10 Best Project Management Software For Startups [2023]

monday.com may seem like the most popular project management software that players in the big leagues use today. Though that is mostly true, monday.com is also one of the most helpful tools startup teams should consider implementing early on so that they can eventually join the bigger players. As a bonus, monday.com is easy to set up and we know how important it is to stay on track on all of your projects as you grow.

monday.com knows how important collaboration is for creative teams so it lets you connect in a variety of different ways without ever leaving the platform: commenting, file attachment, @-tagging, “liking” posts, and assigning tasks with point-and-click ease. You can also build team-specific dashboards and project boards so that everyone can easily see what is being worked on.

monday.com integrates with the tools you already know and love, making the transition for your startup team hassle free. Integrations include project management apps like Slack, Google Drive, Gmail, Google Calendar, Jira, GitHub, Trello, Dropbox, Typeform and many more, accessible through a paid plan with Zapier.

monday.com costs from $6/user/month and comes with a free 14-day trial. They offer a free plan for up to 2 users.

Wrike is a project management solution that lets users customize workflows, set timelines by creating Gantt charts, prioritize important tasks with a pin feature, collaborate with proofing and approving features, and track time within the platform.

Wrike has a free plan for unlimited users...and that includes at least 20 external collaborators! Collaborators are a user type in Wrike that can be assigned to contractors or stakeholders that may not be a part of your core team. They will have access to the “My To-do” tab and the Wrike inbox, plus they can create tasks, folders, projects, and spaces. As an account owner, you’ll be able to limit what they can and cannot see.

Wrike offers 400+ pre-built native integrations, including integrations with the most popular file management software from Microsoft, Google, and Dropbox, along with sales and marketing software from Salesforce and Marketo.

Wrike is free to use for unlimited users with some feature restrictions. Paid plans cost from $9.80/user/month with a 14-day free trial. Plans come with free collaborator seats at 20 collaborator invites or 15% of your license count, whichever is greater.

Height is the all-in-one project management tool that can be used by startups to accommodate workflows on a team-by-team basis and includes unlimited members, guests, and tasks in its free plan.

Height offers different ways to visualize your data, like Gantt charts, spreadsheet, calendar, and kanban boards. Another nice feature is real-time chat per task, which ensures that all conversation about work happens in context, is searchable, and only notifies the people for whom the info is relevant.

Its robust offering includes a command menu from which you can customize keyboard shortcuts for almost anything you can think of, macOS and Windows apps, and SOC 2 Type II compliance for data protection.

Integrations include Notion, Slack, Discord, GitHub, GitLab, Sentry, Zendesk, Figma, Slab, Fivetran, and many more through Zapier.

Height's pricing starts at $6.99/user/month and comes with a free 30-day trial. One last thing, guest accounts are free in all paid plans.

ClickUp is a project management software that sits at the top of many lists. Full of features and with an incredible free version, this tool has what all startups need: great functionality at a low or non-existent price

Collaborative docs will help you create your one pager, investor documents, and partner agreements. Whiteboards can help you brainstorm ideas on a new product. Their in-app chat will keep your comms fresh and without needing to buy another software or relying on instant messaging platforms.

Bonus: If you need more than the 100MB storage limit on the free version, you can get the small team plan and even negotiate the price by letting them know how much you are willing to pay per user.

ClickUp offers native integrations with Slack, G Suite, Dropbox, and many more tools, as well as over 1,000+ integrations through Zapier.

ClickUp is free with limited storage for an unlimited number of users. Paid plans start at $5/user/month and offer a free-trial.

Zoho Projects is an online project management tool that lets teams plan, track, and collaborate on project work. The tool is scalable for startups and small businesses.

Zoho Projects allows users to set up project plans, as well as create and assign ad-hoc tasks across the team. The tool also includes features like flexible work hours, baselines, and critical paths in Gantt charts, team based work allocation, and task reminders. Time tracking and resource utilization features help managers ensure that employees are not over or under worked.

Users can automate task transitions and workflows, track activities and progress by using the advanced reports, and manage budgets with expense management features. Collaboration features include team-wide and individual discussion management, a meeting tab to facilitate virtual meetings, a social feed to interact with and keep track of all your project activities, a forum to discuss ideas and solutions, and a central document management module to manage all information. Mobile applications are also available.

Zoho Projects has several integrations with Zoho apps like Zoho CRM, Zoho Cliq, Zoho Meeting, as well as with other third party apps like Microsoft Office 365, Microsoft Teams, Google Drive, Zapier, Zendesk, and ServiceNow.

Zoho Projects offers a free plan as well as a 10-day free trial for paid editions, which start at $4 per user per month.

Forecast is a project management software for startups that unites your projects, resources, and financials in one AI-powered platform. Project managers can leverage Forecast’s workflow automation capabilities to create smart schedules, estimate timeframes and budgets, and populate timesheets instantly. Forecast is currently used in over 40 countries by an assortment of agencies, consulting companies, SMBs, and enterprises.

PMs can control the workflow by building out detailed task lists and flagging clear priorities. Task cards allow every team member to easily comment, share files, and register time spent. Everything related to the specific task appears in one place, including dependencies and subtasks. You can put together projects for any type of work: fixed price, time and material, or retainer.

Forecast’s AI learns from previous work and suggests the number of hours you normally register on similar tasks to help you log time faster. You can monitor time registrations from a team perspective and notify each member if they forget to enter something in. Time tracking utilization on a company-wide level is calculated for you for easy alerts, estimates, and reporting.

Forecast integrates with Slack, Microsoft Teams, iCloud Calendar, Google Drive, Google Calendar, Outlook, Harvest, Trello, Asana, GitLab, Github, and dozens more using a paid plan through Zapier. Higher-tier subscriptions include native integrations with Timelog, Xero, QuickBooks Online, JIRA, Azure DevOps, Salesforce, Okta, OneLogin, and Azure Active Directory.

Forecast cost from $29/user/month with a minimum of 10 users and offers a 14-day free trial.

Trello is a project management solution that is most known for its Kanban boards. It offers startup teams a comprehensive tool that can be quickly set up and understood with its intuitive drag-and-drop interface for customizing boards and a no-code workflow automation builder. Their free plan lets you run 250 automated command runs per month, which is noteworthy because many PM tools limit automations to paid subscription plans. Startups take note!

Trello is great for startup teams thanks to a feature-packed free plan that Kanban board cheerleaders in particular will appreciate. You get unlimited cards, unlimited members, up to 10 boards per workspace, a list of free integrations with other PM tools (Google Drive, Slack, etc.), unlimited activity logs, mobile app access, and 2-factor authentication for log-ins.

Trello integrates with Confluence, Slack, Dropbox, Google Drive, Evernote, and other third-party apps you typically find in a modern tech stack.

Trello is free to use. Paid plans cost from $5/user/month and come with a 14-day free trial.

Freedcamp is a project management software that comes with something that most startups today consider as the industry standard: a robust mobile app that’s available on iOS and Android. This means that startups without an office or with limited available computers can access project management data on their personal smartphone device or tablet.

Freedcamp lets users save passwords, create invoices, back up and edit files—all this on top of the project templates, CRM features, and white labeling capabilities you would expect from a solid project management tool. Freedcamp also has calendars, discussion boards, milestones, a team/process wiki builder, issue tracking, and a time tracker too.

Freedcamp integrates with thousands of solutions through Zapier (which requires a separate paid plan of its own).

Freedcamp is free to use with some feature limitations. Their paid plans cost from $1.49/user/month, which you can try through their 14-day free trial.

Asana is a popular project and task management tool. It has a free plan for up to 15 users that contains much Asana has to offer, although you miss out on some of the more advanced features. However, this entry level free plan is a great place for startups to jump in.

You can create unlimited projects and tasks and then assign them to up to 15 employees. It’s easy to assign due dates to each task so everyone knows when work needs to be done. Moving tasks around is easy thanks to the simple drag and drop interface.

You can create task dependencies so the right people are notified when work needs to be done. And managers can get an overview of projects in the relevant dashboard, as well as see work in both calendar and list views.

Asana also excels due to its integrations. You can integrate with over 100 different apps including Microsoft Teams, Slack, and most G Suite products. If you need more functionality, pricing for paid plans starts at $10.99 per user per month.

Asana is free to use for up to 15 collaborators.

Hubstaff Tasks is a project management software for startups with multiple task tracking and collaboration features. Its interface is based on the Kanban methodology; it lets you organize tasks in different project stages, which are represented by columns. Each task can be categorized using color-coded labels. One of its notable features is custom workflows. These let you automate assigning tasks to team members at different project stages and moving them forward with one click.

You can create checklists within each task and track them from the project view using progress bars. Files can also be attached to task cards, but the free plan only allows up to 100 MB of storage per user. Switching to the sprints view displays all your assigned tasks, organized by sprint. You can move tasks to current or future sprints or to the backlog with a drag-and-drop mechanism similar to Kanban.

Hubstaff Tasks integrates with Active Collab, Asana, Breeze, ClickUp, GitHub, GitLab, Insightly, JIRA, LiquidPlanner, Mavenlink, Paymo, PivotalTracker, Podio, Redbooth, Redmine, Teamwork Projects, Trello, Unfuddle, Wrike, Zoho Projects, Slack, Zendesk, Salesforce, QuickBooks, and other apps. You can boost your integration options with a paid plan through Zapier, unlocking hundreds of other possible connections.

Hubstaff Tasks is free for up to 5 users and 10 projects. The premium plan starts at $7/user/month and includes a 14-day free trial.