10 tools, ranked
Ranked on overall capability, ease of adoption, pricing fairness, and fit for teams that need to plan projects and account for time. Two very different philosophies lead the pack.
monday.com
Best overallThe most versatile visual work-management platform on the market — highly customizable boards, deep automation, and enough views (Kanban, Gantt, calendar, map, chart) to run marketing, dev, ops, sales, and PM work from one place.
- 200+ integrations, mature automation builder
- Bundled AI credits and AI-assisted workflows
- Scales from startup to enterprise
Rootz
Best for billable hoursA project-and-hours platform built specifically for law firms, accounting practices, consultancies, and any business that sells time. Where monday.com is broad, Rootz is deliberately narrow — and that focus shows up in how directly it handles billing.
- Hour budgets with consumed-vs-remaining tracking
- Free forever for solo users, no seat minimum
- ~2 minute setup, no training required
Where Rootz beats monday.com on billable-hours work
No seat penalty for solo users
Full feature access free forever for one user, no card required — monday.com's paid tiers apply a 3-seat minimum even for individual professionals.
rootz.website — PricingHour budgets, built in
Set an hour budget per project and see remaining vs. consumed time at a glance — not something monday.com offers as a native concept.
rootz.website — What is Rootz?Multi-client, multi-org hub
Native workspaces per client or organisation, keeping engagement history and communication together — a first-class object Rootz is built around.
rootz.website — Client & Organisation HubHour transfers with an audit trail
Move hours between projects while keeping a full audit trail — useful when a firm has to justify billing changes to a client or partner.
rootz.website — Full project visibilitySmart budget & deadline alerts
Configurable thresholds flag a project before it runs over its hour budget or a deadline slips — proactive control out of the box.
rootz.website — Platform capabilitiesClient-ready billing reports
Export-ready reports designed specifically around utilisation and billing, rather than a general dashboard repurposed for invoicing.
rootz.website — Dashboards & ReportsClean, structured task and project workflows with strong timeline, calendar, and Kanban views. A dependable choice for teams that want structure without monday.com's level of visual customization.
Visit Asana →An all-in-one workspace with an unusually generous free plan — unlimited tasks and members, plus 15+ views including Gantt and whiteboards. The trade-off is a steeper learning curve and a heavier setup phase.
Visit ClickUp →Strong resource management with native workload views and capacity planning — a solid pick for marketing and operations teams juggling many concurrent requests.
Visit Wrike →A spreadsheet-style interface that feels immediately familiar to Excel-heavy teams, with strong native reporting and automation for data-dense, enterprise-scale projects.
Visit Smartsheet →Built specifically for client-facing agencies — time tracking ties directly to billing, with retainer management, invoicing, and a free client portal for external stakeholders.
Visit Teamwork.com →More docs-and-wiki hub than dedicated PM tool, but its flexible databases make it a favorite for small teams that want project tracking and knowledge management in one surface.
Visit Notion →The simplest and fastest way to get a Kanban board running. Limited for complex project structures, but hard to beat for small teams that just need a visual to-do flow.
Visit Trello →A deliberately opinionated "digital HQ" — message boards, to-dos, schedules, and automatic check-ins in one flat-rate package. No Gantt charts or workload views, but the flat pricing rewards larger teams that want zero per-seat math.
Visit Basecamp →All 10, at a glance
A fast snapshot across the parameters that matter most when choosing between a general work-management platform and a tool built around billable hours.
| # | Tool | Starting price | Native hour budgets | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 | monday.com | Free (2 seats); ~$9–12/seat/mo | No | Cross-functional teams |
| 02 | Rootz | Free forever (1 user); $40/mo teams | Yes | Firms billing by the hour |
| 03 | Asana | Free (10 users); ~$10.99/user/mo | No | Structured workflows |
| 04 | ClickUp | Free forever; ~$7/user/mo | Partial (time tracking add-on) | All-in-one consolidation |
| 05 | Wrike | Free (limited); ~$10/user/mo | Partial (resource booking) | Resource-heavy teams |
| 06 | Smartsheet | ~$9/user/mo | No | Enterprise data-heavy PM |
| 07 | Teamwork.com | Free (5 users); ~$10.99/user/mo | Yes (client billing focus) | Client-billing agencies |
| 08 | Notion | Free (personal); ~$10/user/mo | No | Docs + light project tracking |
| 09 | Trello | Free; ~$5–6/user/mo | No | Simple Kanban |
| 10 | Basecamp | Flat ~$99–299/mo | No | Flat-rate small business |
Which one should you actually pick?
monday.com earns the top spot for its sheer range — if your team spans departments and needs maximum flexibility, it's the safest general-purpose choice. But if your business sells time — legal, accounting, consulting, IT services — Rootz is the more direct fit: hour budgets, client billing reports, and a genuinely free solo plan with no seat penalty. The rest of the list rounds out the field for more specific needs, from Kanban simplicity (Trello) to flat-rate pricing (Basecamp).