The 10 Easiest Project Management Software In 2023

monday.com is so popular that I had to bring it into this list. If I’m being honest, the platform has so many features and customization options that it was difficult to intuitively build this project. To prevent your suffering, here is my suggestion. First, stay away from the Gantt view.

What you can do: Use the main table view to build out your initial project draft, exchange the date column for the one named ‘timeline’ so you can track a date range, and make sure you click on the checkboxes when selecting dependencies (you’ll know when you see it). If you click anywhere other than the checkbox it will take you to the dependencies of another task.

Intuitive score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Documentation: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Overall score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

monday.com’s integrations include project management apps like Slack, Google Drive, Gmail, Google Calendar, Zoho project, GitHub, Trello, Dropbox, Typeform, and many more, accessible through a paid plan with Zapier.

monday.com is free for up to 2 users and paid plans start at $8/user/month.

Wrike is a work management platform that offers intuitive navigation with distinct Spaces, folders, and tasks, which you can customize however you like and collaborate in real-time while sharing workflows, calendars, and more.

Wrike offers a user-friendly experience with advanced customization capabilities, which makes it better suited for experienced PMs, as building projects can get confusing without prior experience. My recommendation is you start a project using the List view because I found it easier to lay out the tasks and subtasks there than in the Gantt view.

As I was creating my tasks, I also noticed that Wrike places the last item I created on top of the list, which is counterintuitive to how I define tasks in a project. Changing the filters did not help to solve it.

Intuitive score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Documentation: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Overall score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

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 for up to 5 users. Paid plans cost from $9.80/user/month and come with a 14-day free trial.

Projects is Zoho’s cloud-based project management software. It is designed to help project managers create and implement project plans, keep track of workflows, and collaborate with their team. It is a key component of Zoho One, a fully integrated suite that encompasses all the products offered by Zoho.

One of Zoho Projects’ main features is task management. With Zoho’s task management solution, users can easily manage projects at any scale or complexity. The tool works by allowing users to break down projects into simple tasks, subtasks, task lists, and milestones. They can visualize their project plans and keep track of their progress more efficiently through Kanban boards and Gantt charts. This makes setting up dependencies between related tasks much easier for everyone involved, especially when trying to make sure that everyone remains on schedule.

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.

Intuitive score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Documentation: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Overall score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

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 Projects is completely free for up to three users, while the Premium option starts at $5/user/month and offers a 10-day free trial.

Paymo is a tool I’d never used before but heard about, so I was excited to give it a try. I can tell you that navigating the tool was intuitive and I was able to see how they connect project management to client management and resource allocation.

To build your project properly, start at the list view and make sure you clear the default filters that are activated in this view. Once you create your tasks and select dates, switch to the Gantt view where you can finish establishing dependencies with their drag-and-drop functionality.

Intuitive score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Documentation: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Overall score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Paymo integrations include Google products, Slack, Xero, and thousands of other 3rd party software through Zapier.

Paymo is free for personal use. Paid plans start at $4.95/user/month and have a 15-day trial.

Trello is the project collaboration tool of the Atlassian software portfolio. I’ve used Trello in the past and I was excited to try out their new Timeline, Calendar, and Table views as part of their premium plan. However, I was not impressed.

Every friendly bit those cards have in the Kanban view is lacking in the other three. It was hard to build the project and I ended up using the cards to build my task list. After color coding milestones, I discovered that it wasn’t visually translating to the other views! Finally, there is a lack of built-in dependency management.

Intuitive score: ⭐️⭐️

Documentation: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Overall score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Trello integrates with more than 200+ apps and tools your team depends on like Slack, Google workspace, Salesforce, Dropbox and more directly into your Trello boards. (Note: Some connections require an additional subscription fee.)

Trello has a free plan and paid ones start at $5/user/month with a 14-day trial.

ProjectManager at first glance is a tool which looks like MS Project, so immediately there’s a familiar feeling and intuitiveness to building the project. My learning curve steepened once I got to setting dependencies as this software does not have drag-and-drop for it.

In an attempt to give you flexibility to connect tasks, ProjectManager establishes relationships with the fields ‘assign to’ and ‘assign from’ instead of predecessor, which we are used to. My recommendation: when you link tasks, select the predecessor and use the ‘link to’ option to avoid errors.

Intuitive score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Documentation: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Overall score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

ProjectManager integrates with MS Project, Excel, Office 365, Salesforce CRM, QuickBooks, Xero, Dropbox, Desk.com, JIRA, Hubspot, Slack, Zendesk, Evernote, OneLogin, OneDrive, and the complete Google Suite. They also have a powerful REST API to help you build against internal or external tools.

ProjectManager has a free plan for up to 3 users. Paid plans start at $11.50/user/month and have a 30-day trial.

Hive is an incredibly intuitive tool. Took me 5 minutes to get this done from their Gantt view. They don’t have a list view, so if you are used to that, you may have some difficulty using it.

Note: dependencies are not enabled by default. To enable it go to the apps menu and toggle dependencies on.

I’ve mentioned before that I Iove how playful it feels to use this software. If you go to the apps menu you will see there are tons of features developed for it that just haven’t been turned on. They provide you with the starter version of the app and you do the rest. Easy!

Intuitive score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Documentation: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Overall score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Hive integrates with Google Drive, MS Teams, Slack, Salesforce, Jira, and many more via a paid plan through Zapier.

Hive is free for up to 2 users. Paid plans cost from $12/user/month and come with a 14-day free trial.

Starting as an open source project, ActiveCollab has been in the market for over a decade. Although not one of the top contenders in productivity tools, this product checks all the boxes for this list.

After using it for a few minutes, it was clear to me that this is a friendly interface. The layout is consistent throughout the different modules, which makes it easy to find your way around it. With a list, column, and timeline view, it has all the necessary ingredients for you to bake your next project.

Intuitive score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Documentation: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Overall score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

They have a free plan and their paid plans start at $6.25/user/month with a 14-day free trial.

Xebrio is a SaaS-based project management software designed to help businesses of all sizes manage the entire lifecycle of their project development process. The main goal is to deliver end-to-end solutions within a unified platform, or in this case, a unified portal that serves as a collaborative workspace for you and your team members.

Xebrio is not just a project management software; it also includes requirements management, task management, bug tracking, and milestone tracking capabilities. Because of this, the tool allows you to involve stakeholders in the collection, creation, and formalization of project requirements, and keep track of the requirements changes via a feedback loop that ensures transparency and traceability.

The task management feature allows your team to monitor all of their to-do lists—as well as the derivatives of their project requirements—efficiently.

Intuitive score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Documentation: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Overall score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

The milestone tracking feature provides project managers the option to go with a milestone-oriented delivery approach, which involves delivering tasks and other project-related work in chunks. They have the ability to map out critical deliverables to project requirements, available tasks and subtasks, as well as bugs, and then monitor them more effectively.

TeamGantt has all you need to build the basic structure of a project from one view: Gantt. Call it nostalgia, but I like building my projects from this view because it reminds me of my days using MS Project. However, TeamGantt delivered what I needed and more!

Build your tasks on the left-hand pane and assign them to people or tags if you’re not sure who will be working on it. Click on the right-hand pane to start a timeline and drag to extend its duration. Create dependencies by dragging your pointer between tasks. Finally, color-code your tasks so you can later use them as a filter.

Intuitive score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Documentation: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Overall score: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

TeamGantt integrates natively with Slack, Trello, and Dropbox; offers additional API integrations; and connects to hundreds of other apps using a paid Zapier account.

TeamGantt is free for up to 3 users. Paid plans start at $19.90/user/month with a 30-day trial.