Best of
Best project management software, compared on facts
Project management software holds the work a team has agreed to do: tasks, owners, due dates and the views that show what is late. The best project management software for a small team is the one people update without being asked. Some teams need a Gantt chart or sprints; most need a board, a list and a calendar.
Side by side.
Facts a reader can check on each vendor’s own site. No prices.
- Free plan:
- Seats from one:
- Minimum two on paid
- Gantt or timeline:
- Sprints:
- Invoicing built in:
- Free plan:
- Seats from one:
- Gantt or timeline:
- Paid plans
- Sprints:
- Invoicing built in:
- Free plan:
- Seats from one:
- Minimum three on paid
- Gantt or timeline:
- Sprints:
- monday dev
- Invoicing built in:
- Free plan:
- Seats from one:
- Gantt or timeline:
- Sprints:
- Invoicing built in:
- Free plan:
- Seats from one:
- Gantt or timeline:
- Sprints:
- Via template
- Invoicing built in:
- Free plan:
- Seats from one:
- Gantt or timeline:
- Sprints:
- Invoicing built in:
- Free plan:
- Seats from one:
- Minimum two on paid
- Gantt or timeline:
- Sprints:
- Invoicing built in:
- Free plan:
- Seats from one:
- Three-user minimum
- Gantt or timeline:
- Sprints:
- Invoicing built in:
- Free plan:
- Seats from one:
- Minimum three on paid
- Gantt or timeline:
- Sprints:
- Invoicing built in:
- Free plan:
- Seats from one:
- Gantt or timeline:
- Sprints:
- Invoicing built in:
- Free plan:
- Seats from one:
- Gantt or timeline:
- Sprints:
- Invoicing built in:
- Free plan:
- Seats from one:
- Gantt or timeline:
- Sprints:
- Invoicing built in:
- Free plan:
- Up to three people
- Seats from one:
- Free up to 3; 5 on paid plans
- Gantt or timeline:
- Timeline, no Gantt
- Sprints:
- Invoicing built in:
| Free plan | Seats from one | Gantt or timeline | Sprints | Invoicing built in | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Asana | Minimum two on paid | ||||
| Trello | Paid plans | ||||
| monday.com | Minimum three on paid | monday dev | |||
| ClickUp | |||||
| Notion | Via template | ||||
| Basecamp | |||||
| Wrike | Minimum two on paid | ||||
| Smartsheet | Three-user minimum | ||||
| Teamwork.com | Minimum three on paid | ||||
| Jira | |||||
| Todoist | |||||
| Workast | |||||
| Spodus | Up to three people | Free up to 3; 5 on paid plans | Timeline, no Gantt |
Checked on , against each vendor’s public plan pages.
Each one, plainly.
What it is, who it suits, and where it stops.
- 01
Asana
The most common project tool for teams of ten to a few hundred.
Asana is the most common project management software for teams of ten to a few hundred: tasks in lists, boards, timelines and calendars, with goals and portfolios on the higher plans. The free plan is generous. The paid Starter plan has a two-seat minimum. There is no invoicing.
Best for: A team that wants one project tool the whole company can share.
- 02
Trello
The simplest board tool.
Trello is the simplest board tool: cards on lists, dragged between columns. The free plan covers most small teams. Timeline and calendar views are on the paid plans, and anything more comes from Power-Ups. It is task management, not project management, and that is fine for many teams.
Best for: A small team that needs a board and nothing that gets in the way of it.
- 03
monday.com
Boards with typed columns and many views.
monday.com is a work management tool built from boards with typed columns, plus timeline, Gantt, calendar and dashboard views. The free plan is limited to two seats, and paid plans have a three-seat minimum. Sprints live in monday dev, a separate product. Invoicing is not part of it.
Best for: A team that wants boards it can shape into anything, and will pay for three seats.
- 04
ClickUp
The tool that tries to do everything.
ClickUp is the tool that tries to do everything: tasks, docs, whiteboards, goals, time tracking, Gantt and sprints, with a free plan that includes most of it. Teams either love the depth or drown in the settings. There is no invoicing.
Best for: A team that wants every feature in one place and has someone to set it up.
- 05
Notion
Documents and databases used as a project tool.
Notion is a documents-and-databases workspace that many small teams use as their project tool: a tasks database with board, table, calendar and timeline views. Sprints come from a template, not a feature. The free plan is real. It is a good task management system for a team that also writes.
Best for: A small team whose work is as much writing as doing.
- 06
Basecamp
Simple project management software, on purpose.
Basecamp is simple project management software for small companies: to-dos, a message board, a schedule, docs and chat per project, with no Gantt and no sprints on purpose. There is a free plan for one project, and the top plan has no per-user charge at all.
Best for: A small company that wants fewer features, not more.
- 07
Wrike
Marketing project management software for mid-sized teams.
Wrike is marketing project management software as much as anything else: Gantt charts, workload, request forms, proofing and approvals for marketing and operations teams at mid-sized companies. The free plan is basic, and the Team plan has a two-user minimum. Sprints are not native. There is no invoicing.
Best for: A marketing or operations team that runs on request forms and approvals.
- 08
Smartsheet
A spreadsheet that became a project tool.
Smartsheet is a spreadsheet that became a project tool: rows with Gantt, card and calendar views, forms and automations. It suits teams that think in sheets, and it is common as IT project management software, where its resource and portfolio features matter. Smartsheet has a free plan, and Smartsheet's Business plan has a three-user minimum. No sprints, no invoicing.
Best for: A team that already runs its projects in a spreadsheet and wants it to do more.
- 09
Teamwork.com
Project management for client-services teams, with billing.
Teamwork.com is project management software for client-services teams: tasks, milestones, Gantt, time tracking and invoicing from logged hours, with a client view. The free plan covers a small team; paid plans have a three-user minimum. Sprints are not native. It is one of the few project tools with billing built in.
Best for: An agency that bills clients for the hours logged against tasks.
- 10
Jira
The standard for software teams.
Jira, from Atlassian, is the standard for software teams: sprints, backlogs, boards, a timeline view and issue tracking. The free plan covers ten users. Outside software it is used as IT project management software and, through Jira Service Management, as a service desk. It is heavy for a non-technical team, and there is no invoicing.
Best for: A software or IT team that already works in sprints.
- 11
Todoist
Task management software for individuals first.
Todoist is task management software for individuals first: a fast list with natural-language dates, projects, labels and filters, on every platform. Teams can share projects, but it is not project management in the Gantt sense. The free plan is enough for most people. No timeline, no sprints, no invoicing.
Best for: One person, or a small team that wants a shared to-do list and nothing heavier.
- 12
Workast
Task management inside Slack.
Workast is task management inside Slack: the Workast Slack app turns messages into tasks, assigns them and lists them by channel, with a web app behind it. There is a free plan for the basics. It is team task management for a company that lives in Slack, not a full project tool. No Gantt, no sprints, no invoicing.
Best for: A team that will only track tasks if it can do so from Slack.
- 13
Spodus
Boards and tasks on customer records. No Gantt, no sprints.
Spodus is a client-operations workspace, and its project side is boards, tasks and subtasks on customer records, with list, board, calendar and timeline views. The timeline draws each dated task as a bar you can drag; it is not a Gantt chart, and there are no sprints. It fits a service business that wants the tasks beside the deal, the invoice and the support ticket, not a team running software projects. It is free for up to three people, and paid plans start at three seats.
Best for: A service business whose tasks belong to customers, not to a project plan.
How we chose.
We listed the project management software people search for by name and the tools a small business is most often offered, then read each vendor's public plan pages on the date above. The columns are the two features that split teams, Gantt and sprints, plus free plan, seat minimum and whether invoicing is in the product. This is a project management software list, not a ranking: the most popular project management software is not the best one for a five-person studio.
More best-of lists.
The same table, dated the same way, for the other categories a service business buys.
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- Head to headSpodus against one tool at a time
Two ways
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You get every product: CRM, invoicing, support, team, chat and Spodus AI, which asks before it changes anything. Upgrade when your team grows.
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Bring your data from the tool you use now.
Your deals arrive with their stages, owners and dates. Connect your work email, and each client's emails land on their record. On a paid plan, we'll move it all for you, free.
See the whole workspace, not one row of it.
Start today, or bring your own data to a demo and see it there.
Questions, answered
The names that appear on most lists of the top project management software tools are Asana, monday.com, ClickUp, Trello, Jira, Notion, Wrike, Smartsheet, Basecamp and Microsoft Planner. That is a top 10 project management software list by how often a name appears, not by fit: Jira is first for software teams and wrong for most others, and Trello is enough for many small companies that never open the rest.
Todoist, for most people: it is fast, it runs everywhere, and the free plan is enough. Microsoft To Do is free and fine if you live in Outlook. Things is the choice on Apple devices. The best task management software for one person is the one you can add a task to in under five seconds; anything with a project hierarchy will slow that down.
Creative project management software needs proofing and approvals: Wrike and Workamajig have them, and Asana and monday.com add them on higher plans or through add-ons. Marketing teams that plan campaigns in a calendar are usually happy on Asana or monday.com. Every tool on this list is online project management software; none of them needs installing.
Only if you already use them. A Gantt chart shows tasks against dates with dependencies, which matters when one task cannot start before another finishes, as in construction or a product launch. Sprints are fixed work periods from software development. Most service businesses need a board, a list and a calendar. If nobody on the team has asked for a Gantt chart, do not buy for one.