Most to-do lists contain a mix of tasks that cannot actually be done right now. You are at your desk, the list is in front of you, and you are looking at seventeen items — but three of them require your accountant, four need a phone call, two are errands you can only run when you are out, and one needs a decision from your business partner who is tied up until Thursday.

So you skip to the things you can do. Which might be the right things, or might just be the easiest ones.

GTD context lists solve this by organising your tasks around where and how you can do them — not just what they are. When the system is working, you open the list for wherever you are and see only the tasks available to you right now.

What Are GTD Context Lists?

A GTD context list is a grouping of next actions from David Allen’s Getting Things Done system based on the context — the location, the tool, or the mental mode — required to complete them. Instead of one running to-do list, you maintain several smaller lists, each containing only the tasks you can act on given where you are and what you have available.

When you are at your desk, you open your @computer list. When you have thirty minutes free on the phone, you open your @calls list. When you are out, you open your @errands list. At no point do you read items that require a context you are not currently in.

This is one of the most practical ideas in GTD — and compared to other systems like Building a Second Brain, it is fundamentally about reducing friction between deciding to act and actually acting. The list you open tells you what to do. You do not have to re-read everything and work it out each time.

Why Business Owners Need Context Lists More Than Most

The original GTD setup was built for a world where knowledge workers had a desk, a phone on that desk, and predictable meeting rhythms. Business owners running 2–10 person teams do not have that world. One hour you are reviewing financials, the next you are on a client call, the next you are out at a supplier meeting.

Without context lists, every context switch requires you to re-read the full task list and figure out what applies right now. That re-reading is the real cost — not the work itself, but the decision overhead layered on top of every mode change. Multiply that across a full day and it accounts for a meaningful slice of the mental noise that makes overwhelmed business owners feel like they are always busy but never ahead.

Context lists collapse that overhead. You arrive at each context knowing exactly what is available to you.

The Four Contexts Most Business Owners Actually Need

The classic GTD labels (@computer, @phone, @errands, @waiting) are a starting point. Here is how they translate for a real business owner’s day.

@desk (or @computer)

Tasks that require your laptop, your tools, and a degree of focus — writing, analysis, strategy, building. This is where deep work lives. Time blocking your @desk slots early in the morning protects these tasks from the reactive pull that fills the afternoon. Without a protected desk slot, the easiest items on the @computer list tend to colonise the time that should belong to the hardest ones.

@calls

Anything that requires a phone conversation or video call. Keeping these in their own list means you can batch them into one block rather than letting each call interrupt your focus work throughout the day. Batching by context is one of the core levers in the NP System — the same logic that makes production processes efficient applies to your cognitive workflow.

@waiting

Tasks where the next action belongs to someone else. You are waiting for a proposal, a document, or a decision. The @waiting list keeps these visible without cluttering the lists of things you can act on yourself. Review it weekly — anything that has sat there too long becomes a follow-up task on your @calls or @computer list.

@anywhere

Tasks that require no specific tool or location. A quick decision, a two-minute reply, something to think through on a walk. These are the tasks you can act on in an unexpected pocket of time — waiting for a call to start, walking between meetings, sitting in a taxi.

The Context Most Business Owners Ignore

There is a context that rarely appears in standard GTD frameworks but matters more than any other for serious strategic work: a protected thinking slot — what the NP System calls Monk Mode Morning.

This list holds tasks that not only require your computer but require your best, most protected time. Writing a new pitch, redesigning a pricing model, thinking through a market entry. Tasks where interruption costs more than just the time lost — half-finished strategic thinking is harder to recover than the hour itself.

Separating this protected context from general @computer means you can defend those tasks specifically. Otherwise the easier items on the @computer list fill the morning and the strategic work gets pushed to “next week” again — which is how it ends up sitting on the list for months.

How to Set Up GTD Context Lists in Practice

The simplest setup is three or four lists. Start with what reflects your actual day, not an idealised taxonomy from a GTD forum.

Step 1 — Do a brain dump first. Get every open loop out of your head before organising anything. A proper brain dump typically surfaces 40–80 items. Trying to set up context lists from memory produces an incomplete system — the tasks you do not write down are the ones that keep surfacing in the middle of unrelated work.

Step 2 — Identify your real contexts. Look at a typical week and ask: where am I when I do different kinds of work? For most business owners, four or five labels cover the reality — desk, calls, out-and-about, waiting, and a protected focus window.

Step 3 — Assign each item to a context, not a project. This is the GTD distinction most people miss. “Draft the Q3 report” is a @desk task (or @focus task) that belongs to the Q3 reporting project. The context determines when you can do it. The project determines why. Conflating these two dimensions is why most task lists produce so much re-reading without producing much action.

Step 4 — Open the context list, not all tasks. When you sit down to work, do not open the full task view. Open the context that matches where you are. This single behaviour change — opening the right list rather than filtering mentally across everything — is where the friction reduction actually happens.

Context Lists and the Weekly Review

Context lists only work if they stay current. The @waiting list fills with stale entries if you do not clear it weekly. The @calls list grows until it is as unwieldy as the original flat to-do list it replaced.

The weekly review should include a pass through every context list: mark what is done, move tasks that have changed context, and add anything new that arrived during the week. Done properly, this takes about ten minutes. The lists stay small because they only ever hold next actions — not projects, not someday items, not vague aspirations.

Context lists also connect to the Capture → Process → Plan framework for managing everything that lands on you. You capture into one inbox. You process to identify next actions and assign each to a context. You plan by reviewing which contexts you have time for this week. The context list is the output of the process phase and the input to the plan phase — the connective tissue between having your head clear and knowing what to do when you sit down.

Frequently Asked Questions

For further reading, see the guides on the GTD weekly review and the GTD natural planning model.

What are GTD context lists?

GTD context lists are groupings of next actions organised by the condition required to complete them — the location, tool, or mental mode needed. Common contexts include @computer, @calls, @errands, and @waiting. You only ever see tasks you can act on right now.

How many context lists do I need?

Most business owners need four to five: desk or computer, calls, waiting, anywhere, and optionally a protected focus slot for strategic deep work. Start with fewer and add only when your real day demands it.

What is the difference between a GTD context and a GTD project?

A project is any outcome requiring more than one step. A context is the condition required to act — the location, tool, or mode. Every next action in a project gets assigned to a context. The project tells you why; the context tells you when you can act on it.

How often should I review my context lists?

During the day, open whichever context matches where you are. Once a week, during your weekly review, clear completed items, move tasks that changed context, and add anything new that arrived. The weekly pass keeps the lists accurate and prevents them becoming as unwieldy as the flat list they replaced.

Can I use GTD context lists in Asana or Notion?

Yes. In Asana, use sections or custom fields to tag tasks by context and filter each view. In Notion, a database with a Context property and per-context filtered views works well. The NP System uses Asana on the free tier with context as a label filtering each work mode.

The Bigger Picture

Context lists are one part of a working system — the organise layer that sits after capture and process. On their own, they sort the pile. Combined with a capture habit, a processing rhythm, and a weekly review, they become the mechanism that keeps strategic work moving rather than losing every week to whatever is loudest.

The productivity framework that sustains this covers all four phases: Capture, Process, Plan, Do. Context lists sit in the process and plan phases — the layer that connects a cleared head to a specific action in the right window of time.

If you want the full system — the complete free 11-module course covering how context lists connect to the weekly review, to time blocking, and to protecting your deep work time — you can grab the Nerd Productivity System course here. It covers everything from capture to do, with Asana templates and Claude integration included.