Avi SiegelCo-Founder of Momentum. Formerly Product @ Klaviyo, Zaius (acquired by Optimizely), and Upscribe.
Table of Contents
- 1. Momentum
- Why Momentum Stands Out
- Pros and Cons
- Pricing and Access
- 2. Atlassian – Jira Software
- Key Features & Use Cases
- Pros & Cons
- Pricing
- 3. Microsoft – Azure DevOps Services (Azure Boards)
- Key Features & Use Cases
- Pros & Cons
- Pricing
- 4. Asana
- Key Features & Use Cases
- Pros & Cons
- Pricing
- 5. monday.com – Work Management
- Key Features & Use Cases
- Pros & Cons
- Pricing
- 6. ClickUp
- Key Features & Use Cases
- Pros & Cons
- Pricing
- 7. Wrike
- Key Features & Use Cases
- Pros & Cons
- Pricing
- 8. Smartsheet
- Key Features & Use Cases
- Pros & Cons
- Pricing
- 9. Trello (by Atlassian)
- Key Features & Use Cases
- Pros & Cons
- Pricing
- 10. GitHub – Projects (for agile planning on GitHub)
- Key Features & Use Cases
- Pros & Cons
- Pricing
- 11. Shortcut (formerly Clubhouse)
- Key Features & Use Cases
- Pros & Cons
- Pricing
- 12. G2 – Project Management category (comparison marketplace)
- Key Features & Use Cases
- Pros & Cons
- Pricing
- Agile Project Management Tools Comparison
- Choosing a Tool That Serves, Not Enslaves
- Recalibrate Your Search from "Best" to "Best Fit"
- Actionable Steps to Making the Right Choice
Do not index
Do not index
You know the agile ceremonies by heart, but let’s be honest, something’s broken. Your team is juggling Jira for tickets, Google Sheets for capacity planning, Slack for standups, and maybe a carrier pigeon for critical bug reports. It's a chaotic patchwork of tools creating more friction than flow, and it’s sucking the life out of your team.
The constant context switching is killing productivity. Critical information gets lost in the digital shuffle, and ‘agile’ feels more like a slow, painful crawl. You’re told to "move fast and break things," but the only thing breaking is your team's spirit under the weight of administrative overhead. The problem isn't your methodology; it's the operational tax imposed by a disjointed toolkit.
You’ve missed the point if you think another tool is the answer. The issue is that most tools obstruct agile principles instead of supporting them. You need a platform that unifies workflows, provides clarity, and gets out of the way so your team can focus on what they do best: building great products. This guide cuts through the noise to find the best agile project management software for your specific needs. We’ll analyze top contenders like Momentum, Jira, and Asana, providing an honest assessment of their strengths and weaknesses to help you stop duct-taping your workflow together.
1. Momentum
Momentum positions itself as the all-in-one command center for agile software development teams. It’s not just another task board; it’s a purpose-built platform designed to consolidate the fragmented rituals of agile—standups, sprint planning, backlog grooming—into a single, cohesive interface. Its core strength is unification, aiming to eliminate the tool fatigue that plagues so many engineering teams who are sick of juggling spreadsheets, separate standup tools, and their primary project tracker.
The platform excels at streamlining daily ceremonies. Its async and live standup features, complete with a draggable history and smart nudges for stalled tasks, directly address the pain points of disjointed team updates. Instead of chasing down updates in Slack, a scrum master can instantly see who’s blocked and what conversations need attention. It’s built on the premise that if you can reduce the friction in daily communication, you can accelerate the entire sprint.
Why Momentum Stands Out
Momentum’s killer feature is its deep, two-way Jira synchronization. This isn’t a superficial integration; it’s a seamless bridge that allows teams to adopt Momentum without the monumental task of migration. You can connect your existing Jira instance in minutes and immediately benefit from Momentum's streamlined workflows without disrupting your system of record. For a startup engineering lead, this makes adoption incredibly low-risk—no need to convince leadership to overhaul the entire toolchain.
The sprint planning module is another significant advantage. It automates the tedious parts of the process by calculating point targets, breaking down workloads by assignee, and even accounting for out-of-office schedules. The built-in story pointing eliminates the need to copy-paste estimates between tools, making grooming sessions more efficient. For product managers, this translates to more accurate planning and clearer visibility into team capacity.
Momentum is one of the best agile project management software options because it directly attacks workflow inefficiencies. It doesn’t try to replace your core system like Jira, but enhances it by centralizing the ceremonies that happen around it, saving teams from the "death by a thousand tools" scenario.
Pros and Cons
Pros | Cons |
All-in-one Agile Hub: Consolidates standups, sprint planning, triage, and grooming into one unified platform. | Jira-Centric: Primarily optimized for Jira users, which may limit teams on other platforms like Azure DevOps or Asana. |
Seamless Jira Sync: Deep two-way integration allows for instant setup without needing to migrate data. | Newer Platform: As a beta product, it may lack the extensive integrations of more established competitors. |
Automated Planning: Automatically calculates sprint points, tracks assignee workload, and manages out-of-office time. | ㅤ |
Risk-Free Trial: Free beta period with a setup time of under five minutes and no credit card required. | ㅤ |
Pricing and Access
Momentum is currently in a free beta period, making it a no-cost opportunity for teams to evaluate its impact. The quick, sub-five-minute setup process requires no credit card, lowering the barrier to entry for any team looking to improve its agile processes.
2. Atlassian – Jira Software
Jira is the 800-pound gorilla in the agile project management software space. For many software teams, Jira is agile project management. It's built from the ground up to support methodologies like Scrum and Kanban, offering deep, customizable tooling that scales from a two-person startup to a global enterprise. If you need robust, out-of-the-box features for sprint planning, backlog grooming, and velocity tracking, Jira is the default choice for a reason.
Its strength lies in its comprehensive, albeit sometimes complex, feature set. Development teams can manage sprints, track bugs, and visualize progress with burndown charts, while product leaders can use Advanced Roadmaps (a premium feature) for cross-team strategic planning. For teams deeply embedded in software development, mastering the platform is a worthwhile investment. For instance, getting good at mastering Jira bug reports for streamlined issue tracking can dramatically cut down on the back-and-forth and accelerate issue resolution.
Key Features & Use Cases
- Best For: Established software development teams that require powerful, dedicated agile tooling and extensive integration capabilities.
- Deep Agile Tooling: Comes standard with Scrum and Kanban boards, backlog management, sprint planning, and detailed agile reporting like burndown and velocity charts. These tools help teams adhere to agile development best practices.
- Massive Ecosystem: The Atlassian Marketplace offers thousands of apps, allowing you to connect Jira to virtually any other tool in your stack, from GitHub to Slack.
- Scalability: Jira is engineered to grow with you. It supports small teams on its free plan and scales up to enterprises with tens of thousands of users on its Cloud and Data Center deployments.
Pros & Cons
Pros | Cons |
Extensive, native agile features | Can have a steep learning curve for new users |
Huge marketplace for apps and integrations | Advanced features locked behind Premium tiers |
Scales from small teams to large enterprises | Administration can become complex at scale |
Strong reporting and analytics capabilities | The interface can feel cluttered and slow |
Pricing
Jira Software offers several tiers, making it accessible for teams of all sizes.
- Free: Up to 10 users, with core Scrum and Kanban features.
- Standard: Starts at $8.15/user/month for up to 35,000 users.
- Premium: Starts at $16/user/month, adding Advanced Roadmaps, guaranteed uptime SLA, and project archiving.
- Enterprise: Custom pricing for global scale, security, and governance needs.
3. Microsoft – Azure DevOps Services (Azure Boards)
For teams already living and breathing within the Microsoft ecosystem, Azure DevOps Services often feels less like a choice and more like a natural extension. It’s not just a project management tool; it’s a comprehensive suite where Azure Boards, the agile planning component, is deeply intertwined with source control (Azure Repos) and CI/CD (Azure Pipelines). This tight integration is its main differentiator, creating a seamless workflow from user story creation all the way to production deployment.
This all-in-one approach means developers can link commits and pull requests directly to work items, providing project managers with unparalleled, real-time visibility without ever having to leave the platform. It's a powerful proposition for organizations that need a single source of truth for their entire software development lifecycle, backed by enterprise-grade security from Microsoft. This makes it a strong contender for the title of best agile project management software, particularly for those prioritizing ecosystem synergy.
Key Features & Use Cases
- Best For: Development teams heavily invested in the Microsoft/Azure stack who want a unified platform for planning, coding, and deploying.
- Integrated DevOps Toolchain: Azure Boards provides robust Kanban and Scrum tooling, but its true power comes from its native integration with Azure Repos (Git) and Azure Pipelines (CI/CD).
- Customizable Work Items: Go beyond standard user stories and bugs. Create and customize work item types to match your team’s specific process for streamlined project management for software development.
- Enterprise-Ready: Built with enterprise needs in mind, offering advanced security, compliance, and integration with Azure Active Directory.
Pros & Cons
Pros | Cons |
Seamless integration across the entire development lifecycle | Interface can feel less intuitive than more modern competitors |
Generous free tier for small teams (up to 5 users) | Can be overly complex for non-development or non-technical teams |
Strong enterprise-level security and compliance features | Pricing for add-ons like Test Plans can increase the total cost |
Highly customizable work items and process templates | Less extensive third-party app marketplace compared to Jira |
Pricing
Azure DevOps offers a flexible, service-based pricing model.
- Free: Up to 5 users for Basic features (includes Boards, Repos, Pipelines), with additional free CI/CD minutes and artifacts storage.
- Basic Plan: $6/user/month for the 6th user and beyond.
- Basic + Test Plans: $52/user/month, adding comprehensive test planning and management capabilities.
- Additional services like parallel jobs for pipelines are available as add-ons.
4. Asana
Asana has evolved from a simple task manager into a powerful work management platform. While not a pure-play agile tool like Jira, its flexibility and user-friendly interface make it an excellent choice for teams that blend agile practices with broader business projects. It excels at providing visibility across departments, not just within engineering. Think of the early-stage startup where the marketing lead needs to know when a feature is shipping to prep the launch campaign—Asana is built for that cross-functional harmony.
Its core strength is its versatility. A marketing team can use its Kanban boards for campaign sprints, while an engineering team can manage a product backlog, and leadership can get a high-level overview using Portfolios. This cross-functional capability, combined with AI-powered features like Smart status updates, helps bridge the communication gap that often exists between technical and non-technical teams, ensuring everyone is aligned on strategic objectives.
Key Features & Use Cases
- Best For: Cross-functional teams (product, business, marketing) that need a highly visual and approachable platform for managing agile and traditional projects side-by-side.
- Multiple Project Views: Seamlessly switch between List, Kanban Boards, Timeline (Gantt-style), and Calendar views to visualize work in the most effective way for any given task or stakeholder.
- Goals & Portfolios: Connect day-to-day agile work directly to high-level company objectives, providing leadership with real-time insight into how sprints are contributing to strategic goals.
- AI-Powered Automation: Asana Intelligence helps teams automate status updates, summarize long comment threads, and generate project plans, reducing administrative overhead.
Pros & Cons
Pros | Cons |
Very approachable user interface with enterprise scalability | Core agile features are less specialized than dedicated tools |
Rich reporting and goal management for business teams | Some advanced features only on Advanced or Enterprise plans |
Mature ecosystem and extensive learning resources | Seat minimums and tier caps can be limiting for smaller teams |
Strong integrations with major business software stacks | Can become cluttered if not managed with clear conventions |
Pricing
Asana's pricing scales with team size and feature requirements.
- Starter: Starts at $13.49/user/month for small teams needing project management basics.
- Advanced: Starts at $30.49/user/month, adding Portfolios, Goals, and workload management.
- Enterprise: Custom pricing for organizations needing advanced security, controls, and dedicated support.
- Enterprise+: Custom pricing for the most complex enterprise-grade needs.
5. monday.com – Work Management
monday.com has evolved into a serious contender in the agile project management space. It positions itself as a "Work OS," a flexible platform where teams can build custom workflows for nearly anything, from sprint planning to CRM. Its strength lies in its exceptional ease of use and visual interface, which makes agile concepts accessible to teams that might find tools like Jira overly rigid or complex.
The platform excels at translating complex project data into intuitive, colorful boards and timelines. This visual approach is particularly effective for hybrid teams or organizations where non-technical stakeholders need clear visibility into development progress. Setting up a sprint board with custom statuses and adding automations like "when status changes to Done, notify the product manager" can be done in minutes, not hours. This low barrier to entry makes it a powerful choice for teams that need to get moving quickly without a dedicated administrator.
Key Features & Use Cases
- Best For: Cross-functional teams and businesses that prioritize visual workflow management, flexibility, and rapid setup over deep, developer-centric tooling.
- Highly Customizable Workflows: Build your agile boards from scratch or use robust templates for sprints, roadmaps, and backlogs. Multiple views (Kanban, Gantt, Calendar) let team members see work in the way that makes sense to them.
- Powerful Automations: Automate repetitive tasks without writing code. Higher-tier plans offer a generous number of automated actions per month, which can significantly streamline handoffs between development, QA, and product teams.
- Integrated Dashboards: Aggregate data from multiple project boards into a single, high-level dashboard. This is invaluable for leadership who need real-time insights into team velocity and project health without digging through individual tasks.
Pros & Cons
Pros | Cons |
Fast setup with strong templates and visual dashboards | Essential features like time tracking require Pro plan |
Scales well from simple boards to multi-team programs | Costs increase with automation and integration usage |
Competitive automation quotas on Pro/Enterprise plans | Less specialized for software teams than Jira |
Intuitive and user-friendly interface | Free plan is quite limited for agile teams |
Pricing
monday.com's pricing is based on seat count and feature tiers.
- Free: Up to 2 users, with basic boards and documents.
- Basic: Starts at $9/user/month, offering unlimited items and 5 GB of storage.
- Standard: Starts at $12/user/month, adding Timeline/Gantt views, automations, and guest access.
- Pro: Starts at $19/user/month, including private boards, time tracking, and more automations.
- Enterprise: Custom pricing for enterprise-grade security, governance, and advanced analytics.
6. ClickUp
ClickUp markets itself as the "one app to replace them all," and for many teams, it comes impressively close. It aims to be an all-in-one productivity platform, combining tasks, documents, dashboards, goals, and communication into a single, highly customizable environment. This makes it a strong contender in the agile space, especially for startups that want to consolidate their tool stack without sacrificing core agile functionality.
Its main appeal is the sheer breadth of its feature set. Where other tools focus purely on Scrum or Kanban, ClickUp provides multiple views like Lists, Boards, and Gantt charts out of the box. This flexibility allows different teams within the same organization to work in the way that suits them best, all while contributing to a unified project. For a growing startup trying to keep costs down, having documentation, project tracking, and reporting in one place can be a game-changer.
Key Features & Use Cases
- Best For: Teams looking for a highly customizable, all-in-one platform that consolidates project management, docs, and goal tracking.
- Multiple Agile Views: Easily switch between List, Board, Calendar, and Gantt views to visualize work in different ways. Supports sprints, custom fields, and points for robust agile planning.
- Built-in Automation: Automate routine tasks like assigning work, changing statuses, or posting comments to reduce manual overhead and keep sprints moving.
- Integrated Docs & Dashboards: Create knowledge bases and project briefs directly within ClickUp. Build custom dashboards with dozens of widgets to track progress and report on key metrics without leaving the app.
- Optional AI Add-on: Use AI to summarize comment threads, generate subtasks, and write updates, helping to streamline communication.
Pros & Cons
Pros | Cons |
Broad feature set in one app (tasks, docs, dashboards) | The sheer number of features can create a steep learning curve |
Highly customizable to fit various team workflows | Performance can sometimes be slow with complex views |
Generous free plan and strong value on paid tiers | AI and advanced permissions are paid add-ons or on higher tiers |
Constant release of new features and improvements | The interface can feel overwhelming for new users |
Pricing
ClickUp’s pricing is designed to scale from individuals to large enterprises.
- Free Forever: Generous plan for personal use with unlimited tasks and members.
- Unlimited: Starts at $7/member/month, adding unlimited storage, dashboards, and integrations.
- Business: Starts at $12/member/month, adding advanced automations, time tracking, and goal setting.
- Enterprise: Custom pricing for advanced permissions, dedicated support, and enterprise-grade security.
7. Wrike
Wrike positions itself as an enterprise-grade work management platform that happens to excel at agile. It’s not just for software teams; its strength lies in connecting developers with marketing, sales, and operations under one roof. This makes it one of the best agile project management software choices for organizations aiming to scale agile principles beyond the engineering department.
Where a tool like Jira is laser-focused on development lifecycles, Wrike provides a broader canvas. It’s built for the program manager who needs to orchestrate work across different teams, some running Scrum while others follow a more traditional waterfall model. Its robust resource planning and advanced analytics provide the high-level visibility that leadership craves, making it a go-to for standardizing processes across a growing organization.
Key Features & Use Cases
- Best For: Large organizations and PMOs needing a centralized platform to manage hybrid agile approaches and cross-departmental projects.
- Flexible Agile Support: Provides Scrum and Kanban boards alongside traditional project views like Gantt charts, supporting hybrid methodologies.
- Advanced Resource Management: Features sophisticated tools for resource and capacity planning, including time tracking, which helps in balancing workloads across multiple projects.
- Enterprise-Ready: Comes equipped with over 400 integrations, advanced reporting, custom workflows, and enterprise-level governance and security features.
Pros & Cons
Pros | Cons |
Strong solution for cross-departmental scaling and PMOs | Higher pricing compared to small and medium business tools |
Excellent for managing hybrid agile and operational work | Administration and setup can be complex initially |
Deep reporting and business intelligence options | Can be overkill for teams needing a simple, developer-centric tool |
Highly customizable with custom item types and automations | Interface can feel less intuitive for pure agile practitioners |
Pricing
Wrike’s pricing is geared toward teams and businesses, scaling up to comprehensive enterprise solutions.
- Free: For teams getting started, with basic task management.
- Team: Starts at $9.80/user/month for growing teams.
- Business: Starts at $24.80/user/month, adding customization, resource management, and analytics.
- Enterprise & Pinnacle: Custom pricing for organizations needing advanced security, reporting, and automation capabilities.
8. Smartsheet
Smartsheet takes a different approach to agile project management, building its platform on a foundation that looks and feels like a supercharged spreadsheet. This familiar paradigm makes it incredibly accessible for cross-functional teams, especially those in business operations or finance who might find developer-focused tools intimidating. It bridges the gap between technical and non-technical teams by providing a common, flexible language for planning and tracking work.
Its power lies in transforming simple rows and columns into dynamic project assets. A single sheet can be visualized as a Kanban board for sprint management, a Gantt chart for long-range planning, or a calendar for release schedules. For organizations needing to scale governance and reporting across multiple agile projects, Smartsheet excels at rolling up data into executive-level dashboards, making it a strong choice for portfolio-level visibility.
Key Features & Use Cases
- Best For: Hybrid organizations that need to manage agile projects alongside traditional business initiatives and require strong, consolidated reporting for leadership.
- Multiple Views: Instantly switch between Grid, Gantt, Kanban, and Calendar views of the same underlying data, allowing different teams to work in the format they prefer.
- Powerful Automation: Build automated workflows to handle repetitive tasks like sending update requests, approving work, or moving cards between lanes based on specific triggers.
- Enterprise Governance: Premium add-ons like Control Center allow for the standardized creation and management of projects at scale, ensuring consistency across the portfolio.
Pros & Cons
Pros | Cons |
The spreadsheet paradigm is easily understood by all teams | Premium add-ons significantly increase the total cost |
Strong portfolio and executive-level reporting capabilities | Recent licensing changes have drawn pricing scrutiny |
Scales well with powerful governance and control add-ons | Can feel less "agile-native" than developer tools |
Highly flexible and customizable for various workflows | The core interface can feel busy for simple projects |
Pricing
Smartsheet’s pricing is based on user types and feature tiers.
- Free: For 1 user and up to 2 editors to try out the basics.
- Pro: Starts at $9/user/month for small teams needing unlimited sheets and dashboards.
- Business: Starts at $32/user/month, adding automation, integrations, and brand management.
- Enterprise: Custom pricing for organizations requiring advanced security, governance, and premium features like Control Center.
9. Trello (by Atlassian)
If Jira is the 800-pound gorilla, Trello is the nimble spider monkey. Its brilliance lies in its simplicity. Built around the Kanban board concept, Trello uses a visual system of boards, lists, and cards that is so intuitive you can master it in minutes. For teams just dipping their toes into agile or those who need a straightforward way to manage lightweight Scrum or Kanban workflows, Trello is an accessible starting point.
Its core strength is getting out of your way. There's no complex setup or steep learning curve; you can create a board and start collaborating almost instantly. This makes it one of the best agile project management software options for non-technical teams, startups, or project managers who need a simple tool for task tracking without the overhead of a more robust system. As teams mature, Power-Ups (integrations) and Butler automations allow for a surprising degree of customization.
Key Features & Use Cases
- Best For: New agile teams, small projects, non-technical departments, and anyone who values simplicity and visual workflow management over complex features.
- Visual Kanban Boards: Trello's signature feature is its drag-and-drop boards with lists and cards, perfect for managing tasks through different stages of a workflow.
- Butler Automation: Automate repetitive tasks within your boards, such as moving cards, applying labels, or notifying team members when a task progresses.
- Power-Ups & Integrations: Extend Trello’s functionality by integrating with tools like Slack, Google Drive, GitHub, and Jira, turning a simple board into a more powerful hub.
Pros & Cons
Pros | Cons |
Extremely easy to use with a minimal learning curve | Limited native reporting and analytics features |
Excellent for lightweight Scrum/Kanban workflows | Advanced permissions and admin controls require higher tiers |
Affordable and flexible pricing | Can become cluttered with highly complex projects |
Strong visual interface makes tracking intuitive | Less suited for large-scale, enterprise-level agile planning |
Pricing
Trello’s pricing is designed to scale from individual users to large organizations.
- Free: Unlimited cards, up to 10 boards per workspace, and unlimited storage.
- Standard: Starts at $5/user/month (billed annually), adding unlimited boards, advanced checklists, and custom fields.
- Premium: Starts at $10/user/month (billed annually), introducing multiple views (Calendar, Timeline, Map), and advanced admin and security features.
- Enterprise: Starts at $17.50/user/month (billed annually) for unlimited workspaces and organization-wide permissions.
10. GitHub – Projects (for agile planning on GitHub)
For development teams that live and breathe inside GitHub, bolting on an external project management tool can feel like a clunky, context-switching nightmare. GitHub Projects solves this by bringing agile planning directly into the environment where code is created, reviewed, and merged. It's not trying to be a standalone, all-in-one PM tool; instead, it offers a developer-centric agile solution that’s tightly integrated with repositories, issues, and pull requests.
This integration is its superpower. You can link pull requests directly to project tasks and automatically update their status on a Kanban board when the code is merged. This creates a single source of truth that bridges the gap between planning and execution, eliminating the classic "Is the board up to date?" question. For engineering managers, this makes it one of the best agile project management software choices for minimizing administrative overhead and keeping focus on the code.
Key Features & Use Cases
- Best For: Development teams that want to manage their agile workflow within the same platform they use for source control and CI/CD.
- Integrated Views: Provides flexible table, board, and roadmap views that are populated by issues and pull requests, allowing for customizable workflows.
- Developer-Centric Workflow: Automate status updates based on repository events (e.g., closing an issue, merging a PR), creating a seamless workflow. This tight integration is a core component of effective agile ticketing solutions.
- Marketplace Ecosystem: While not as vast as Jira's, the GitHub Marketplace offers powerful apps and integrations to connect with other essential developer tools.
Pros & Cons
Pros | Cons |
Natural fit for development teams already using GitHub | Non-developer stakeholders may find the UI less suitable |
Single platform for code, planning, and CI | Advanced compliance and features require higher-tier plans |
Low incremental cost if already paying for GitHub | Reporting features are less robust than dedicated PM tools |
Excellent for open-source project management | Can feel basic for complex, multi-team enterprise planning |
Pricing
GitHub Projects is included with GitHub's core plans.
- Free: Includes GitHub Projects for public and private repositories.
- Team: Starts at $4/user/month for protected branches and code owners.
- Enterprise: Starts at $21/user/month, adding advanced security, compliance, and support.
11. Shortcut (formerly Clubhouse)
Shortcut is an agile project management tool built with a strong opinion: software teams deserve software that thinks the way they do. Formerly Clubhouse, it strips away the enterprise complexity of heavier tools, focusing instead on a fast, intuitive workflow that maps directly to the software development lifecycle. It’s designed around a clear hierarchy of Stories, Epics, and now Objectives, providing a direct link from individual tasks to company-wide goals.
For teams that find Jira overly cumbersome but need more engineering-specific features than a generalist tool can offer, Shortcut hits a sweet spot. It provides robust functionality like detailed agile reports, deep Git integration, and workflow automation without the steep learning curve. The platform makes it easy to write and manage user stories, the fundamental building block of any agile workflow. And understanding how to write good user stories is key to leveraging it effectively.
Key Features & Use Cases
- Best For: Fast-growing startups and SMB software teams looking for a powerful, developer-first alternative to Jira.
- Developer-Centric Workflow: Features deep integrations with GitHub, GitLab, and Bitbucket, allowing teams to link branches, commits, and pull requests directly to stories and automate status updates.
- Agile Reporting: Offers built-in reports like velocity charts, cumulative flow diagrams, and cycle/lead time charts to help teams measure and improve their processes.
- Goal Alignment: The Objectives feature lets teams connect their day-to-day work (Stories and Epics) directly to high-level company OKRs, improving transparency.
Pros & Cons
Pros | Cons |
Designed specifically for software teams | Less suitable for non-technical teams like marketing or HR |
Clean, intuitive, and fast user interface | Some enterprise features (SSO/SCIM) are on higher tiers |
Competitive pricing for startups and SMBs | Smaller app marketplace compared to Jira |
Offers generous nonprofit and startup discounts | Lacks some of the deep customization of larger tools |
Pricing
Shortcut provides a simple pricing structure aimed at growing teams.
- Free: Up to 10 users, with core features included.
- Team: Starts at $8.50/user/month, adding unlimited teams and reporting.
- Business: Starts at $12/user/month, with advanced features like roadmaps and team goals.
- Enterprise: Custom pricing for advanced security like SSO, SCIM, and dedicated support.
12. G2 – Project Management category (comparison marketplace)
Instead of being a singular tool, G2's Project Management category is a peer-review marketplace that acts as a crucial validation step in your software selection process. Think of it as a meta-resource. When you've narrowed your options, G2 provides a real-world sanity check based on thousands of user reviews. It's an indispensable resource for cross-referencing features, pricing, and satisfaction scores before committing to a new platform.
Its primary value comes from aggregating user-generated data into filterable grids. You can quickly see how different tools stack up based on user satisfaction, market presence, and specific feature ratings. This allows you to move beyond polished marketing copy and see what actual users—the people in the trenches—think about a specific piece of best agile project management software. If you're stuck choosing between two similar tools, diving into the user-reported pros and cons on G2 can often be the tiebreaker.
Key Features & Use Cases
- Best For: Teams and leaders looking to validate their software shortlist, discover alternatives, and compare tools using peer-driven reviews and data.
- Filterable Grids: Compare dozens of tools side-by-side, filtering by user satisfaction, company size, and specific features to find the perfect fit.
- User-Reported Feedback: Access detailed reviews covering the pros, cons, and specific problems that the software solves for real-world teams.
- Category Reports: Download in-depth "Grid" reports that visually map out the competitive landscape, identifying leaders, contenders, and niche players in the market.
Pros & Cons
Pros | Cons |
Broad coverage of vendors with fresh user data | Sponsored placements can influence rankings |
Helps create and validate software shortlists | Category is broad, not just agile-specific |
Peer reviews provide an honest look at tools | Review quality can sometimes be inconsistent |
Snapshot of pricing models and alternatives | Requires sifting to find agile-focused info |
Pricing
G2 is free to use for browsing reviews, creating comparison lists, and reading reports. Vendors pay for premium profile features and promotional placements.
- Free: Access to all user reviews, comparison tools, and standard reports.
Agile Project Management Tools Comparison
Product | Core Features / Workflow | User Experience / Quality ★ | Value & Pricing 💰 | Target Audience 👥 | Unique Selling Points ✨ |
🏆 Momentum | Async/in-person standups, sprint planning, triage, backlog | ★★★★☆ Intuitive live board & smart nudges | Free beta, quick setup under 5 mins | Agile teams, PMs, scrum masters, eng leaders | Two-way Jira sync, built-in story pointing, priority inbox |
Jira Software | Scrum/Kanban boards, roadmaps, burndown charts | ★★★★☆ Deep tooling, mature ecosystem | Tiered (Free to Enterprise) | Agile teams, enterprises | Massive add-ons, strong reporting |
Azure DevOps (Azure Boards) | Agile boards, pipeline & repo integration | ★★★★ Tight MS ecosystem integration | Free 5 users + add-ons | MS/Azure users, enterprise dev teams | Full DevOps suite, strong compliance |
Asana | Boards, timelines, portfolios, AI-powered features | ★★★★ User-friendly, rich reporting | Tiered pricing, enterprise plans | Business & product teams | AI status updates, workload tracking |
monday.com | Visual boards, automations, reporting | ★★★★ Fast setup, visual dashboards | Tiered, automation quotas | Small to large teams | Visual OS, strong templates, enterprise security |
ClickUp | Agile views, docs, dashboards, automation, AI add-on | ★★★★ Broad features, AI enhanced | Generous free + paid tiers | All team sizes, knowledge workers | All-in-one PM+Docs, AI automation |
Wrike | Scrum/Kanban, resource planning, advanced analytics | ★★★★ Enterprise readiness | Higher pricing, complex | Large enterprises, PMOs | Hybrid agile support, >400 integrations |
Smartsheet | Grid, Gantt, Kanban views, automation | ★★★★ Familiar spreadsheet paradigm | Premium add-ons costly | Business & product executives | Portfolio mgmt, executive reporting |
Trello | Kanban boards, automation, Power-Ups | ★★★ Easy & flexible for beginners | Affordable tiers | Small teams, personal use | Simplicity, Butler automation |
GitHub Projects | Agile boards, roadmaps integrated w/ code | ★★★★ Dev-centric, integrated UI | Included with GitHub plans | Developers, dev teams | Code+planning in one platform |
Shortcut | Stories, sprints, epics, reports, Git integration | ★★★★ Software dev focused | Competitive SMB pricing | Software development teams | Strong Git integration, purpose-built agile |
G2 (Marketplace) | User reviews, ratings, comparisons | N/A User-based scoring | Free access | Buyers researching PM tools | Peer reviews, pricing snapshots |
Choosing a Tool That Serves, Not Enslaves
We’ve just walked through a dozen platforms, each claiming to be the key to unlocking your team’s agile potential. The options are vast. But if you’ve been paying attention, you’ll have noticed there’s no silver bullet here. The concept of the “best agile project management software” is a myth; the reality is finding the right software for your team.
The common trap is to chase the tool with the most exhaustive feature list. This is the product manager’s equivalent of judging a car by the number of buttons on the dashboard. It feels comprehensive, but it often leads to a bloated, confusing experience that nobody wants to use. Your team ends up fighting the software instead of solving customer problems, and you become a glorified tool administrator instead of a product leader. The goal isn’t to find a platform that dictates your process but one that bends to it.
Recalibrate Your Search from "Best" to "Best Fit"
Instead of starting with feature comparison charts, start with your team’s most acute pain points. Are your standups devolving into life-sucking status reports where everyone is zoned out? A tool like Momentum that structures agile ceremonies and integrates them directly into your workflow might be the answer. Is your team drowning in a sea of disconnected Jira tickets, Slack threads, and Google Docs? A platform designed to unify that chaos is where you should focus your energy.
Think back to the principle that "the customer is always wrong, but you should listen anyway." The same logic applies to your team. They might ask for a specific feature, but what they’re really communicating is a deeper, unresolved pain. An engineer complaining about ticket management isn’t asking for more custom fields; they’re asking for less administrative overhead so they can get back to coding. Don't just hear the feature request; listen for the underlying friction.
Actionable Steps to Making the Right Choice
Before you pull the trigger on a multi-year contract, take a deliberate approach. Your next steps shouldn't be another demo, but a frank, internal discussion.
- Identify the Real Problem: Get your team in a room and map out the biggest bottlenecks in your current workflow. Is it sprint planning? Cross-team communication? Visibility for leadership? Be brutally honest.
- Define Your Non-Negotiables: Based on those problems, create a short list of must-have capabilities. If your entire company operates within the Microsoft ecosystem, seamless integration with Azure DevOps might be a non-negotiable. If you’re a startup needing to consolidate a messy tool stack, a unified platform is your priority.
- Run a Pilot, Not Just a Trial: Select your top two contenders and run a pilot with a small, dedicated group. Don't just click around during a 14-day trial. Use the software for an entire sprint. See how it performs under the real-world pressure of deadlines and changing priorities.
Ultimately, the best agile project management software is the one that gets adopted, removes friction, and quietly fades into the background. It should serve your team, not enslave them. Your job is to ship great products, not to become an expert on project management software. Choose the tool that helps you do just that.
If your team's biggest agile pains are unstructured ceremonies, messy sprint planning, and the chaos of keeping Jira, Slack, and docs in sync, take a look at Momentum. It’s built to solve those exact problems by unifying your agile workflows in one place, helping your team stay focused and ship faster. See how Momentum can streamline your process.
Written by
Avi Siegel
Co-Founder of Momentum. Formerly Product @ Klaviyo, Zaius (acquired by Optimizely), and Upscribe.