GTD Weekly Review: The Habit That Makes GTD Work

David Allen calls the Weekly Review “the critical success factor” in making GTD stick. He’s not exaggerating. In practitioner communities, the pattern is consistent: those who abandon GTD typically don’t fail at capturing or organizing – they stop reviewing.

The Weekly Review is where GTD transforms from a collection of lists into a trusted system. Skip it, and your carefully organized projects become digital clutter. Maintain it, and you’ll experience what Allen describes as “mind like water” – a state of relaxed control where nothing slips through the cracks.

This article goes deep on the review ritual: why it matters psychologically, how to execute each step, when to schedule it, and how to make it stick. For the complete GTD methodology, see our Getting Things Done Guide.

What Happens When You Skip Reviews

Before diving into how to do weekly reviews well, let’s understand what happens when you don’t.

System Decay

Your GTD system is a living thing. Projects complete, priorities shift, new commitments arrive. Without regular review, your lists become increasingly disconnected from reality. That project you finished last month? Still sitting in your active list. That urgent task from your boss? Buried under items that no longer matter.

When lists don’t reflect reality, you stop trusting them. And once trust erodes, you stop looking at them altogether. The system collapses not with a bang, but with a slow drift into irrelevance.

Decision Paralysis

The Zeigarnik Effect explains why uncompleted tasks occupy mental bandwidth. Your brain maintains “open loops” for everything you’ve committed to but haven’t finished. Without regular reviews to close these loops – either by completing tasks, deferring them, or consciously deciding to drop them – your cognitive load steadily increases.

The result? Decision paralysis. With too many open loops competing for attention, even simple choices become difficult. You know that feeling of staring at your task list, unable to decide where to start? That’s what happens when the review habit breaks down.

The Fresh Start Trap

Here’s the insidious pattern: instead of maintaining their system, many people abandon it and start over. New app, fresh lists, clean slate. It feels productive. For a few weeks, the new system works beautifully.

Then the same decay begins again. Projects pile up, lists get stale, reviews get skipped. The cycle repeats.

The solution isn’t a new system. It’s maintaining the one you have.

The Psychology Behind the Review

Understanding why the weekly review works makes it easier to prioritize.

Cognitive Offloading

Your working memory can hold roughly four items at once¹. A typical knowledge worker juggles dozens of projects with hundreds of tasks. The math doesn’t work – unless you offload to an external system.

But here’s the catch: you’ll only offload if you trust the external system to remind you at the right time. The weekly review is what creates that trust. By regularly confirming that everything important is captured and organized, you give your brain permission to let go.

Research by Masicampo and Baumeister found that the mere act of making a plan for uncompleted tasks reduces their cognitive burden, even before you execute the plan². The weekly review is a systematic way to make plans for everything on your plate.

Closure and Control

The Zeigarnik Effect cuts both ways. Yes, unfinished tasks nag at us. But completing a review – even if individual tasks remain undone – can provide a sense of closure for the meta-task of staying organized.

After a good weekly review, you know exactly what you’re not doing and why. That conscious choice provides relief that simply ignoring your lists never can. You move from a state of ambient anxiety (“What am I forgetting?”) to one of informed confidence (“I know what’s on my plate, and I’m making deliberate choices”).

The Ritual Effect

When the weekly review happens at the same time, in the same place, with the same steps, you don’t waste energy wondering whether to do it or how. The habit carries you through – the routine itself becomes a trigger for the focused mindset you need.

This is why the when and where of your review matters as much as the what. We’ll cover timing and environment later.

The 6-Step Review Ritual

David Allen’s original weekly review has many steps. Here’s a distilled version focused on what matters most, with the why behind each step.

1. Clear Inbox to Zero

Why it matters: Unprocessed items represent untrusted capture. If your inbox contains items that have been sitting there for weeks, you’ve effectively trained yourself that the inbox isn’t urgent. That training bleeds into your capture habits – why bother adding things if they’ll just sit there?

How to do it:

• Process each item using the clarify workflow: Is it actionable? What’s the next action? Does it take less than 2 minutes?
• Apply the 2-minute guideline: if you can do it in under two minutes, do it now rather than tracking it
• Defer, delegate, or delete everything else
• The goal is zero items, not “mostly empty”

In Super Productivity: Open your inbox and process each item. Use quick syntax to add time estimates as you clarify: Review proposal 30m or Email Sarah re: meeting 2m.

2. Review All Projects

Why it matters: Stalled projects create hidden stress. Even if you’re not consciously thinking about that side project you haven’t touched in three weeks, your brain knows it exists. The weekly review surfaces these stalled projects so you can make conscious decisions about them.

How to do it:

• Go through each active project
• Ask: Does this project have a clear next action? If not, define one
• Ask: Is this project still relevant? If not, move it to Someday/Maybe or archive it
• Look for projects that have been “active” for too long without progress

Warning sign: If you’re feeling overwhelmed by your project list, some items probably belong on Someday/Maybe. GTD doesn’t prescribe a specific limit – the right number varies by person and circumstance.

3. Check Waiting For List

Why it matters: Delegated items and things you’re blocked on don’t magically resolve themselves. Without follow-up, they slip through the cracks – and often become urgent at the worst possible time.

How to do it:

• Review everything you’re waiting on from others
• For items older than a week, consider a follow-up ping
• For items critical to your own projects, escalate or find alternatives
• Add follow-up dates to items that don’t have them

Pro tip: When you delegate, immediately add the item to Waiting For with a follow-up date. Don’t rely on remembering to check.

4. Review Someday/Maybe

Why it matters: This list is where dreams go to die – unless you review it regularly. The Someday/Maybe list should be a source of possibility, not a guilt-inducing graveyard.

How to do it:

• Scan the list for items whose time has come
• Promote 1-2 items to active projects if you have capacity
• Delete items you’ve lost interest in – they’re just noise now
• Add new items that have been floating in your head

The litmus test: Does seeing this item spark excitement or dread? Excitement means it might be ready to activate. Dread means it’s time to delete.

5. Review Upcoming Calendar

Why it matters: Surprises are the enemy of “mind like water.” By reviewing your calendar during the weekly review, you convert surprises into expected events you can prepare for.

How to do it:

• Look at least two weeks ahead
• For significant meetings or deadlines, ask: What preparation is needed? Add those as tasks
• Identify potential conflicts or overcommitments
• Block time for important work that doesn’t have a meeting forcing it to happen

Integration point: This is where GTD and time boxing connect. The weekly review identifies what needs attention; time boxing secures when.

6. Update Priorities

Why it matters: Urgency isn’t the same as importance. Without deliberate prioritization, you’ll spend your week reacting to whatever screams loudest rather than advancing what matters most.

How to do it:

• Identify 3-5 “must win” items for the coming week
• These should be items that, if completed, would make the week a success regardless of what else happens
• Order your next actions lists so the most important items are visible
• Consider: What would future-me thank present-me for doing this week?

Reality check: If everything is a priority, nothing is. Ruthlessly limit your “must wins” to what you can actually accomplish.

When and Where to Review

The best weekly review is the one that actually happens. Timing and environment matter more than most people realize.

Timing Options

Friday afternoon:

• Pros: Closes the work week with clarity; starts the weekend with a clean slate
• Cons: Energy is often low; easy to skip when rushing to leave
• Best for: People who want work and personal life clearly separated

Sunday evening:

• Pros: Starts Monday with momentum; quiet time for reflection
• Cons: Intrudes on weekend; can feel like work
• Best for: People who feel anxious on Sunday nights anyway (the review replaces anxiety with action)

Monday morning:

• Pros: Fresh energy; sets the week’s direction
• Cons: Often interrupted by meetings; feels reactive rather than proactive
• Best for: People whose weekends are truly unplugged

Experiment: Try each timing for 2-3 weeks. Notice not just what works logistically, but what works psychologically. The right time feels like relief, not obligation.

Duration

• Full review: 60-90 minutes (David Allen’s recommendation)
• Experienced practitioners: 30-45 minutes once the habit is established
• Minimum viable: 15-20 minutes (better than skipping)

Don’t aim for perfection. A quick review that happens is infinitely better than a thorough review you skip.

Environment

• Quiet space: Interruptions break the reflective mindset
• Same place each time: The environment becomes a trigger
• Ritualize it: Same coffee, same music (or silence), same routine
• Close other tabs: This isn’t multi-tasking time

Weekly Review in Super Productivity

Here’s how to implement the review ritual in Super Productivity:

Set Up a Recurring Review Task

Create a repeating task for your chosen time: “Weekly Review” with whatever time estimate feels right (start with 45m). Set it to repeat weekly.

Use Tag Filters to Scan

During the review:

• Filter by project to review each project’s next actions
• Filter by the #waiting-for tag to see delegated items
• Use the Someday/Maybe project or tag to review deferred items

Review Completed Tasks

Super Productivity tracks what you’ve completed. During your review, glance at the past week’s accomplishments. This isn’t just feel-good – it calibrates your sense of what’s realistic for a week.

Update Time Estimates

As you review, update time estimates based on reality. If tasks consistently take longer than estimated, adjust. This data compounds – eventually, your estimates become genuinely predictive.

Common Weekly Review Mistakes

Rushing Through It

A 45-minute review done in 20 minutes isn’t efficient – it’s incomplete. You’ll miss stalled projects, forget to process inbox items, and skip the reflection that makes the review valuable.

Fix: Block the full time. If you finish early, great. But don’t shortchange the process.

Over-Organizing

The review is for clarity, not perfection. Don’t spend 30 minutes reorganizing tags or debating which project a task belongs to. Get clear enough to act, then stop.

Fix: Set a timer. When it goes off, wrap up wherever you are.

Guilt Spirals

You open your project list and see three projects with no progress in a month. The guilt spiral begins: “I’m terrible at this. I’ll never get caught up. Why bother?”

Fix: Past incompletions don’t predict future ones. Acknowledge the stall, make a conscious decision (continue, defer, or drop), and move on. The review exists precisely so you can course-correct without judgment.

Skipping When Busy

“I’ll skip the review this week – too much to do.” This is backwards. Busy weeks need reviews more, not less. Without the review, you’ll spend the week reacting instead of prioritizing.

Fix: Do a minimum viable review. Even 15 minutes of inbox processing and priority setting beats nothing.

When Reviews Feel Overwhelming

Sometimes you open your system and feel paralyzed. The backlog is too big, the projects too numerous, the guilt too heavy. Here’s how to recover:

The 10-Minute Version

Just do inbox processing. That’s it. Get to inbox zero, and you’ve done something meaningful. The rest can wait for next week’s review or a dedicated catch-up session.

The 2-List Approach

Temporarily simplify: Active Projects (things you’re actually working on this week) and Everything Else. Review only the active list. Let “Everything Else” sit until you have capacity.

The Reset Session

If your system has truly fallen apart, schedule a longer session – 2-3 hours on a weekend. Do a complete brain dump, process everything, rebuild your project list from scratch. This isn’t regular maintenance; it’s system recovery. But sometimes it’s necessary.

For more on intentionally killing projects that are draining you, see our guide on finishing side projects.

Making the Review Stick

Knowing the steps isn’t enough. The weekly review only works if it becomes automatic. Here’s how to build the habit:

Pair It With a Reward

The review itself might not feel rewarding, especially at first. Pair it with something you enjoy: a favorite coffee, a walk afterward, music you only play during review time. The association builds over time.

Track Your Streak

“12 consecutive weekly reviews” is motivating in a way that “I usually do weekly reviews” isn’t. Track your streak somewhere visible. Don’t break the chain.

Find an Accountability Partner

Tell someone you trust about your review habit. Report in after each one. The mild social pressure is surprisingly effective.

Review the Review

Once a month, spend 5 minutes evaluating the review itself:

• What’s working?
• What am I consistently skipping?
• Should I adjust the timing or duration?

The meta-review ensures the habit evolves with your needs.

Conclusion

The weekly review is the keystone habit of GTD. Without it, your lists become stale, your trust erodes, and the system collapses. With it, you maintain the “mind like water” state that makes GTD transformative.

Start simple:

1. Schedule your first (or next) Weekly Review – pick a time, block it on your calendar
2. Set up a recurring task in Super Productivity so the habit has structure

The review doesn’t need to be perfect. It just needs to happen. Thirty minutes of honest review beats thirty days of ignoring your system.

Your future self will thank you.

Ready to master the full GTD system? Read our complete Getting Things Done Guide to learn the five-step workflow, set up your trusted system, and achieve lasting productivity.