The 15 Best Free Project Management Softwares

It can be tiring to manage multiple projects at once, only using a spreadsheet or a document for reference and tracking. Unfortunately, many companies can relate to this situation. After all, using specific software to manage assignments can be really expensive, and it's understandable why people still use simpler ways. However, according to a PWC study, the use of project management software is linked to high-performing projects, with 77% of the companies interviewed using this solution. And the list of benefits of using this kind of software is incredibly big: increase in productivity, accuracy on related expenses, projects finished on time, decrease in failures by miscommunication, and so on. In this article, you are going to find 15 free project management software that will help you achieve better results in your projects, by helping you to organize and collaborate with teammates.

What is Project Management Software?

Project management software is essential to project managers (PMs) and teams to help them accomplish goals in time within the available resources. This kind of solution allows businesses to have a complete overview of their workflow. At the same time, they control their quality management, multiple tasks, budget, and all the data exchanged along with the projects they develop. Project management involves three steps:

• Planning
• Tracking and Management
• Collaboration

That's why the PM must choose software with features that cover all these steps.

Planning

Planning is the first thing you need to do before starting a new project. In this stage, you need to consider resources and which people will fit the purpose of that project. Moreover, it's necessary to schedule tasks, set due dates for each one of them, as also for the project's completion. These are the main features in the Planning step:

• Scheduling
• Resource allocation
• Forecast the final date

Tracking and management

A project needs constant tracking of phases and tasks so that they can be efficient, and the final date can be achieved. To have excellent project development features such as time tracking, task assignment and management, and analysis are essential.

• Time tracking
• Task management
• Analysis and reports

Collaboration

Collaboration tools connect all the teammates during a project. They are responsible for the performance and success of projects that involve a large team. Instant messaging apps are an excellent example of a collaboration tool -Skype, Slack, Google Chat, or even private chats in devices that offer other project management features. These tools enhance communication between the team members, keeping them on the same page.

Top 15 free project management software

Not every tool in the market has a free version, and some that do are not that complete and functional. So with that in mind, we have narrowed down our list of the best free project management software in the market. Although some of them offer freemium with some limited features, all of them have a fit for purpose (you just need to have yours figured out). Some have unlimited users and projects, being excellent for big teams. In contrast, others are suitable for individuals, freelancers, and small businesses due to seat limitations. These are our top 15 project management tools, with brief descriptions of their freemium, and also crucial features and links to their reviews, so you can have an overview of the ones that will fit your purpose. You can quickly navigate between them on the menu below to see more details.

1. DragApp
2. Zoho Projects
3. Bitrix24
4. Wrike
5. Kanbanflow
6. Teamgantt
7. Teamwork
8. Agantty
9. Asana
10. Paymo
11. Flowlu
12. Basecamp
13. Liquid Planner
14. Avaza
15. Zenkit

1. DragApp

Imagine managing your multiple projects inside your email. Your life would be a lot easier since emails can quickly become tasks. Drag is a shared inbox inside Gmail, that can also be used as a Project Management tool, mainly as a task-tracking software. Its kanban view helps in both the scheduling phase and the tracking and management phase. It helps to eliminate the back-and-forth between your Gmail and a third-party tool. Therefore, you will gain more productivity and save time by centralizing your processes in only one place you already know. Your Drag boards are customizable, and you can display them with a Kanban or a list view. Besides, it's possible to add notes and due dates to your tasks and emails and mention teammates on the private chat, centralizing all the communication necessary for a specific job. Also, you can drag your cards easily between columns to help you with tracking the steps of a project. You can purchase a paid plan that starts at $10 per user/month. Key features:

• Unlimited Users
• Shared Gmail Inboxes
• 10 boards
• 100 cards per board/month
• Integrations with Google Groups and Google Calendar
• Limited workflow
• Unlimited collaboration (delegation, reply as an alias, internal team chat, collision detection, and more.)
• Unlimited productivity (checklists, tags, sort & filter, notes, color coding)

Reviews:

• G2 – 4.4 stars
• Capterra – 4.5 stars

2. Zoho Projects

Zoho Projects is a cloud-based project management tool that helps you plan, assign, and manage your tasks and resources while you collaborate with your team. It allows you to use Gantt charts to build your project plan and track your task schedule. Additionally, you can personalize your experience on layouts, statuses, fields, and workflows. The free plan covers up to 3 users and 2 projects, being excellent for freelancers and small teams. If you need to upgrade to a higher number of users and projects, the plans start at $3 user/month. Key features:

• File storage 10MB
• Gantt chart viewer
• Custom Status for Tasks & Projects
• Issue tracker module
• Task Dependency (Finish-to-Start)
• Zoho CRM Integration
• Subtasks

Reviews G2: 4.2 stars Capterra: 4.2 stars

3. Bitrix24

Bitrix24 is a complete platform for businesses that need to manage daily tasks, projects, and CRM. Moreover, it offers extra features, such as a contact center and a website building. It has a wide range of features to manage projects such as an interactive Gantt chart view, task dependencies, and reports. The freemium version of Bitrix is unlimited, with all the core features available and unlimited users. In case you need premium features, you can purchase plans with prices starting at $24 per month. Key features:

• Tasks, subtasks, and projects
• Planner
• Checklists
• Reminders
• Integration with CRM, workflows, calendar, and drive
• Mobile functions for iOS and Android
• Project Kanban
• Gantt
• Task time tracking

Reviews G2: 4.0 stars Capterra: 4.5 stars

4. Wrike

Wrike is a software that allows you to control your work progress. You can use the time tracking feature and a timeline view for better managing your projects. It integrates with other most-used business tools such as Dropbox and Microsoft Excel. Your workflows in Wrike are entirely customizable, with color code, and custom fields to export data. Wrike is free for unlimited users with up to 2 GB of storage. Key features:

• Board view
• Task Management
• File sharing
• Real-time Activity Stream
• Spreadsheet view
• Integrations with Google Drive, Dropbox, Box, MSFT Office 365 and OneDrive
• Desktop & mobile apps

Reviews G2: 4.2 stars Capterra: 4.2 stars

5. Kanbanflow

Kanbanflow is a project management solution with a Kanban view. It allows you to have a better overview of your board and control your tasks in a very customizable way. Besides, you have essential features, such as time tracking, analytics, and reporting and integrations with third-party tools.

The freemium offers unlimited users, boards, tasks, and time inside Kanbanflow. For more advanced features, you should consider the premium plan, with prices starting at $5 user/month.

Key features

• WIP limits
• Subtasks
• Filter
• Recurring tasks
• Stopwatch timer
• Pomodoro timer
• Pomodoro statistics

Reviews G2: 4.1 stars Capterra: 4.5 stars Related post: Teamwork in project management

6. Teamgantt

Teamgantt is an online project scheduling software. It allows you to invite your co-workers and teammates to view and edit your Gantt chart. Besides, you can drag and drop your tasks to plan your projects. You can keep all of your tasks, documents, conversations, and also the team availability in just one place. It helps to centralize all the information you need to develop and accomplish your projects. TeamGantt's free version is limited to 3 people, and one project, but with some essential features. For more users and unlimited features, the paid plans have prices starting at $24.95 per month. Key features:

• Forecasting of Workloads
• Dependencies
• Filtering
• Your Team Can Update Their Progress
• Daily Email Reminders
• Simple Task List Views
• Share Projects with Team Members
• Conversations on Tasks
• File Attachments

Reviews G2: 4.8 stars Capterra: 4.6 stars

7. Teamwork

Teamwork helps in-house & remote teams to manage their work projects. Its primary goals are to improve collaboration, visibility, accountability, and team results. It allows you to customize your workflow, and also centralize the information about your assignments in just one place. The free version is limited to 2 Projects and 5 team members, being useful for small teams. In case you need an upgrade, prices start at $10 user/month. Key features:

• Limited Board View
• Filters and tags
• 100MB of Storage
• Mobile and Desktop apps
• Milestones
• Calendar view
• Time tracking
• Gantt Chart

Reviews G2: 4.3 stars Capterra: 4.4 stars

8. Agantty

Agantty is an entirely free project management solution. Users can have an unlimited amount of projects, tasks, and teams in their accounts. It helps with team collaboration, allowing them to assign tasks to each other, and to organize and plan projects on a Gantt-chart. It will enable everyone to have a better view of what is happening. You can administer an unlimited amount of teams and tasks with a single account, as well as look up your To-Dos on a neat dashboard. Agantty doesn't have a paid plan, and for now, they don't have any premium features for an upgrade. Key features:

• Gantt chart
• Task overview
• Drag n' Drop
• Reoccurring tasks
• Dependencies

Reviews G2: 4.1 stars Capterra: 4.6 stars

9. Asana

Asana is an online task management software focused on managing projects and entire workflows. It offers a comfortable and flexible interface that allows teams to follow almost every stage of their projects, assigning tasks effortlessly. This tool offers a free deal that is excellent for individuals, freelancers, or even teams that are beginners in project management. However, you can collaborate with up to 15 teammates. But in case you need more complete features and a higher number of seats, the premium plans' prices start at $10.99 user/month. Key features:

• Unlimited tasks
• Assignee and due dates
• Unlimited activity log
• Board and list view projects
• Unlimited file storage (100MB per file)
• Unlimited projects
• Calendar view
• iOS and Android mobile apps
• Time tracking with integrations
• 100+ free integrations with your favorite apps

Reviews G2: 4.3 stars Capterra: 4.4 stars

10. Paymo

Paymo is a tool that helps to organize tasks inside projects. It includes features essential to project management, such as resource scheduling and time-tracking. It's possible to add all the essential information to your assignments, for example, priorities and statuses to track tasks' progress in real-time. Moreover, like many other task management solutions, it offers kanban style boards. Paymo's freemium is available to just one user, being suitable for freelancers who need to organize their workload. But if you are part of a team, the paid plans start at $8.95 per user/month. Main features:

• Time tracking
• Desktop & Mobile apps
• Kanban boards
• Reporting
• File storage

Reviews G2: 4.5 stars Capterra: 4.7 stars

11. Flowlu

Flowlu helps you to keep all your projects under control and have a clear overview of each step of your project. You can instantly view project progress, key milestones, and deadlines, budget status, as well as estimated and spent time on tasks. Aside from that, you can forecast the project's revenue, calculate costs, and then compare these against the results. Moreover, you can manage tasks, workload, and performance of your staff. The free version includes up to 2 users (1 as an admin), 1 GB of file storage, and one workspace. For a plan upgrade, prices start at $29 per month. Key features:

• Tasks & Projects
• Agile Projects (Scrum)
• Project Expense & Revenue
• Cloud CRM
• Lead & Contact Management
• Quotation (Estimates)
• Invoicing & Payment Processing
• Finance Management
• Records Management
• Online Messenger

Reviews G2: 4.6 stars Capterra: 4.8 stars

12. Basecamp

Basecamp is a free project management software that allows you to manage projects and staff at once, in an effortless way. In other words, it helps you to run your business, centralizing your processes. Teams focused on project completion within time, and budget will be able to track and manage them in just one place. Moreover, it allows you to organize your tasks in to-do lists, where it's easy to reorder and prioritize assignments. The free Basecamp plan is suitable for freelancers, personal projects, and similar types of light use. You can have up to 20 users and three projects on your free account, plus 1 GB of storage space. But in case you need an upgrade, the price is $99 per month. Main features

• To-to lists
• Schedule with a calendar
• Share your documents and files
• Group chat
• Recurring task
• My stuff- for your individual work

Reviews G2: 4.1 stars Capterra: 4.3 stars

13. LiquidPlanner

LiquidPlanner is a free project management software that helps you plan and prioritize your projects and track changes across all active projects by allowing you to analyze risks and resources. In your dashboard, you can visualize pending, approved, and active projects, and have access to your portfolio whenever you need insights and comparisons to make critical decisions. It makes setting a task priority much more straightforward. Besides, it helps you to calculate a realistic range of time you would most likely take to complete your work. You can enjoy LiquidPlanner's free plan with unlimited internal dashboards, up to 25 virtual members, and 2000 active tasks. For more complete and unrestricted features, the premium plans start at $45/user/month. Key features

• Comments with tasks
• Time Tracking
• iOS and Android Apps
• Analytics
• Phone and Email Support
• API Access

Reviews G2: 4.2 stars Capterra: 4.3 stars

14. Avaza

Avaza is a platform that teams can use to collaborate on projects and tasks, track time, manage expenses, schedule resources, and also invoice customers. In your Avaza dashboard, you can instantly toggle between three views for tasks: Kanban, Gantt, and List. Besides, you can convert emails into tasks, filtering, and grouping them within or across projects. It also offers flexible project budgeting, billing methods, and time tracking on tasks. On the free plan, you have unlimited project collaborators, with 5 active projects, 10 customers, and 5 invoices per month. For more advanced features, you can acquire a paid plan, with prices starting at $9.95 per month. Key features:

• Automatic backups
• Secure data protection
• Unlimited access
• Responsive mobile design
• iPhone, iPad, Android-friendly
• 100MB Storage

Reviews G2: 4.5 stars Capterra: 4.6 stars

15. Zenkit

Zenkit is a free project management software with an easy interface and essential features. It allows users to convert projects into to-do lists, so managing tasks becomes a lot easier. Moreover, you have an activity tracking feature, checklists, and labels to keep your team on the same page. The free version of Zenkit is suitable for a small team, with up to 3 members and 5 workspaces. For more advanced plans, it offers plans starting at 9 euros per user, per month. Key features

• Up to 100 collections
• 500 items
• 1 GB attachment space
• 2 Factor Authentication
• 3 Zenkit Universe Connections

Reviews G2: 4.8 stars Capterra: 4.7 stars

How to choose the best free project management software?

Before buying any software, you need to make an in-depth analysis of how your business is right now. First, if you are a Project Manager, you must know not only your needs, but also your team's expectations, and how they would behave with a new tool implementation. Don't forget to analyze how your workflow is running at the moment, so you can pick a tool that will require a smooth transition. With that part solved, it's time to list which of the features of PM software will be essential for teamwork. For example, Kanban view or Gantt Chart (even both), time or task tracking, to-do lists, or checklists, and so on. And of course, the software needs to attend to the number of people in your team, so no one is left out. Therefore, choose software with unlimited users, so you don't need to constantly upgrade the number of seats. Last, but not least, be aware of the number of projects you can run in the tool of your choice. After all, having a project cut out because you reached the limit can mess with your whole workflow, right?