Project management software is used to plan tasks, assign work, and track a team’s deadlines. The features offered by these tools are becoming increasingly similar: Kanban boards, Gantt charts, automation, and—since 2025—AI features, which are often sold as add-ons. The main differences lie in the limitations of the free versions, the price per user, and the target audience.
This comparison features 12 software programs, their free versions, their starting prices, their target audiences, and their AI features. Prices were collected on September 28, 2026, from the vendors’ pricing pages. Unless otherwise noted, prices are per user per month, excluding taxes, in the currency displayed by the vendor; “annual” means billed annually.
The table lists the software programs in the order in which they are presented in the article.
Acollab is a collaborative project management software that allows teams to manage their projects easily.
Tasks, subtasks, assignments, deadlines, and progress can be tracked using different views: List, Kanban, Gantt, Calendar, or Resources. The solution also provides an overview of multiple projects and helps distribute the workload more effectively within the team. Finally, time tracking allows you to monitor the time spent on tasks and projects to better assess their profitability.
Free Trial: Acollab is available for free for 30 days, with no obligation.
Price: The rate is then €5 (excluding tax) per user per month for an annual subscription and €7 (excluding tax) per user per month with the time-tracking option.
Monday.com is a cloud-based project management software that makes it easy to work collaboratively with your teams. It's a seamless way to manage projects with shared boards and notifications sent to your staff to keep them up to date with the latest changes.
Free plan: 2 users, 3 boards, and 3 documents, without AI. Pricing: Basic at €9, Standard at €12, and Pro at €19 per user per month with annual billing; monthly billing costs 18% more. AI: AI credits included starting with the Basic plan (1,000 per month, 3,000 with Pro).
Wrike is a versatile project management software approved by over 20,000 companies worldwide.
Offering 360° visibility and total control over your projects, Wrike facilitates interdepartmental collaboration and task automation.
With customized dashboards, collaborative multi-labeling, and intuitive integrations with over 400 applications, Wrike is the ideal solution for any company looking to optimize its project management.
Free plan: essential task management. Pricing: Team at $10 per user per month (2–15 users) and Business at $25 (5–200 users), billed annually; Pinnacle and Apex available upon request. AI: essential features starting with the Team plan; customizable agents starting with the Business plan.
Asana organizes work into projects, tasks, and goals, with list, board, timeline, and calendar views. It is designed for teams that coordinate projects across multiple departments, all the way up to large organizations, with portfolio and workload management features in the higher-tier plans.
Free plan: up to 2 users. Pricing: Starter at $10.99 per user per month on an annual plan ($13.49 per month), Advanced at $24.99 ($30.49 per month), Enterprise by quote. AI: AI Teammates and the Asana Dash assistant are included in paid plans, with a limited number of requests per user.
Limitations: Since the free plan is limited to 2 users, a team of three must upgrade to the Starter plan.
Go to Asana
ClickUp brings together tasks, documents, whiteboards, goals, and team messaging in a single tool. It offers detailed customization options (statuses, fields, views), making it ideal for teams that want to consolidate multiple tools into one.
Free plan: unlimited members, 60 MB of storage, 5 spaces. Pricing: Unlimited at $7 per user per month on an annual plan ($10 per month), Business at $12 ($19 per month), Enterprise by quote. AI: optional; Brain AI at $9 and Everything AI at $28 per user per month.
Limitations: The 60 MB included in the free plan fills up quickly with attachments, and the AI feature is an additional cost: $12 plus $9 per user per month for Business with Brain AI.
Go to ClickUp
Trello, developed by Atlassian, is based on Kanban boards: cards that you move from column to column, complete with due dates, checklists, and attachments. It takes just a few minutes to get started, and it’s ideal for small teams and simple projects.
Free plan: Up to 10 users and 10 boards per workspace, 10 MB per file. Pricing: Standard at $5 per user per month on an annual plan ($6 per month), Premium at $10 ($12.50 per month). AI: Atlassian Intelligence, available in paid plans.
Limitations: Views other than the Kanban board (timeline, grid, dashboard) are available only to Premium users.
Go to Trello
Jira, also published by Atlassian, is designed for software development teams: tickets, sprints, Scrum and Kanban boards, and roadmaps. It is also used by product teams.
Free plan: up to 10 users, 2 GB of storage, no AI. Pricing: Standard at $9.05 per user per month, Premium at $18.30. AI: Rovo, with a credit allowance that depends on the plan.
Limitations: Its terminology (tickets, sprints, epics) and configuration settings require some time for a non-technical team to get used to them.
Go to Jira
Notion combines documents, databases, and tasks in a single workspace. A team can use it to draft project specifications, track tasks using Kanban or timeline views, and organize their meeting minutes.
Free plan: limited number of blocks for teams of 2 or more members, 10 guests, 7 days of history, and files up to 5 MB. Pricing: Plus at €9.50 per member per month (annual plan), Business at €19.50. AI: Notion bot and meeting note-taking.
Limitations: Notion is primarily a documentation tool; its workload management and project reporting features are more basic than those of a specialized tool.
Go to Notion
Smartsheet builds on the logic of a spreadsheet (rows, columns, formulas) and adds Gantt charts, forms, automations, and project portfolio management. It is designed for teams familiar with Excel and organizations that manage multiple projects simultaneously.
Free plan: None; 30-day trial. Pricing: Pro at €8 per member per month on an annual plan (€11 per month); Business at €17 (€22 per month); Enterprise by quote; unlimited free contributors. AI: Smart Assist, Smart Columns, and AI-generated dashboards, included starting with the Pro plan.
Limitations: No free plan, and a spreadsheet-style interface that may not be ideal for teams accustomed to Kanban.
Go to Smartsheet
Zoho Projects is part of the Zoho suite, which also covers customer relationship management, accounting, and support. It offers Gantt charts, timesheets, and Kanban boards, with the lowest starting prices in this comparison.
Free plan: 5 users, 3 projects, 5 GB. Pricing: Premium at €4 per user per month on an annual basis (€5 per month), Enterprise at €9 (€10 per month). AI: Zia assistant, and MCP server for connecting external AI assistants.
Limitations: This is most beneficial for a company that already uses other Zoho applications.
Go to Zoho Projects
Teamwork.com is designed for agencies and service companies that manage projects for their clients: time tracking, budgets, billing, and client access.
Free plan: 5 users and 5 projects. Pricing: Basics at $9.99 per user per month on an annual basis (minimum of 3 users); Accelerate at $24.99 (minimum of 5 users); 14-day trial. AI: built-in AI agents.
Limitations: The minimum number of users makes the tool more expensive for a very small team.
Go to Teamwork.com
Basecamp, developed by 37signals, provides a task list, a schedule, a message thread, a group chat, and a file storage area for each project. Its pricing model is unique: a flat monthly fee, with no per-user charge.
Free plan: 1 project, 1 GB, 5 users. Pricing: Freelancer at $25 per month (3 active projects, 20 users), Studio at $59 (10 active projects), Pro at $99 (25 active projects, unlimited users), Unlimited at $299 per month (billed annually). AI: Basecamp allows you to connect your own AI agents rather than integrating a proprietary AI.
Limitations: No Gantt chart; Basecamp is better suited for project coordination and communication than for detailed planning.
Go to Basecamp
Free plans are often limited to 2 users (monday.com, Asana) or 5 (Zoho Projects, Teamwork.com, Basecamp), and some providers require a minimum of 3 or 5 paying users. Do the math based on the actual number of people who will update tasks, keeping in mind that some providers (monday.com, Smartsheet) offer free reader access.
A team that uses Kanban doesn’t have the same needs as an engineering firm that plans phases and milestones over several years. Make sure the views you need (Kanban, Gantt, timeline, workload) are included in the specific plan you’re considering—not just in the higher-tier plan.
The monthly payment costs 18% (monday.com) to 43% (ClickUp) more than the annual plan. Add in the AI options, which are often billed separately: $9 per user per month for Brain AI at ClickUp, and an additional license for the Microsoft Planner agent.
Most of the software programs in this comparison are online services hosted outside of Europe. For confidential projects, check the location of the hosting, the data processing terms under the GDPR, and whether your content might be used to train the provider’s AI models.
There is no single “best” software in absolute terms: the choice depends on the team’s size, its work style, and the tools already in place. monday.com, Asana, and Wrike are suitable for cross-functional projects; Jira is best for software development; Trello is ideal for simple projects; and Microsoft Planner is best for organizations using Microsoft 365.
Ten of the twelve software programs in this comparison offer a free plan, with limitations: 2 users for monday.com and Asana, 5 for Zoho Projects, Teamwork.com, and Basecamp, and 10 for Trello and Jira. ClickUp and Wrike allow an unlimited number of members, but with reduced storage or features. Smartsheet does not offer a free plan, and Planner is included with Microsoft 365 subscriptions.
For a small team working on simple projects, yes: the free plans from Trello and Jira support up to 10 users. Beyond that, limits on storage, the number of projects, or the number of users generally require a paid plan.
Trello is suitable for simple projects organized using Kanban and costs $5 per user per month on an annual plan. Asana and monday.com are designed for projects involving multiple teams, with timeline views, dashboards, and automations; their entry-level plans cost $10.99 (Asana) and €9 (monday.com) per user per month on an annual plan.
Notion lets you track tasks in Kanban or timeline view, but it is primarily a documentation tool. It is well-suited for teams that want to centralize their documents and project tracking; for workload management or managing multiple projects, a specialized tool is more appropriate.
Jira can be used by business teams, but its terminology (tickets, sprints, epics) and configuration are designed for software development. A non-technical team will generally find it easier to get up to speed with Trello, Asana, or monday.com.
Microsoft offers four solutions: Planner, Project Server Subscription Edition, Dynamics 365 Project Operations, and Project Standard or Professional 2024. Among the other software programs included in this comparison, Smartsheet and Wrike also support project portfolio management.
It depends on the provider. monday.com, Asana, Wrike, and Smartsheet include AI features in their paid plans; ClickUp offers them as an add-on, starting at $9 per user per month; and Microsoft Planner requires an additional license.
Project management software tracks tasks and deadlines. Project documents are usually stored elsewhere: plans and reports on a file server, meeting minutes in SharePoint or Teams, correspondence with the client in emails, and previous projects in the archives.
Outmind indexes these sources and allows users to find a document based on its content or search a project’s history, while respecting each user’s access rights and without moving the data.
