Nothing Special   »   [go: up one dir, main page]

You might be using an unsupported or outdated browser. To get the best possible experience please use the latest version of Chrome, Firefox, Safari, or Microsoft Edge to view this website.

10 Best Asana Competitors & Alternatives (2024)

Written By
Contributor
Written By
Former Deputy Editor

Reviewed

|Former Managing Editor, SMB
& 2 others
Editorial Note: We earn a commission from partner links on Forbes Advisor. Commissions do not affect our editors' opinions or evaluations.

Asana’s budgeting tools, integrations, Agile project management and deadline management features make it a popular project management system for organizations of all sizes. However, it is not the only option available on the market. Other project management platforms offer a variety of features comparable to Asana, such as task delegation, automation and integration—and some even have features Asana lacks. In this article, Forbes Advisor highlights the best Asana competitors and alternatives based on features, pricing, customer reviews and more.

Read more

The Best Asana Alternatives of 2024


Why You Can Trust Forbes Advisor Small Business

The Forbes Advisor Small Business team is committed to bringing you unbiased rankings and information with full editorial independence. We use product data, strategic methodologies and expert insights to inform all of our content and guide you in making the best decisions for your business journey.

We reviewed 17 project management systems using a complex approach to help determine the 10 best Asana competitors and alternatives. Our ratings looked at criteria that included the starting price for the system, access to necessary and unique features, how real users viewed the providers and an analysis of various factors by our experts. All ratings are determined solely by our editorial team.


Best for Advanced Users

Airtable

Airtable

Starting price

Free; $20 per user per month (billed annually)

Integrations

Salesforce, Google Calendar, Facebook, Mailchimp, Slack and more

Free trial

Yes

Airtable

Free; $20 per user per month (billed annually)

Salesforce, Google Calendar, Facebook, Mailchimp, Slack and more

Yes

Editor's Take

While Airtable has a drag-and-drop interface like Asana, its massive number of features make it ideal for advanced users who can take advantage of all it has to offer. These include features for just about every team at a company, including marketing, product, operations, human resources (HR), sales and finance.

For example, HR can navigate the hiring process from application to onboarding. Other features allow users to track sales pipelines, budget for projects, manage workflows, act on feedback received from customers and make decisions on marketing efforts all with Airtable.

Who should use it:

Organizations with many teams that need to track data and manage workflows

Read more:

Read our full Airtable review.

Pros & Cons
  • Drag-and-drop like Asana
  • Offers a completely free plan
  • All plans come with unlimited bases
  • Paid plans are expensive compared to some of its competition but still cheaper than Asana
  • Storage limits

Best for Visual Task Management

monday.com

monday.com

Starting price

Free; $9 per user per month (billed annually)

Integrations

Zoom, Google Docs, Salesforce, Slack and more

Free trial

Yes

monday.com
Learn More Arrow

On monday.com's Website

Free; $9 per user per month (billed annually)

Zoom, Google Docs, Salesforce, Slack and more

Yes

Editor's Take

monday.com is a great Asana alternative for those who prefer a visual approach to task management. The platform uses “pulses” to track tasks, which can be customized with colors, due dates, assigned team members and notes. Pulses can also be grouped into “boards” that function like Asana projects, allowing users to see all the tasks associated with a project in one place.

monday.com also has some features Asana lacks, such as time tracking and Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) compliance. It also has an Asana integration so that users can continue to use Asana for certain tasks while taking advantage of monday.com’s other features.

Who should use it:

Teams that prefer a visual approach to task management and need features like time tracking and HIPAA compliance.

Read more:

Read our full monday.com review.

Pros & Cons
  • HIPAA-compliant
  • Has a free plan
  • Unlimited boards and docs on all plans
  • Need higher-priced plans for more view options
  • No integrations unless using the Standard or higher plan

Best for Integrations

ClickUp

ClickUp

Starting price

Free; $7 per member per month

(billed annually)

Integrations

Slack, Microsoft Outlook, HubSpot, Salesforce, Timely, Google Drive and more

Free trial

Yes

ClickUp
Learn More Arrow

On ClickUp's Website

Free; $7 per member per month

(billed annually)

Slack, Microsoft Outlook, HubSpot, Salesforce, Timely, Google Drive and more

Yes

Editor's Take

Compared to Asana’s 100+ integrations, ClickUp takes the win. It offers more than 1,000 integrations, including Slack, API, GitHub, OneDrive, Google Drive, Zoom, Loom, Zendesk and Time Doctor. After analyzing more than 4,000 teams that switched to ClickUp, it determined teams save one day per week using its solutions.

It has workflow automations and goal tracking and offers something no other platform we’ve considered does: “Let’s make a deal” pricing, where you name the price that you’re willing to pay per user, per month. Otherwise, costs are still reasonable starting at just $7 per member, per month, for paid plans.

Who should use it:

Teams that use a lot of integrations and need workflow automations.

Read more:

Read our full ClickUp review.

Pros & Cons
  • More than a thousand integrations
  • Automatically import from other project management systems
  • Unlimited tasks with all plans
  • Time tracking needs some work, especially when assigning tasks to others
  • Learning curve is steeper than some solutions but around the same as Asana’s

Best for Microsoft Users

Microsoft Planner

Microsoft Planner

Starting Price

Free (with a Microsoft 365 subscription); $6 per user per month (billed annually)

Integrations

Other Microsoft products

Free trial

Yes

Microsoft Planner
Learn More Arrow

Read Forbes' Review

Free (with a Microsoft 365 subscription); $6 per user per month (billed annually)

Other Microsoft products

Yes

Editor's Take

Microsoft Planner comes free with your Office 365 subscription. As such, it’s a great Asana alternative for organizations that are already using Microsoft products. Planner is integrated with other Microsoft products, such as Outlook, OneDrive and SharePoint, so users can add tasks from emails, attachments and notes easily.

Planner also has some features Asana lacks, such as the ability to see upcoming tasks on a calendar and get weekly email digests of progress. Unlike Asana, Microsoft Planner doesn’t have any project templates, so users will have to create their own.

Learn more: Read our full Microsoft Planner review.

Who should use it:

Organizations that are already using Microsoft products and need a simple task management solution.

Pros & Cons
  • Included with your Office 365 subscription
  • Cheaper than Asana, and you get the full suite of Office 365 products
  • Available on iOS and Android
  • Doesn’t have as many integrations as its competition
  • Can’t use it without an Office 365 subscription
  • No desktop app

Best for Templates

Notion

Notion

Starting price

Free; $10 per user per month (billed annually)

Integrations

Slack, Zapier, Jira, Asana, Google Drive, IFTTT and more

Free trial

Yes

Notion
Learn More Arrow

Read Forbes' Review

Free; $10 per user per month (billed annually)

Slack, Zapier, Jira, Asana, Google Drive, IFTTT and more

Yes

Editor's Take

With more than 50 templates included with every plan, Notion is a great Asana alternative for teams that need help getting started with their projects. Templates for everything from product development to event planning to social media marketing.

Like Asana, Notion has a drag-and-drop interface. But unlike Asana, Notion also has a “block” system that allows users to add different types of content, such as headings, lists, images, code snippets and files. Blocks can be rearranged and customized to fit the needs of each user. Notion also can create custom databases and embed external websites.

Learn more: Read our full Notion review.

Who should use it:

Teams that need help getting started with their projects and need features like custom databases and website embedding.

Read more:

Read our full Notion vs Asana Comparison.

Pros & Cons
  • Offers professionally designed and community templates
  • It’s easy to use—much easier than Asana
  • All plans come with unlimited pages and blocks
  • Audit log only available for Enterprise customers
  • Free plan doesn’t have version history

Best for Large Organizations

Confluence

Confluence

Starting price

Free; $6.40 per user per month

Integrations

Jira, Google Analytics, Slack, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Google Drive and more

Free trial

Yes

Confluence
Learn More Arrow

On Confluence's Website

Free; $6.40 per user per month

Jira, Google Analytics, Slack, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Google Drive and more

Yes

Editor's Take

A good Asana alternative for large organizations, Confluence is a collaboration platform that helps teams organize their work and connect with other people in the organization. It’s used by companies like LinkedIn, The New York Times and NASA.

Confluence has some features Asana lacks, such as a fully functioning sandbox―Asana has one but it’s clunky at best―and page versioning. It also has an Asana integration, so users can continue to use Asana for certain tasks while taking advantage of Confluence’s other features.

Learn more: Read our full Confluence review.

Who should use it:

Large organizations that need features like custom templates and workflows.

Pros & Cons
  • Has more than 1,000 integrations
  • Backed by Atlassian
  • 50% off for nonprofits
  • Steep learning curve
  • Asana’s free plan comes with unlimited storage but Confluence’s

Best for Time Tracking

Teamwork.com

Teamwork.com

Starting price

Free; $10.99 per user per month (billed annually)

(minimum of three users)

Integrations

Dropbox, Google Drive, SharePoint, QuickBooks, Microsoft Project and more

Free trial

Yes

Teamwork.com
Learn More Arrow

Read Forbes' Review

Free; $10.99 per user per month (billed annually)

(minimum of three users)

Dropbox, Google Drive, SharePoint, QuickBooks, Microsoft Project and more

Yes

Editor's Take

Used by companies like Netflix, Panasonic, HP, PayPal and Disney, Teamwork.com is easy to use and implement at scale. It also works great for freelancers, thanks to its time tracking features.

Teamwork.com has all the features you’d expect from an Asana alternative, such as task management, subtasks, file sharing and commenting. It also has a necessary feature that Asana doesn’t, which is document collaboration. Like Asana, Teamwork.com offers a free plan, although it’s limited in scope.

Learn more: Read our full Teamwork.com review.

Who should use it:

Teams that need time tracking features and document collaboration.

Pros & Cons
  • Document collaboration
  • Time tracking
  • Offers a free plan for up to five users
  • Can take a long time to load if there’s a lot of data
  • Free plan doesn’t include any teams

Best for Solopreneurs

Trello

Trello

Starting price

Free; $5 per user per month (billed annually)

Integrations

Slack, Mailchimp, Zapier, Freshdesk, Salesforce, TimeCamp and IFTTT

Free trial

Yes

Trello
Learn More Arrow

Read Forbes' Review

Free; $5 per user per month (billed annually)

Slack, Mailchimp, Zapier, Freshdesk, Salesforce, TimeCamp and IFTTT

Yes

Editor's Take

While Trello works great for teams, it’s a great first step for solopreneurs to get their businesses organized. Whether you’re a writer, a social media manager or virtual assistant, Trello’s easy drag-and-drop interface makes it easy to move tasks to different boards and gives users an at-a-glance Kanban view, so you can always stay on top of your pipeline and see what’s due soon.

Trello also offers a ton of integrations, so you can connect it to the other apps you use for work. For example, you can connect Trello to your Gmail account and get notified whenever someone mentions you in a comment or assigns you a task. You can also connect IFTTT so that every time you add a new card to Trello, it creates a task in Asana automatically.

Learn more: Read our full Trello review.

Who should use it:

Solopreneurs and small teams that need an easy way to organize their work.

Pros & Cons
  • Offers a free forever plan
  • Drag-and-drop interface
  • Kanban board
  • Customizable background
  • You can use it to organize personal trips/itineraries
  • Attach files and images to each card
  • Third-party Power Ups (aka integrations) aren’t always intuitive
  • No native time tracking, you must use a third-party Power Up

Best for Productivity

Wrike

Wrike

Starting price

$10 per user per month

Integrations

Salesforce, Tableau, Microsoft Teams, Gmail, OneDrive, GitHub, Slack and Dropbox

Free trial

Yes

Wrike
Learn More Arrow

On Wrike's Website

$10 per user per month

Salesforce, Tableau, Microsoft Teams, Gmail, OneDrive, GitHub, Slack and Dropbox

Yes

Editor's Take

Individuals and businesses can increase their productivity using Wrike’s AI Work Intelligence. It’ll predict potential issues so you can mitigate them early on, and it’ll help prioritize which tasks you should tackle first. You’ll get prioritization lists, suggested remediations and risk predictions in real time.

AI Work Intelligence is a great addition to an already feature-packed tool. Wrike’s Gantt chart lets you visualize your project’s timeline and track dependencies. It also has a Kanban board, so you can visually see which tasks are in progress and which are still to do. You can also add subtasks, so you can break down a big project into smaller, more manageable tasks.

Learn more: Read our full Wrike review.

Who should use it:

Teams that need help with project management and task prioritization.

Pros & Cons
  • Gantt charts
  • Kanban board
  • Real-time risk prediction and mitigation
  • Some plans include time tracking and timesheets
  • Artificial intelligence (AI) recommendations based on your data
  • Can be overwhelming to use if you’re not familiar with project management
    terminology
  • Storage limits with each plan

Best for Group Chats

Basecamp

Basecamp

Starting price

Free; $15 per user per month

Integrations

Zapier, Calamari, Everhour, Zoho Flow, ZapUp, Retool and Automate.io

Free trial

Yes

Basecamp
Learn More Arrow

Read Forbes' Review

Free; $15 per user per month

Zapier, Calamari, Everhour, Zoho Flow, ZapUp, Retool and Automate.io

Yes

Editor's Take

Basecamp offers two plans. One is for freelancers, startups and small teams and has only a few features, such as 500 GB of storage space. When you upgrade to its Pro Unlimited plan, you’re paying a flat $299 per month (billed annually) for unlimited projects, clients and users. You’ll still have storage limits, but it’s 5 TB, and you get priority support and advanced client access.

When paying for an entire year, you can save 15%. If you’re a student or teacher, your account is free, and non-profits get a discount. Because you can have unlimited users, this is perfect for large teams to collaborate. With group chat, remote teams can communicate with ease.

Learn more: Read our full Basecamp review.

Who should use it:

Large teams that need an easy way to communicate and collaborate.

Pros & Cons
  • Offers a free forever plan
  • Automated check-ins
  • In-app group chats (called Campfires)
  • Message boards
  • Each project has a schedule each team member can access
  • Paid plan comes with unlimited users, projects and clients
  • Doesn’t have as many integrations as some of its competition
  • Limited plan options

Compare Asana Alternatives

Company Starting Price Integrations Free Trial Learn More
Free
Microsoft Teams, Salesforce, Tableau, Zapier, Canva and Vimeo
30 days

Read Forbes’ Review

Free
Salesforce, Jira Cloud, Microsoft Outlook and Hootsuite
14 days
Free
Slack, Outlook, Dropbox, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Zapier, OneDrive
14 days

On monday.com’s Website

Free
Slack, GitHub, Dropbox, YouTube, Vimeo, Zoom, Discord and Miro
Yes (but doesn’t disclose how long)

On ClickUp’s Website

Free with Microsoft 365 platform
Other Microsoft products
One month

Read Forbes’ Review

Free
Jira, GitHub, Slack, Zoom, OneDrive, Zapier and IFTTT
Yes (but doesn’t disclose how long)

Read Forbes’ Review

Free
Outlook, Google Drive, SharePoint, Excel, Google Analytics, GitHub and Slack
7 days

On Confluence’s Website

Free
HubSpot, Slack, MS Teams, Zapier, Bybrand and Stripe
30 days

Read Forbes’ Review

Free
Slack, Mailchimp, Zapier, Freshdesk, Salesforce, TimeCamp and IFTTT
14 days

Read Forbes’ Review

Free
Salesforce, Tableau, Microsoft Teams, Gmail, OneDrive, GitHub, Slack and Dropbox
14 days

On Wrike’s Website

Free
Zapier, Calamari, Everhour, Zoho Flow, ZapUp, Retool and Automate.io
30 days

Read Forbes’ Review


What To Look for in a Project Management System

A reliable project management system can make or break a project. Asana is a great tool but it might not be the right fit for your team. Here are some things to look for in a project management system:

  • Ease of use: The system should be easy to use and understand. Asana is known for its simplicity, but there are other options out there that are just as user-friendly.
  • Integrations: The system should integrate with the tools you’re already using. Asana integrates with many popular applications, but if you’re using a less common tool, you might have to look elsewhere.
  • Price: The system should be affordable. Asana offers a free plan and paid plans starting at $10.00 per user, per month, when billed annually.
  • Features: The system should have the features you need, such as task management, collaboration tools and a drag-and-drop interface. Asana has basic task management features, but if you need something more robust, you might want to look at an Asana alternative.

Is Asana the Best Project Management System?

Asana Pros & Cons

Pros

  • Unlimited tasks, projects, messages, activity log and storage with every plan, even its free one
  • Has an iOS and Android mobile app
  • Time tracking integrations
  • Paid plans come with unlimited dashboards and free guests
  • Task templates with paid plans

Cons

  • No phone support
  • 24/7 support only available with Enterprise plans
  • Default email notification settings are overwhelming
  • There are more intuitive tools out there
  • Its user interface (UI) needs work

Asana Cost

Asana offers three levels of plans ranging in price from free to $24.99 per user, per month (billed annually). It also offers custom Enterprise plans.

  • Basic: Free
  • Premium: $10.99 per user, per month (billed annually) or $13.49 billed monthly
  • Business: $24.99 per user, per month (billed annually) or $30.49 billed monthly
  • Enterprise: Custom pricing

When To Choose a Competitor Over Asana

There are a few reasons you might want to choose an Asana competitor over the popular project management tool. While Asana has many integrations, you’ll need higher-tiered plans for more advanced integrations, such as Tableau, Power BI, Adobe Creative Cloud and Salesforce. Its competition often offers these integrations at lower price points.

Asana also doesn’t offer 24/7 customer support, so if you need help outside of business hours, you’ll have to wait until the next day for a response or upgrade to an Enterprise-level plan, which isn’t always feasible—especially for bootstrapping startups.

Other project management tools, such as Trello and Wrike, also have more user-friendly interfaces. If you’re not a fan of Asana’s UI or find it too complicated, try an alternative.

Finally, if you need a tool with more robust features, such as resource management, you’ll want to look elsewhere. Asana is a great tool for simple task management, but if you need something more complex, it might not be the right fit.


Methodology

When looking for the best Asana alternatives, Forbes Advisor analyzed several of its competitors. We looked at features, ease of use, integrations, pricing and real customer experiences to find the best Asana alternatives for small businesses. After assigning a weighted score to each data point, we chose the top 10 highest scores that best fit small and medium businesses (SMBs). We specifically compared the features to those of Asana to see what these companies do better or what Asana offers that they do not.

Pricing

When we considered pricing, the starting price of a project management system was our chief concern. We also looked for providers that offered several different pricing tiers, especially since Asana offers multiple plans. Additionally, providers that offered a free trial or free version of its service received higher marks in our scoring as well. Pricing amounted to 20% of our weighted scoring.

Features

We broke features down into two sections: general features and additional or unique features. For general features, we looked for offerings that each service provider should offer and whether it was available either free or if you had to upgrade to a free plan to gain access to it. These features included software integrations, timelines, role assignment features, dependencies and access to Gantt charts and a mobile app. General features accounted for 20% of our scoring.

Additionally, we looked for these Asana alternatives to provide unique features not available everywhere. Some of these included billing and invoicing, markup tools, budgeting and offering guest and client access. We weighted additional features at 20% of our total score.

Third-party Reviews

How a project management system is viewed by the general public was also important to our overall rankings. To gauge this metric the best, we chose to look at some of the top third-party review sites, such as Capterra and Trustpilot, to see how these Asana alternatives were rated. Specifically, we looked for how many reviews were left for each system that were at least 3.5 out of 5 or higher on each site. These reviews accounted for 20% of the total score.

Expert Analysis

Taking all of this into consideration, our experts also looked at factors that included ease of use, popularity, value for the money and any stand-out features to determine our expert score. This roundup accounted for 20% of the total score.


Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

What is the best Asana alternative for small business?

Notion is a great Asana competitor for small teams and businesses. This is because it has more than 50 templates for different types of workflows, is easy to use and has a low monthly price.

What is the best Asana alternative for large organizations?

Confluence is the best Asana alternative for large organizations. It offers features that Asana doesn’t, such as custom templates and workflows.

Is there a free version of Asana?

There is a free version of Asana. It comes with unlimited tasks, projects, messages, activity log and file storage. You can use it to collaborate with up to 15 teammates and it comes with a mobile app and plenty of integrations.

Is Asana better than monday.com?

Asana is better than monday.com for task management, and it has a lower monthly price considering you must pay for at least three seats with monday.com. It also offers more integrations than monday.com. However, monday.com is better for project management and offers 24/7 support.

Is Asana better than Trello?

Trello is ideal for freelancers and small teams to keep track of projects and pipelines, whereas Asana is a better collaboration tool. Trello is much more user-friendly, is more visual and offers a Kanban-style board.


Information provided on Forbes Advisor is for educational purposes only. Your financial situation is unique and the products and services we review may not be right for your circumstances. We do not offer financial advice, advisory or brokerage services, nor do we recommend or advise individuals or to buy or sell particular stocks or securities. Performance information may have changed since the time of publication. Past performance is not indicative of future results.

Forbes Advisor adheres to strict editorial integrity standards. To the best of our knowledge, all content is accurate as of the date posted, though offers contained herein may no longer be available. The opinions expressed are the author’s alone and have not been provided, approved, or otherwise endorsed by our partners.
The Forbes Advisor editorial team is independent and objective. To help support our reporting work, and to continue our ability to provide this content for free to our readers, we receive compensation from the companies that advertise on the Forbes Advisor site. This compensation comes from two main sources. First, we provide paid placements to advertisers to present their offers. The compensation we receive for those placements affects how and where advertisers’ offers appear on the site. This site does not include all companies or products available within the market. Second, we also include links to advertisers’ offers in some of our articles; these “affiliate links” may generate income for our site when you click on them. The compensation we receive from advertisers does not influence the recommendations or advice our editorial team provides in our articles or otherwise impact any of the editorial content on Forbes Advisor. While we work hard to provide accurate and up to date information that we think you will find relevant, Forbes Advisor does not and cannot guarantee that any information provided is complete and makes no representations or warranties in connection thereto, nor to the accuracy or applicability thereof. Here is a list of our partners who offer products that we have affiliate links for.
lorem
Are you sure you want to rest your choices?