Trello is a kanban project management tool founded in 2011 by Fog Creek and acquired by Atlassian for $425 million, with 90+ million users. The free plan is powerful, and Standard starts at $5/user/month.

Strengths and Features

✅ Founded in 2011 by Fog Creek Software and acquired by Atlassian for $425 million in 2017, with 90+ million users worldwide
✅ Free plan offers unlimited cards, lists, and members, with a 10MB per-file limit and 1 Power-Up per board
✅ Standard plan at $5/user/month unlocks unlimited Power-Ups, 250MB attachments, and 1,000 Butler automation runs
✅ Premium plan at $10/user/month adds Timeline, calendar view, dashboard, and advanced automation
✅ Butler automation engine supports trigger-based rules, with 250 runs/month on the free plan
✅ Integrates with 200+ Power-Ups including Slack, Google Drive, Jira, and GitHub
⚠️ Limited for complex project management, with no native Gantt chart, resource management, or advanced reporting
⚠️ Advanced features (unlimited Power-Ups, Timeline, calendar view) require a paid subscription
⚠️ Cards are semi-structured task containers, weaker than Notion for documents, knowledge bases, and databases
⚠️ Limited offline functionality - cards cannot be created, edited, or have attachments loaded without a network connection
⚠️ Some Power-Ups are English-only, and access in the Asia-Pacific region can be slow at times

Product Information

Category Communication

Tags Team Collaboration project management Drag-and-drop Kanban Atlassian Trello Card-based Tasks Power-Ups Butler Automation Task Board

Company trello

Service Region United States

Official Website https://trello.com/

Recommendation Score 4 pts

Published 2026-08-09

Detailed Notes

Overview

Trello was founded by Fog Creek Software in 2011 (founding team including Joel Spolsky, Michael Pryor, and Brett Kiefer), headquartered in New York, USA, and was acquired by Atlassian in 2017 for $425 million. Today it has more than 90 million registered users worldwide. As the synonym for the kanban method, Trello organizes tasks with a minimal board-list-card structure, supporting drag-and-drop, checklists, due dates, labels, attachments, and Power-Ups, with an almost zero learning curve.

Within the team collaboration category, Trello is the kanban benchmark for extreme simplicity; backed by the Atlassian ecosystem, it works closely with Jira and Confluence, covering lightweight scenarios from personal to-do lists to small-team agile collaboration.

Key Strengths

Extremely simple onboarding: A new user can go from signup to creating a first board and managing tasks in under 5 minutes, ideal for non-technical teams and individuals. See the project management guide.
Generous free plan: Unlimited cards, lists, and members, 10MB per file, 1 Power-Up, and 250 Butler automation runs per month - enough for most personal and micro-team needs.
Power-Ups ecosystem: 200+ third-party integrations including Slack, Google Drive, Jira, and GitHub, with calendar and Timeline views enabled as needed.
Butler automation: Trigger-based conditional rules (auto-run when cards move, are due, or are commented on), with 250 runs/month on free and higher quotas on paid plans.
Atlassian ecosystem synergy: Cards can be upgraded into Jira tickets and linked to Confluence documents, with 2 Atlassian products (Jira and Confluence) working seamlessly for a smooth path from light to professional.
Trello AI: AI capabilities since 2023, providing smart suggestions and automated template generation.

Product Ecosystem

Boards and Cards

The core interaction unit: boards (project containers), lists (workflow stages), and cards (the smallest task unit). Cards support descriptions, checklists, due dates, labels, attachments, member assignment, and comments.

Power-Ups

A third-party integration marketplace with 200+ apps including calendar view, Timeline, dashboard, Slack, Google Drive, Jira Cloud, and GitHub; 1 on the free plan and unlimited on paid plans.

Butler Automation

A built-in automation engine that runs batch operations through conditional rules and buttons with no coding.

Trello AI

AI-assisted features including smart suggestions and automated template generation (launched 2023).

Views and Templates

Calendar view, Timeline, dashboard, and a board template marketplace; Premium unlocks workload management and branded boards.

Mobile and API

Native iOS/Android apps plus a full REST API and Webhooks for programmatically creating cards, updating fields, and listening to events, enabling automation integration.

Limitations

Limited for complex project management: No native Gantt chart, resource management, or advanced reporting; Jira or ClickUp fit multidimensional management better.
Advanced features require payment: Unlimited Power-Ups (Standard and up) and Timeline/calendar views (Premium and up) require subscriptions, so heavy-automation teams must budget monthly cost.
Weak structured information management: Cards are essentially semi-structured task containers, with document, knowledge base, and database capabilities weaker than Notion.
Limited offline functionality: Cards cannot be created, edited, or have attachments loaded offline, which is a limitation for travel.
Incomplete localization: The interface supports Chinese, but some Power-Ups and help docs are English-only; Asia-Pacific access can be slow at times.

Use Cases

Personal task management (recommended ★★★★★): To-do lists, personal projects, habit tracking.
Small-team collaboration (recommended ★★★★★): Task boards and linear workflows for 5-20 person teams.
Content planning and publishing calendars (recommended ★★★★): Editorial team scheduling with the calendar Power-Up.
Recruiting pipeline management (recommended ★★★★): Candidate boards - resume screening, interview scheduling.
Simple project management (recommended ★★★★): Small and mid-size projects with few dependencies and linear flows.
Complex enterprise projects (recommended ★★): Prefer Jira, ClickUp, or Monday.com.

Pricing

Plan	Pricing	Key features
Free	$0	Unlimited cards/lists/members, 10MB attachments, 1 Power-Up, Butler 250 runs/month
Standard	$5/user/month	Unlimited Power-Ups, 250MB attachments, Butler 1,000 runs/month
Premium	$10/user/month	Timeline, calendar view, dashboard, workload management, branded boards
Enterprise	Custom quote	Advanced admin controls, SSO, audit logs, dedicated support

Note: Prices are the public Atlassian rates (August 2026, monthly/annual); the Enterprise plan includes advanced security and admin features.

FAQ

Is Trello free to use? Yes. The Free plan offers unlimited cards, lists, and members, 1 Power-Up, and 250 Butler runs per month - enough for individuals and micro teams; upgrade to Standard ($5/user/month) or Premium ($10/user/month) for more extensions and automation; see SaaS billing best practices.
What is the difference between Trello and Jira? Trello is minimal kanban project management for individuals and small teams; Jira is professional issue tracking for development teams. Both are in the Atlassian ecosystem, and Trello cards can be upgraded into Jira tickets for a smooth transition. See agile backlog refinement.
Trello or Notion? Trello focuses on kanban task management with extreme simplicity; Notion is an all-in-one workspace (notes, knowledge base, databases, and project management). Choose Trello for task boards only and Notion for unified document collaboration. See the Notion project management guide.
Is the free Butler automation enough? The free plan provides 250 runs/month, which suits individuals and light teams; heavy automation (cross-board batch tasks, scheduled cleanup) is better on Standard or Premium, which raise the quota to 1,000 runs/month; see SaaS billing best practices.
How do I migrate a project away from Trello? Trello offers full JSON export, and ClickUp, Monday.com, Jira, and Asana all provide import wizards; you can also migrate programmatically via the REST API. See remote team collaboration tool comparison.

Visit Trello Website →