Project management tools that start free, and what the paid plan costs

Project management is the one category on the register where nearly every product lets you start for nothing. A free plan is a way in, not a price. The question is where it stops.

Where each free plan stops

• Asana Personal is free for two users.
• ClickUp Free Forever has unlimited tasks, five spaces and 60 MB of storage.
• monday.com Free covers two seats, three boards and three Docs.
• Trello Free allows up to ten collaborators and ten boards per workspace.
• Wrike Free gives project and task management with board and table views.
• Smartsheet has no free plan, only a 30 day trial.

The first two paid plans, per user a month

Prices per user per month billed annually, in rand. Where a vendor lists in dollars, the figure is converted at the 2 October 2026 reference rate and marked about, because the rate moves daily. Smartsheet lists its rand prices itself.

Read the gating, not the headline

The cheapest first plan is not always the cheapest useful plan. monday.com holds its Gantt and calendar views for Standard. Asana includes timeline and Gantt views from Starter. ClickUp lists its AI add ons separately, which can add a large share to the bill. A team that needs one specific view should price the plan that holds it.

Compare Asana with monday.com, ClickUp with Trello and Smartsheet with Wrike for the plan detail, or see the whole project management category.