Cheapest Project Management Software in 2026
Ranked by the price you actually pay once the free plan stops being enough, not by marketing copy.
Clockify is the cheapest entry paid plan at $3.99 per seat a month, though it is a time tracker with task features bolted on rather than a full project manager. For a genuine board-and-list tool, Trello starts at $5 a user a month and Azure DevOps at $6, with the first 5 users free forever. Height ($6.99), ClickUp ($7), Todoist ($8 for Business), Shortcut ($8.50), monday.com ($9), Teamwork.com ($9.99) and Linear ($10) round out the list, all billed annually per user or seat.
Every "best project management software" list leads with feature comparisons and buries the number that actually decides the purchase: what you pay once your team outgrows the free plan. Of the 10,000+ tools Toolradar tracks, 56 in the Project Management category have verified pricing, and this guide ranks the ones with a genuinely usable paid tier by their cheapest entry price, from lowest to highest.
We pulled each tool's current pricing straight from Toolradar's own pricing data, then cross-checked every entry price against the vendor's live pricing page and used the vendor's number when the two disagreed. Prices below are per user or per seat, per month, billed annually, unless a plan is explicitly flat-rate. We also note what each free tier does and does not cover, since a plan that looks free often caps out at 2 seats or 60MB of storage before you can do real work.
Top Picks
Based on features, user feedback, and value for money.
| Tool | Starting price | Rating | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Clockify | From $3.99/mo | 4.7(9,198) | Teams that need time tracking and lightweight task management in one tool without payin... |
| Trello | From $10/mo | 4.5(36,971) | Small teams that want simple Kanban boards without a steep learning curve |
| Azure DevOps | From $6/mo | 4.3(403) | Software teams already on Microsoft infrastructure who need issue tracking tied to pipe... |
| Height | From $8.5/mo | n/a | Teams that want an autonomous AI layer handling routine project upkeep on top of standa... |
| ClickUp | Free plan | 4.3(19,403) | Teams that want tasks, docs, chat, and goals in a single tool instead of stitching seve... |
| Todoist | From $8/mo | 4.6(3,451) | Small teams and individuals who want fast, natural-language task capture without a heav... |
| Shortcut | From $8.5/mo | 4.4(175) | Engineering teams that want sprints, stories, and GitHub integration without Jira's com... |
| monday.com | Free plan | 4.7(16,800) | Teams that want a highly visual, customizable work OS across multiple departments, not... |
| Teamwork.com | From $8.99/mo | 4.4(2,017) | Agencies and services teams that bill clients and need project profitability built in f... |
| Linear | From $10/mo | n/a | Engineering teams that want a fast, opinionated issue tracker over a flexible general-p... |
Teams that need time tracking and lightweight task management in one tool without paying for a separate app
Clockify's pricing is very fair, especially with its generous free tier offering unlimited users and core tracking features.
Watch out
Monthly billing is ~25% more expensive
Small teams that want simple Kanban boards without a steep learning curve
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
Software teams already on Microsoft infrastructure who need issue tracking tied to pipelines and repos
Azure DevOps is one of the best values in DevOps platforms thanks to its generous free tier: 5 users get full Basic access free, including Repos, Boards, Pipelines, and Artifacts.
Watch out
The free tier covers only 5 Basic users. User #6 triggers $6/month per user for ALL additional Basic users, not just the 6th.
Teams that want an autonomous AI layer handling routine project upkeep on top of standard task views
Height's pricing is exceptionally generous, especially with its robust Free tier offering unlimited tasks, views, and integrations for unlimited members.
Watch out
Team tier price requires annual commitment.
Teams that want tasks, docs, chat, and goals in a single tool instead of stitching several apps together
ClickUp is the value leader among mainstream project management tools.
Watch out
AI Brain ($9/user/mo) is charged per ALL paid members in the workspace, not just AI users, a 10-person team pays $90/mo extra even if only 2 people use AI
Small teams and individuals who want fast, natural-language task capture without a heavyweight interface
Todoist's pricing is quite generous, especially with its robust free tier offering significant functionality.
Watch out
Pro tier requires annual commitment for $5/mo price.
Engineering teams that want sprints, stories, and GitHub integration without Jira's complexity
Shortcut's pricing is quite generous, especially the Free tier for up to 10 users.
Watch out
Monthly billing increases Team tier to $10/user/month.
Teams that want a highly visual, customizable work OS across multiple departments, not just engineering
monday.com sits in the sweet spot between Trello's simplicity and Asana's structure, with pricing to match.
Watch out
3-seat minimum on all paid plans: you cannot buy 1 or 2 seats. A solo user on Basic pays $27/mo ($9 × 3), not $9/mo
Agencies and services teams that bill clients and need project profitability built in from day one
Teamwork's pricing is fair, offering a generous free tier and competitive per-user pricing.
Watch out
Annual billing required for listed prices.
Engineering teams that want a fast, opinionated issue tracker over a flexible general-purpose board
Linear is the fastest, most polished issue tracker available, and its pricing is refreshingly simple.
Watch out
250-issue cap on Free: once you hit 250 active issues, you must upgrade or archive old issues. Growing teams hit this within 2-3 months of real usage
Other Project Management worth considering
Beyond the editorial top picks, these are also strong choices we evaluated.
What Counts as Project Management Software Here
Project management software gives a team a shared view of tasks, deadlines, and progress: boards, lists, timelines, or issue trackers that multiple people update and everyone can see. That excludes pure time trackers and single-player to-do apps unless they also support shared projects and assignees, which is why a tool like Clockify makes this list (it added shared projects and task assignment) while a purely personal timer would not.
The pricing model varies more than the feature set. Most tools here bill per user or per seat, annually, with a monthly option at a markup. A few, like Todoist's Business tier, separate an individual plan from a team plan entirely. Azure DevOps and a couple of others give away a set number of free seats before billing kicks in, rather than gating features behind a paywall.
Why the Entry Price Matters More Than the Feature List
Most teams do not evaluate project management software by reading a spec sheet, they start on the free plan, hit a wall, usually a seat cap or a storage limit, and then pay whatever the next tier costs without shopping around. That habit costs real money at scale: the gap between the cheapest tool here ($3.99 a seat) and the most expensive mainstream one ($10 a seat) is roughly 150 percent, and it compounds fast once a team passes 10 or 20 seats.
Billing structure matters as much as the sticker price. A per-seat annual price with a 3-seat minimum, like monday.com's, costs more for a 3-person team than a flat-rate plan that covers 10 users, like Taskade's cheaper flat tiers outside this list. Knowing whether you are buying per-seat or flat-rate pricing before you commit to annual billing avoids a surprise renewal invoice.
Key Features to Look For
Per-user, per-seat, and flat-rate plans are not directly comparable at face value. Always normalize to a monthly-per-person cost before comparing tools.
A free plan capped at 2 seats or 60MB of storage is a trial in disguise. Check the real limit, not just whether a free tier exists.
Every tool on this list charges more for monthly billing, often 20 to 30 percent more. The annual price is the real comparison point once you have validated the tool.
Some plans, like monday.com's Basic and Scoro's combinations, enforce a minimum seat count that inflates the real bill for small teams.
Time tracking, reporting, automations, and integrations are the features most commonly locked behind the first paid tier. Know which one you need before comparing price alone.
Flat-rate plans with a generous user cap can beat per-seat pricing for small teams, but stop scaling once you outgrow the cap.
Mistakes to Avoid
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Comparing sticker prices without normalizing for billing unit. A $9 flat-rate plan for 10 users beats a $7 per-seat plan once a team passes 12 or 13 people.
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Ignoring seat minimums. monday.com's 3-seat floor turns a $9 headline price into a real $27 monthly minimum, a fact most comparison articles skip.
- ×
Committing to annual billing before validating the tool on its free plan. Every tool here charges 15 to 30 percent more for monthly billing, but that premium buys the flexibility to walk away.
- ×
Assuming the cheapest tool covers the same features as a pricier one. Clockify's entry price wins on cost but its task management is secondary to time tracking, not a like-for-like swap for Linear or monday.com.
- ×
Not checking free-tier storage and history limits before onboarding a real team. ClickUp's 60MB cap and Todoist's 1-week activity history are easy to blow past in the first week of real use.
Expert Tips
- →
Run the free plan with your actual team size for at least two weeks before comparing paid tiers. Seat caps and storage limits only become obvious under real usage.
- →
Calculate the true monthly cost including any seat minimum, not the advertised per-seat price. monday.com and Scoro both enforce minimums that change the real number.
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Default to monthly billing during evaluation, then switch to annual once you've confirmed the tool sticks. The 15 to 30 percent annual discount is only worth locking in after validation.
- →
Match the pricing model to your team's growth pattern. Flat-rate plans like Todoist's Business or Shortcut's free tier favor stable small teams; per-seat plans scale more predictably for teams that grow steadily.
- →
Re-check pricing pages before renewal. Clockify cut its free plan from unlimited users to 5 in 2026, and pricing structures across this category change more often than the feature lists do.
The Bottom Line
There is no universally cheapest project management tool, only the cheapest one that still does what your team needs. Clockify wins on raw price at $3.99 a seat but leads with time tracking, not boards. Trello and Azure DevOps are the cheapest genuine project trackers at $5 and $6 a user, and Height, ClickUp, Todoist, Shortcut, monday.com, Teamwork.com, and Linear fill out the rest of the field between $6.99 and $10 a user a month, all billed annually. Of the 10,000+ tools Toolradar tracks, 56 in the Project Management category have verified pricing, and every price in this guide is checked against the vendor's own current pricing page.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the cheapest project management software?
Clockify has the lowest entry paid price at $3.99 per seat a month billed annually, though it is primarily a time tracker with task management layered on. For a tool built primarily around boards and projects, Trello is the cheapest at $5 a user a month billed annually, followed by Azure DevOps at $6.
Is there a genuinely free project management tool?
No tool on this list is free at real team scale. Linear's free plan is the most generous for small software teams (unlimited members, 250 issues, 2 teams), while Azure DevOps gives 5 users free permanently. Most other free plans cap out at 2 to 10 seats or a small storage allowance, which is enough to trial the tool but not to run a team on indefinitely.
Why do project management tools charge less for annual billing?
Annual billing reduces churn and gives the vendor predictable revenue, so most tools discount it 15 to 30 percent versus paying month to month. Clockify's Basic plan, for example, is $3.99 a seat annually versus $4.99 monthly, and ClickUp's Unlimited plan is $7 annually versus $10 monthly.
What do free project management plans typically not include?
The most commonly gated features are time tracking, advanced automations, unlimited storage, timeline or Gantt views, and SSO. monday.com's free plan lacks automations entirely, ClickUp's caps storage at 60MB, and Trello holds Timeline and Calendar views behind its $10 Premium tier rather than the $5 Standard plan.
Is the cheapest project management tool always the best value?
Not necessarily. Clockify's $3.99 entry price is the lowest here, but a software team that needs sprint planning and GitHub integration gets more real value from Shortcut at $8.50 or Linear at $10 than from underfitting a time tracker to a job it was not built for. Match the tool's core strength to your actual workflow before optimizing purely on price.
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