Jira vs Trello: Who wins the battle to project management?

Jira vs. Trello: Which one is better?

The choice between the two is more than a decision—it’s a strategic move.

And as a project manager, not making the right choice can take a toll on your routine operations.

So, I did some deep digging into both Jira and Trello. Thanks to their free trials, I got a hands-on look at what they offer.

Adding more things, my DevOps team pitched in with insights from a developer’s point of view and a look at how agile project management fits in.

So, who wins the battle for successful project management out of two?

Let’s find out and decode their strengths and weaknesses in detail.

Trello vs. Jira: An overview

Trello and Jira, are products of Atlassian, an Australian Software Company. However, their approach to Agile framework methodologies differs from each other.

Where Trello is best known for its Kanban board for task visualization capabilities, Jira’s Kanban, Scrum, and Sptint boards grab the appreciation of developers.

Neither of them is a one-size-fits-all solution but caters to different user needs.

Trello

Trello is one of the most popular and versatile project management tools. It is renowned for its lightweight approach – non structured interface to handle simpler projects.

Since its launch in 2011, Trello has evolved to be a visual workflow management system. Its kanban board functionality presents a visual outlook on your tasks and projects to help you stay on top. Apart from that, you can simply move across various stages through its drag-and-drop functionality.

The three-part hierarchy of Trello consists of boards, columns, and cards. Despite its straightforward nature, the platform falls short when handling complex projects. Its design supports short, temporary projects and is great for individuals as well as small teams.

Explore ProofHub vs Trello so you have options to choose from outside the Atlassian family

Jira

Jira, renowned as an issue-tracking tool, is a popular project management platform for software development teams. Jira is known for its agile team support – presenting a structured framework for software development workflows.

Launched in 2002, the platform derives its new name from its previous name “Gojira.” The platform’s adherence to agile methodologies allows teams to track issues, manage projects, and automate workflows.

But what about the teams with sequential workflows or a combination of waterfall and agile?

Jira’s functionalities don’t offer the desired flexibility for workflows like these. However, teams with general requirements may find it overwhelming due to its steep learning curve.

Trello vs. Jira: Head-to-head comparison

For your convenience and understanding, I categorized my evaluation criteria based on the following four parameters.

• Task management
• User experience
• Fit for project needs
• Pricing

Let’s look at the difference and assess how they stack against each other.

Task management

Trello

Trello is known for its simplistic yet flexible nature. And its Kanban board functionality is what it is best known for.  So, if you are a business that wants to stay on top of its daily operations and workflow progressions, Trello is the right way to go.

Trello offers a wide range of features that include:

• Kanban board to help you visualize your workflow across different stages. Its drag-and-drop interface allows you to move cards with ease.
• Cards is the generic name for tasks in Trello. These can be moved across lists and contain a wealth of your task information. This includes a description, due dates, a checklist, comments, and attachments.
• Trello has multiple task views, including Timeline, Calendar, Dashboard, Workspace, Table, and Map views. You can choose the view of your choice to get real-time visibility into progress and status.
• Checklists in Trello cards help break down larger tasks into smaller and manageable steps.
• Power-ups and integrations of Trello are potent. You can choose to integrate with 100+ applications, including Slack, Google Drive, and even Jira. You can use these to tailor Trello as per your needs.
• Trello templates provide a seamless way to customize your workflow. The template library spans various categories, making customization super easy. 
• Butler automation takes the load off your shoulders by automating whatever you desire.
• Communication and collaboration on Trello cards highly depend on comments and @mentions.

But here’s the catch.

Many powerful Trello features are limited to high-pricing plans. That means you might find it hard to handle complex projects with basic plans.

Check out our guide to the 17 best Trello alternatives & competitors if you are overwhelmed with Trello

Jira

At the surface, Jira shares many similarities with Trello. But their approach to task management is entirely different. Because Jira is designed to serve software development teams.

So, if you want complete control over your product development cycles, nothing beats Jira. From planning, coding, and deploying to releasing and maintaining software, Jira is a full-fledged solution to your software development needs.

Its product management features for DevOps teams are –

• Jira’s intuitive platform supports two different agile methodologies, namely Scrum and Kanban.
• The platform provides multiple boards while easily adapting to changing work requirements. Scrum boards to break complex boards into more manageable tasks. These tasks are completed in short cycles called sprints. Kanban boards, on the other hand, facilitate visualization across different stages of your workflow.
• Jira’s functions around hierarchy structure. Where Epics take the initial spot. It is a collection of similar subject issues.
• Issues form the basis of Jira. It could represent a project task, story, or bug. These can further be broken down into subtasks. Apart from that, you can even add custom fields and even link issues for defining dependency.
• Workflow represents the roadmap from initiation to completion. Customizing your workflow as per your needs is convenient with Jira.
• Roadmaps present full-scale visibility into project progress.
• Jira’s dashboards and reports offer a comprehensive overview of each sprint. The four reports are Agile, DevOps, Issue analysis, and Forecast and manageable reports. Also, dashboards, charts, and graphs add a layer of visibility to sprint cycles.
• Advanced Jira automation relies on three building blocks: triggers, conditions, and actions.
• Built-in channels in Jira facilitate team communication and collaboration. You can add comments and have discussions.
• With 3000+ integrations, Jira leaves nothing to be explored beyond its intuitive platform.

Jira Work Management (JWM)

JWM is a specialized platform that streamlines your specialized workflow, regardless of the departments. It comes free with Jira software.

• From a simplistic list, board, calendar, and timeline to overviews and summaries, JWM views make it easy to visualize and manage tasks.

• Enterprise-grade security control to safeguard sensitive information. 
• Custom field reporting with 30+ custom fields to generate advanced reports. 
• Customizable 23 pre-made templates to build the workflow as per your niche.

Explore the 24 best Jira alternatives & competitors for Agile project management

User experience

Here, I’ve evaluated the user experience based on the following four parameters –

• Learning curve

If you want an easy-to-grasp project management platform, stick to Trello. Its card-and-board interface allows you to add tasks, set deadlines, and a complete overview of task progress. You just simply need to set it up and start running its simplistic interface immediately.

But if you are a first-time user, you may feel flooded with Jira’s steep learning curve. Why? Because of too many features and menu-drop complexities that come with it.  You will need to invest in dedicated efforts to understand its working.

• Simplicity

Trello wins the game to simplicity over Jira. And the credit goes to its simple and quick-to-use structure. You get a card that has all the task information. To move them across stages, you just simply need to drag and drop them. But when your cards increase, keeping track of them will become extremely difficult for you.

Jira is a feature-rich commendable source of power and support for the DevOps team. But that’s just not at all. It all comes at a price. You need to invest a good amount of effort in understanding its intricacies.

• Customization options

Trello offers pretty basic customization options. You can set due dates, add labels, checklists, and more. However, you need to rely heavily on Trello Power-ups to add extensive features. Obviously, this will increase the cost as well as complexity.

Jira hands over control to its users. From adding custom fields to tailoring your task reports, you can tailor the platform according to your team’s needs. Its full-fledged customization eliminates the need for any external tool. But over-customization can simply add to complexity levels.

• User interface

Trello’s visual Kanban boards are like a whiteboard of your accomplishments and to-dos. Its quick and intuitive user interface is worth admiring. It is suitable for teams requiring a general approach to their project management.

Jira’s tech-savvy user interface is highly recommended for tech-savvy teams. Its powerful built-in features and customization options appeal to users with complex project needs.

Fit for project needs

Choosing the right project management tool greatly impacts your project health.  And the choice greatly depends on what you aim to get out of it.

Before sticking to either of the tools, evaluate your choice based on the following parameters –

• Project type and size

If your workflow follows a linear approach like waterfall, consider Trello an excellent option.  You can manage your tasks with ease using cards and lists. But if your workflow includes complex dependencies, Trello might not be the right fit.

Moving ahead, Jira helps teams deal with multi-layered complicated projects and dependencies. It includes not to miss robust features, like bug and issue tracking, that help you get granular control over your project lifecycle.

• Team size

Trello’s free plan with unlimited cards and a personal board is a decent choice for individuals and freelancers. But if you are a smaller team, dealing with simple projects, you may find getting yourself a paid pricing plan.

Jira also offers a free plan. However, individual users might feel tangled within its complex structure. Larger teams with intricate projects or data-driven operations can draw in more results from Jira than Trello.

• Team type

Trello’s functionality suits every team type, provided they have a simple workflow structure. Jira is suitable for teams working in a close relationship with software development. It helps structure your product development cycle while enhancing your project management operations.

The platform is versatile and finds application in other business teams, too. The use cases of JWM are –

• Marketing teams
• HR teams
• Sales teams
• Finance teams
• Operation teams
• Legal teams
• Design teams

• Project management methodologies

Both tools cater to the diverse needs of agile teams. Trello excels in Kanban methodology by promoting visualization across the workflow. And performs well for projects that follow linear iterations.

Jira supports both Scrum and Kanban methodologies. You can create issues, issue backlogs, plan sprints, and track sprint cycle progression. If you find yourself unfamiliar with what I am talking about here, then Jira is surely not for you.

Pricing

Although both Trello and Jira offer free plans, Trello is more suitable for typical project management needs. I found it to be a bit more user-friendly compared to Jira, which gave my head a spin initially.

Trello’s task management software has three pricing tiers along with one free plan.

• Free plan: $0  for unlimited cards and 10 boards per workspace
• Standard plan: $5 per user per month
• Premium plan: $10 per user per month
• Enterprise plan: $17.50 per user per month (for an estimated 50 users)

The per-user cost of the Enterprise plan decreases as the number of users increases.

Jira exceeded my expectations when I consulted my DevOps teams. They found its free plan pretty generous regarding the key features offered.

Jira’s issue-tracking software has four tiers.

• Free plan: $0 for 10 users with 2 GB storage
• Standard plan: $8.15 per user per month for up to 35000 users
• Premium plan: $16 per user per month
• Enterprise plan: Custom pricing

Trello vs Jira: which one to choose?

Trello or Jira? Jira or Trello? 

Choosing the right project management tool is crucial to streamline your workflow. It holds the strength to either facilitate or derail your project progressions. Trello and Jira diverge in two different directions despite their owners being the same.

Trello’s flexibility complements businesses with basic project management requirements. Jira, on the contrary, syncs well with the software teams running iterative operations.

However, Trello and Jira’s integration provides the best of both worlds to teams with hybrid workflow – both iterative and linear processes.

Here, I’ve built a Trello vs Jira decision table for you to reach the verdict quickly.

Beyond Trello and Jira: ProofHub (A better alternative option)

When Trello and Jira both fail to meet your expectations, ProofHub becomes the most suitable solution to trust.

ProofHub is an all-in-one project management software and team collaboration with game-changing functionalities and scalable pricing.

You can find the best of both Trello and Jira under ProofHub’s umbrella. It is a great solution for teams seeking a balanced approach. From catering to small and larger groups and handling simpler to complex projects, ProofHub supports diverse project management styles.

The key features that help ProofHub cut above the competition –

• An all-in-one solution for task management, team collaboration, file storage, online proofing, and more.
• Built-in chat and discussions to facilitate communication and collaboration that both Trello and Jira lack.
• Supports agile methodologies by facilitating sprint planning.
• Gantt chart to create a product roadmap, add goals, and set dependencies and milestones.
• A Centralized platform that brings everything in one place.
• Kanban boards to create, visualize, and manage sprints.
• Powerful project, resources, and time-utilization reports to get visual project insights.
• Customized workflow to match your project and team requirements.
• Flat-fee pricing model to accommodate unlimited users as you scale.

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