Best Workflow Automation Software Shortlist
Here’s my list of the best workflow automation software:
Our one-on-one guidance will help you find the perfect fit.
Managing complex projects manually soon becomes overwhelming. You make mistakes, miss necessary steps, and your team members get lost and confused in the resulting mess. That’s no way to run a business. Fortunately, workflow automation software is here to help.
Workflow automation software uses rule-based logic to run sequences of tasks without human intervention. You set up the rules once, and then the software takes care of getting things done. All you have to do is sit back, monitor progress, and hope you didn't mess up any of the steps, or it will need your intervention.
What is workflow automation software?
Workflow automation software is a digital low-code solution that allows you to automate tasks and usually includes:
- An automation builder with drag-and-drop capabilities
- A notification system that can be set to in-app information displays or email alerts
- A list of triggers that you can use to make decisions within a flow
- Audit trails so you can review the steps that were taken on each flow
Overviews Of The Best Workflow Automation Software
Here’s a brief description of each workflow automation solution to showcase each tool’s best use case and noteworthy features.
monday.com
Best for PMOs looking to standardize processes
monday.com is a work management platform that has an automation module that helps you be more productive at work. The workflow automation features cut out repetitive tasks and ensure that your processes become standardized.
Why I picked monday.com: You've seen how many ads are out there talking about this tool. Well, let me tell you that not all their money goes into advertising as the automations in this platform are exquisitely developed. The automations builder is extremely easy to use and will let you build dozens of automations in minutes. You can either build automations from scratch or select one of the many automation templates available in the platform. These automations go beyond the tool and extend to other tools it integrates with, like Slack or Clearbit.
What I like the most is that these automations are not exclusive to one of their products. You will find this in all three versions of monday.com (work, dev, and sales).
monday.com Standout Features & Integrations
Features like the notifications panel gather alerts triggered by automations so you can stay on top of the creation of a new project or an assignee changing within a task. I also like the way the no-code builder is programmed. This makes it very easy to select a trigger, and use dropdowns to select the conditions and the action that will result from it.
Integrations include project management apps like Slack, Google Drive, Gmail, Typeform, Trello, Twilio, Google Calendar, Jira, GitHub, Trello, Dropbox, and Typeform. There are also thousands of additional apps you can connect to using a paid Zapier account.
Pros
- Easy to create notification flows
- Long list of supported integrations
- Easy to customize a workflow or board
Cons
- May be too robust for small teams
- Complex pricing rubric
Pneumatic Workflow
Best for building a workflow template library
Pneumatic is a workflow management software that allows you to build and automate workflows for your business processes. You can organize your workflows into templates for easier reproduction and quicker creation in the future.
Why I picked Pneumatic Workflow: The software's workflow builder can be used to create any task or workflow you need for your team. You can establish pre-defined variables like names, assignees, descriptions, and required policies or standard operating procedures (SOPs). Once you've built a workflow template, the dashboards help you track what's progress, started, and completed.
You can include external parties in your workflow, and easily invite guests by email. Admins can also use the workflow management software to configure role-based access permissions for individual staff members and teams. You can generate filtered and customized reports to understand your workflow performance, and receive weekly process summaries.
Pneumatic Workflow Standout Features & Integrations
Features include templates, unlimited workflows, external guests, kick-off forms that you can publicly share, conditional workflow logic, and granular access controls.
Integrations can be built with the system's API, or configured by connecting either Zapier or Make.
Height
Best for agencies to manage projects across different teams
Height is a flexible and inclusive project management tool that can be shared across the entire organization. It enables you to effectively centralize your workspace, allowing every team member and stakeholder to work together, share information, submit work requests, and keep track of tasks together.
Why I picked Height: Height offers no-code automations to help with repetitive and time-consuming tasks. While it’s still in beta release, the automations feature is tailored to facilitate robust multi-step workflows. You can use the tool to create complex workflows with as many triggers, actions, and filters as you want.
Height app users can also run live brainstorming sessions with team members, key stakeholders, and clients to cook up and record new ideas, solutions, project proposals for key products and services. The app also offers reusable templates or premade to-do lists that can be used for marketing events, product launches, and new hire onboarding with just a few clicks.
Height Standout Features & Integrations
Features include the task management solution which allows you to plan, organize, and manage tasks and projects in one location. It will serve as a hub for team members working on the same project, where they will find their assigned tasks, share documents, and work together as a productive unit. Additionally, the roadmaps feature lets you plan, visualize, and share your vision for the product or upcoming project over a period of time.
Integrations include GitHub, GitLab, Notion, Discord, Sentry, Zendesk, Slack, Discord, Figma, Slab, and Fivetran. You can access additional integrations through a paid account with Zapier.
Pros
- Guest account permissions
- macOS and Windows apps
- Request collection through forms
Cons
- Automations is still in Beta testing
- Relatively new in the market
SysAid
Best for ITSM workflow automation
SysAid is a service desk and IT service management (ITSM) software that is designed to help businesses streamline their IT services and manage workflows more efficiently. It's includes a fairly comprehensive set of tools, including incident and request management tools, problem and change management tools, and IT asset management tools.
Why I picked SysAid: SysAid is both extremely customizable and scalable, meaning you can customize it to fit your business needs, whether you're a small startup or a large corporation. It's workflow automation system additionally incorporates AI and machine learning features to help identify patterns and proactively take action, such as assigning tickets to the most appropriate support agent or escalate issues as needed. SysAid also allows you to manage your IT assets throughout their lifecycle using barcode scanning, streamlining the asset management process and improving accuracy.
SysAid standout features and integrations:
Features include self-service incident management and ticket tracking, which allows users to view the the status of their submitted service requests and incidents through a self-service portal. This transparency and real-time visibility into ticket status help users stay informed and ensure that their issues are being addressed in a timely manner. SysAid also incorporates gamification elements into its platform to enhance user engagement and increase productivity, foster teamwork, and create a sense of accomplishment among IT staff.
Integrations include Slack, Jira, Microsoft Teams, Nagios, SolarWinds, Zabbix, ServiceNow, TeamViewer, Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP), and Active Directory (AD)
Jotform Enterprise
Best enterprise workflow automation with approval & e-signature tools
Jotform Enterprise provides a powerful, easy-to-use data collection process for businesses of all kinds who are looking to optimize their workflow automation processes. With Jotform, businesses will have access to offline forms, surveys for product feedback and reviews, collaboration tools, approvals for automated workflows, and conditional logic for a personalized customer form experience. They specialize in B2B businesses but can be adapted to a wide range of customer markets and industries.
Why I picked Jotform Enterprise: Jotform Enterprise's flexibility allows you to build complex systems that are tailored specifically to your needs. Jotform offers an easy-to-use form builder that allows you to quickly create forms for any purpose, from collecting customer information to helping employees to track their progress on projects. The form builder includes hundreds of customizable templates that can be used as a starting point for creating your forms. You can create an order form that integrates with a payment processing service or set up an automated system that sends out email notifications when someone fills out a form.
Jotform Enterprise Standout Features & Integrations
Features include powerful analytics tools that allow users to monitor how customers interact with forms in real time. This includes tracking page views, submission times, and abandonment rates. With this data, users can identify areas where customers are dropping off or struggling with the form process so they can make improvements accordingly.
Another thing I really like about this tool is that you can host it in almost any place you can think of. The beauty of this is that you can easily comply with local regulations relating to data privacy.
Integrations include Google Drive, Google Sheets, Slack, Dropbox, PayPal, Stripe, Salesforce, Mailchimp, and Airtable. It also can integrate with Zapier to automate workflows and connect JotForm with over 1,000 other apps and services but this requires a Zapier account and may incur additional costs.
Next Matter
Best for handling complex, cross-functional workflows
Next Matter is the platform for capturing and automating a business’s high-impact workflows – no matter how unique or complex. It accomplishes that by offering workflow builders all the custom tools required to mirror complex workflows to the exact specifications of the business, as well as a no-code management and optimization experience for teams looking to scale up.
Why I picked Next Matter: Next Matter offers the reliability and performance of custom code, with the speed and flexibility of no-code – so complex workflows can be ready for go-live in just hours. The no-code building blocks are easy-to-use and cover an enormous range of operational functions and use cases, and advanced Builders can use low-code blocks to craft custom activities for everything else.
Next Matter’s no-code workflow management experience is equally impressive. The platform provides managers with full operational transparency and the ability to track workflow status at high and granular levels, in real-time. Managers and executives alike can use powerful reporting and analytics to spot improvement opportunities, and optimize workflows on the fly.
Lastly, Next Matter engages end users – employees, suppliers, customers, and more – with delightful, personalized experiences that reduce coordination friction and cognitive load. If you’re ready to bring reliable automation and scalability to your most complex workflows, and you’re looking to see real results fast, check out Next Matter.
Next Matter Standout Features & Integrations
Features include no-code / low-code tools and custom building blocks to recreate, launch, and optimize workflows, an all-in-one workspace for workflow orchestration, external steps, granular permissions and visibility controls, custom workflows triggers, advanced workflow logic, and more.
Integrations out-of-the-box include Slack, GSuite, Office 365, Sendgrid, Hubspot, Zendesk and many others, while an API can be used to connect custom apps, databases, and more.
Pricing:
14-day free trial
From $20/user/month (minimum 50 users)
Qntrl
Best to establish accountability across processes
Qntrl is an advanced workflow orchestration software that improves productivity and efficiency in the workplace. At its core, it automates processes across different applications to reduce manual data entry and speed up workflows.
Why I picked Qntrl: The software provides a unified platform that can integrate with existing systems, eliminating the need for multiple tools or applications to create automations. It allows you to create automated processes quickly and easily without extensive technical expertise or coding knowledge. You can create workflows that are triggered by events or conditions, making it easy to customize the process based on preferences. You can even set up automated responses when certain conditions are met, or an event occurs.
Qntrl Standout Features & Integrations
Features that caught my attention were the ones related to the granular control over processes. I was especially surprised by the fact that I can assign who is responsible for each step of a process. Additionally, you can gain better insights into your operations via native data collection and analysis capabilities. The software collects data from various sources, such as web forms, customer feedback, and social media posts and then analyzes it using machine learning algorithms that automatically populate the system to use within workflows.
Integrations include applications such as Salesforce, Dropbox, MS Teams, Harvest, Google Sheets, and Slack. You can also create as many custom integrations as you want using Webhooks and its API.
DocuWare
Best to workflow automation tool to streamline document storage & management
DocuWare is a powerful workflow automation software solution used to streamline business processes.
Why I picked DocuWare: It provides users with the tools they need to create automated workflows, helping them increase their efficiency and reduce costs. This cloud-based document management system offers features like drag-and-drop functionality, real-time collaboration capabilities, and secure access control.
Not only does DocuWare enable businesses to automate tedious tasks such as document routing, approvals, and notifications; but it also helps eliminate manual errors associated with paper processing. Moreover, the platform’s mobile app allows employees to stay connected whenever they’re on the go – providing them access to all the essential documents needed for their job from any device or location. With its customizable options, users can easily create rules for specific types of documents and automate their entire workflow process in no time.
DocuWare Standout Features & Integrations
Features include intelligent indexing, forms for data capture, barcode recognition, file import, documents from MS Teams, and indexing data export.
Integrations include over 500 different applications across email, team portals, CRM, ERP, HR systems, including Microsoft Dynamics, Sage, QuickBooks, and SAP.
DocuWare offers pricing upon request. They have a 30-day free trial and free demo to get you started.
Camunda Platform
Best for modeling and deploying diagrams with BPMN & DMN
Camunda is a process orchestration solution that is mainly designed for end-to-end automation. It is an open-source workflow automation software solution that provides users with a simple yet highly intuitive drag-and-drop process builder. This feature makes the platform flexible enough for a wide variety of use cases.
Why I picked Camunda: This software is used by different types of businesses, ranging from media and entertainment to financial services. The solution is also robust enough to facilitate endpoint diversity, meaning it can be utilized to implement various automation solutions across multiple possible endpoints. This includes different devices and systems, as well as key human resources.
In addition, Camunda is designed to handle complex logic with branching. It features advanced workflow patterns that enable technical and non-technical users to collaborate and design complex business processes and automated workflows.
Camunda has dynamic parallel execution as well, which allows for the organization and optimization of multiple tasks simultaneously. Camunda is powered by Zeebe’s cloud-native workflow and decision engine. This enables dev teams to automate workflows and processes at scale with efficiency and speed. Zeebe is the workflow and decision engine that powers the latest iteration of the software; i.e., the Camunda Platform 8.
Camunda Standout Features & Integrations
Features include workflow management, BPMN modeling, automations, task management, process monitoring, user management, and third-party integrations/add-ons.
Integrations include Salesforce, Microsoft Dynamics, SAP, Oracle, Microsoft SharePoint, Alfresco, Apache Kafka, RabbitMQ, MySQL, PostgreSQL, Microsoft SQL Server, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform (GCP), Signavio, Bizagi, and ProcesMaker.
Camunda is free for up to five modeling users.
Adobe Workfront
Workflow automation built for enterprise-scale organizations
Now an Adobe company, Workfront aims to unlock organizational productivity at the enterprise level.
Why I picked Adobe Workfront: The process management software prioritizes requests, assigns work to teams, and automates approvals. From onboarding to delivery, digital assets are automatically built, reviewed, approved, and tagged to associated projects.
Workfront simplifies digital reviews and approvals, as well as providing real-time status updates. It accelerates content delivery by surfacing the correct information and tying project information to assets and social media.
Wrike Standout Features & Integrations
Features include pre-built templates, custom request forms, interactive Gantt charts, visual proofing, workflow automations, time tracking, project portfolio management, and dashboards.
Integrations. Wrike offers 400+ pre-built native integrations, including the most popular file management software from Microsoft, Google, and Dropbox, along with sales and marketing software from Salesforce and Marketo, and creative apps from Adobe.
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The 10 Best Workflow Automation Software Comparison Chart
This comparison chart summarizes basic details about each of my top workflow automation software selections. You can view pricing details and the availability of free trials or demos side-by-side to help you find the best platform that works for your budget.
Tool | Free Option | Price | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
1 | monday.com Best for PMOs looking to standardize processes | 14-day free trial + free plan available | From $8/user/month (billed annually, min 3 seats) | Visit Website |
2 | Pneumatic Workflow Best for building a workflow template library | 14-day free trial + free plan available | From $99 /month (unlimited users) | Visit Website |
3 | Height Best for agencies to manage projects across different teams | 30-day free trial | From $8.50/user/month | Visit Website |
4 | SysAid Best for ITSM workflow automation | 30-day free trial | $1,211 for 500 assets | Visit Website |
5 | Jotform Enterprise Best enterprise workflow automation with approval & e-signature tools | Free plan available | Pricing upon request | Visit Website |
6 | Next Matter Best for handling complex, cross-functional workflows | 14-day free trial | From $20/user/month (maximum 50 users) | Visit Website |
7 | Qntrl Best to establish accountability across processes | 15-day free trial | $8/user/month | Visit Website |
8 | DocuWare Best to workflow automation tool to streamline document storage & management | 30-day free trial + free demo | Pricing upon request | Visit Website |
9 | Camunda Platform Best for modeling and deploying diagrams with BPMN & DMN | 30-day free trial | From $49/month | Visit Website |
10 | Adobe Workfront Workflow automation built for enterprise-scale organizations | Free demo available | Pricing upon request | Visit Website |
Other Workflow Automation Options
Here are a few tools that did not make it to the top but are worth your consideration.
- Boomi Flow
Low-code workflow automation
- ClickUp
Best to create shared workflows with external apps
- Assembly
Save time with 100s of customizable templates, automate any task, and get real-time insights
- Smartsheet
A dynamic workspace with advanced workflow automation features
- Wrike
Best for scaling organizations
- Jira Software
Best workflow solutions for agile teams
- Kissflow Workflow
Best no-code workflow automation software with a template bank
- Hive
Best workflow automation software for beginners
- Integrify
Best workflow automation software that helps you scale easily
- Kantata
Workflow automation tools for professional services organizations
- Kissflow
An end-to-end workflow platform offering painless inter-process integrations
Selection Criteria For Workflow Automation Software
In picking the best workflow automation tool, I first researched the most popular software on the market for its reviews and user interface. Then I shortlisted based on factors that make software a good automation tool for any team. Finally, I used my experience in project automation to select the criteria by which I would evaluate the tools and inform my overviews.
Core Features
This is the core functionality that each tool needed to be considered for my list:
- Process design and modeling: Users can create, visualize, and map out their existing processes or design new ones.
- Integration capabilities: well-implemented connections to apps such as ERP, CRM, document management and calendars.
- Conditional Logic: The ability to incorporate conditional statements and decision points within workflows, allowing for dynamic routing based on specific criteria.
Key Features
- An intuitive drag-and-drop interface: deploying easy-to-understand solutions such as drag-and-drop designs, pre-built reports, customizable templates, and simple dashboards is crucial for a user-friendly automation platform.
- Flexible visual workflows: allowing users to choose the view that suits them best, from Kanban boards to workflow diagrams.
- Automatic processes: reducing manual input and human errors through automatic status updates, business process automation, task assignments, API calls, etc.
- Comprehensive notifications: reminders sent via email, text, or within the platform to notify team members of pending tasks and approvals.
- Audit trails: predefined rules for dealing with issues and tracking the actions taken.
- Role-based access control: provisioning permissions and access levels according to employee job function and requirements.
- KPI-focused reports: feedback based on key performance indicators to ensure that priority issues get the attention they deserve.
- Status indicators: identifying issues that need attention, problems in the workflow, and oversights that need correction.
- A cloud-based solution: taking advantage of cloud implementation to enable access from anywhere, lower costs, and reduced risk of data loss.
Usability
I focus on all the ways in which the software helps you automate a manual process. This includes the use of a drag-and-drop builder
User Interface (UI)
I look for workflow management tools that are visually attractive. Building workflow automations requires concentration, and you don't need a tool that requires brain power to figure it out.
Integrations
I look for integrations with popular productivity apps and business tools. This includes built-in integrations with common apps like Google Drive or Slack, integrations through 3rd party software like Zapier, and custom integrations.
Pricing
I look for workflow automation that’s affordable, even for small businesses. Therefore, I look at the paid plans and include information on tool pricing based on monthly payments, free trials, demos and any information I find useful for you.
Workflow Automation FAQs
Find answers to common questions about this topic.
What is a workflow?
What is workflow automation?
Why is workflow automation important?
What is an example of workflow automation?
What other tools have workflow automation?
How do I automate my workflows?

What's Next?
If you want to dig deeper into the logic behind workflow automation tools, I suggest you read our ultimate guide on workflows and workflow diagrams for project managers.
Related tool lists:
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