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Lyven vs Tody

Lyven is a household app for couples that gives every job a single owner, weighted by real effort, so the work is split fairly rather than rotated between whoever's turn it is. Tody is a cleaning app that rotates tasks between household members and runs a leaderboard to keep everyone moving. Both explicitly aim for fair distribution. Here is what that means in each app, and why the mechanism matters more than the word.

Verified live 29 July 2026, checked against Tody's own website and its App Store listing.

What Lyven actually does

Every job in the house, from the school forms to the bins to who remembers the dentist, gets one owner. Not shared, not rotated. That owner carries the noticing and the planning as well as the doing, weighted by how much real effort the job takes, not how it looks from the outside. The split is fused with the shopping list and the meals, so it is something you run the week on, not a chart you check once and forget. There is no scoreboard and no points. Free while in beta.

Where they agree

Tody's own site is explicit about the goal: an automated rotation scheme across household members that it describes as designed to ensure fair chore distribution. That's the same problem Lyven exists for, stated almost identically. Tody also has an Effort Manager that weighs how much time and energy each task takes, so the split accounts for difficulty rather than counting tasks one for one, a genuine nod to the same principle behind Lyven's effort weighting. And like Lyven, Tody agrees the system has to run continuously: its dueness tracking means nothing gets forgotten just because a fixed day passed, the same reason Lyven fuses the split with the shopping list and the meals rather than leaving it as a chart nobody opens again.

Where they differ: a rotation and a leaderboard versus an owner

Tody's fairness mechanism is a rotation, and on top of the rotation it runs a leaderboard, monthly challenges, and a mascot called Dusty that reacts to how the household is doing. That's two different failure modes stacked on each other: a rotation still means someone has to remember whose turn a task is this week, the exact planning load a rota is supposed to remove, and a leaderboard turns that rotation into a contest with a winner and, implicitly, a loser. Lyven's answer removes both. One job, one owner, permanently, weighted by real effort, with nobody's turn to remember and no leaderboard to climb.

What Tody Premium costs

Tody is free to download on iOS and Android, but the free plan only works on a single device with no cloud backup. Per its own App Store listing, Premium Solo is US$9.99 a year and adds cloud backup, still just for one person on their own devices. Sharing data between household members needs Premium+ Duo at US$24.99 a year, the tier built for two people, rising to US$39.99 for a family and US$79.99 for a team, all with a 30 day free trial. Lyven is free while in beta, the whole system, for however many people are in the household, with no per-person tier. The quickest way to see it is the free Split Check, a two minute, no sign up look at how your own household's work divides right now.

Side by side

 LyvenTody
Core purpose Splitting household work fairly between two adults, one owner per job Cleaning schedule that rotates tasks and gamifies completion with a leaderboard
Fairness mechanism Single owner per job, weighted by real effort, no rotation, no scoreboard Automated task rotation plus an Effort Manager, layered with a leaderboard and monthly challenges
Platform Web / PWA, any phone or computer iOS and Android
Price Free while in beta, full system Free on one device, no cloud backup. Premium priced by household size, Duo (two people) US$24.99/yr, 30 day trial
Built for Two adults running a home together Households of any size wanting an adaptive cleaning schedule, priced per tier

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Both apps, honestly

Lyven that's us

Web / PWA, any phone or computer · free while in beta · built in Melbourne

A single owner per job, weighted by real effort, fused with the shopping list, the meals and the running list of what the home needs, so the split is something you live in rather than something you check on.

Strong at
  • No rotation, leaderboard or mascot. One job stays with one owner, permanently
  • Runs on any phone. A mixed iPhone and Android household is not a problem
  • Free while in beta, the full system, no per-person pricing
Worth knowing
  • Built for two adults, not the whole family. Multi member and multi kid households are not supported yet, planned for after beta
  • No adaptive dueness tracking or room-by-room detail. Not the goal
  • Still in beta. Access is by waitlist and households come in a few at a time

Tody the rotation and leaderboard

iOS and Android · free for one person, Premium from US$9.99/yr solo, US$24.99/yr for two · 4.8 stars from 11,000+ ratings on the App Store (checked 29 Jul 2026)

An adaptive cleaning app built since 2013 by a small Danish team. Tracks how overdue each task is rather than fixed days, rotates tasks between household members, weighs effort with a built in Effort Manager, and layers in a leaderboard, monthly challenges and a mascot called Dusty to keep people motivated.

Strong at
  • Adaptive dueness tracking instead of fixed calendar days, a genuinely different and well regarded approach to scheduling
  • An Effort Manager that weighs task difficulty, closer to real effort weighting than a flat task count
  • Long track record: built since 2013, 4.8 stars from 11,000+ ratings, and press recognition from Martha Stewart, BuzzFeed and MacWorld
Worth knowing
  • Rotation plus a leaderboard stacks two mechanisms Lyven deliberately avoids: someone still has to remember whose turn it is, and there's still a contest to win
  • The free plan only works on one device with no cloud backup. Even Premium Solo doesn't share with a partner, that needs the Duo tier
  • Household size pricing means the cost climbs as the household grows, unlike Lyven's flat free-while-in-beta system

Common questions

Is Tody or Lyven better for couples?

It depends what your household needs. Tody rotates cleaning tasks between household members, weighs effort with its Effort Manager, and layers in a leaderboard and monthly challenges to keep things moving, genuinely useful if a bit of structure and competition helps your household stay on top of cleaning. Lyven is built specifically for the two adults running the whole home: one owner per job, weighted by real effort, with no rotation and no leaderboard, fused with the shopping list and meals. If an adaptive cleaning schedule with some game mechanics is what you need, Tody is built for that. If the goal is to stop rotating and competing altogether, Lyven is built for that instead.

Does Tody help split chores fairly between partners?

Tody's own site describes its automated rotation scheme as designed to ensure fair chore distribution, and its Effort Manager weighs how much time and energy each task takes so the split isn't just counting tasks. That's a real, more thoughtful attempt at fairness than most rivals in this comparison series. But rotation still means someone has to remember whose turn it is, and the leaderboard sitting on top of it turns the split into a contest. Lyven's answer is different: no rotation, no leaderboard, one clear owner per job, weighted by the real effort it takes.

What does Tody cost?

Tody is free to download on iOS and Android, but the free plan only works on one device with no cloud backup. Per its own App Store listing, Premium Solo is US$9.99 a year and adds cloud backup, still just for one person. Sharing data between two people needs Premium+ Duo at US$24.99 a year, with a 30 day free trial (rising to US$39.99 for a family and US$79.99 for a team). Lyven is free while in beta with the full system, for however many people are in the household, no per-person tier.

Does Tody work for a household without kids, just two adults?

Yes, Tody works for any household size, with pricing tiers from Solo through Duo, Family and Team. It isn't designed specifically around the two adult fairness problem the way Lyven is though. If your household is just the two of you and the goal is fixing who carries the mental load rather than rotating tasks and climbing a leaderboard, Lyven's single owner model is built for that specific case.

Will Lyven cost money after beta?

Lyven is free for the whole beta. After that, the plan is to keep a generous free tier for the core split and the daily habit, with paid tiers adding extra depth such as projects and outsourcing rather than gating the basics. The exact boundary is still being finalised.

Is my household's data private?

Yes. Lyven is private by design with Australian hosting. The Split Check requires no account, and beta data is handled under Lyven's privacy policy.

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