10 Best Trello Alternatives in 2026 (Free, Open-Source, and Self-Hosted)

Trello alternatives compared

How we evaluated these tools

We build Kaneo, which is the first entry on this list. So here are the criteria, stated up front, and an honest section under every tool explaining when it beats Kaneo.

1. Cost at ten and at fifty users. Per-seat pricing behaves very differently at those two points.
2. What the free tier actually allows, in collaborators, boards, and features.
3. Licence and self-hosting. Whether you can run it, and whether the free build is complete.
4. Single sign-on. Included, paid tier, or absent.
5. Structure beyond the board. Backlog, workflows, priorities, and schedules without add-ons.
6. Data portability. Export, import, and a documented API.
7. Deployment and maintenance burden for the self-hosted options.
8. Where it is genuinely better than Kaneo.

The 10 best Trello alternatives in 2026

1. Kaneo

Kaneo keeps the part of Trello that works, a fast board you can read at a glance, and adds the structure teams end up building by hand. Boards and lists for day-to-day work, a backlog for what is coming, workflow columns that mean something, and Gantt and calendar views when dates matter. Priorities, labels, assignees, custom fields, task relations, comments, attachments, and time tracking are built in rather than bolted on.

Kaneo Cloud is hosted in the EU and costs $5 per user a month, with single sign-on on every plan. Kaneo is also open source under the MIT licence, so you can export everything or move to your own server whenever you want. Self-hosting is one application container plus PostgreSQL.

Key features

• Kanban boards and list views with realtime updates
• Backlog planning and configurable workflow columns
• Gantt and calendar views for tasks with start and due dates
• Project custom fields: text, number, date, dropdown, and checkbox
• Priorities, labels, assignees, task relations, comments, attachments, and time tracking
• Workspace roles and permissions
• Single sign-on with Google, GitHub, Discord, or any OIDC provider, on every plan
• GitHub, GitLab, and Gitea integrations with two-way issue sync, plus notifications in Slack, Discord, Telegram, and Mattermost
• Public REST API, API keys, webhooks, and an MCP server for AI agents
• Per-project JSON export and import

Pros: The structure Trello leaves to Power-Ups is included: backlog, workflows, priorities, Gantt, calendar, custom fields, and time tracking. Single sign-on on every plan, and the same features in the free MIT-licensed self-hosted build.

Cons: No Power-Up marketplace, no butler-style automation builder beyond rules that move tasks on integration events, and no one-click Trello importer yet. Moving boards over means Trello's JSON export plus Kaneo's API or JSON import.

Pricing: Kaneo Cloud is $4 a month for one user and $5 per user a month for teams, 14-day trial, no credit card. Annual billing works out at $3.33 and $4.17 a month. Self-hosting under MIT is free.

Best for: Teams who like Trello's board but need a backlog, schedules, and roles, with a choice of managed hosting or their own server.

Why choose it over Trello: You stop maintaining a process out of lists and labels, single sign-on is not an Enterprise conversation, and you can run it yourself. Full breakdown on our Kaneo vs Trello page.

2. PLANKA

PLANKA is the closest open-source match to Trello's look and feel: boards, lists, cards with covers, checklists, and realtime updates, all on your own server. If the goal is "Trello, but self-hosted" and nothing more, start here.

Key features: Trello-style boards and cards, realtime collaboration, checklists, labels, due dates, notifications, Docker deployment.

Pros: Very familiar to Trello users, actively developed by a dedicated team, straightforward Docker install.

Cons: Since 2.2, PLANKA uses a source-available Fair Use licence rather than an OSI open-source one, and OIDC single sign-on is in the paid Pro tier. There is no backlog or workflow layer, and no data export.

Pricing: Community edition free to self-host, Pro tier paid.

Best for: Teams who want Trello's exact interaction model on their own hardware and do not need SSO in the free build.

Why choose it over Trello: Same mental model, your server, your data. See Kaneo vs PLANKA if SSO or export matters.

3. ClickUp

ClickUp is the broadest tool here: tasks, docs, whiteboards, chat, dashboards, goals, and time tracking in one product, with board view as one of dozens of views.

Key features: Board, list, Gantt, and calendar views, docs, whiteboards, chat, dashboards, automations, native time tracking.

Pros: Enormous feature surface, a free plan with unlimited members, and more capability per dollar than most of this list.

Cons: Cloud only and proprietary. The breadth is overwhelming for a small team that liked Trello because it was simple. The free plan caps storage at 60MB, and SAML single sign-on starts at the Business tier.

Pricing: Unlimited is $7 per user a month and Business $12, billed annually. See ClickUp's pricing.

Best for: Teams who want to replace Trello and several other tools at once.

Why choose it over Trello: Much more structure and many more views at a similar per-seat price. Compare with Kaneo vs ClickUp if the breadth is the part you would turn off.

4. Asana

Asana is built for coordinating many projects across a company: portfolios, goals, workload, and approvals, with boards as one way to view a project.

Key features: Board, list, timeline, and calendar views, portfolios, goals, workload, rules, approvals, forms.

Pros: Excellent cross-project reporting, mature and polished, strong for marketing and operations teams.

Cons: Cloud only and proprietary, and noticeably more expensive per seat. The free Personal plan is limited to 2 users, and SAML single sign-on is an Enterprise-tier feature.

Pricing: Starter is $10.99 per user a month and Advanced $24.99, billed annually. See Asana's pricing.

Best for: Organisations where someone needs fifty projects rolled up into one view.

Why choose it over Trello: Real portfolio and workload management. See Kaneo vs Asana, and our Asana alternatives round-up if price is the worry.

5. monday.com

monday.com is a work OS rather than a board: colourful, highly configurable boards with dashboards, forms, automation recipes, and CRM templates.

Key features: Customisable boards, dashboards, forms, automations, CRM and HR templates, an app marketplace.

Pros: Very visual and approachable for non-technical teams, strong automation for operations work.

Cons: Cloud only, proprietary, sold in seat blocks rather than exact headcount, and single sign-on is Enterprise-tier. The free plan is capped at 2 seats and 3 boards.

Pricing: Per seat with minimum seat counts. See monday.com's pricing.

Best for: Operations, marketing, and sales teams who want dashboards and forms alongside their boards.

Why choose it over Trello: Far more powerful boards and automation for business workflows. See Kaneo vs monday.com and our monday.com alternatives round-up.

6. Notion

Notion is a flexible workspace for documents, wikis, and databases. A task database with a board view does what Trello does, inside the same tool as your docs.

Key features: Documents and wikis, databases with board, table, calendar, and timeline views, templates, automations.

Pros: Excellent documentation, very flexible, one place for notes and tasks.

Cons: Cloud only and proprietary. Project tracking is something you build and maintain rather than something you get, and it tends to drift. SAML single sign-on starts at the Business tier.

Pricing: Plus is $10 per member a month and Business $20. See Notion's pricing.

Best for: Teams whose work is mostly writing, with tasks as a side effect.

Why choose it over Trello: Your boards sit next to the docs they reference. Compare with Kaneo vs Notion if tracking has become the main job.

7. Linear

Linear is a fast, keyboard-first issue tracker for product and engineering teams, with cycles, triage, and project updates.

Key features: Issues, cycles, projects, triage, roadmaps, GitHub and GitLab integrations, a very fast interface.

Pros: The most polished tracker on this list, with sensible defaults for software teams and excellent speed.

Cons: Cloud only and proprietary, opinionated toward software work, and single sign-on is on paid plans. The free plan is capped at 2 teams and 250 issues.

Pricing: Basic is $10 per user a month, billed annually. See Linear's pricing.

Best for: Engineering teams who moved past cards and want issue tracking that keeps up with them.

Why choose it over Trello: Real issue tracking with cycles and triage. See Kaneo vs Linear for the open-source, self-hostable option.

8. Basecamp

Basecamp combines to-dos, card tables, message boards, chat, docs, and check-ins, and it is priced per account rather than per user.

Key features: Card tables (kanban), to-do lists, message boards, Campfire chat, docs and files, schedules, client access.

Pros: Flat pricing, strong client communication, a calm and opinionated way of working.

Cons: Cloud only and proprietary. The card table is simpler than a dedicated board, and there is no single sign-on beyond its own accounts.

Pricing: Free tier, then flat plans: Freelancer at $25 a month for up to 20 users, and Studio at $59 a month with unlimited users. See Basecamp's pricing.

Best for: Agencies and small companies that run client projects and want messages and tasks together.

Why choose it over Trello: One flat price for the whole company, plus communication tools Trello does not have. See Kaneo vs Basecamp.

9. WeKan

WeKan is the veteran open-source kanban board, MIT licensed, with swimlanes and a long list of install methods.

Key features: Boards with swimlanes, cards with checklists and due dates, board permissions, OIDC sign-in, Snap, Docker, and Sandstorm installs.

Pros: MIT licensed, free single sign-on through OIDC, long history and many deployment options.

Cons: Built on Meteor and MongoDB, with an interface that shows its age. Board-focused, with no backlog layer or time tracking.

Pricing: Free to self-host. There is no official hosted cloud.

Best for: Self-hosters who want swimlanes and a board that has been running in production for years.

Why choose it over Trello: Free, open source, and on your server. See Kaneo vs WeKan.

10. Vikunja

Vikunja is an open-source task manager with list, table, kanban, Gantt, and calendar views. It is excellent for personal use and works well for small teams sharing projects.

Key features: List, table, kanban, Gantt, and calendar views, labels, priorities, reminders, OIDC sign-in, CalDAV.

Pros: Small, fast, and pleasant, with a kindly priced hosted option and free single sign-on.

Cons: AGPLv3, and some features, including time tracking, sit in the paid Vikunja Pro add-on for self-hosters. Sharing rather than workspace roles for permissions.

Pricing: Free to self-host, hosted cloud from €4 a month. See Vikunja's pricing.

Best for: Individuals and small groups who want Trello-like boards plus lists and calendars.

Why choose it over Trello: More views, CalDAV, and a free self-hosted build. See Kaneo vs Vikunja.

How to choose

• You want Trello, but self-hosted. PLANKA for the closest feel, Kaneo for SSO and a backlog in the free build, WeKan if you want swimlanes.
• Your board has become a process. Kaneo, Linear, or ClickUp.
• You are an engineering team. Linear or Kaneo, especially if you want issues synced with GitHub, GitLab, or Gitea.
• You are a marketing or operations team. monday.com, Asana, or ClickUp.
• Your work is mostly documents. Notion.
• You pay per seat and the team is growing. Basecamp's flat rate, or a self-hosted open-source tool.
• Single sign-on without an Enterprise contract. Kaneo, WeKan, or Vikunja, or check the free SSO guide.

What it actually costs at ten and fifty users

Rough monthly figures at October 2026 list prices, on annual billing:

Kaneo Cloud is the cheapest per-seat row, below even Trello Standard, and it includes the Gantt and calendar views Trello keeps for Premium plus single sign-on Trello keeps for Enterprise. At fifty users it is roughly $290 a month less than Trello Premium. Basecamp's flat rate wins at real scale if its way of working suits you. The self-hosted line never moves, but it swaps the bill for someone's time, and that cost is easy to leave out of a table like this.

Migrating off Trello

Any board member can export a board to JSON from the board menu, on every plan, with its cards, lists, labels, checklists, and members. The JSON only carries the 1,000 most recent actions, which is where comments live, so a busy board's older comment history may be missing. CSV export is limited to Premium Workspaces and leaves out comments. Attachments are links rather than files, so download the ones that matter separately.

From there it is a scripting job against the target tool's API. Kaneo has a documented public REST API and per-project JSON import, so a board of a few hundred cards is an afternoon. Import into a scratch project first, check that assignees resolve by email and that due dates land in the right timezone, and keep Trello readable for a few weeks rather than cancelling on day one. If you want a one-click Trello importer, say so in a GitHub issue, since import work is prioritised by demand.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best free alternative to Trello?

If you are willing to run a server, Kaneo, WeKan, and Kanboard are MIT licensed and free to self-host with no user limits, and PLANKA's Community edition is free under its own licence. Among hosted options, ClickUp's free plan has unlimited members with a small storage cap. Trello's own free plan still covers up to 10 collaborators per Workspace, which is enough for many small teams.

Is there an open-source alternative to Trello?

Yes. Kaneo, WeKan, and Kanboard are MIT licensed, Vikunja is AGPLv3, and PLANKA is source-available under a Fair Use licence. All of them can be self-hosted for free, and they differ in how much structure they add beyond the board and in what the free build withholds, particularly single sign-on.

Can Trello be self-hosted?

No. Trello is an Atlassian cloud product with no on-premise or self-hosted edition at any tier. Running a Trello-style board on your own server means using a different tool, and our guide to self-hosted Trello alternatives compares the options.

Which Trello alternative is best for software teams?

Linear if you want a polished hosted tracker and are happy on cloud SaaS. Kaneo if you want two-way issue sync with GitHub, GitLab, or Gitea, branch and pull request automation, and the option to self-host. See our guide to a kanban board with GitHub issue sync.

Does Trello include single sign-on?

SAML single sign-on for Trello is an Enterprise-tier feature, at $17.50 per user a month billed annually, rather than part of the Standard or Premium plans. If you need OIDC or SAML against your own identity provider without an Enterprise contract, check our guide to tools with free SSO.

What does Trello do better than these alternatives?

Simplicity and familiarity. Almost everyone has used Trello, the learning curve is close to zero, and the Power-Up ecosystem covers a huge range of edge cases. If your team uses one or two boards and nobody is maintaining a process on top of them, Trello is still a fine choice.

The short version

If Trello's free plan covers your team and the board is all you need, stay. It is still the simplest board there is.

If your board has quietly become a backlog, a workflow, and a schedule held together by labels and Power-Ups, Kaneo gives you those as features. Kaneo Cloud is $5 per user a month, hosted in the EU, with single sign-on on every plan and backups and updates handled for you. Fourteen-day trial, no credit card, and an MIT-licensed codebase underneath, so you can always take your data and host it yourself.