10 Best Free Project Scheduling Software in 2023

Wrike is a flexible project scheduling tool that lets you view projects in both board and spreadsheet views.

When setting up, you can create different spaces. These could be based around projects, departments, clients, teams, or whatever makes sense for your business. You can then add tasks to each project and include essential information such as due dates, collaborators, files, and descriptions.

The free version has all the features you need to schedule projects. You can add unlimited users, manage tasks and subtasks, view projects in board or spreadsheet views, and collaborate with external users.

The free plan’s biggest limitation is the lack of Gantt charts and 2GB storage limit across the whole space. In comparison, the professional plan costs $9.80 per user per month and offers 1 to 2GB of storage per user.

Monday.com is a project management app that lets you create spreadsheet-like projects for different parts of your business. The tool has over 200 templates for functions such as marketing, events, real estate, and sales.

To get started, just sign-up and then choose the templates you need. You can customize each one by adding the exact features you need. For example, a realtor can add dates, list prices, and locations. Or a content agency could keep track of publish dates, clients, and writers.

The free version of Monday.com lets you create unlimited boards. Use these for different projects or clients. You can also add unlimited docs and access over 200 templates.

The biggest restriction is that you can only add one other person to your projects. This is fine for freelancers, but you’ll have to pay as soon as your business grows to three team members. At this point, the cheapest paid plan costs $6 per user per month.

Zoho Projects is a free project management platform with project scheduling capabilities designed for project managers (PMs) and stakeholders.

Zoho’s free project planner can be used by project managers of smaller teams and businesses to easily map out their work breakdown structure. The tool is equipped with various core modules such as task and subtask management, issue management, task lists, and milestones. The free planning and scheduling tool also enables project managers to create plans that guide team members on the step-by-step journey of completing their project, thanks to the platform’s built-in Gantt chart view. Project managers who are managing a remote or hybrid team can benefit from Zoho Projects’ collaborative features, including the built-in Feed, documents, Forums, and chat tool.

Zoho Projects is endlessly scalable and flexible using its marketplace of tool connectors and app add-ons. Pick between hundreds of integrations, free and paid options, for customer relationship management, asset management, marketing, design, and more. You can sort add-ons by pricing, user rating, and/or functionality. Certain add-ons are limited to paid Zoho Projects plans but many are open to freemium users, like Hubspot, DocuSign, and SugarCRM.

Features include roadmapping, project management, task scheduling/tracking, customer management, prioritization, and notifications.

Integrations include Microsoft Office 365, Microsoft Teams, Google Drive, Zendesk, and ServiceNow. Integrations via Zapier and Zoho Flow are also supported. Being part of the Zoho ecosystem allows you to connect to several of Zoho’s own services for Sales, Marketing, CRM, customer service, and others.

Zoho Project is completely free for up to three users. Paid plans start from $5 per user/month. A 10-day free trial is available.

Hub Planner is a web-based project management tool that allows you to schedule tasks and resources for projects.

Why I picked Hub Planner: The tool is highly customizable. You can create your own task types and resource groups, which makes it easy to tailor the software to your team's specific needs. There are also a lot of reporting options available, which is helpful for tracking project progress and making data-driven decisions.

Hub Planner allows you to see all of your team members' schedules in one place, so you can quickly identify any conflicts or overbooking. You can also set resource availability and leave, so you always know who is available to work on a particular project. The drag-and-drop functionality is particularly helpful when it comes to scheduling resources.

Hub Planner Standout Features & Integrations

Features include resource management, PTO planning, timesheets, reporting, skills matching, task management, templates, drag and drop scheduler, project budgets, approval flow, smart scheduler, and third-party integrations/add-ons.

Integrations include DIY options via the Hub Planner API and webhooks. Additionally, you can access thousands of apps using a Zapier account.

Trello is user-friendly project scheduling software that uses Kanban boards to keep you on track. The basic idea is that you create a board for each project, add lists such as “To do”, “In progress,” and “In review,” then add tasks to each one.

The thing I love about Trello is how easy it is to use. It’s easy to add tasks by creating a new card. You can then add due dates, collaborators, and a to-do list that shows what you need to do to complete a task.

Moving cards across projects is as simple as dragging them from one list to another. And you can set up an automation that moves tasks when the to-do list is complete. You can also comment on tasks and add attachments to each one.

Trello has a generous free plan with unlimited members and cards. You also get access to the easy-to-use mobile app on Android and iOS.

The downside is that you can only add ten boards per workspace. You also miss out on custom fields, advanced checklists, and the ability to upload files larger than 10MB.

Trello has plenty of integrations, including with Slack, Google Drive, Jira, and Ganttify. If you want to upgrade, the standard plan costs $6 per user per month and premium costs $12.50 per user per month.

Asana is an easy-to-use project management system. The thing I like about it most is how easy it is to use. Creating and assigning tasks is super-intuitive. And the drag and drop interface makes moving them to the relevant place easy.

The free plan helps you schedule projects with up to 15 users. You can create unlimited projects and tasks and then assign them to relevant stakeholders. Then create dependencies within a task so people know when they need to work. You can view projects in both calendar and regular view.

Asana’s free version offers integrations with over 100 apps, including Microsoft Teams, Adobe Cloud, Slack, Salesforce, and more. Paid plans start at $13.49 per user per month. For this, you get premium features including task templates and the ability to set start and end dates for each task.

Coda is the most unusual tool on this list. It is a no-code document builder that lets you combine familiar document features into a single file. One document can include spreadsheets, text, charts, Kanban boards, drop-down menus, and headings.

How does this fit in with project scheduling? Well, you can use the tool to create powerful apps to manage your projects. Just add the features you need to get your work done. If you need some help, start off with one of many project templates that cover everything from task lists, to content calendars, and more.

You can also pull in data from different tools, or send the information from your doc out to other software. For example, you can set up the tool to notify people on Slack when someone completes a task. Each document is fully collaborative, so everyone in your team can work on the same one.

The free tool offers access to pretty much everything Coda has to offer. The only limit is that you can’t hide pages which means docs become complicated. You are also restricted to using 1,000 rows and up to 50 objects.

If you find this isn’t enough, you can upgrade to a paid plan for $12 per doc maker per month. The doc maker is the person who creates the document, everyone else can still collaborate on the doc for free.

TeamGantt is a tool that specializes in—you guessed it—Gantt charts. This makes breaking complex projects down into smaller steps and milestones easy. And the tool has plenty of features that help with project planning, scheduling, and management.

Why I picked TeamGantt: The tool uses a drag-and-drop interface which makes it easy to add tasks to your project. Project scheduling is as simple as adding deadlines and dependencies so you know exactly when work should be finished. Once you are set up, it’s easy to switch between Gantt, Kanban, and calendar views to get a full overview of your project.

TeamGantt Standout Features & Integrations

Features include a drag-and-drop UI, a multiple-project view, workloads, team availability, a live chat for improved collaboration, portfolio views, reports, and a dedicated mobile app.

Integrations include Basecamp, Dropbox, Slack, and thousands of additional apps using Zapier. You can also build custom integrations using its API.

TeamGantt Plans & Pricing

Pricing starts at $24 /manager/month and provides access to unlimited projects and tasks.

Clickup brands itself as a productivity platform rather than a project scheduling tool, but it has plenty of features that make it great at the latter. The free plan has rich functionality and many powerful tools.

The standout feature is the huge array of view options. The free plan gives unlimited use of list, board, table, and calendar views, as well as restricted uses of Gantt, activity, project timelines, workload, map, and mind views. It’s everything you need to schedule projects effectively.

ClickUp also has several features that make it a powerful collaboration tool. In-app email, collaborative docs, and real-time chat make working in a team easy. There’s also limited cloud storage.

Paid plans add unlimited storage, full access to integrations, and the ability to add guests with set permissions. You also get more advanced security and sign-in options. Pricing starts at $9 per member per month.

Teamwork is a powerful project management solution with plenty of advanced features on the paid plan. The free plan is more limited, but still has much to get to grips with.

Teamwork’s free plan lets you create two projects and add up to five users. You can create tasks and subtasks within each project, and then set dependencies so work gets done in the right order. Calendar, Gantt, and board views provide plenty of insight into project progression, which is great for scheduling.

Time tracking functionality is the standout feature of the free plan. You can track how long activities take manually or with a timer. It’s easy to view all this data on a timesheet, which is useful for invoicing or simply scheduling upcoming projects effectively.

While Teamwork has plenty of integrations, the free plan only offers integrations via Zapier. If you want to upgrade, paid plans start at $12.50 per user per month.