When comparing Remember the Milk vs Joplin, the Slant community recommends Joplin for most people. In the question“What are the best cross-platform task apps?” Joplin is ranked 5th while Remember the Milk is ranked 19th.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Has its own syntax for programming smart lists
Smart lists are configured using Remember the Milk's syntax, making it very customizable.
Pro Semantic shortcuts
Remember The Milk has a list of semantic shortcuts that allow adding tasks and task options faster.
Pro Many features already working in the free version
The majority of commonly used features are available for free. The pro version adds increased functionality such as advanced sorting, mobile push notifications and sharing permissions.
Pro Excellent cross platform support
Whether you depend on an iOS, Windows or Android phone; Google Calendar or Outlook; Evernote or Twitter: RTM has an app or extension for you.
Pro Powerful query language
Query language can be used to build your own GTD-based system, with tags and lists and queries. Such as system can be used for private life and work alongside several simple lists without things getting mixed up.
Pro Location-based notifications
You can set locations for each task (for example a specific store, or a general location like 'near the beach' for shell collectors), and RTM will remind you when you are near or in that location. This can help keep your daily list uncluttered and remind you of errands you might have forgotten.
Pro Tasks may have additional options
Extra options such as how often it repeats, the due date, and the location.
Pro Support of a "start" date
A start date can be set which can be used with smartlists or to set a reminder.
Pro Lists can be shared
Share lists with other Remember The Milk users, or with iCal and more. Shared lists can be collaboratively updated. This makes it great for teams or just to share progress with others.
Pro Quickly add rich text
Remember The Milk offers Smart Add – shortcuts that allow you to quickly add advanced information to a task. For example, you can quickly add a due date, set the priority level, add a tag, set repeat times, add URLs, and add notes to your tasks. For the full list, check out How Do I Use Smart Add?
Pro Manual sorting
Manual sorting is available on both the web app and android, allowing prioritization of tasks. This can be particularly useful for shopping lists, where you can put all the meat together, and all the cheese together etc. to make it easier to skim through when you're in the store.
Pro Nice Android Widget
Compared to competitors like todoist, the widget doesn't use too much space.
Pro Really, really cool support
They react within hours, and they actually keep track of your issue.
Pro Support for keywords to set due/start date, add to list with one line of text
There are special characters which open a box so the user can select predefined values or a calendar picker.
Pro Lightning fast sync
Syncs quickly across all your devices and platforms.
Pro Syncs with Evernote
Not only syncing, it's more of a "linking" with a two-way synchronization. Changing the title of a note in Evernote will update the title in Remember the Milk. So far, Remember The Milk is the only to-do app with a feature like this.
Pro Add tasks via e-mail
You can add tasks to Remember the Milk via email easily once you get the hang of formatting the messages.
Pro Twitter integration
The Twitter integration is excellent and allows for many types of automation.
Pro Offline access
Pro Open source
Peace of mind that there is no malicious piece of software in the app.
Pro Encryption
Pro Cross-platform
Supports Windows, Mac, Linux, Android and iOS.
Pro Supports file attachments
Pro Supports markdown
Pro Supports tags for notes
Pro Web Clipper
Browser extension saves full pages, clean content, or screen selections to new notes.
Pro Optional CLI interface
Provides a CLI interface for terminal lovers.
Pro Supports multiple languages
English, French, and Spanish, Italian, German, Czech and many others.
Pro Active user forum with support from app creators
Support, troubleshooting, and new feature requests are easy to make at the user forum and you can contact the app creator directly.
Pro Dropbox support
Can sync using Dropbox.
Pro Nextcloud support
Pro Timed alarm reminder for to-do lists
Cons
Con Subtasks only available in Pro version
Subtasks can break a longer to-do item into discrete tasks, helping you keep tabs on your progress.
Con Bad UI redesign
The web app takes up too much screen real estate and uses a half-screen format that requires a wide screen. The task edit screen is clunky. It still has UI bugs one year in. You can't complete tasks from the UI.
Con Free version lacks features
Mobile reminders, subtsaks, offline mode, Microsoft Outlook sync, priority, and more features are limited to the paid version ($39.99/year). To see the full list of restrictions, check out this page.
Con Does not support attachments
Cloud storage was recently added as a pro feature.
Con Cannot add task in notification bar
There is no pull down option to add a task in the notification bar.
Con Ugly icon
The goofy cow image does not fit well with a professsional office environment.
Con Sync issues with Android
If update on Linux then sync on Android, sometimes the Android sync will duplicate or remove some journal notes. Seems to be a bug in the Android app. The Linux app alone without sync with Android seems to work well using Dropbox. But don't expect changes you make on Android to sync properly back to Linux.
Con Sync issue under Linux
The Linux client has a bug that requires the user to click the mouse frequently in order for sync to proceed. This bug has been open for a while.
Con Gargantuan memory footprint
1GB+ of memory for taking notes.
Con Old school interface
Con Bloated
This project is suffering from feature creep and uses a lot of memory for a note-taking app.
Con App Image launches very slowly
On Linux, you can only install via App Image, which take 5+ seconds to launch. I can launch LibreOffice in under two seconds.
Con Sync issues on Windows
No way to change account settings and sync easily corrupted.
Con Weak tag searching
Joplin can currently only search for a single tag at a time. None of the boolean operators (AND, OR, NOT) are available for use in searches. This greatly diminishes the usefulness of tags in Joplin.