Learning how to manage your projects efficiently can mean the difference between profit and loss for your revenue. In fact, it's estimated that 9.9% of every dollar is currently wasted due to poor project performance. That's a sobering stat, especially if your startup or freelance business isn't turning over a high profit margin to begin with.
From kanban apps to Gantt chart software, here are the 11 best free project management apps for teams on a. (Web, Windows, Mac, iOS, Android) for spreadsheet-like features in a project management app; Podio (Web, iOS, Android) for customizing your project. Best free project management software for customizing your project management tool. Project management tool free download - airTODO - Project Management Tool, Project Management, On Track: Project Management Tool and Dashboard, and many more programs. Best Video Software for. Project management tools for Mac offer sophistication in three basic areas of project management, namely time management, expense management and internal collaboration within the business as well as communication with customers.
The good news: There's free project management software that can give you the resources you need to become more organized and efficient with each new project that comes down the pipeline. From kanban apps to Gantt chart software, here are the 12 best free project management apps for teams on a budget.
Need more features and have a bit more flexibility in your budget? Check out our recommendations for the best project management apps.
What Makes Great Free Project Management Software?
To narrow down our list of the best free project management software, we looked for tools that met the following criteria:
- Free for unlimited projects: The apps we chose have free plans that you can use to manage unlimited projects.
- Variety: We included options for various management methodologies—kanban, Gantt charts, Scrum, and to-do lists—so we eliminated some apps simply because there were better alternatives available using the same PM methodology.
- Hosted: There are a lot of great, free, self-hosted project management tools, but they take longer to set up and manage. We're featuring project management apps that are hosted by the companies that provide the tools.
We selected tools that offer web apps (though many offer synchronized web, mobile, and desktop apps). If it's not important to you that your project management app is accessible online, you may also want to consider Projectlibre and GanttProject in addition to the apps listed below. Both of these tools are powerful desktop-only apps that are designed to be alternatives to Microsoft Project.
The 12 Best Free Project Management Apps
- Trello (Web, macOS, Windows, iOS, Android) for individuals and teams who need a work pipeline
- MeisterTask (Web, Windows, macOS, iOS, Android) for combining project ideation, planning, and execution
- KanbanFlow (Web) for combining kanban, time tracking, and Pomodoro
- Freedcamp (Web, iOS, Android) for managing all projects and communications in a single tool
- Asana (Web, iOS, Android) for creating a to-do list powerful enough to manage projects
- Paymo (Web, Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, Android) for freelancers who charge by the hour
- Bitrix24 (Web, Windows, macOS, iOS, Android) for classic project management with Gantt charts
- Wrike (Web, Windows, Mac, iOS, Android) for spreadsheet-like features in a project management app
- Podio (Web, iOS, Android) for customizing your project management tool
- Yodiz (Web, iOS, Android) for Agile and Scrum teams
- Agantty (Web) for creating Gantt charts quickly and easily
- AND CO (Web, macOS, iOS, Android) for projects that require invoicing
Trello (Web, macOS, Windows, iOS, Android)
Best free project management software for individuals and teams who need a work pipeline
Trello is a simple way to start organizing your projects in kanban boards. And with a free plan that allows for unlimited boards and users, it's a tool that anyone can use. Freelancers use Trello to plan their assignments on a personal board, and teams use Trello to hand work off to each other, creating a collaboration pipeline.
Start out with a handful of lists for your tasks, and customize those lists with steps in your workflow (e.g., to-do, doing, and done) or as separate parts of your project (e.g., development, design, and distribution). Next, add your tasks—with labels, due dates, checklists, and comments to keep everything in one place—and drag them to the appropriate list. Keep track of all comments on tasks that mention you—or that you're watching—from the notifications menu.
For more features, Trello's Power-Up options (in the web app's menu) let you view tasks on a calendar, add voting options on tasks, fade away old tasks automatically, and much more. And you can make Trello boards for everything—personal and work tasks alike—to get your work done in a way that fits your needs best.
Trello Price: The Free plan includes unlimited boards and users, one Power-Up per board, and attachments up to 10MB in size; upgrade for $9.99/user/month (billed annually) to the Business Class plan that includes unlimited Power-Ups, attachments up to 250MB in size, and more granular permissions controls.
Automate Trello with Trello's Zapier integrations.
Want to use Trello as a team? Learn how Trello uses Trello for its own project management needs. Want to use it as a personal to-do list? Here's how to use Trello for GTD.
MeisterTask (Web, Windows, macOS, iOS, Android)
Best free project management software for combining project ideation, planning, and execution
MeisterTask takes a fresh approach to kanban boards, with brightly colored lists and a dashboard wallpaper. And your team will be more productive, too, since MeisterTask includes automations that are triggered when you drag tasks to new lists. You can send emails, reset due dates, and more just by moving tasks around. You can also see all the tasks you're responsible for—across all of the projects you're assigned to—in your personal dashboard.
If your projects start life in brainstorming sessions with mind maps, you'll have another reason to try MeisterTask: its MindMeister integration. You can plan your project in a mind map, then drag it into MeisterTask to turn each idea into a task. It's one of the quickest ways to turn your team's ideas into an actionable plan for execution.
MeisterTask Price: Free for the Basic plan that includes unlimited projects and users, two native app integrations, and file attachments up to 20MB in size; upgrade for $8.25/user/month to the Pro plan that includes unlimited native app integrations, attachments up to 200MB in size, and a searchable task archive.
Automate MeisterTask with MeisterTask's Zapier integrations.
Want more ideas for how to use MeisterTask as a team? Here's how five teams use MeisterTask and Zapier to boost productivity.
KanbanFlow (Web)
Best free project management software for combining kanban, time tracking, and Pomodoro
Wondering how long your tasks take to complete? KanbanFlow is another kanban board app that includes a timer that logs how long you spend on each task—and how long it stays in a particular list. The timer also includes a Pomodoro mode to help your team work in sprints and remind everyone to take breaks so they stay productive all day.
KanbanFlow's Pomodoro timer also asks your team members to record what caused an interruption when they have to pause their focus session timer. These tools together help you find and nix bottlenecks in your workflows—all while pushing your projects towards completion.
KanbanFlow Price: The Free plan includes unlimited tasks and boards, the Pomodoro timer, and productivity reports; upgrade for $5/user/month to the Premium plan that includes file attachments, priority support, and third-party integrations.
Automate KanbanFlow with KanbanFlow's Zapier integrations.
Freedcamp (Web, iOS, Android)
Best free project management software for managing all projects and communications in a single tool
For a more full-featured project management tool, Freedcamp gives you a place to manage tasks along with calendar and milestone tools to plan your project's schedule. Tasks can be organized in a standard to-do list or a kanban board, while your most important dates can be split between milestones or the calendar to help with short- and long-term planning.
Freedcamp can easily be your project hub, holding everything you need to get work done. Core generator software tool for mac license codes. Bring in your files and keep discussions inside your projects—or upgrade to add extra tools for invoicing, CRM, and more—and you'll only need to check one app each day to get your work done.
Freedcamp Price: The Free plan includes unlimited users and projects, attachments up to 10MB in size, and all of Freedcamp's core apps; upgrade for $1.49/user/month (billed annually) to the Minimalist plan that includes premium support, attachments up to 25MB in size, and unlimited task nesting.
Automate Freedcamp with Freedcamp's Zapier integrations.
ClickUp is another project management tool that’s free for unlimited users and unlimited projects. The 100MB storage restriction makes it tough for teams with larger files, but it’s easy to use and offers enough customization to work for any type of organization.
Asana (Web, iOS, Android)
Best free project management software for creating a to-do list powerful enough to manage projects
Your to-do list isn't bad—you just need a few more features to manage your team projects. Asana offers just that. It's a project management tool that lets you break projects down into sections and sub-lists, along with dashboards to see how much of the project has been completed already. You'll add, rearrange, and complete tasks the same way you would in a to-do list app—but with the collaboration and organization features you need to work as a team.
Additionally, PicMonkey has loads of sticker overlays, like mustaches and party hats, as well as a host of borders and textures to easily add flair to your photos. Visual basic for mac. However, as expected, be wary of overuse; the result can easily appear fake and edited.
For your personal tasks—or the things at work that don't fit into a precise project—you can make extra lists in Asana that are shared with specific people. Your own assigned tasks will also show up in your My Tasks view for a quick way to see the things you need to take care of.
Asana Price: The Free plan includes unlimited projects, up to 15 users, and basic search features; upgrade for $9.99/user/month (billed annually) to the Premium plan that includes project timelines, advanced search, and task dependencies.
Automate Asana with Asana's Zapier integrations.
Learn more about how to use Asana as a team, how to use Asana for GTD, and how to take advantage of Asana's hidden features. Or if Asana's not quite right for your needs, check out some of our other favorite to-do list apps.
Paymo (Web, Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, Android)
Best free project management software for freelancers who charge by the hour
Paymo is a project management app and time tracker with a free plan that makes it easier for freelancers to plan, prioritize, and keep track of their work for multiple clients and projects.
Add clients, add projects for those clients, and then add tasks to those projects. For each task, you can assign due dates, set priorities, and add descriptions and attachments. You also have two options for how to view your tasks—as a list or in a kanban board—or use Paymo's filter to sort all of your tasks for every client and project by status, due dates, priorities, and more.
When you're ready to start working on a specific task, just select that task in Paymo's time tracker and click the play button to start tracking your time. When you stop the timer, it adds the time to your timesheet and attributes it to the right task, client, and project.
When it's time to bill your clients, use Paymo's time reports to pull the exact data you need. Export, print, or share the report with your clients in a detailed list view or as a pie graph or bar chart, or take the data and use it to create a branded invoice directly in Paymo. Outlook for mac inbox repair tool. You can even set up your invoices to allow for online payments through Stripe, PayPal, and more.
Paymo Price: The Free plan includes one user, unlimited projects, 1GB of storage, and up to three invoices; upgrade for $9.56/user/month for the Small Office plan that includes unlimited invoices, 50GB of storage, and project templates.
Automate Paymo with Paymo's Zapier integrations.
Looking for more apps to simplify your administrative tasks as a freelancer? Here are our recommendations for the best time tracker apps and the best accounting apps for freelancers.
Bitrix24 (Web, Windows, macOS, iOS, Android)
Best free project management software for classic project management with Gantt charts
Have a large or distributed project team to keep on track? Bitrix24 is a great solution: It combines classic project management features with native collaboration tools. From a social intranet to in-app video conferencing and screen-sharing to HR and client management tools, Bitrix24 is designed to be a one-stop shop for managing projects, teams, and your company as a whole.
Organize tasks within your projects, then use a Gantt chart view to keep everything on track. You can even track employee workloads and deadlines to avoid burning out team members. And if you plan to upgrade from a free to a premium plan, Bitrix24 is one of the few project management apps that has flat-rate pricing rather than charging a per-user fee, which could save you on subscription costs.
Bitrix24 Price: The Free plan includes unlimited projects, up to 12 users, and 5GB of online storage; upgrade for $39/month to the Plus plan that includes up to 24 users and 24GB of online storage.
Can't decide if you need task lists, kanban boards, or Gantt charts most? Zoho Projects (free for up to five users and two projects) includes them all. You can write tasks down in a list, organize them into a kanban workflow, then make sure everything will be done on time with a Gantt chart. We didn't include it on our main list because it doesn't offer unlimited projects in its free plan, but it's a great option to include in your testing if you think you'll eventually want to upgrade to a premium plan.
Wrike (Web, Windows, Mac, iOS, Android)
Best free project management software for spreadsheet-like features in a project management app
If it were up to you, would you manage your projects in a spreadsheet? If so, you might like Wrike. Wrike offers the same flexibility of a spreadsheet—with columns for every bit of info you want to track about tasks—combined with reminders and Gantt chart views (premium plans only) that will keep your work on track.
Wrike lets your team update the status of tasks at various intervals—in-progress, on hold, cancelled, or completed—letting you track the status of all project tasks in detail. Additionally, you can set the status of projects to green, yellow, red, on hold, or cancelled, making it easy to create your weekly project status reports.
While you can do a lot with Wrike's free plan, its best features—including time tracking, Gantt charts, activity streams, and custom dashboards—require a premium plan. If you're running a small operation now but planning to scale in the future, Wrike grows alongside you, giving you all of the tools you need to run both a single small project and many concurrent large ones.
Wrike Price: The Free plan includes unlimited projects and tasks for up to five users; upgrade for $9.80/user/month (billed annually) to the Professional plan that includes Gantt charts and shareable dashboards for five, 10, or 15 users.
Automate Wrike with Wrike's Zapier integrations.
Podio (Web, iOS, Android)
Best free project management software for customizing your project management tool
Want something a bit more customizable? Podio lets you build a hyper-customized project or task manager. With a form-style builder, you'll drag and drop the fields you want in your projects and tasks to gather the data your projects need. You can then visualize your projects and tasks in lists, cards, or calendar views, and use Podio's built-in search to find any item you need in any of your custom apps.
Tying it all together is Podio's internal social network where you can post updates, ask questions, and chat with your team members. You can use it as the hub to keep track of your team's work, with tools for each item you're working on and the discussions about them all in one place.
Podio Price: The Free plan includes unlimited tasks and workspaces for up to five employees; upgrade for $7.20/employee/month (billed annually) to the Basic plan that includes user management and collaboration with external users.
Automate Podio with Podio's Zapier integrations.
Want to customize every part of your project management workflow and be sure you maintain control of your data? Self-hosted project management tools are a great option. For free, self-hosted project management software, we recommend Taiga, Lavagna, Redmine, and Odoo.
Yodiz (Web, iOS, Android)
Best free project management software for Agile and Scrum teams
Yodiz offers a surprisingly powerful free tool for teams that use Agile and Scrum methods. It lets you do everything you need to plan your projects, releases, and sprints: create user stories, nest user stories within epics, create sprints and set sprint dates, add estimates in both story points and hours, and view sprint progress on a sprint board.
Good Project Management Tool For Mac
Unlike a lot of free project management apps that claim they're for Scrum but are really just kanban boards with the ability to add estimates, Yodiz is truly a Scrum tool designed specifically for Scrum teams. It's as powerful as most of the big names in Scrum software—comparable to tools like VersionOne and CA Agile Central—and it's completely free for teams of up to three.
Yodiz Price: Free for the Starter plan that includes unlimited projects for up to three users; for more than three users, upgrade to the Issue Tracker plan for $3/user/month.
Automate Yodiz with Yodiz's Zapier integrations.
Agantty (Web)
Best free project management software for creating Gantt charts quickly and easily
Most project management apps that let you create Gantt charts are feature-rich and robust—great if you need all of the bells and whistles, but cumbersome if you don't. Agantty is different. It's a simple and free project management app that lets you create Gantt charts with projects and tasks quickly, easily, and painlessly.
Just add your projects, enter dates and deadlines, then add tasks to each project. Agantty displays them all on a timeline for you. Need to adjust dates? It's easy. Just drag the edges of a project or task left or right, and Agantty automatically updates the timeline and dates for you. The end result is a calendar that provides a visual of everything your team is working on.
And if you have team members who prefer a simpler task list, just switch to Agantty's dashboard view to see all upcoming and in-progress tasks for the day, week, month, or a custom range. Click items in the list to make edits, or check the box next to a task to mark it as complete.
Agantty Price: Free for unlimited projects and teams and all app features.
AND CO (Web, macOS, iOS, Android)
Best free project management software for projects that require invoicing
Created by the same team that runs freelance platform Fiverr, AND CO is a powerful project management app that gives you all the tools you need to manage a freelance (or other service-based) project from start to finish, totally free for all features, with no limitations.
Once your free account is created, you can log in and click the green Create button to set up your first project, which might include client info, services and fees, contracts, and expenses—everything you need to manage your project on the legal and tax side of things. As you begin working on the project, you can create tasks and organize them by project or list. Since AND CO includes a built-in time tracking tool, you can easily log your work time to individual tasks and projects for more accurate billing.
The biggest downside of AND CO's task and project management area is that it's designed for a single user, so you won't be able to assign individual tasks or projects to multiple team members. But for freelancers or businesses with a single project manager, this shouldn't be an issue.
AND CO stands out for its custom contracts and invoice capabilities, which can be sent to the client for one-off payments or subscriptions, or even to require a down payment before the project work begins. All invoices can be paid directly upon receipt by the client through WePay, Stripe, or PayPal. (Note: PayPal will only work for one-off invoices, and cannot be used for recurring payments.) Once the payment is made, AND CO logs the invoice amount as income, keeping a running tally of income vs. expenses for you throughout the calendar year.
If you find yourself wishing for project management software that offers powerful invoice and subscription payment options, along with tasks and time tracking, you may gravitate towards AND CO for an all-in-one tool with an easy-to-use interface.
AND CO Price: Free.
Automate AND CO with AND CO's Zapier integrations.
Add Extra Features to Your Project Management App
Need more features from your new project management tool? Zapier integrations help by connecting your project management app to the other tools your team already uses.
Say you want to add tasks to projects via email, but your new app doesn't include that feature. Just connect both your email and project management tool to Zapier, then have Zapier watch for new messages to turn them into tasks in your project management app automatically.
Check out Zapier's project management app integrations to see all of your options, or consider these ideas for inspiration:
Track time and send Invoices
Whether you're working on client projects and need to bill for each hour spent, or are working on your own projects and want to know how long they take, time tracking apps can help you see where every minute goes. Hook up your projects to your time tracking app, and you can log time just by checking off to-dos.
Chat with your team
Team chat apps are a great way to make sure everyone knows what's happening in your projects. Zapier can connect your project management tool to Slack, Discord, Zoho Cliq, and other popular chat apps so you can notify your team about new tasks and deadlines or start new projects right from your chats.
Organize project data
Projects include a lot of moving parts, and Zapier can help pull them all together. Whether you need to add notes to your project, create contracts and other template documents, log your work in a spreadsheet, or anything else, there's a Zap for that.
Don't see the automation you need? Explore all of our app integrations to find exactly what you're looking for, or create your own Zap.
Free Project Management Tool For Mac
Learn More About Project Management
Project management is far more than just an app—it's a way to take your project from idea to completion. You could just choose the project management software you want and start using it, but your projects will be far more successful if you break your tasks down into steps, add milestones and due dates to keep things on track, and use checklists to ensure each task is completed with the same quality and care.
Deselect the check box to turn off all aspects of AutoCorrect. • Show AutoComplete Tip for AutoText and Dates: This check box is probably the most important one for AutoText because it’s an on/off switch for AutoText’s AutoComplete feature. If you deselect this, you can still use the AutoText toolbar All Entries pop-up menu or choose Insert→AutoText to manually put AutoText entries into your document. In the AutoCorrect preferences dialog, you can adjust settings for these additional features: • Automatically Correct Spelling and Formatting as You Type: This check box is an on/off switch for all the automatic Word behaviors shown on all the tabs of AutoCorrect preferences. Word for mac 2011 help. Deselecting this check box pretty much defeats the purpose of AutoText unless you want to turn off AutoText for a particular demonstration.
Zapier's Ultimate Guide to Project Management teaches you that and more. It walks you through the best project management systems, shows you how to manage projects effectively, and showcases the best tools to get things done.
Originally published in May 2017, this post has been updated by Jessica Greene and Maria Myre with each project management app's latest features and pricing, along with new criteria for how we chose the best apps. We also removed several apps from the previous version of this list that didn't meet our new criteria, and we added three great new providers: Paymo, Yodiz, AND CO, and Agantty.
It's easy to find a project management tool for large groups, but finding one for personal use that doesn't overwhelm you with group-focused features is a challenge. Here's a look at five popular tools for personal project management.
The spread on this week's Hive Five was wide reaching. The answers you provided to the question 'What is the best personal project management tool?' are, unsurprisingly, quite diverse and personal. We tallied up the votes, and in some cases folded very similar tools into a combined entry, and now we're back to report on your favorite personal project management tools.
This list is now a bit out of date, and we don't necessarily recommend the tools on this page for personal project management. For a more updated list of great tools, check out our more recent hive five on the same topic.
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Five Best Personal Project Management Tools
When your to-do list becomes a monster, and an item next to a checkbox will actually take a long…
Read more ReadTodoist (Web-Based, Free)
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Todoist is a full featured to-do and project management tool well suited for personal project management. You can easily sort your tasks into project and sub-projects, manage the tasks within the project with further sub-lists, and assign due dates to everything. Todoist integrates with Gmail for easy movement between your email inbox and your project management inbox.
mGSD (Web-Based, Free)
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Formerly known as MonkeyGTD, mGSD is a robust, TiddlyWiki-powered personal management tool. Whether or not you're an adherent of David Allen's Getting Things Done system or not—but especially if you are—mGSD is packed with features for managing your projects in GTD style. You can easily flag inputs as next actions, part of a new or existing project, send them over to your tickler file for future reminders, or stash them as reference material. You can store mGSD on any remote web server (or your Dropbox account) for remote access or keep the file local for easy transport on your flash drive.
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Tom's Planner (Web-Based, Free)
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If Gantt charts are a big part of your workflow and project planning, Tom's Planner is an intuitive Gantt chart tool that works nicely as a personal project management tool. Unlike most traditional Gantt charts that display the data after you input it elsewhere, Tom's Planner has a strong focus on ease of use including on-the-fly, mouse-based tweaking of your charts. You can take it for a test run here, and make sure to pay special attention to the functionality of the right-click mouse button.
Things (Mac, $49.95)
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Things is a polished to-do and project management tool exclusive to Mac OS X and iOS. The interface is easy to navigate, keyboard shortcuts are abundant, and it's extremely well integrated into the core applications of the Mac like iCal. Moving tasks about, organizing them into projects, and linking them into your calendar is easy peasy. All your tweaking in the main application easily syncs with your iPhone, iPad, and other iOS devices.
OneNote/Evernote/Text
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It was quite a neck and neck battle between OneNote, Evernote, and basic text capture. In light of their primary roles as note taking and organization tools—and the diverse nature of the vote spread this week—we took the liberty to roll them together into one entry. OneNote is a Windows-only offering commonly bundled with Microsoft Office that offers excellent project management via notebooks and their accompanying pages and sub-pages. Evernote is a web and mobile device-based capture tool and the personal project manager of choice for many people. If you're already using Evernote to capture all the inputs in your life, using it to manage your projects and organize related tasks and material is relatively easy. Finally, a significant number of readers eschewed all the bells and whistles of fancy tools like OneNote and Evernote and managed all their projects using basic text documents.
Now that we've had a chance to look over the top contenders for best personal project management tool, it's time to cast a vote for your favorite:
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Have a personal project manager to share that we overlooked? Let's hear about it in the comments. Have a great idea for the next Hive Five? Shoot us an email at tips@lifehacker.com and we'll do our best to get your idea the limelight it deserves.
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