Best Project Management Software for Software Teams

Website: https://www.atlassian.com/software/jira

Best for: Sprint planning and release tracking

Starting price: $9.70 per user/month (billed monthly)

Free plan: Yes

Pros: Backlogs, sprints and burndown charts built in; deep search and automation rules

Cons: Setup and admin take real time; the free plan caps at 10 users

Jira is the tool most software teams compare everything else against. Standard costs $9.70 per user per month on monthly billing for the first 100 users, and Premium costs $19.60, with lower per user rates above 100 users. The free plan covers up to 10 users. The backlog holds epics and stories in priority order, sprint planning pulls the top items into a sprint, and the board shows each story moving from to do to done across the sprint.

Burndown charts, velocity reports and release hubs come built in, so the team can see whether a release will land on time without building a report by hand. Bitbucket and GitHub integrations link each issue to the branch and the pull request that implements it, and automation rules can move a story to review when a pull request opens. The cost is admin work: custom fields, workflows and permission schemes take time to set up, and a team that skips that setup ends up with a board that nobody trusts.

Website: https://linear.app

Best for: Fast issue tracking for development teams

Starting price: $10 per user/month (billed annually)

Free plan: Yes

Pros: Fast keyboard driven issue tracking; cycles and projects for release planning

Cons: Free plan caps at 250 issues; no built-in burndown chart

Linear is built for software teams that want issues to move fast. Basic costs $10 per user per month when billed annually, and Business costs $16. The free plan covers unlimited team members but caps at 250 issues and 2 teams. Work enters through a triage inbox, gets labelled and assigned in seconds, and moves through cycles that mirror sprints, with velocity reports at the end of each cycle.

Projects group related issues into a release or a product bet, and roadmaps show the order of work across the quarter. GitHub and GitLab integrations link each issue to the code that implements it, so a bug can be traced from the report to the merged fix. The limits matter for strict scrum teams: there is no built-in burndown chart, so teams that want one track it in a sheet or a separate report, and the 250 issue cap on the free plan fills fast on an active team.

Website: https://shortcut.com

Best for: Lightweight stories and iterations for dev teams

Starting price: $8.50 per user/month (billed annually)

Free plan: Yes

Pros: Simple stories, epics and iterations; strong GitHub and GitLab links

Cons: Free plan covers up to 10 users; reporting is thinner than Jira

Shortcut is a project tracker built for software teams that find Jira heavy. Team costs $8.50 per user per month when billed annually, and Business costs $12. The free plan covers up to 10 users with core features. Work is organised as stories inside epics, with iterations that mirror sprints, and objectives that group epics into a release or a product bet for the quarter.

GitHub and GitLab integrations link each story to the branch and the pull request that implements it, so a story can be traced from the backlog to the merged change. The interface is fast and spare, with keyboard shortcuts and a clean board that new team members learn in a day. The limits are scale and reporting: the free plan ends at 10 users, and the reports are thinner than Jira, so a team that needs detailed velocity and capacity analysis will outgrow Shortcut sooner.

Website: https://clickup.com

Best for: Flexible dev tracking on a tight budget

Starting price: $9 per user/month (billed annually)

Free plan: Yes

Pros: Free Forever plan with unlimited tasks; sprints with points and custom statuses

Cons: Feature depth can overwhelm new users; some views slow down with large workspaces

ClickUp gives development teams a lot of function for little money. The Free Forever plan includes unlimited tasks and unlimited members, and Core costs $9 per user per month when billed annually, with Business at $17. Sprints carry points, custom statuses and automations that move a story to the next stage when the work is done, and the board, list and calendar views let the team switch between a sprint board and a release schedule without moving data.

GitHub and GitLab integrations link tasks to commits and pull requests, and docs and whiteboards sit in the same workspace, so sprint planning notes and release notes stay next to the work. Goals track sprint targets, and dashboards show velocity and burndown across sprints. The weak point is focus: ClickUp ships so many features that a new team can spend its first week clicking through settings instead of shipping code. Large workspaces with thousands of tasks can also load slowly in some views, so keep the structure simple.

Website: https://asana.com

Best for: Structured development workflows

Starting price: $10.99 per user/month (billed annually)

Free plan: Yes

Pros: Clear task lists with subtasks and approvals; timeline view for release planning

Cons: Timeline and workload need the Advanced plan at $24.99; no native burndown chart

Asana suits development teams that want clean, structured work instead of a deep configuration project. Starter costs $10.99 per user per month when billed annually, and Advanced costs $24.99. The Personal plan is free for up to 10 teammates. Each sprint becomes a project, each story becomes a task with subtasks for the steps, and milestones mark the release date that the team works toward.

Timeline view maps sprint work against a release date, and rules can route a completed story to the reviewer who owns that area. Asana integrates with Jira, GitHub and Slack, so sprint tasks can link back to the code change or the discussion that prompted them. The limits are clear: Asana has no native burndown chart, so teams that want one track it in a sheet, and the timeline and workload views that matter for release planning sit on the Advanced plan.

Website: https://monday.com

Best for: Visual dev boards and roadmaps

Starting price: $9 per seat/month (billed annually)

Free plan: Yes

Pros: Board views with timeline and calendar; automations for status changes

Cons: Free plan covers only 2 seats; time tracking sits on higher tiers

monday.com starts at $9 per seat per month when billed annually on the Basic plan, with Standard at $12 and Pro at $19. A free plan covers up to 2 seats, and Basic plans carry a 3-seat minimum. The board layout fits development work well because each story becomes a row, each status column shows the stage, and each date column shows the sprint deadline. Timeline and calendar views show sprint work against a release date.

Automations move a story to review when the work is marked done, assign the next task to the developer on duty, and send a reminder when a release date slips. GitHub integration links board items to pull requests, and forms collect bug reports and feature requests in a standard format, which feeds the backlog without manual entry. The main limits are the small free plan and the fact that time tracking, which many team leads want for sprint effort, sits on higher tiers rather than Basic.

Website: https://github.com

Best for: Teams that live in GitHub

Starting price: $4 per user/month (billed monthly)

Free plan: Yes

Pros: Projects built into GitHub repos; issues and pull requests linked to work

Cons: Reporting is thinner than Jira; no native time tracking

GitHub Projects suits teams that already live in GitHub. Team costs $4 per user per month, and Enterprise costs $21. The free plan covers unlimited public and private repositories with 2,000 automation minutes a month. Projects sit next to the code: issues, pull requests and project boards share one home, so a story can move from the backlog to a merged pull request without leaving GitHub.

Boards, tables and roadmaps show the work by status, by milestone or by assignee, and custom fields carry priority, size and release. Automation rules move an issue to done when its pull request merges, which cuts the manual board updates that slow a sprint. The limits are reporting and scope: the reports are thinner than Jira, with no native burndown chart or velocity analysis, and there is no native time tracking, so teams that need those add a separate tool.

Website: https://www.wrike.com

Best for: Dev work with approval chains

Starting price: $10 per user/month (billed annually)

Free plan: Yes

Pros: Approval workflows for release sign off; request forms for bug reports

Cons: Reporting depth needs the Business plan at $25; interface takes time to learn

Wrike fits development teams that work inside larger organisations with formal sign off steps. Team costs $10 per user per month when billed annually, and Business costs $25. A free plan covers unlimited users with basic task management. Approval workflows route a release checklist to each approver in turn, and a release cannot move forward until every sign off is recorded, which suits regulated teams and large product groups.

Request forms turn bug reports from support, sales or customers into standardised tasks with the fields developers need, and dashboards show defect counts by severity, by feature and by sprint. Gantt charts map sprint work against release dates, and integrations link tasks to GitHub and GitLab. The limits are cost and complexity: the reporting depth that justifies Wrike for many teams sits on the Business plan, and the interface has many panels and settings, so new users need a week or two before it feels natural.