Best Free Project Management Tools in 2026
ClickUp Free Forever is the widest free plan: unlimited members and unlimited tasks, with 60MB of storage. Trello Free is $0 for up to 10 collaborators and 10 boards per Workspace. Jira Free is forever for 10 users. Asana Personal is for one or two people. Todoist Beginner is a personal list of 5 projects. The paid guide is best project management software. A stored trial flag is not the same thing as these plans: that cut is the free trial share.
Ongoing free plans for boards, tasks, and a 10-person engineering team. Trials of the paid tier are a different product.
Project Management is 217 published tools on Toolradar as of September 22, 2026. 104 of them have a free path (free, freemium, or open source). That is 48%, under the catalog-wide 55% free path (5,834 of 10,667). The shortlist below is the free path a person can actually stay on, read from the vendor page the same morning.
A free trial of a paid plan is a different offer. 2,885 listings in the whole catalog have a stored trial flag (27%), and 30% of Paid listings do. Those rates are in the free trial share. This page does not rank trials.
Top Picks
Picked by editorial review, informed by G2 and Capterra review volume and rating and by media mentions, the signals behind our category rankings. How we rate
| Tool | Starting price | Rating | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| ClickUp | Free plan | 4.3 19,870 reviews | A team that wants one workspace and can live with 60MB of files |
| Trello | From $10/mo | 4.1 37,904 reviews | A small team that thinks in lists and cards |
| Jira | From $9.05/mo | 3.6 8,109 reviews | Engineering teams under the 10-user line |
| Asana | From $10.99/mo | 4.4 27,636 reviews | A pair tracking personal projects |
| Todoist | From $8/mo | 4.6 3,494 reviews | One person with a short list of projects |
ClickUp
Top Pick- 4.6 on G2 (14,240 reviews)
- 4.6 on Capterra (4,630 reviews)
- 4.3 on TrustRadius (693 reviews)
- 3.3 on Trustpilot (287 reviews)
- 4.0 on PeerSpot (20 reviews)
A team that wants one workspace and can live with 60MB of files
- Pro: Free Forever: unlimited tasks, unlimited members, docs, and kanban, on the September 22 pricing page
- Pro: Unlimited is $7 per user per month billed yearly ($10 billed monthly), so the step up is printed
- Pro: Business is $12 billed yearly ($19 monthly) on the same page
- Con: Storage on Free Forever is 60MB. Attachments are what count, not tasks
- Con: Several views are marked Trial on the free column (Gantt, timeline, goals). A trial column is not the free plan
ClickUp is the value leader among mainstream project management tools.
Watch out
AI Super Credits run out mid-month for heavy users: Brain AI includes 1,500 credits/mo, Everything AI includes 5,000, overages at $0.001/credit add up for teams using AI Fields and Super Agents
A small team that thinks in lists and cards
- Pro: Free is $0 for up to 10 collaborators per Workspace, with unlimited cards
- Pro: Up to 10 boards, assignee and due dates, and mobile apps are on the free plan
- Pro: Standard is $5 per user per month billed annually, or $6 billed monthly
- Con: The 11th board is a paid problem. Free stops at 10 boards per Workspace
- Con: Files are 10MB each. Calendar, timeline, and dashboard views are Premium
Trello remains the simplest kanban board on the market, and its pricing reflects that simplicity.
Watch out
Butler automation on Free (250 runs/mo) depletes fast, a single rule on a busy board with 10 card moves/day burns 300 runs in a month, forcing an upgrade or disabling automations entirely
Engineering teams under the 10-user line
- Pro: The pricing page says Free forever for 10 users
- Pro: Structured data on that page lists Standard at $7.91 per user per month
- Pro: It is the backlog tool, not a personal to-do list
- Con: The 11th user leaves the free plan
- Con: Heavier than a board if the work is not issues and sprints
Jira is the default tool for software development teams, and its pricing is among the most competitive in enterprise software.
Watch out
Storage limits: Free gets 2GB total. Standard gets 250GB. For teams storing attachments and test artifacts, Standard's 250GB can fill in 2-3 years. Premium gets 'unlimited' but has fair-use policies
A pair tracking personal projects
- Pro: Personal is described for one or two people, with unlimited tasks and projects
- Pro: List, board, and calendar views are on that plan
- Pro: File cap on the description we fetched is 100MB per file, with unlimited storage
- Con: Two people is the shape of the plan. A team of ten is not Personal
- Con: Timeline, Gantt, and forms sit on Starter, above Personal
Asana is the structured project management tool for teams that need goals, portfolios, and workflow automation, not just task boards.
Watch out
Starter caps automation at 250 runs/month across the entire workspace, a single daily rule on 10 boards burns through this in 25 days, forcing an upgrade to Advanced at 2.3x the price
One person with a short list of projects
- Pro: Beginner includes 5 personal projects, list and board layouts, and reminders
- Pro: 5 people can be on a personal project
- Pro: File uploads on Beginner are 5MB, against 100MB on Pro and Business
- Con: Five projects is the wall. The page prints 300 on Pro
- Con: A team workspace is a Business feature. Beginner is not that
Todoist's pricing is quite generous, especially with its robust free tier offering significant functionality.
What It Is
Why It Matters
Teams pick a tracker and then discover the free plan was a trial, or that 'unlimited' stopped at storage and automation. The pages below were fetched on September 22, 2026. Where the vendor did not print a dollar, this guide does not invent one. Asana Starter and Todoist Pro are in that bucket.
Key Features to Look For
An ongoing $0 plan, not a countdown
A published seat or board cap, so you know when the plan breaks
Tasks or cards that do not meter the core object
A paid step whose price is on the same page, when the vendor prints it
A split between personal lists and a shared workspace
What to Consider
How many people. Jira Free stops at 10 users. Trello Free stops at 10 collaborators per Workspace. Asana Personal is one or two people. ClickUp Free Forever says unlimited members.
What is actually unlimited. ClickUp tasks are unlimited and storage is 60MB. Trello cards are unlimited and boards stop at 10, with 10MB per file.
Whether you need a software backlog. Jira Free is the engineering pick under 10 users. Trello is the board. Todoist Beginner is a personal list.
The paid price, only when the page prints it. ClickUp Unlimited is $7 per user per month billed yearly. Trello Standard is $5 per user per month billed annually. Jira's page schema lists Standard at $7.91 per user per month.
Evaluation Checklist
Count the people who will be members, not guests, and compare that number to the free cap
Put one real project on the free plan and see which view is marked trial
Check storage with one attachment, not with the task count
Read the paid price on the vendor page before you assume the step up
Pricing Comparison
| Tool | Free plan | The cap that matters | Paid step we could read |
|---|---|---|---|
Free Forever | 60MB storage, 5 spaces. Tasks and members unlimited | Unlimited $7/user/mo billed yearly | |
Trello | $0 | 10 collaborators, 10 boards, 10MB per file | Standard $5/user/mo billed annually |
Jira | Free forever | 10 users | Standard $7.91/user/mo in the page schema |
Asana | Personal | 1 or 2 people | Starter price not printed on the fetch |
Todoist | Beginner | 5 personal projects, 5 people per project | Pro price not printed on the fetch |
Vendor pages fetched September 22, 2026. Asana and Todoist paid dollars are omitted because the fetch did not print them.
Mistakes to Avoid
Expert Tips
- →
- →
Keep the paid project-management guide for when the free cap is the point, not the starting point
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If you need the trial rate rather than the free plan, read the free trial report. It is a catalog flag, not these five pages
Red Flags to Watch For
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A countdown where the page promised a forever plan
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Unlimited tasks paired with a storage cap you only notice after the files are in
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A review that quotes a Starter or Pro price the vendor page did not show
The Bottom Line
For a team that wants to stay on $0, start with ClickUp. For a simple board under 10 people and 10 boards, use Trello. For software work under 10 users, use Jira. Asana Personal is a pair. Todoist Beginner is a personal list. Paid prices are printed here only when the vendor page printed them on September 22, 2026.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best free project management tool?
Is the free plan a trial?
Not on this page. ClickUp calls it Free Forever. Jira's page says free forever for 10 users. Trello Free is $0 with a board cap, and Trello also offers a separate Premium trial. The catalog-wide trial flag is the free trial share.
How much is Trello if we outgrow Free?
Standard is $5 per user per month billed annually, or $6 billed monthly. Premium is $10 billed annually, or $12.50 billed monthly. Enterprise is $17.50 per user per month billed annually. Fetched from trello.com/pricing on September 22, 2026.
Why is there no Asana Starter price?
The pricing page fetched on September 22 described Personal, Starter, and Advanced, and it did not print a Starter dollar in the text we received. Inventing one would be worse than leaving the cell blank.
Cite this page: Toolradar, "Best Free Project Management Tools in 2026", updated September 2026, https://toolradar.com/guides/best-free-project-management-tools
Sources
Prices and plan details on this page come from each vendor's own pricing page, re-checked by the Toolradar pricing tracker:
- ClickUp pricing, checked
- Trello pricing, checked
- Jira pricing, checked
- Asana pricing, checked
- Todoist pricing, checked
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