against these threats, it’s important to conduct pen testing before and after an acquisition. This will help you identify potential security issues so they can be fixed before the transition is complete.
While periodic pen testing is important, it is no longer enough in today’s world. As businesses rely more on their web applications, continuous pen testing becomes increasingly important.
There are two main types of pen testing: time-boxed and continuous.
Traditional pen testing is done on a set schedule, such as once a year. This type of pen testing is no longer enough in today’s world, as businesses rely more on their web applications.
Continuous pen testing is the process of continuously scanning your systems for vulnerabilities. This allows you to identify and fix vulnerabilities before they can be exploited by attackers. Continuous pen testing allows you to find and fix security issues as they happen instead of waiting for a periodic assessment.
Continuous pen testing is especially important for organizations that have an agile development cycle. Since new code is deployed frequently, there is a greater chance for security vulnerabilities to be introduced.
Pen testing as a service models is where continuous pen testing shine. Outpost24’s PTaaS (Penetration-Testing-as-a-Service) platform enables businesses to conduct continuous pen testing with ease. The Outpost24 platform is always up-to-date with an organization’s latest security threats and vulnerabilities, so you can be confident that your web applications are secure.
Manual and automated pen testing: Outpost24’s PTaaS platform combines manual and automated pen testing to give you the best of both worlds. This means you can find and fix vulnerabilities faster while still getting the benefits of expert analysis.
Provides comprehensive coverage: Outpost24’s platform covers all OWASP Top 10 vulnerabilities and more. This means that you can be confident that your web applications are secure against the latest threats.
Is cost-effective: With Outpost24, you only pay for the services you need. This makes it more affordable to conduct continuous pen testing, even for small businesses.
Regular pen testing is essential for secure web application development. Depending on your organization’s size, industry, and development cycle, you may need to revise your pen testing schedule.
Once-a-year pen testing cycle may be enough for some organizations, but for most, it is not. For business-critical, customer-facing, or high-traffic web applications, you should consider continuous pen testing.
Outpost24’s PTaaS platform makes it easy and cost-effective to conduct continuous pen testing. Contact us today to learn more about our platform and how we can help you secure your web applications.
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The windows Update CLI commands are useful for troubleshooting Windows Update errors. And they are helpful when you need to automate the windows update tasks. In newer versions of windows, the WUAUCLT command has been deprecated and replaced with the usoclient. In this article we have included the options and syntax for using wuault, usoclient, and powershell to detect and install windows updates
WUAUCLT
The windows update command utility in windows is: WUAUCLT. This stands for Windows Update Automatic Update Client. This client has been deprecated in windows 10 and server 2016. Howeve,r it is still available through windows 7 and server 2012R2.
Below is a list of arguments you can pass to the WUAUCLT commands and a short explanation of what each argument does. Search:
Command
Description
/DetectNow
Detect and download updates that are available (will vary by system settings)
/ReportNow
Tell the client to report its status back to the WSUS server
/RunHandlerComServer
/RunStoreAsComServer
/ShowSettingsDialog
Show Windows Update settings dialog
/ShowWindowsUpdate
Shows the windows update dialog box or web page (depending on windows version)
/ResetAuthorization
when an update check occurs a cookie is stored that prevents a new update or check for 1 hour. So, you should use this to delete this cookie
/ResetEulas
Resets the accepted EULA’s
/ShowWU
Shows the windows update dialog on windows vista and above. Opens Windows update on XP
/SelfUpdateManaged
Scan for windows updates using WSUS
/SelfUpdateUnmanaged
Triggers a windows update scan using the windows update website
/ShowOptions
Open the windows update settings window
/ShowFeaturedOptInDialog
Show Opt-In dialog for featured updates
/DemoUI
Show the icons for windows update
/ShowFeaturedUpdates
Open windows update dialog and shows the featured updates
/ShowWUAutoScan
/UpdateNow
Install updates now
Showing 1 to 17 of 17 entries
Examples
See below for some examples of running the wuauclt. All examples should be run from an elevated/administrative command prompt
If all you want to do is detect and install updates right now, you would run:
Wuauclt /dectectnow /updatenow
If it is refusing to install, you can run:
Wuauclt /resetauthorization
If you want to have the client report its status back to the WSUS server, you would run:
Wuauclt /reportnow
Powershell
Powershell will give you the most flexibility in installing windows updates. The other methods are fine for simply downloading and installing all updates. However, with the powershell cmdlets you can do things like get a list of updates, search for updates with a specific word in them, then only install those updates.
**Note, I usually only reboot if required. For that reason, I don’t like to use the AutoReboot flag.
Check if a reboot is required
Get-wurebootstatus
List available updates on Microsoft Update
Get-WUInstall –MicrosoftUpdate –ListOnly
USOClient
The USO client is new to windows 10 and Server 2016. This replaces the wuauclt command in these Operating systems. I would recommend using powershell instead of this client when you are doing automation, since it will work on newer and older clients. However, this client is very simple to use. and is useful for one-off purposes. See the table below for all of the command arguments: Show 102550100 entriesSearch:
In a previous article, I showed you how to install Active Directory (AD), the first domain controller (DC) in a new forest and domain, using Server Manager in Windows Server 2019. But if you’re not afraid of the command line, there’s a much quicker way to get Active Directory up and running in Windows Server. In this article, I’ll show you how to configure AD using PowerShell.
There are two steps to installing AD in Windows Server 2019. The first is to install the Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS) server role. The second step is to configure your server as a domain controller. An AD domain must have at least one DC. Your server will be the first DC in a new AD forest and domain.
To complete the instructions below, you will need to have an account with administrator privileges in Windows Server 2019. I will also assume that you are using Windows Server 2019 with the Desktop Experience role installed. If you are using Server Core, the instructions vary a little but are more or less the same.
Active Directory prerequisites
Before you install your first domain controller in the new AD domain, there are a couple of things you should do to prepare the server. While it’s not absolutely necessary, I recommend giving the computer a name that makes it easy to identify. For example, I usually call the first domain controller in a new domain DC1. Secondly, you’ll need to set a static IP address and configure the network adapter’s DNS server.
Let’s start by renaming the server.
Log in to Windows Server 2019 as an administrator.
Open the Start menu and click the Windows PowerShell
In the PowerShell window, run the command below and press ENTER. Replace ‘DC1’ with the name that you would like to use for your domain controller.
Rename-Computer -NewName DC1
Restart the server.
Once the server has rebooted, we can configure the network adapter. Your DC will need to communicate with other devices on the local network, so it’s important to speak to whoever oversees your network and get them to provide you with a static IP address that isn’t already in use. On my network, I will assign a static IP address of 192.168.1.10/24 and the default gateway is 192.168.1.1.
Log in to Windows Server 2019 as an administrator.
Open the Start menu and click the Windows PowerShell
In the PowerShell window, run the New-NetIPAddress command below and press ENTER. Replace the values for IPAddress, DefaultGateway, and PrefixLength to those provided by your network administrator.
The above command is designed to work on servers that have only one network adapter installed. If you have more than one adapter, you’ll need to enter the interface number instead of (Get-NetAdapter).InterfaceIndex. You can get the interface index number (ifIndex) for each adapter using Get-NetAdapter.
Now configure the adapter’s DNS settings. We’ll set the preferred DNS server to be our domain controller’s IP address because the domain controller will also perform the function of DNS server for the domain. So, replace 192.168.1.10 with the same IP address you configured for the adapter. Run Set-DNSClientServerAddress as shown, and press ENTER.
Again, the command is designed to work on servers that have only one network adapter installed. If you have more than one adapter, you’ll need to enter the interface number instead of (Get-NetAdapter).InterfaceIndex.
How to Install Active Directory in Windows Server 2019 Using PowerShell (Image Credit: Russell Smith)
Install the Active Directory Domain Services role
The next step is to install the AD DS server role. It’s easy to do using the Install-WindowsFeature cmdlet as shown below. If you are using Server Core, remove the -IncludeManagementTools parameter.
How to Install Active Directory in Windows Server 2019 Using PowerShell (Image Credit: Russell Smith)
Once the AD DS server role is installed, you’ll get a message in the PowerShell window. The Success column should read True.
How to Install Active Directory in Windows Server 2019 Using PowerShell (Image Credit: Russell Smith)
Configure the first domain controller in a new Active Directory forest
Before you continue, you should decide on a Fully Qualified Domain Name (FQDN) for your new domain. I’m going to use ad.contoso.com in this example. Where ‘ad’ is the name of my new domain and contoso.com is the top-level domain (TLD). You should make sure that you own the public TLD. In this example, I should own the contoso.com domain name. AD in the FQDN defines my internal DNS namespace for Active Directory.
To configure Windows Server 2019 as a domain controller, run Install-ADDSForest as shown in the example below. Replace ad.contoso.com with your chosen FQDN. DomainNetBIOSName is usually set to the part of your FQDN that identifies your internal AD DNS namespace. So, the part that comes to the left of the first period. In this case, ‘ad’.
Install-ADDSForest -DomainName ad.contoso.com -DomainNetBIOSName AD -InstallDNS
You should note that Install-ADDSForest is only used when you are installing the first domain controller in a new AD forest. Install-ADDSDomain and Install-ADDSDomainController are used respectively to create a new domain in an existing forest and install a new DC in an existing AD domain.
DomainName and DomainNetBIOSName are the only two compulsory parameters for the Install-ADDSForest cmdlet. If you want to explore what other options you can configure, run the command line below:
Get-Help Install-ADDSForest
When you run the Install-ADDSForest cmdlet, you’ll be prompted to enter a password for Directory Services Restore Mode (DSRM). Or Safe Mode password as it’s sometimes referred to. Enter a password and confirm it when prompted.
You’ll then see a message:
The target server will be configured as a domain controller and restarted when this operation is complete.
Do you want to continue with this operation?
Type y in the PowerShell window and press ENTER to confirm that you want to configure the server as a domain controller.
How to Install Active Directory in Windows Server 2019 Using PowerShell (Image Credit: Russell Smith)
As AD is configured, you’ll see some yellow warnings appear in the PowerShell window. They are normal and you can safely ignore them. The server will automatically reboot. Once Windows Server has rebooted, you will need to log in with the domain administrator account. The domain administrator account is assigned the same password as the built-in administrator account.
On the sign-in page, type administrator in the User name field. Type the password for the administrator account, which is the same as the password for the previous built-in administrator account, and press ENTER.
How to Install Active Directory in Windows Server 2019 Using PowerShell (Image Credit: Russell Smith)
And that is it! You are now logged in to your AD domain’s first domain controller. You can access Server Manager from the Start menu. In Server Manager, click the Tools menu and then select Active Directory Users and Computers to start managing your domain.
In this tutorial dedicated to Active Directory and security, I will give you some tips to harden the level of security in order to be less vulnerable to attacks.
The different configuration points, which will be discussed, simply allow attacks to be made more difficult and longer internally, in no way will they guarantee that you are invulnerable.
What you need to know is that your first ally is time, the more “difficult” and longer it will be, the more likely you are that the attacker(s) will move on.
Before applying the settings, they should be tested in a restricted environment so as not to create more problems, especially on Active Directory environments that are several years old.
In order to “protect” against Man-in-the-middle (MITM) attacks, it is possible to activate the signature on SMB protocol exchanges.
SMB signing works with SMBv2 and SMBv3.
The configuration of the signature can be done:
at the client level
at the server level
From the moment one of the two negotiates the signature, the SMB flow will be signed.
The configuration is done at the level of group policies: Computer configuration / Windows settings / Security settings / Security options. The two parameters to activate:
Microsoft network client: digitally sign communications (always)
Microsoft network server: digitally sign communications (always)
Again, I advise you to test on a few computers before applying this to your entire fleet, for my part, I had problems with RDS servers in terms of access to shares.
Network Security: Restrict NTLM: NTLM authentication in this domain
The NTLM configuration allows quite a bit of flexibility in terms of configuring it and adding exceptions.
Disable LLMNR and NBT-NS
LLMNR (Link-Local Multicast Name Resolution) and NBT-NS (Netbios Name Service) are two broadcast/multicast name resolution “protocols” that are enabled by default, they are used when dns name resolution fails.
If you use Wireshark type software to listen to the network, you will see that there is a lot of LLMNR and NBT-NS traffic.
The main danger of LLMNR and NBT-NS is that it is easy to send a false response with another computer in order to retrieve an NTLM hash of the requesting client.
Below are screenshots of the responder which allows you to respond to LLMNR and NBT-NS requests
Listen
Now we will see how to deactivate LLMNR and NBT-NS
Disable LLMNR
Good news, LLMNR is disabled by group policy in configuring the DNS client of computers.
To disable LLMNR, you must enable the Disable multicast name resolution setting located at: Computer Configuration / Administrative Templates / Network / DNS Client.
After applying the GPO on the computers in the domain, they will no longer use LLMNR.
If you have non-domain computers, it will be necessary to do this on them.
Disable NBT-NS
Here it gets a little complicated because NBT-NS is configured at the NIC level and there is no applicable group policy. The good news is that for client computers (mainly workstations), it is possible to do this by an option on the DHCP server.
At the options level (extended or server), option 001 Microsoft Options for disabling NetBios must be configured in the Microsoft Windows 2000 Option vendor class. The value 0x2 must be entered to disable NBT-NS.
For computers that are not in automatic addressing, Netbios must be disabled on the network card(s).
Open network card properties.
Select Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4) and click Properties.
From the General tab, click on Advanced.
Go to the WINS tab, and select Disable NetBIOS over TCP/IP.
Close the different ones by validating the configuration.
It is possible to disable Netbios by GPO using a PowerShell script run at startup.
It is also important to follow some simple “hygiene” rules:
Limit privileged account usage (domain admins)
Do not use domain admin accounts on workstations
Update servers and computers regularly
Update applications (Web server, database, etc.)
Make sure you have up-to-date antivirus
Learn about security bulletins
Regarding the last point that I will address, it is passwords, for domain administrator accounts, privileged long passwords (20 to 30 characters) which will take much longer to be “brute-forced” than an 8-character password even with complexity.
Enter the password of the account passed as a parameter in the login window, then in the Powershell console enter the password of the directory recovery mode and confirm the promotion as a domain controller.
Wait during the promotion operation ….
After the operation completes, the following message appears and the server restarts.
At reboot the server is domain control.
Complements
There are 3 different Powershell commands that allow promotion as a domain control. Each of the commands is to be used in a particular case:
Install-ADDSForest : which is used for creating a new Active Directory forest.
The premise of this article’s headline is nonsense, sure, but it isn’t clickbait—I promise.
You’re almost certainly here because you searched for “best productivity apps.” I understand that impulse. You want to get more done in less time, which is about as universal a feeling as humans can have at work. The problem: productivity is deeply personal, and the words “productivity tools” mean a lot of different things to different people. What works for you may or may not work for me, which is why—after over a decade of writing about productivity software—I don’t really believe there are objectively “best” productivity apps.
I do, however, think there are categories of tools that can help you become a better version of yourself. Some of them work better for more people than others, and not everyone needs an app from every category. Knowing what kinds of apps exist, and what you should look for in an app, is more important than knowing what the “best” app in that category is.
Having said that, you’re here for software recommendations, not my personal reflections on the nature of productivity. So I’m going to go over the main kinds of productivity apps I think most humans who use electronic devices at work should know about. I’ll explain why I think each category is important, point to an app or two that I think will work well for most people, then offer links to other options if you want to learn more.
Just remember: the specific app doesn’t matter. The best productivity app is the one that works best for you. The most important thing is having a system. Sound good? Let’s jump in.
All of our best apps roundups are written by humans who’ve spent much of their careers using, testing, and writing about software. We spend dozens of hours researching and testing apps, using each app as it’s intended to be used and evaluating it against the criteria we set for the category. We’re never paid for placement in our articles from any app or for links to any site—we value the trust readers put in us to offer authentic evaluations of the categories and apps we review. For more details on our process, read the full rundown of how we select apps to feature on the Zapier blog.
We all have things we need to do—at work and in the rest of our lives. The worst place you could store those things, in my opinion, is in your mind. It’s just stressful: you’ll remember, at random moments, that there’s something you were supposed to be doing, and that memory will result in panic. Writing down everything you need to do allows you to make a plan, and (crucially) means you don’t have to panic.
Not everyone benefits from a dedicated to-do list app—some of the most productive people I know prefer sticky notes, email inboxes, or even spreadsheets. I think that’s great, so long as you have some place to record the things you need to do.
I think that Todoist, shown above, is a great to-do list app for most people. It’s easy to use but also offers a lot of features. It can also be installed on basically any device you can imagine, meaning your to-do list is always available. It allows you to assign due dates to tasks, sort tasks by project, or even view a project using a Kanban board. You don’t have to worry about those features if you don’t want to, though, which is why I think it’s a great starting point for someone who needs a to-do list.
If Todoist doesn’t work for you, though, check out our list of the best to-do list apps—it’s got a wide variety of recommendations. I, personally, use TickTick because I like how easy it is to add tasks, and I also can’t stop saying good things about Things for sheer simplicity on Apple devices. Find a tool you like—and that you remember to actually open. There’s nothing less useful than an app full of tasks you never look at.
Once you’ve picked your to-do list app, make the most of it with automation, so you can easily add tasks that come in by email, team chat apps, project management tools, or notes. Read more about automating your to-do list.
There are only so many hours in the day, unfortunately, which means you have to budget them. A calendar is how you do that. You could use a paper wall calendar, sure, but a calendar app lets you invite other people to an event. Also, in a world where so many meetings are virtual, calendar apps give you a useful place to store the link to your Zoom call.
I think that Google Calendar, shown above, is the right calendar app for most people—particularly people who already use Gmail. Google Calendar is easy to load on any device, lets you see your calendar in several different views, and makes it easy to invite anyone else to any event or meeting you happen to plan. I could writemultiplearticlesonGoogle Calendar features (and I have). This app does everything any other app can do, and more, all while being pretty easy to use.
If Google Calendar doesn’t work for you, though, check out our list of the best calendar apps for more options. Microsoft Outlook is a solid alternative, as is the Calendar app that comes with all Apple devices.
I’d also consider looking into some kind of meeting scheduling app. These apps let anyone sign up for appointments with you, which is particularly useful if you have a meeting-heavy calendar. Calendly, shown below, is a solid option, with a lot of customizability and the ability to sync with Google Calendar. You can check out our list of the best meeting schedulers for a more complete rundown of Calendly and other options.
Once you choose a calendar app, take it to the next level. With automation, you can do things like automatically turn calendar events into tasks on your to-do list or use forms to create calendar events. Here’s how you can bring context to your calendar by connecting other apps.
I’m constantly taking notes: before and during meetings; while researching an article; while brewing beer. And I think most people have some class of information they’ll need to reference later that doesn’t quite meet the threshold of a “document.” Who wants a sprawling series of folders with all of that information?
This, to me, is what note-taking apps are for: quickly writing things down so you can read them later and (hopefully) follow up. They also work well as a personal journal, or a place to store files related to a particular project.
OneNote, above, is probably the note-taking app most people should try first. It’s free—so long as you don’t run out of OneDrive storage—and it gives you all kinds of ways to organize notes, from notebooks to sections to sub-headers. It also has powerful search, which includes the scanned contents of any images or PDFs you might drop in a note.
But OneNote isn’t the only option. You should check out our list of the best note-taking apps for more choices. If you loved Evernote back in the day, you should check out Joplin, which is a completely free and open source replacement for that app. And I personally love Obsidian, which turns your notes into an entire database, complete with internal links and an extensive plugin collection. There are a lot of good choices out there—find something that lets you write things down and dig them up later.
I’ve never tried to work in the middle of an amusement park, but I imagine it would be distracting. The internet is worse. Everything you could possibly imagine is available, all delivered by brilliant engineers who are doing everything they can to keep you looking at more and more and more of it. It’s understandable if you have trouble getting stuff done in that context, which is why apps that block distractions are so helpful.
Freedom is a great tool for the job. It runs on every platform and can block distractions—both websites and apps—on all of your devices. That means you can’t, for example, block Twitter on your computer only to pick up your phone and look at it there. With Freedom, you can set up multiple block lists, then start timers for any of them.
I personally love Serene, which combines distraction blocking with a sort of to-do list. You say what you want to do and how long it will take, then you start a distraction-free session to work on it. There’s also Cold Turkey Blocker, which can optionally prevent you from changing the time settings on your computer as a way of working around the block you set up. You’ve got more choices, though, particularly if you’re a Mac user. Check out our list of the best distraction blockers to learn more.
Remember: the internet is distracting on purpose. There’s no shame in using a tool to build discipline.
My dentist tells me I should brush my teeth twice a day, and I believe him, but I tended to only brush at night. I used a habit tracker to change that.
These applications might sound similar to a to-do list, but they’re very different. You can’t add individual tasks to a habit tracker—only recurring ones. The idea is to set an intention to do something regularly, then keep track of how often you regularly do it. Eventually, you have a streak going, which psychologically motivates you to keep it up until the habit becomes second nature. Don’t laugh—it works.
We recommend checking out Streaks, shown above, for iPhone and HabitNow, below, for Android. These apps both live on your phone, which is the place you’re most likely to look. They both let you create a list of habits you’d like to build, then remind you about that intention. They also both show you your progress in various ways.
They’re not the only options, however; check out our list of the best habit tracker apps for more ideas. Also keep in mind that some to-do lists have habit-tracking capabilities built right in. I, personally, use TickTick‘s built-in habit tracker—I love it. And some people use a paper calendar for tracking a simple habit—just add an X every day you stick to your habit.
I’d love to read articles or watch YouTube videos all day. We all would. Sometimes, though, you have to do something else—even though your friend just sent you a really, really interesting article. That’s where read-it-later apps come in. They let you quickly save something you intend to read, so that you can come back to it when you have time.
I think that Pocket, above, is the app of choice in this class. It’s free to use, offers extensions for every major browser, and also has great mobile versions that sync your articles for offline reading. There’s even built-in support for highlighting, then reviewing your highlights later.
Instapaper is a close second, and it even lets you send articles to your Kindle. These aren’t your only choices, though—check out our list of the best read-it-later apps for some more options. It’s also worth noting that some people use bookmarking apps or even note-taking apps for the same purpose, and that’s great—they both make it easy to save things for future reference.
Automate the process of saving articles by connecting your read-it-later app to Zapier. Here are some ideas to get you started.
Whether it’s for a quick presentation or troubleshooting a problem, sometimes recording what’s on your screen and sharing it just makes life easier. Screen recording tools are perfect for this, allowing you to quickly record your screen, your voice, and even your face if you have a webcam.
Loom is a great first tool to check out in this category. It’s easy to set up, works on all major platforms, and makes it really simple to share recordings. You can even add your face, via a webcam, to the recording.
I personally use Zappy, which was originally an internal tool used by Zapier. It’s honestly the best screenshot tool I’ve ever used, and it’s free—if you use a Mac, it’s worth a try. Check out our list of the best screen recording tools for more options, and keep in mind you can actually record your screen without any software, if you don’t mind managing the file yourself.
Want to share your screen in real-time? You need a screen sharing tool (Zoom works pretty well, surprisingly).
Other productivity tools worth checking out
This article could go on forever. There’s no end to great software out there, and I love writing about it. I think the above categories should save you all kinds of time—and take up plenty of your time to set up—but here are a few other suggestions if you’re feeling particularly motivated.
Password managers, like LastPass or 1Password, help you generate random passwords for all of your different services without the need for memorization. This is great for security, but it also makes logging in to stuff faster. Here’s a list of the best password managers.
Mobile scanning apps, like Microsoft Lens, let you scan documents using your phone while also digitizing any text using optical character recognition (OCR). Check out our list of the best mobile scanning OCR apps for more choices.
Time tracking apps, like Toggl Track, are great for keeping track of how long projects take and making sure you’re not spending too much time on the wrong things. Take a look at our list of the best time tracking apps to find the right one for you.
Mind mapping software, like Coggle, helps you map the connections between different ideas while you’re brainstorming. Here are our picks for the best mind mapping software.
AI software, like OpenAI, could make all kinds of tasks easier in the future. It’s early, granted, but I already find it useful when I’m in the brainstorming phase of a project—I can ask the bot to generate ideas.
Once you have apps set up in some of these categories, you can take the whole productivity thing even further. Automation software like ours at Zapier connects all the other apps you use, with workflows you can build yourself—no code required. Like the tools above, Zapier won’t solve every problem you have, but it’s a great way to connect tools that otherwise don’t integrate well—which means you can use the best tools for you, as opposed to the tools that happen to play nice together. And it’s not limited to productivity—eventually, you’ll find yourself automating even your most business-critical workflows.
Plus, if you sign up for Zapier, we’ll be able to write more useful articles like this one. Here are five things you should automate today to get started.
This post was originally published in September 2018 by Matthew Guay. The most recent update was in December 2022.
There are too many to-do list apps. Trying them all would be a massive task, and I know because I did.
Why are there so many apps for something easily done on sticky notes? Because managing tasks is an intensely personal thing. People will reject anything that doesn’t feel right. That’s a good instinct, but it makes it hard to find the right app.
To that end, we’ve been hard at work researching the best to-do apps, trying to find the right ones for various use cases. Research for these pieces was exhaustive. We started by finding the best apps for every platform: Android, Windows, macOS, and iPhone/iPad. We then tried the top-rated apps in every respective app store, and spent way too much time migrating our personal to-do lists from one app to another.
And now I’m offering you what I feel is the cream of the crop. Whatever you’re looking for, one of these apps is going to be right for you. Click on any app to learn more about why I chose it, or keep reading for more context on to-do list apps.
Other options, including project management software, note-taking apps, and other tools that can do the job
What makes the best to-do list app?
How we evaluate and test apps
All of our best apps roundups are written by humans who’ve spent much of their careers using, testing, and writing about software. We spend dozens of hours researching and testing apps, using each app as it’s intended to be used and evaluating it against the criteria we set for the category. We’re never paid for placement in our articles from any app or for links to any site—we value the trust readers put in us to offer authentic evaluations of the categories and apps we review. For more details on our process, read the full rundown of how we select apps to feature on the Zapier blog.
I’ve written about technology in general, and productivity specifically, since 2009. In that time, I’ve personally tried basically every to-do list app that has come out, and I’m usually depending on at least one of them to function.
Of course, when it comes to managing a to-do list online, everyone has different criteria. I kept this in mind as I tested, and I noticed a few features that made certain apps stand out.
The best to-do list apps:
Make it fast to add and organize tasks. Ideally, a task is added and categorized in a couple taps or keystrokes.
Offer multiple ways to organize your tasks. Tags, lists, projects, and due dates are all helpful, and the best to-do apps offer at least a few categories like this.
Remind you about self-imposed deadlines. Notifications, widgets, emails—if you’re using an online to-do list, it should help you track what needs to happen when.
Offer clean user interfaces. The best to-do app fits into your workflow so you can get back to what you’re supposed to be doing.
Sync between every platform you use. Which platforms will depend on what you personally use, but I didn’t consider anything that doesn’t sync between desktop and mobile.
I tried to find the task list apps that balance these things in various ways. None of these options will be right for everyone, but hopefully one of them is right for you. Let’s dive in.
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Todoist isn’t the most powerful to-do list website out there. It’s also not the simplest. That’s kind of the point: this app balances power with simplicity, and it does so while running on basically every platform that exists. That’s a strong selling point—which is probably why Todoist is one of the most popular to-do lists right now.
Adding tasks was quick on every platform in my tests, thanks in part to natural language processing (type “buy milk Monday” and the task “buy milk” will be added with the next Monday set as your due date). You can put new tasks in your Inbox and then move them to relevant projects; you can also set due dates. Paid users can create custom filters and labels, and there are also some basic collaboration features.
Todoist is flexible enough to adapt to most workflows but not so complicated as to overwhelm. And it adds new features regularly: you can view projects as a Kanban board, for example, and navigating the app by keyboard is much smoother after recent updates. Overall, this is a great first to-do list app to try out, especially if you don’t know where to start.
Todoist also integrates with Zapier, which means you can automatically create tasks in Todoist whenever something happens in one of your favorite apps. Here are some examples.
Add new Google Calendar events to Todoist as tasks
Best to-do list app with embedded calendars and timers
TickTick(Web, Android, Windows, macOS, iPhone and iPad)
TickTick is a fast-growing task list app that offers a wide array of features on just about every platform you can imagine. Adding tasks is quick thanks to natural language processing. There’s also a universal keyboard shortcut offered on the desktop versions and pinned notifications and widgets on mobile, which makes it quick to add a task before getting back to what you’re doing. Tasks can be organized using lists, tags, and due dates, and there’s also the ability to add subtasks to any task.
TickTick offers all of this with apps that feel native—the macOS version is distinct from the Windows version, for example, in ways that make sense given the differences between those two systems. TickTick also offers a few features that are above and beyond what other apps offer.
First, there’s a built-in Pomodoro timer, allowing you to start a 25-minute work session for any of your tasks (complete with numerous white noise options, if you want). Second, there’s integration with various third-party calendars, allowing you to see your tasks and your appointments in one place, and even do some time blocking. There’s also a built-in habit-tracking tool, allowing you to review how many days you did or didn’t stick to your exercise and diet commitments. And an Eisenhower Matrix view allows you to prioritize your tasks based on what’s urgent and what’s important. It’s a great collection of features, unlike anything else on the market.
With TickTick’s Zapier integration, you can connect TickTick to the other tools in your tech stack to automatically create tasks whenever you get new leads, deals, or emails.
In 2015, Microsoft bought Wunderlist and put that team to work on a new to-do list app. Microsoft To Do is the result of that, and you can find Wunderlist’s DNA throughout the project. The main interface is clean and friendly, adding tasks is quick, but there’s a lot of flexibility below the surface.
But the real standout feature here is the deep integration with Microsoft’s ecosystem. Any email flagged in Outlook, for example, shows up as a task. Outlook users can also sync their tasks from that app over to Microsoft To Do, meaning there’s finally a way to sync Outlook tasks to mobile. Windows users can add tasks using Cortana or by typing in the Start menu. For example, you can type “add rice to my shopping list,” and rice will be added to a list called “shopping.” If you’re a Windows user and an Outlook user, this is the app for you.
This is also the prettiest to-do list app on the market, in my opinion. You can set custom background images for every one of your lists, allowing you to tell at a glance which list you’re looking at. You’re going to be looking at your task list all day—it might as well look good.
Microsoft To Do integrates with Zapier, which means you can make sure Microsoft To Do is talking to all the other apps you use, not just the Microsoft ones. Here are some examples to get started.
Create Workboard action items from new tasks in Microsoft To-Do
To-do list apps tend to fall into two categories: the complex and the minimalist. Things is somehow both.
That’s about the highest praise I can give a to-do list app. This is an app with no shortage of features, and yet it always feels simple to use. Adding tasks is quick and so is organizing them, but there’s seemingly no end of variation in ways to organize them. Areas can contain tasks or projects; projects can contain tasks or headers that can also contain tasks; and tasks can contain subtasks if you want. It sounds confusing, but it isn’t, which really speaks to how well Things is designed.
Other apps offer these features, but Things does it in a way that never feels cluttered, meaning you can quickly be done with looking at your to-do list and get back to whatever it is you’re doing. Combine this blend of functionality and beauty with features like a system-wide tool for quickly adding tasks, integration with your calendar so you can see your appointments while planning your day, intuitive keyboard shortcuts, reminders with native notifications, and syncing to an iPhone and iPad app.
The only downside here is the complete lack of versions for Windows and Android, though this decision is probably part of what allows the team to focus on making such a clean product. If you’re an Apple user, you owe it to yourself to try out Things.
You can automatically add to-dos to Things from your other apps with Things’ integrations on Zapier. Here’s some inspiration.
OmniFocus is nothing if not flexible. This Apple-exclusive application is built around the Getting Things Done (GTD) philosophy trademarked by David Allen, but an array of features means it can be used for just about any organizational system you can imagine. There are three different kinds of projects you can set up, for example, depending on whether you need to do tasks in a specific order or not. There are six main views by default, allowing you to organize your tasks by things like due date, projects, and tags. You can even add more views, assuming you have the Pro version.
You get the idea. OmniFocus is a power user’s dream, with more features than anyone can hope to incorporate into a workflow, which is kind of the point: if there’s a feature you want, OmniFocus has it, so you can organize your tasks basically any way you can imagine.
Syncing is offered only between Apple devices. There’s a web version that’s intended for occasional usage away from your Apple machines, but non-Apple users should probably look elsewhere.
You can connect OmniFocus to your other favorite apps with OmniFocus’s Zapier integration. Whenever something happens in another app that you want to keep track of in OmniFocus, Zapier will automatically send it there.
Create OmniFocus tasks from new saved Slack messages
OmniFocus price: From $99.99/year for the recurring plan, which includes all apps and the web version. Also available as a one-time purchase from $49.99 (14-day free trial).
Games are fantastic at motivating mundane activity—how else can you explain all that time you’ve spent on mindless fetch quests? Habitica, formerly known as HabitRPG, tries to use principles from game design to motivate you to get things done, and it’s remarkably effective. You can add tasks, daily activities, and habits to a list. You also have a character, who levels up when you get things done and takes damage when you put things off. You can also earn in-game currency for buying offline rewards, such as a snack, or in-game items like weapons or even silly hats.
This is even better when you join a few friends and start a party. You can all fight bosses together, but be careful: fail to finish some tasks on time and your friends will take damage. If that doesn’t motivate you, nothing will.
What’s the downside? Habitica isn’t a great to-do list for managing long-term projects, so you might need something else for that. But if motivation is your problem, Habitica is well worth a spin.
Habitica price: Free version available; paid version from $5/month.
If you live in Gmail and Google Calendar, Google Tasks is an obvious free to-do list app to try out. That’s because it lives right in the sidebar of those two apps, and offers more than a few integrations. Plus, there’s a dedicated mobile app.
The app itself is spartan. Adding tasks is quick, particularly if you spend a lot of time in Gmail anyway, but there’s not a lot of organizational offerings. There are due dates, lists, descriptions, subtasks, and the ability to “Star” tasks. There’s not much beyond that, which is ok. On the desktop, the integration with Gmail is a key selling point. You can drag an email to Google Tasks to turn it into a task, for example. You also can see your tasks on your Google Calendar, if you want.
The best to-do app is one that’s always handy. If you’re the kind of person who always has Gmail open on your computer, it’s hard for any app to be handier than Google Tasks. The mobile versions make those tasks accessible on the go.
You can automatically move information between Google Tasks and your other apps with Google Tasks’ integration on Zapier. Here are a few examples of workflows you can automate, so you can stop manually moving your tasks.
Any.do offers a really slick mobile app that makes it quick to add tasks, organize them into lists, and add due dates. But where it really shines is with its daily “Plan my Day” feature, which forces you to schedule when you’ll accomplish your various tasks, so that you remember to actually do things. Any.do also integrates nicely with Google and Outlook calendars, allowing you to see your appointments and your tasks in one place. This is exactly what you need if you’re the kind of person who adds things to a list and forgets about them.
The desktop version isn’t quite as slick as the mobile version—it feels cluttered and is more than a little confusing. Still, Any.do’s mobile version alone makes a compelling reason to give it a shot, especially if that’s where you do most of your task management.
Any.do integrates with Zapier, so you can automatically add tasks to Any.do whenever there’s a new calendar event, note, or task in your other apps.
Any.do price: Free version available; paid version from $2.99/month.
Other to-do list options
We focused on dedicated to-do list apps in this roundup, but plenty of other software can fulfill the same function. Here are a few ideas if none of the above quite fit what you’re looking for:
Project management apps like Trello and Asana can be used as to-do lists, especially if you already use them to manage your other work.
Note-taking apps like Evernote, OneNote, and Google Keep also have to-do list features, if you want to combine your to-do lists and notes.
