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We’ll come right out and say it; ClickUp is better than Trello. It integrates with a wider range of useful software than Trello and provides a larger range of task management features. In fact, our in-depth, hands-on research found it to be the most useful project management software on the market.
On the other hand, Trello is more affordable than ClickUp and it’s easier to use, making it a better solution for smaller teams and individuals. Still, ClickUp offers a more robust free plan, so if you’re really trying to keep costs as low as possible, ClickUp is still your best bet.
In this guide, we’ll match up Trello and ClickUp on everything from features and integrations to pricing and customer support, so you can make the right decision for your project management needs.
Price From All prices listed as per user, per month (billed annually) | Score The overall score obtained from our most recent round of project management software user testing. | Free Version | Pros | Cons | Verdict | |||
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Slick software with a highly powerful core and an AI assistant, plus a genuinely usable free tier for individuals. | A fairly-priced, stripped-down option best for small teams who need a central location for basic task management. | |||||||
Start Free Trial | Compare Deals |
ClickUp vs Trello: Key Differences
Before we get into the specifics of how and why ClickUp is better than Trello, let’s learn a bit more about what makes these two project management tools so different. Here are the key differences between ClickUp and Trello:
- ClickUp has a much better free plan than Trello.
- Trello has better customer support options than ClickUp.
- ClickUp has better task management and workflow creation features.
- Trello is easier to set up and use than ClickUp.
- ClickUp has an AI assistant, whereas Trello has few advanced features.
- Trello is a great solution for basic task management.
- ClickUp’s software provides better value for the price.
- ClickUp has better tools for collaborating.
Note: All the images used in this article were taken during Tech.co’s project management user testing series. For more information on how we test project management tools, as well as other products, visit our product research page.
Test Summary (Fall 2023)
ClickUp was our top-rated provider back in 2023, but unfortunately, I didn’t find the user experience quite as smooth during our recent testing series. It took longer to load than other platforms we tested, and although it has a huge range of useful task management features and project-tracking tools, I found it a little overwhelming. The automation builder is clunkier than the likes of monday.com.
I found Trello a lot easier to get to grips with initially, but when I tried to perform complex project management tasks, I found it a little limiting. I had to look for add-ons to complete some tasks, and not all of them were free. This is why I wouldn’t recommend Trello for complex tasks and project management, because providers like Teamwork will provide you with more features out of the box.
If you’re set on either ClickUp or Trello, I’d pick ClickUp if you’re looking for a central location for all of your project’s tracking, reporting, monitoring, and collaborating, while Trello is better if you’re working on a simple, linear project with basic tasks.
ClickUp Pricing vs Trello Pricing
To kick off the ClickUp vs Trello battle, it’s worth saying both are actually very good value for money — ClickUp’s paid plans may be more expensive, but they’re also much better software.
ClickUp’s Unlimited plan is definitely one of the best value plans available – for just $7 per user every month, you’ll be able to lift the limits on many of the features included in the free plan (more on this in the pricing section below). As a result, ClickUp is one of our top-rated providers for pricing, undercutting many project management software competitors on pricing while remaining more than competitive when it comes to features.
Trello is still quite affordable, though, offering a lower starting price of only $5 per user, per month for its Standard plan. It is notably less functionality than ClickUp overall, but still, if low price is your vibe, this could be your best bet.
ClickUp pricing
ClickUp sets no user limit on any of its plans – you can have as many team members working on a project as you like.
- Free ($0): The free plan has a storage limit of 100 MB and a project limit of five, and you’ll only be allowed to make 100 automation actions a month. You’ll be limited to 100 ‘uses’ of your Gantt Chart, custom fields, and resource management tools. However, these aren’t included at all on many free plans – and you do get custom project templates, a time tracking function, and 24/7 live support.
- Unlimited ($7 per user, per month): As you may have guessed from the name, the limits on features like Gantt Charts are removed on this plan. Along with everything currently available in ClickUp’s free plan, There’s also a form builder, 1000 automation actions per month, and unlimited storage too.
- Business ($12 per user, per month): The Business plan is the first ClickUp plan to include burndown charts, which makes it the most attractive option for Scrum teams. There’s also a custom chart and custom widget builders, which will give you more control over precisely how you display the data being compiled in your project.
- Enterprise (Custom): This is the only ClickUp plan where you’re eligible for onboarding assistance. On this plan, you’ll have an Enterprise API as well as unlimited custom roles, single sign-on, and a dedicated success manager to liaise with if you have any issues.
Price (annually) The amount you'll pay per month, when billed annually | Users | Projects/Boards | Number of automations | Gantt Chart | Resource management | Time Tracking | ||
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TRY FOR FREE | BEST FOR SMALL TEAMS | |||||||
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5 | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited | |||||
100/month | 1,000/month | 10,000/month | 250,000 automations/month | |||||
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100 uses per project | 100 uses per project | | | |||||
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Trello pricing
Just like ClickUp, there are no user limits on any of Trello’s pricing plans.
- Free ($0): Trello’s free plan offers unlimited storage, but you’ll be limited to 10 MB per file. There are 250 automation actions a month available, plus integrations with popular CRM systems, comms integrations, and MailChimp. There’s also a Kanban board, custom fields, and preset/custom project templates too, but there’s a project limit of 10.
- Standard ($5 per user, per month): The Standard plan increases the automation limit to 1000 and the per-file storage limit to 250 MB. There’s guest access on this plan, saved searches, and advanced checklists. The project limit is removed too.
- Premium ($10 per user, per month): This plan is the best Trello plan in terms of pricing against features, and comes with a Gantt Chart, sub-tasks, dashboards for key performance data, preset charts, and a calendar.
- Enterprise ($17.50 per user, per month): The enterprise plan isn’t a whole load different to the Premium Plan, but does have more diverse guest access features, a single sign-on function and organization-wide permissions.
Price (annually) The amount you'll pay per month, when billed annually | Users | Projects/Boards | Number of automations | Kanban Board | Gantt Chart | Resource management | Time Tracking | ||
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10 | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited | ||||||
10 | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited | ||||||
250/month | 1000/month | Unlimited | Unlimited | ||||||
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Do ClickUp and Trello have free plans?
ClickUp’s free plan is, to put it bluntly, miles better than Trello’s. That’s not to say that Trello doesn’t have a good free plan – it’s a great piece of kit, and considering you’re not paying anything, it’ll still come in mighty handy. Plus, it has preset and custom automations, as well as preset and custom templates, all for free, which most providers don’t hand out for no fee.
The reason ClickUp is so much better than Trello when it comes to their respective free plans is that it offers an enormous amount of features for absolutely nothing, plus all the customer support options available on ClickUp’s other plans. There are preset charts and widgets, a team instant messenger, a Kanban board and so much more. So, despite the fact you can create more projects on Trello’s free plan (10) and you’re stuck with 5 on ClickUp’s free offering (remember though, you can just make a new account), ClickUp wins.
The only downside to ClickUp’s excellent free plan is it does set limits on some features. For example, you can only use the Gantt Chart 100 times, and the case is the same with things like Dashboards, which are useful for displaying key data points your team needs to know about.
ClickUp vs Trello: Head-to-Head
Now that you understand the key differences between ClickUp and Trello, and you know how much each project management tool costs, we can dig a bit deeper.
In this section, we’ll compare ClickUp and Trello on a wide range of metrics, including ease of use, task management features, workflow creation, customer support, and integrations, so you know exactly what you’re getting from each solution before you make a decision.
Best for Project and Workflow Creation: ClickUp
ClickUp performs much better than Trello when it comes to project and workflow creation. ClickUp has a form builder on all its plans bar the free offering, and although there’s no dedicated budget management tool, there’s a workaround for this – you can add “money” columns to task lists to represent budgets. On Trello, there’s also a workaround but it’s a lot more restrictive overall.
However, ClickUp and Trello both offer custom and preset project templates on all their plans, as well as pre-built and custom automations. This immediately sets them ahead of providers that don’t offer the ability to automate any aspect of your workflow or any preset templates.
We were able to build a simple automation in ClickUp to save our team time. Source: Tech.co testing
Best for Task Management: ClickUp
ClickUp is much better for managing tasks than Trello. For starters, ClickUp’s free plan has a full range of task management features, including Gantt Charts, a spreadsheet-style view, a Kanban board, task dependencies, and much more.
Trello’s set is a bit more limited when compared to ClickUp — you can’t draw dependencies between tasks, and there’s no time-tracking function. The range of task management features ClickUp offers — as well as how easy they are to use – is a core reason why it’s our top-rated project management software.
The only thing not included on the free ClickUp plan is burndown charts (which are useful for scrum teams) but Trello doesn’t offer these on any of its plans. Impressively, when ClickUp doesn’t have a dedicated feature for something – like an issue log – it can often be achieved with a workaround.
To be fair to Trello, it might not have ClickUp’s range, but it still provides a basic set that doesn’t feel too overwhelming. If you’re just here for a more barebones project management software that will let you see what tasks need doing, and which ones haven’t been done yet, then Trello will suit you just fine.
Using ClickUp’s AI tool was easy, allowing us to generate a task description. Source: Tech.co testing
Best for Customer Support: Trello
Trello was actually our top provider for customer support, with a live chat function available on all plans, and phone-baed 24/7 live support on the Enterprise plan – which costs just $17.50 per user, per month so is cheaper than ClickUp’s Business plan.
This is mostly because you can only contact Trello by email. There’s a community forum and a knowledge base, but only having a singular way to actually get through to support staff isn’t ideal. Considering 9/10 Americans say customer service is a deciding factor on whether or not to do business with a company, you’d hope this would be slightly higher.
While customer support is not a strong point for ClickUp, but it’s certainly not bad, though. ClickUp offers live chat and email as avenues for contact, and you can refer to the online knowledge base if you think you can work it out yourself. However, we found monday.com’s live chat function more helpful – during a recent platform testing session, I was able to troubleshoot a problem quickly by contacting an agent, who sent me a video showing me what I was doing wrong.
The Trello user forum is comprehensive and thorough, allowing us to solve problems by asking questions. Source: Tech.co testing
Best for Ease of Use: Trello
Trello’s main USP is that it’s great for simple task management, but it’s far from being the most useful program for more complex tasks. That being said, it still scored higher than ClickUp on our ease of use tests, which is why we gave this one to Trello.
Trello has a simple interface that’s pretty easy to navigate, which is great considering some other providers are much more cluttered. This meant it didn’t take long for members of our testing group to set up their projects in Trello. “A lot of the steps are pretty self-explanatory,” commented Tech.co’s Conor Cawley during our project management testing series.
“It’s basically built for that,” he continued. “A lot of stuff was borderline automatic, like building the calendar and getting the Kanban board. With a single click, these views were auto-populated, making setting up everything nice and easy.”
However, Trello struggles with more complex tasks. The more complicated our test project became, the harder it was to get Trello to do what we wanted, which was very different from our experience with ClickUp.
ClickUp is reasonably user-friendly, no matter how complex the task gets, but dropped marks due to the long loading times some members of our testing group experienced. It’s not like it’s difficult to use, but compared to a provider like monday.com, the raft of features can feel a little intimidating.
“You don’t always know where to click,” explains Matie Bouhali, one of Tech.co’s software editors. “I would’ve loved some prompts or anything that could help me because you basically land on the interface and it’s not super clear. It’s very confusing.”
The Trello Kanban board interface was easy to use, even for those of us that had never used it before. Source: Tech.co testing
Best for Integration: ClickUp
This one was a pretty easy win for ClickUp, with the project management tool offering more than 1,000 different third-party integrations. In comparison, Trello offers just slightly more than 200 third-party integrations, so the winner is quite clear from a numbers standpoint.
To be clear, though, both project management tools offering enough integrations to get by for the average business. You’ll find Slack, Google Drive, GitHub, Microsoft Teams, and other major integrations across both platforms, so unless you’re getting really niche when it comes to building your all-in-one business hub, you should be fine with either option.
ClickUp offers a vast library of third-party integrations. Source: Tech.co testing
How Do ClickUp and Trello Compare to Other Providers?
Obviously, ClickUp vs Trello isn’t the only easy-to-use project management software head-to-head worth looking into – there are a whole bunch of other providers that are definitely worth a look at. Even if you still end up opting for ClickUp, at least you’ll do it safely in the knowledge that you’ve ruled out the competition.
Zoho Projects, for example, is one of the few project management options on the market with a more affordable offering, with a robust free plan and a starting price of only $4 per month. Jira is another popular solution, offering a more complex interface geared towards software developers and engineers.
Check out the table below to learn more about what kind of project management tools are out there for your business to choose from.
Price From All prices listed as per user, per month (billed annually) | Pros | Cons | Verdict | |||||||||
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Slick software with a highly powerful core and an AI assistant, plus a genuinely usable free tier for individuals. | A fairly-priced, stripped-down option best for small teams who need a central location for basic task management. | A feature-rich service with two plans for enterprises, and a free tier for new users to try. | A great task management system due to strong customizability and support team, with a generous free trial. | A great value piece of software that’s ideal for tech, software development and engineering teams. | A simple task-list-based project management platform with an acceptable free tier. | A solid project management solution with an attractive free tier for small teams and a very affordable premium plan. | A great tool for spreadsheet-natives, which can take your Excel-based task planning to the next level. | Best for client-facing businesses, since it offers great service features. | An enterprise solution aimed at large companies. | A pricey service best for companies invested in Microsoft. | A very basic, relatively limited software that’s a lot simpler than its competitors. | A great user experience all round, with an easy-to-use automation builder and great budget tracking capabilities. |
At Tech.co we don’t write about products and services without conducting thorough research, and hands-on testing where applicable. While this process can be time-consuming, it’s time well spent if it means we’re providing better, more useful information for your business.
When it comes to project management software, test out each project management software first-hand, guided by an in-house research framework consisting of six core assessment areas that break down into a range of smaller subcategories. This framework is based on the factors companies and project managers have told us are important to their every day usage. The six criteria are:
- Ease of Use: After getting five to six participants to test each project management software for an hour, we assessed how easy it was to set up a project with the platforms, how clear their interface was, and how easy they were to navigate.
- Pricing: We look at all plan costs. Providers offering lots of features for lower costs will have better pricing scores than those that lock them away on higher-tier plans.
- Customer Support: We assess the ways you can contact your project management software provider if something goes wrong. Providers offering 24/7 live support, as well as phone-based support and onboarding assistance, get the best scores.
- Security: For this area, we assess the security options offered by each provider. This includes user-level security features like 2-factor authentication as well as more administrative security measures like user permissions and IP restrictions.
- Integrations: We assess the quantity – and the quality – of the applications each project management software provider integrates with.
- Functionality: This part of our research involves assessing the full feature set that each product provides. We look at 4 function-based sub-categories as part of this, including task management, project & workflow creation, data visualization, and collaboration.
It’s important to note that not all of these criteria hold equal weight in our testing methodology. This is best practice, and based on what businesses have told us is essential, compared to what’s simply “nice to have”. Because of their central importance to project management, how easy each tool is to use, how much it costs, features for project & workflow creation, and task management had more of an impact on the overall than other criteria.
Verdict: ClickUp is the better Project Management Software
While Trello definitely provides a capable and commendable basic task management solution, ClickUp is a better project management software than Trello. However, it’s worth noting that Teamwork scores better than both of these providers (4.6/5 overall) and has a cheaper starting plan than ClickUp, retailing at $5.99 per user, per month.
ClickUp has more features than Trello, including important task management features like time tracking and task dependencies, and it has more tools for visualizing data too. However, we found that Trello easier to use than ClickUp, aside from when it came to more complex project management tasks. Due to its wealth of superior features, even though ClickUp’s more expensive plans are pricier than Trello’s comparable offerings, ClickUp is still better value for money.
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