Working as a creative means having the opportunity to explore your passions and interests on your own terms.
On the other hand, this can also make it difficult to stay on top of your obligations and get the most out of the time you spend working.
Fortunately, contemporary project management apps have introduced a wide range of tools to help creatives maximize their productivity without increasing stress.
In this article, we’ll take a look at the top 10 project management apps for creative professionals to use in 2022.
Teamwork is a comprehensive project management and productivity platform that’s used to facilitate all kinds of creative work.
It comes with an incredibly deep range of features including resource management, process templates, time tracking, budgeting, and integrations with third-party software.
You can even add help-desk, video chat, sales CRM, document management, and other functions to your subscription for an extra cost.
Small teams can use Teamwork for free depending on their needs.
However, the free tier is limited to a maximum of five users, and it’s missing some key features that are only available with premium subscriptions.
Aside from messaging, milestones, and basic task management, you won’t be able to do much with the free version of Teamwork.
The Deliver tier costs $12.50 per user per month or $10 per user per month billed annually.
This is where you start to see more of the benefits of Teamwork such as project templates, time tracking, invoicing, and unlimited client users.
At $22.50 per user month/$18 per user per month billed annually, Grow plans add in advanced features like resource scheduling, custom fields, time budgeting, and integration with Hubspot.
Both Deliver and Grow offer a 30-day free trial, and there is also a custom Scale tier for organizations that need more than these subscriptions offer.
Monday.com is a productivity suite that offers four main products: sales CRM (customer relationship management), marketing, project management, and development.
While we’ll be focusing on the project management tool, some users may also be interested in one or more of the other three.
When you’re using monday.com to oversee a team, you can view all of your current projects from a centralized dashboard.
After clicking on a specific project, you’ll be able to see a variety of data points such as the calendar, budget, progress, and which team members are working on which tasks.
Users can also comment and send messages to each other from within monday.com, eliminating the need for communication across many different channels. This feature boosts productivity and improves communication between team members.
Furthermore, monday.com integrates with a wide range of third-party platforms like Outlook, Microsoft Teams, Dropbox, Slack, Zoom, and the G Suite (including Google Calendar).
The platform’s no-code design makes it easy to configure integrations, even if you don’t have much technical experience.
Monday.com is free for up to two seats, but free users are naturally more limited when it comes to features.
At $6 per user per month paid annually (minimum three users), the Basic tier adds in some helpful tools like priority support, 5 GB of file storage, and additional options for data visualization.
Standard introduces even more features such as calendar view, timeline view, guest access, and automations/integrations, but Standard users can only create 250 automation actions and 250 integration actions per month.
The Standard tier comes in at $10 per user per month paid annually.
Unfortunately, there is no volume discount for larger teams — the $10 per user per month rate is the same for teams of 10 and for teams of 100.
Finally, monday.com offers a Pro tier ($22 per user per month paid annually) as well as custom enterprise solutions.
The Pro subscription comes with additional actions, time tracking, and some other tools, while Enterprise is tailored to much larger businesses with features like security policies, dedicated training and onboarding, and more customizable permissions.
Hive is a comprehensive project management solution that’s practical for teams of all sizes.
Like monday.com, it comes with a broad set of features covering virtually every aspect of project management.
For example, Hive includes built-in templates for projects that require editing or approval.
After the initial proposal, reviewers can proofread and use native annotation tools to make suggestions.
Once the proposal is approved, the project will automatically move onto the next stage.
This is just one illustration of how Hive can facilitate complex projects.
Hive also comes with a similar interface to monday.com.
Users can analyze project statuses through a calendar, table, gantt, or kanban view, all of which are commonly utilized by other project management platforms.
Each individual user will also see an action list that’s tailored to their specific role.
Another similarity to monday.com is that Hive is free for individuals or teams of just two users.
However, free Hive members can still access most of the platform’s features, and they can also take advantage of unlimited storage.
Unlike monday.com, Hive offers a single paid subscription instead of three different ones.
Premium users can either pay $16 per user per month or get a discounted rate of $12 per user per month in exchange for paying annually.
This tier removes the limit on users and adds in almost all of the missing features from the free option.
However, you will need to upgrade to an Enterprise plan in order to truly get everything out of Hive.
Services like SSO, timesheets, and support for external users are sold as extra add-ons to regular paid users, but they’re bundled in with every Enterprise subscription.
You can contact Hive directly for more information about the Enterprise plan.
Project.co is another all-in-one project management tool that connects both your team and external users.
With Project.co, you’ll be able to completely oversee your projects with features for time tracking, payments, task management, discussion, file sharing, storyboarding, and more.
Naturally, you can also connect Project.co to some of the other applications commonly used by businesses and organizations.
Confirmed integrations include Figma, Miro, Frame.io, Airtable, Stripe, and Google Docs, but you should be able to get Project.co working with many other services.
You can use Project.co as a solo user at no charge, but new members also get a 14-day free trial of the paid version (no credit card required).
Aside from support for additional users, the free version includes all of the features you would get with a paid subscription. This makes Project.co ideal for individuals who want a free platform to work with collaborators.
The key difference between creators and collaborators is that creators can take a much wider range of actions within projects.
For example, creators have the option to create and edit projects and tasks, invite new users, make payments, edit account settings, and more. Collaborators are more limited and can only perform basic actions on the specific projects they’re invited to.
Asana brands itself as helping teams get more done while removing busywork and other inefficiencies from their processes.
It comes with a familiar set of project views including lists, timelines, and boards, enabling users to visualize their workflows in whatever way makes sense to them.
With Asana, you’ll have access to comprehensive tools to help your team stay focused and make consistent progress.
Each project starts with a project overview that includes the overall goal, the role of each team member, progress through successive milestones, and resources used to help complete tasks.
Additionally, Asana offers more than 50 project templates to reduce the time you spend creating new processes.
For example, the Content Calendar template will enable you to get a professional content workflow up and running in seconds or minutes rather than hours or days.
Like the other services we’ve covered, Asana is available for free if you’re willing to miss out on some of its more advanced features.
Free users can still manage projects, invite up to 15 teammates, and leverage most of Asana’s integrations with third-party software.
Paid subscriptions are currently available for $13.49 per user per month or $10.99 per user per month billed annually.
That pricing puts Asana roughly on par with the other leading project management platforms in 2022.
Some of the key features limited to premium subscribers are timeline view, workflow builder, unlimited dashboards and reporting, and a dedicated admin console.
Users who want more from Asana can upgrade to a Business subscription for $30.49 per user per month or $24.99 per user per month paid annually.
On top of everything that comes with the Premium tier, Business users also get portfolios, workload management, custom rules, approval workflows, extra integrations, and a handful of additional tools.
Basecamp is a project management suite specifically designed for teams that are working remotely.
Each project is contained separately, and you can limit access to just the team members that have a specific role.
This makes it easier to compartmentalize your workflow and communication.
The Basecamp service comes with all the features you would expect from a modern project management tool.
You can communicate through public and private messages, set up to-do lists, share documents and images, configure recurring questions for your team members, and more.
Users can also set up their own work hours so that collaborators know when to expect them to be available.
While Basecamp offers many popular integrations, it’s also designed to replace some of the other applications you might be using.
For example, you might keep a separate Google Calendar for personal use, but Basecamp will act as a calendar for your entire organization.
You can also communicate through Basecamp directly instead of working through Slack or another messaging application.
If you’re new to Basecamp, you can start with a 30-day free trial of the premium plan.
However, the free tier of Basecamp is relatively limited with support for just three projects and 20 users.
It’s common for project management services to limit users on free accounts, but Basecamp is one of the only platforms we covered that also limits the total number of projects.
On the other hand, Basecamp may actually be more affordable for larger teams due to its unique price structure.
While most services charge on a per-user basis, Basecamp costs a flat rate of $99 per month.
Every plan comes with unlimited projects and users, so you’ll pay the same amount whether your team has five members or 50.
ClickUp is our seventh project management tool. It stands out for a surprisingly practical free plan.
In contrast to most of the other platforms we’ve seen, ClickUp lets free members create unlimited tasks and add an unlimited number of users.
While free users get just 100 MB of storage and are subject to some other restrictions, ClickUp is still a great option for users who don’t want to spend any money.
Paid ClickUp plans are available for $9, $19, and $29 per user per month depending on the features you’re looking for.
You’ll get a significant discount from those rates if you’re willing to pay annually instead of monthly.
Similar to other providers, ClickUp offers a custom enterprise solution for teams that need tools like white labeling, single sign-on, guided onboarding, or dedicated support.
The main goal of ClickUp is to connect the different areas of your workflow and help you develop more connected strategies.
For example, you can integrate user feedback directly into your processes in order to constantly take customer insights into account when making decisions.
In terms of the interface, ClickUp uses familiar tactics like Gantt structures, timelines, and kanban displays.
You can track time and manage your team’s workload from within the ClickUp app, further reducing the need for outside applications.
While Clickup allows users to add guests to their projects, the maximum number of guests is limited based on your subscription tier.
As the name implies, Filestage is more narrowly focused on files than most other project management tools.
At the same time, it still offers enough to be a dedicated project management solution for some organizations.
Filestage supports approval processes, which are great for creative projects that require feedback.
With Filestage keeping track of each task’s progress through your approval workflow, you won’t have to worry about sending emails back and forth between various collaborators.
Naturally, Filestage is built to fit into your existing workflow without forcing you to make any major changes.
Popular integrations include Asana, G Suite, Dropbox, Microsoft Teams, monday.com, Slack, Jira, and the Adobe Creative Cloud.
You can also use tools like Pabbly to set up your own custom connections as needed.
While Filestage offers a seven-day free trial with no credit card required, it’s one of the only providers we’ve covered that doesn’t come with any kind of free plan.
After the end of your trial period, you will have to pay for a subscription in order to maintain access to your account.
Filestage plans start at $9 per user per month for the Essentials tier.
Essentials comes with unlimited files and proofs but just one active project, one review step, 5 GB of storage, and no project templates.
At $19 per user per month (minimum of five users), the Advanced tier raises each of those limits and adds extra features including due dates, project folders, extra team roles, and self-service integrations.
Similarly, Professional is $39 per user per month (minimum of five users) with all the features from Advanced, higher limits on usage, and tools like custom branding, external partner uploads, and priority support.
As we’ve seen with most other platforms, Filestage has an Enterprise option with high-level functionalities such as API access, single sign-on, and service-level agreements.
Overall, Filestage roughly fits in with its competitors with respect to pricing and value for money.
Trello is a popular project management service that relies on cards and columns to organize various tasks.
Along with a conventional kanban view, Trello also offers other views such as timeline, table, calendar, dashboard, board, and even a unique map view.
Free and Standard users are limited to the kanban display, while Premium and Enterprise members can leverage all of Trello’s views.
Even if you stick with Trello’s free plan, you’ll be able to access unlimited file storage.
However, each individual file is restricted to 10 MB, so you may need to compress some files in order to store them on Trello as a free user.
There are also three different premium subscription tiers with different features and limitations:
While Standard comes with more than enough features for basic project management, Premium adds in some critical tools like priority support, Google single sign-on, and access to alternative views such as timeline and map.
Enterprise removes all limitations on workspaces and introduces some features that are designed for larger organizations.
Last but not least, nTask is the final project management platform we were able to cover on our list.
According to the nTask website, this service is used by a variety of high-profile clients including AT&T, Apple, Google, Sony, Walmart, and HP. It comes with the familiar task displays you would expect like gantt and kanban.
To help stay on top of your workflow, nTask provides a broad range of tracking options such as to-do lists, meeting scheduling, risk management, and timesheets.
Employees can track hours and submit them for approval, and managers can assign estimated times for each task in order to analyze team productivity.
That said, you will need to integrate with a third-party platform in order to pay your employees based on the time they track through nTask.
Fortunately, nTask works well with a long list of external services including Zoom, Google Calendar, Outlook Calendar, Apple Calendar, and Microsoft Teams.
You can also leverage Zapier in order to set up integrations with platforms that aren’t already connected to nTask.
After signing up for nTask, you can get a 14-day free trial of the Premium or Business plan without having to provide a payment method.
nTask still offers free access after that, but you’ll have to pay for a subscription in order to access the full range of features or work with teams of more than five users.
Premium costs $4 per user per month billed monthly or $3 per month billed annually, while Business will cost you $12 per user per month billed annually or $8 per month billed annually.
Some of the key advantages of the Business plan are custom roles and permissions, advanced reporting, risk tracking, priority support, and 10 GB of storage vs. 5 GB with Premium.
Unsurprisingly, there is also a custom Enterprise option for users who need more than the Business tier offers.
As a creative professional, you have the opportunity to explore your own skills and pursue your own interests.
At the same time, you need to structure your workflow in order to make the most of your productive hours and maintain a healthy work-life balance.
While there are far too many project management apps to cover in one list, you can’t go wrong with any of the ten we’ve covered.
These services can help you with every element of your workflow and remove any inefficiencies in your existing practices.
If you’re looking for the perfect voice actor, you can post a project on our platform and manage its progress on your favorite project management tool 🙂
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