Top 10 Monday.com Alternatives to Streamline Your Workflows (Features & Cost)

#1: SmartSuite

SmartSuite is the ultimate work management software that combines the power of automation and tailored workspace to help you plan, manage, and track projects.

SmartSuite is the best Monday.com alternative due to its intuitive interface and amazing customization offerings.

Some of the key features that our customers can’t stop obsessing over are as follows:

1. Workflow automation

SmartSuite built-in automation maintains consistency and efficiency across all your projects. You can set up customizable recipes based on specific triggers. Such automated workflows eliminate manual intervention in routine tasks such as changing dates or sending updates and free up your time to focus on getting work done.

And the best part?

SmartSuite offers a no-code drag-and-drop automation builder making it easy for anyone in your team to build basic to complex automation.

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To get started, click on “Automation.” From here, choose the right trigger and set up the right action. For instance, when a status is changed (trigger), send a Slack message (action).

2. Project management

One of the key offerings of SmartSuite is its comprehensive project management dashboard. It gives you a bird’s eye view into the creation, assignment, tracking, and completion of various tasks. 

You get access to a variety of tools for a streamlined process.

• Dependency field: Build task sequences by adding dependencies to visualize different phases of task completion and avoid delays.
• Organization and reporting: Team members get a consolidated view of all assigned tasks under ‘My work’ dashboard. Custom ‘Work In Progress’ report helps you track task responsibilities, balance workloads, and monitor timelines.
• Powerful dashboards: Create appealing dashboards to understand relationships, evaluate task progress, and track metrics. Each dashboard is configurable with 25+ widgets ranging from graphs to comparison tables.
• Gantt View: With this view, you can have a visual timeline of project tasks, showing their start and end dates, as well as dependencies between them. This helps track project progress and ensure tasks are completed on schedule. 

• Team-Based Dashboards: With this views, managers can plan their whole team’s priorities and next steps, along with getting a centralized repository for files and assets. 
• Files and Deliverables: Attach key deliverables, provide feedback, and manage versions – all right in the context of your project work.
• Assign and Track Projects: See your team’s time entries and filter them in any number of ways to build customized reports. 

Watch it in action here 👇

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3. Team collaboration

SmartSuite offers a communication center that helps you collaborate with team members in a space where tasks are executed. Such integrated communication features reduce roadblocks by keeping everyone in the loop.

Team members can connect 1:1 or in group chats, share quick updates via @mentions, share real-time updates, send emails, and ask questions. Member’s profile and availability status help you connect with the right stakeholder at the right time.

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All of this combined boosts the team’s productivity and promotes transparent communication. A bonus perk is SmartSuite’s mobile app which facilitates seamless and quick communication.

SmartSuite Pricing

SmartSuite offers a 14-day free trial and a forever-free plan with access to automation, team collaboration, authentication, and much more.

As for the paid plans, there are four options:

• Team: Starts at $12/user per month
• Professional: Starts at $28/user per month
• Enterprise: Starts at $35/user per month
• Signature: Customized plan tailored to your organization’s needs and team size.

How Does SmartSuite Compare to Monday.com?

SmartSuite is Monday.com’s top contender because of its automated workflows, customizable dashboard, and affordable pricing plans.

Monday.com’s free plan offers limited views and reporting features. The paid plan requires payment for a set number of users which makes it an expensive tool for scaling. In contrast, SmartSuite offers an incomparable free plan with 8+ dashboard views and built-in automated workflows. Also, there is no minimum user cap to upgrade as you only pay for additional fees.

SmartSuite’s automated workflows are another feature that makes it a better alternative to Monday.com. You can build basic to complex multi-step automation to trigger actions without any coding knowledge. Such automation takes care of recurring tasks so you can stay focused on important projects.

Lastly, unlike Monday.com, SmartSuite offers much more flexibility and customizations. You can customize dashboards, workflows, and reports to your preferences and work in a way you like.

SmartSuite Pros and Cons

✅ Generous free plan with access to advanced features

✅ 200+ project templates for different use cases

✅ Customizable dashboard and reporting

✅ No-code automation to streamline your workflows

❌ Only 25 native integrations 

#2: Asana

Best for: Managing projects through tasks and automated workflows

Similar to: ClickUp and Trello

Asana is a project management tool that helps you organize, plan, and track work through subtasks, multiple dashboards, and automated workflows.

Asana offers a much more generous free plan for up to 10 team members. It is easier to use and offers more specific task management capabilities than Monday.com.

Who Is It For?

Small and medium-sized businesses.

Asana’s Top Features

• Workflow automation: Asana offers multiple automated workflows to streamline work by improving coordination and team efficiency. With Asana’s rule builder, you can automate actions based on several triggers sending a slack update (action) when an action is complete (trigger).
• Resource management: Get an overview of your team’s workload, project progress, and overall capacity to rebalance work and plan future projects.
• Team collaboration: Asana helps you communicate directly within each task through comments and mentions, assign tasks to multiple projects, add dependencies, and get real-time updates from team members.
• Task creation and assignment: Asana’s task creation and assignment feature allows users to create detailed tasks with specific due dates and descriptions. Users can assign tasks to team members, set priority levels, and add subtasks to break down complex projects. Each task can include attachments, comments, and tags to facilitate collaboration. Additionally, tasks can be part of larger projects and tracked across various views such as lists, boards, and calendars.

Asana Pricing

Asana offers four pricing plans: a free basic, starter, advanced, and enterprise. For starters and advanced you can get a 30-day free trial. 

Pricing for paid plans is as follows:

• Starters: Starts at $13.49 per user/month
• Advanced: Starts at $30.49 per user/month
• Enterprise: Custom plan with advanced integrations
• Enterprise+: Custom plan with Audit log API and data loss prevention integrations

Asana Pros and Cons

✅ Subtasks and automation

✅ User-friendly dashboards

✅ 270+ integrations

❌ Limited customizations

❌ Limited reporting

❌ Can get expensive for smaller teams

#3: Trello

Best for: Visual project planning and task management using Kanban boards

Similar to: Basecamp and ClickUp

Trello is a visual project management software that helps you plan, manage, and track your projects using a Kanban system.

Trello is a strong contender against Monday.com due to its cost-efficient features like automation and power-ups.

Who Is It For?

Freelancers, solopreneurs, or small-sized businesses.

Trello’s Top Features

• Task management: Move tasks around multiple boards and get a granular view of all the projects in multiple views–boards, tables, timelines, and cards.
• Trello power-ups: Power-ups are mini integrations that help you do more with your Trello boards. Trello offers 150+ power-ups such as tracking time, doing calculations, and creating polls.
• Butler automation: Trello’s automation bot, Butler, helps you delegate repetitive tasks by setting up rule-based triggers. The bot also suggests automation based on your daily task operations.

Trello Pricing

Trello offers a free plan with built-in automation and 10 workspace collaborators. They also offer a 14-day free trial for all three pricing plans:

• Standard: $6 per user/month
• Premium: $12.50 per user/month
• Enterprise: $17.50 per user/month

Trello Pros and Cons

✅ User-friendly and intuitive dashboard

✅ Ease of use across various devices

✅ Built-in automation

❌ Lack of seamless working across multiple boards

❌ Need third-party integrations (paid)

❌ Limited user control

#4: Airtable

Best for: Creating and sharing relational databases

Similar to: Smartsheets and Trello

Airtable is a project management tool that lets you store and manage databases in a spreadsheet-like interface, with relations among cells.

Compared to Monday.com.com, Airtable offers extensive features in its free plan such as multiple dashboard views.

Who Is It For?

Small and mid-sized businesses

Airtable’s Top Features

• Airtable automation: Build multi-sequence workflows through actions and trigger logic.
• Multi-dashboard views: Get a bird’s eye view of your task’s progress by shifting tasks through list, Gantt, kanban boards, and calendar view.
• Interface designer: Build custom interfaces through drag-and-drop editor for anyone on your team.

Airtable Pricing

Airtable’s free plan is best suited for individuals or small teams. The paid plans come in three tiers:

• Team: Starts at $24 per user/month
• Business: Starts at $45 per user/month
• Enterprise scale: Includes enterprise-level integrations. Contact sales for a quote.

Airtable Pros and Cons

✅ High-level customization and flexible dashboards

✅ User-friendly interface with multiple views

✅ Vast project templates

❌ Limited reporting capabilities

❌ Limited team communication

#5: ClickUp

Best for: Creating highly customizable project dashboards

Similar to: Trello and Jira

ClickUp is an all-in-one project management software that helps you manage tasks and projects effectively. You can manage your projects, coordinate with your team, and manage team resources without leaving ClickUp.

ClickUp is an amazing Monday.com alternative as it offers high-level customizations at a reasonable price.

Who Is It For?

Entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small and large businesses alike

Clickup’s Top Features

• Clickapps: Adapt task management dashboards to meet your specific requirements such as removing/adding certain features.
• Advanced task views: Mind map view to brainstorm with your teams and build a project plan by converting pointers into tasks.
• Integrations: 1000+ integrations to help you import data from apps to streamline tasks and projects in ClickUp.

ClickUp Pricing

ClickUp’s free plan offers unlimited task creation and guest invites with full access only. They have three paid plans:

• Unlimited: Starts at $10 per user/month
• Business: Starts at $19 per user/month
• Enterprise: White labeling and enterprise AI. Contact sales to get a quote.

ClickUp Pros and Cons

✅ Advanced customizations even on low-tier plans

✅ Generous free plan

✅ 100+ automation templates

❌ Not intuitive

❌ Steep learning curve

#6: Smartsheet

Best for: Managing complex projects using a spreadsheet-like interface

Similar to: Asana and SmartSuite

Smartsheet is an advanced enterprise-level work and project management software that helps you plan, track, and manage basic to high-level projects.

Smartsheet is a good alternative to Monday.com for teams comfortable with spreadsheet-focused interfaces for managing complex projects.

Who Is It For?

Enterprise-level teams who manage complex and large numbers of projects

Smartsheet’s Top Features

• Team collaboration: Request, gather, and manage feedback, upload a variety of file types, and real-time push and email notifications.
• Workapps: Package your reports, sheets, docs, and dashboards in a no-code custom app giving you and your team access to the right information at the right time.
• No-code automated workflow: Send upcoming deadline reminders, request signatures through integration with DocuSign, or perform calculations.

Smartsheet Pricing

Smartsheet doesn’t have a free plan or trial. Smartsheet charges based on the number of users and offers three paid plans:

• Pro: Starts at $12 per member/month
• Business: Starts at $24 per member/month (Minimum of 3 members)
• Enterprise: Unlimited storage and enterprise plan manager. Contact sales for a quote.

Smartsheet Pros and Cons

✅ High level of customization

✅ Huge library of project templates

✅ Powerful analytics and reporting tools

❌ Steep learning curve for spreadsheet novices

❌ Data doesn’t get updated in real-time

#7: Wrike

Best for: Managing complex workflows across multiple teams

Similar to: Smartsheets and Jira

Wrike is a collaboration and project management software focused on streamlining tasks and projects across various teams.

Wrike is a better alternative to Monday.com for managing projects with irregular shifts, like weekends or contractors. Wrike also offers more native third-party integrations, while Monday.com.com offers many of them for a price.

Who Is It For?

Agencies and enterprise-level businesses

Wrike’s Top Features

• Advanced reporting: Get detailed reports into multiple projects through dynamic widgets and custom reporting.
• Cross-tagging feature: Assign multiple tags to tasks, subtasks, folders, milestones, phases, and projects to increase cross-project visibility.
• Effort management: Evaluate estimated efforts to complete a task and forecast your resources, assign the right person, and understand the project completion timeline.

Wrike Pricing

Wrike offers a generous forever-free plan. There are five paid plans with a 14-day free trial access:

• Team: Start at $9.80 per user/month
• Business: Start at $24.80 per user/month
• Enterprise: Unlimited user access with advanced reporting and integrations. Contact sales to get a quote.
• Pinnacle: Native integration with PowerBi and locked spaces. Contact sales for a quote.

Wrike Pros and Cons

✅ 400+ integrations

✅ User-friendly interface

✅ Library of customizable project templates

❌ Learning curve due to overwhelming features

❌ Budgeting feature only available for pinnacle plan users

#8: Basecamp

Best for: Centralized project management and team communication

Similar to: Clickup and Trello

Basecamp is a project management software that stands out with its appealing and intuitive visual interface. It offers unique features like hill charts, built-in communication tools, and mission control to give a clear picture of the project’s progress.

Basecamp is a more affordable and intuitive project management tool than Monday.com. It’s particularly beneficial for large teams as they can get access to all the features due to Basecamp’s flat-rate pricing model.

Who Is It For?

Solopreneurs, start-ups, and small businesses.

Basecamp’s Top Features

• Automatic check-ins: Set up automated check-ins at set intervals (daily, weekly, or monthly) to ask questions or get updates.
• Mission controls: Gives a panoramic view of the project’s progress through status needles reflecting the progress and health of each project.
• Hill charts: Visually track tasks by monitoring the task’s progress in a hill-like chart to identify roadblocks, see dependencies, and understand overall progress.

Basecamp Pricing

Basecamp offers two paid plans, one of which has fixed pricing. For both, you can get a 30-day free trial:

• Basic: Starts at $15/user per month
• Pro Unlimited: $349/month fixed price for unlimited seats

Basecamp Pros and Cons

✅ Intuitive dashboard

✅ Multiple visual reports

✅ Free unlimited guest invites

❌ Limited integrations and automation

❌ No built-in Gantt chart view

#9: Jira

Best for: DevOps issue tracking and supporting IT workflows.

Similar to: Smartsheets

Jira is a robust project management software made primarily for software development teams. It’s a part of Atlassian’s product suite (Just like Trello) and offers advanced features like multiple dashboard views, custom reporting, issue tracking, and no-code automation.

Jira’s analytics feature is much more advanced than Monday.com as it offers dozens of out-of-the-box reports. Jira also stands out with over 1000 integrations making it a versatile software.

Who Is It For?

Software development and IT teams

Jira’s Top Features

• Advanced reporting dashboard: Get contextual insights through resolution time report, sprint report, time tracking report, and control chart.
• Atlassian intelligence (AI): Surface key issues, summarize chart data, and identify patents to help your team ship updates faster.
• Agile project management dashboard: Kanban view and Scrum charts make sprint tracking intuitive.

Jira Pricing

Jira offers both a free plan and a 7-day free trial for three paid plans:

• Standard: Starts at $8.15 per user/month
• Premium: Start at $16 per user/month
• Enterprise: Unlimited automation and Atlassian intelligence (AI). Contact sales for a quote.

Jira Pros and Cons

✅ Easy to configure dashboards

✅ 1000+ third-party integration via the Atlassian marketplace

❌ Limited team collaboration options 

❌ Out-dated and non-intuitive user interface

#10: Hive

Best for: Multipurpose collaboration to manage projects and communicate effectively

Similar to: Trello and Asana

Hive is a cloud-based project management software that helps you plan and manage multiple projects, create custom workflows, build forms, and chat with your co-workers in real time.

Hive offers more flexibility in adding users, while Monday.com requires increments of 5, making it more expensive.

Who Is It For?

Teams of all sizes–from startups to large enterprises

Hive’s Top Features

• Message to task conversions: Quickly share updates within Hive and convert actionable into tasks.
• Timesheet reporting: Get a complete view of how long it takes to finish each task through built-in timesheet reports.
• Form builder: Set up custom forms to collect feedback, approve requests, or place orders. Automatically convert form responses into action cards.

Hive Pricing

Hive offers a forever free plan with up to 10 workspace members and a 14-day free trial for three paid plans:

• Starter: Starts at $7 per user/month
• Teams: Starts at $18 per user/month
• Enterprise: Custom analytics & reporting dashboard. Contact sales for a quote.

Hive Pros and Cons

✅ Built-in AI

✅ 100+ templates for different use cases

✅ Multiple dashboard views 

❌ Custom analytics and reporting are only available on the enterprise plan

❌ Limited native integration with heavy reliance on Zapier

Scale your projects smoothly with SmartSuite

All project management tools showcased in this guide have unique capabilities.

Smartsheet and Wrike are good choices if you have a huge budget and need to manage complex, large-scale projects and want to integrate with your tool stack.

Alternatively, Trello or Basecamp are the best choices if you prefer an intuitive project management interface and internal team collaboration.

SmartSuite offers an extensive range of features making it the best project management tool for early-stage startups to enterprise-level businesses.

Advanced automated workflows, customizable dashboards, a vast template library, and seamless team collaboration make it the best Monday.com alternative. The standout benefit is SmartSuite’s generous free and paid plans, starting at $12/month per user, which give users access to all these features (and more!).

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