The Habits list, with two sample Habits.
Habits view from the Habitica iOS app.
Habits are one of the three main types of tasks in Habitica, along with Dailies and To Do's. A player's Habits can be found in the Habits list, located in the leftmost column of the tasks page. There is no limit to the number of Habits the player can create.
Rewards and Losses[]
Just like real-life habits, Habits in Habitica can be good, bad, or both.
- Good Habits, denoted by a plus sign ("+"), are rewarded with experience, gold, and mana.
- Bad Habits, denoted by a minus sign ("-"), are penalized with health loss and mana loss. The player's mana value cannot decrease below zero.
- Habits that are both positive and negative can be used for goals on which players can make progress (rewarding themselves) or fail to make progress (penalizing themselves).
Habit Colors[]
New Habits start with a task value of zero, which is indicated by the color yellow. Completing a good Habit (clicking "+") will increase its task value, eventually turning the Habit from yellow to green, then to blue. Completing a bad Habit (clicking "-") will decrease its task value, eventually turning the Habit dark red.
Each time your cron runs, Habits that are plus-only ("+") or minus-only ("-") will automatically change color slightly towards the default yellow color. I.e., a minus-only Habit will become less red and a plus-only Habit will become less blue. Over time, if you don't keep clicking the buttons on the Habits, they will eventually return to yellow.
Habits with both "+" and "-" buttons enabled will not automatically change color when cron runs.
For a more detailed explanation about task colors and values, see the Task Value page.
Difficulty Level[]
You can set the difficulty level of a Habit. The levels of difficulty are trivial, easy, medium, and hard, with easy being the default for a new Habit. The higher the difficulty of a Habit, the greater the experience and gold that you will earn when you click "+". Likewise, the higher the difficulty, the greater the amount of health you will lose by clicking "-".
The amount of mana earned or lost from Habits is not affected by the difficulty.
Habit Counter[]
A Habit with a +3 and -2 streak
Each Habit displays a frequency counter to track how many times the Habit has been clicked during a certain time period. For Habits with both "+" and "-" enabled, the "+" and "-" clicks are counted separately. The counter appears as either a single number or in the format "+x | -y", where x is the number of "+" clicks and y is the number of "-" clicks.
The counter reset frequency (daily, weekly, or monthly) can be customized through the Reset Counter setting under its settings. The default reset frequency is daily. Daily counters reset each time cron runs. Weekly counters reset the first time your cron runs after Sunday night (for Habitica users that log in daily, this will be Monday morning). Monthly counters reset the first time your cron runs after the last day of the month (usually the first day of the month for daily users).
For Habits from an active Challenge or Group Plan, only the owner of the Challenge or Group Plan can change the reset frequency.
Stats[]
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Distribution choices
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The player can also set the stat of a Habit from the following choices: Strength, Intelligence, Perception, and Constitution. Stats can only be selected if the task-based auto-allocation feature is turned on. The default stat is Strength. On the website, a Habit's stat can be altered in the Advanced Settings section of the editing panel. For the iOS and Mobile App for Android: Habitica the chosen stat appears as a part of the task details.
Setting Up Your Habit List[]
The Habit editor.
To set up your own Habit list:
- Edit or delete the default Habits. Depending on the options you chose when you created your account, you may find that you have been given some default Habits. If they don't work for you, feel free to edit or delete them; if you change your mind, you can always recreate them manually.
- Add one or more Habits you want to work on. Try starting with a few and build up as you go. It's easier to add more later as you gain confidence in changing your habits. For tips on whether your task should be a Habit, a Daily, or a To Do, see Should this task be a Habit, Daily, or To Do? in the FAQ.
- Positive or negative? Decide whether this Habit is a good one, a bad one, or a behavior that has the potential for both progress and giving in to temptation. By default, a Habit is both good and bad. To make it just a good Habit, click on the minus sign ("-") to disable the negative option. To make it just a bad Habit, click on the plus sign ("+") to disable the positive option. In general, you can toggle the "Directions/Actions" option by clicking on either button in the web app, or by toggling the checkbox in the mobile app.
- Specify difficulty. Changing the difficulty of a Habit, which by default is set to easy, can help motivate yourself to complete Habits that are harder or more time-consuming. There is no set way to determine whether a Habit should be trivial, easy, medium, or hard. A good strategy is to assign a higher difficulty to Habits that are harder to do, take more time to perform, or are generally unappealing. Remember, these are habits that are hard for you, and you alone. In other words, if others find a habit easy (such as "get up without hitting snooze") and you find it very difficult, it would be appropriate for you to mark it as a habit with a higher difficulty. The higher the difficulty of the Habit, the more gold and experience you will be rewarded when you complete it. The amount of mana earned will not increase with difficulty.
- Add tags. Tags are used to label tasks. They might specify a specific time period, challenge, or area of your life to which a task is relevant. You may find that your account has some default tags. Use them or add your own tags as described in the Editing Tags section of the Tags page, and see the Sample Tags page for more ideas.
- Specify reset counter frequency. Changing the frequency at which the counter resets, which by default is daily, can help you keep track of how often you are clicking on a Habit with greater precision than just looking at the Habit color. For example, a positive/negative Habit such as "went to bed early/went to bed late" will be clicked, at most, once a day. Here a "monthly" reset frequency would provide more insight.
- Start tracking! Click "Save" to save your customization and start becoming more productive!
Advanced Settings[]
These options appear under the Advanced Settings on the website. All but task stat do not appear on the apps.
Adjust Counter: You can use this feature if you need to reset or alter your habit counter manually. This can become necessary if you want to have your task streak back to what it was prior to using the Orb of Rebirth.
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Distribution choices, see above
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Stats: If you use the task-based auto-allocation feature, the Advanced Settings menu will give you four options for "Stats": Strength, Intelligence, Perception, and Constitution. These stats will not appear in the Habit edit screen unless you have the task-based auto-allocation feature turned on.
Adding A New Habit[]
Entering a new Habit.
1. Type the title of the Habit into the empty field below the "Habits" heading and hit "Enter" on your keyboard. For instance, if you want to encourage yourself to study chemistry, type "Study chemistry 30 minutes" into the text field.
2. The new Habit will appear at the top of your list of Habits.
The edit Habit button.
3. Edit your new Habit. Click the Habit title or the three-dot -> pencil icon to edit.
And that's it! You've added a new Habit. See the Setting Up Your Habit List section above for details on what the options are for customizing your Habits and how to do so.
Adding Multiple Habits[]
To add more than one Habit at a time:
- Type in your first Habit in the grey text box above the Habit list. After creating one Habit, use the Shift + Enter key to begin the next Habit, and repeat as necessary
- Press Enter button when finished entering all Habits.
To add multiple Habits with tags, select one or more tags, then add your Habits.
Rearranging Habits[]
Rearranging a Habit.
Habits, like Dailies and To Do's, can be rearranged by dragging and dropping them in their new position, or on the web only, by clicking on the three dots in the top right corner of the Habit box and choosing "To top" or "To bottom."
Habit Tabs[]
Habit tabs for decluttering your list.
You can declutter your list by using the tabs at the top and bottom of the Habits column. Options are "All", "Weak", and "Strong". Clicking the Weak tab shows only Habits that are yellow, orange, or red. Clicking the Strong tab shows only blue and green Habits.
Checking on your Habits[]
Beginning in late June 2018, Habitica began storing daily habit values for each user, including the number of times a habit was clicked and its final Task Value for each day. (Prior to that change, Habitica stored the timestamp value for each click).
Other ways to check the progress of your Habits are the Data Export tool and the Data Display Tool. There are some limitations on stored data, which are explained on the Data Export page. While the explanation is referring to exported data, it is also true of the data that you can see in the progress graph, since the same data set is used for both.
Directionless Habits[]
You can disable both the plus ("+") and the minus ("-") options of a Habit to create directionless Habits, which can be used in various creative ways.
Using Habits for Reminders and Quotes[]
Habits used as reminders.
Habits can be used as reminders for items that don't need any action, but that are good to keep in mind. For example, a player might find an inspiring quote or a tip that is helpful for improving their life.
- Create a Habit containing the quote or tip.
- Edit the Habit to disable both the plus ("+") and minus ("-") signs.
- You can also add emoji to make the Habit stand out; perhaps :elephant: because elephants never forget!
- Drag the Habit to the top of the Habits list, or on the web only, use the To Top menu option, to increase its visibility.
Using Habits as Dividers[]
Habits used as dividers.
Similar to using Habits for reminders or quotes, adding directionless Habits in conjunction with Markdown formatting can help players organize their Habits. See the Markdown Cheat Sheet for help with formatting.