Personal Kanban for busy people
I built Personal Kanban because I wanted a daily workhorse that stays out of my way.
As a manager, engineering manager, and builder, I live in my Kanban board. I need something fast, clear, and trustworthy—something that opens instantly, never syncs badly, never asks me to log in, and still gives me real insight into how much work actually gets done week over week. After trying countless tools, I ended up building my own.
That project became Personal Kanban—an open-source, privacy-first Kanban board that runs entirely in your browser.
You can use it right now:
Why I built it
I wanted a board that feels instant.
No backend.
No framework overhead.
No accounts.
No subscriptions.
Just a clean, modern Kanban board that loads in milliseconds and lets me focus on work instead of tooling.
Everything lives in your browser’s localStorage. Your data never leaves your machine unless you explicitly export it. That single design choice unlocks speed, simplicity, and privacy at the same time.
What makes Personal Kanban different
This is not a “toy Kanban.”
Under the hood, it’s a carefully designed system with real workflow intelligence, even though it’s built with only vanilla HTML, CSS, and JavaScript .
Here’s what I care about—and what I built it to do well:
⚡ Extremely fast
Zero server calls
No framework runtime
Optimized drag & drop even with hundreds of tasks
Virtualized Done column for large histories
It feels native because, effectively, it is.
🎯 Designed for managers and leaders
Clear visualization of work in progress
Strong focus on flow, not just task lists
Weekly completion insights so you can see how much you actually finished
Reports that answer “Are we moving?” instead of “Do we have tickets?”
📊 Real productivity insights
Personal Kanban includes a dedicated Reports view:
Calendar heatmap of activity
Weekly completion counts
Lead time trends
Cumulative Flow Diagram (WIP over time)
This is the part I personally rely on most—it shows me, honestly, how my weeks went.
🏷️ Labels, priorities, due dates—done right
Grouped labels with fast search
Priority and due date signals without clutter
Task age and “last updated” visibility
Notifications for upcoming or overdue work
Everything is configurable per board, so the UI adapts to how you work.
🧠 Multiple boards, zero complexity
Create as many boards as you want
Switch instantly
Export/import boards as clean JSON
Perfect for personal work, leadership boards, or experiments
Built the hard way (on purpose)
Personal Kanban follows strict technical principles:
No frameworks
No backend
No database
Minimal dependencies
Vite + ES modules
localStorage only
This keeps the app understandable, hackable, and resilient. You can read the code, fork it, extend it, or run it offline forever .
It’s old-school engineering with modern UX.
Who this is for
If you are:
an engineering manager
a tech lead
a founder
a manager who actually uses Kanban daily
someone who values speed, clarity, and ownership of their data
…this tool was built for you.
It’s intentionally opinionated, but flexible enough to adapt to how you work.
Try it. Use it. Star it ⭐
If this resonates with you, the best way to support the project is simple:
Use it for your daily work
Star it on GitHub
Share feedback or ideas
👉 Live app:
https://michael-diener.com/kanban
https://mdiener21.github.io/personal-kanban/
👉 GitHub:
https://github.com/mdiener21/personal-kanban
I built Personal Kanban to be the tool I always wanted.
If it becomes yours too, that’s the best outcome I could hope for.
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