A company should usually buy project management software, because per-seat prices are low and the work is similar across companies, and Asana is the strongest buy since its Starter and Advanced plans list no seat limit and unlimited automations. Build a custom system, which ranks third here, when your project management is a delivery operation with job costing, client approvals and data from other systems that no board tool holds.
The ranking, entry by entry
1 Asana
Best for companies whose project work fits a standard task tool
Project management is the category where buying most often wins, and Asana is the buy with the fewest published caps. Starter and Advanced are billed per user, annually, and both list no user seat limit and unlimited automations. Caps are what usually push a growing company toward a build, and there are fewer of them here. It is first because none of its published limits pushes a company toward a build.
Watch for. SAML authentication, SCIM provisioning and capacity planning are Enterprise features, priced by contacting sales. A company of 50 or more will likely need them.
- How it charges
- Per user, billed yearly or monthly, Enterprise quoted
- Main limit
- Portfolios need Advanced, resource tools and SSO need Enterprise
2 Smartsheet
Best for teams that would otherwise build on spreadsheets
Smartsheet ranks second. A custom project system often starts as a spreadsheet that grew, and Smartsheet is the product for a company at that point. It suits a company that runs projects in a spreadsheet style grid and wants Gantt and approvals. The Business plan is billed per member, yearly, and lists unlimited automations. Buying it is usually cheaper than building the same grid again with a database underneath.
Watch for. The Pro plan covers only 1 to 10 members. Portfolios and SAML single sign-on are Enterprise additions, and Enterprise is priced by quote.
- How it charges
- Per member, billed yearly or monthly, Enterprise quoted
- Main limit
- Pro stops at 10 members and 250 automations a month, no API calls
3 Custom build by Black Badger
Best for delivery operations that a task board cannot hold
We publish this guide and we build custom systems, so take this entry as our own. Building ranks third because a company rarely needs custom task lists. It needs custom software when projects are the business, and each one carries estimates, costs, client sign-offs and records held in finance or the CRM. Black Badger builds that as one system your whole team and your clients use, with no per-seat fee and code you own.
Watch for. If your teams mainly need tasks, dates and owners, buy a product. A build is for when the project record is also the financial and client record.
- How it charges
- One-time build scoped in writing, then running costs such as hosting
- Main limit
- Needs a scoping call first, and suits companies of 50 or more employees
What a custom build involves, and how to ask about one
4 monday.com
Best for teams that want visual boards and accept monthly quotas
The fourth place goes to monday.com, which is easy to adopt and cheap per seat, with a price that climbs from Basic to Pro, billed yearly. The build or buy issue is its quotas. Pro allows 25,000 automation actions and 25,000 integration actions a month and 10,000 API calls a day, and portfolio management, resource management and multi-level permissions are Enterprise features. A company that automates heavily will meet those limits.
Watch for. The pricing page asks for a quote above 40 users, so a company of 50 or more is negotiating from the start.
- How it charges
- Per seat, billed yearly, from 3 users, Enterprise quoted
- Main limit
- Pro caps automations at 25,000 a month, portfolios need Enterprise
5 ClickUp
Best for companies that want tasks, docs and chat in one tool
ClickUp ranks fifth. It bundles tasks, docs and chat on Core and Business, billed per user and yearly, at prices that make the buy side cheap. The limits that matter for this decision are the pooled ones. Automation actions are 1,000 a workspace a month on Core and 10,000 on Business. API calls are held to 100 a minute below Enterprise, which constrains any integration you build around it.
Watch for. Single sign-on, audit trails and custom permissions are Enterprise features, and Enterprise is priced by quote.
- How it charges
- Per user, billed yearly, Enterprise quoted
- Main limit
- API limit is 100 calls a minute until Enterprise, then 10,000
6 Wrike
Best for teams of 50 to 200 that want one fixed plan
Wrike ranks sixth. The Business plan is billed per user, annually, and covers 5 to 200 users, which fits a mid-size team. The build or buy concern is the ceiling above it. Past 200 users you move to Pinnacle or Apex, priced by contacting Wrike. The pricing page states no automation, storage or API limits, so you cannot test your plans against it in advance.
Watch for. Business and above are annual only. Ask Wrike for the automation and API limits in writing before you design a process around them.
- How it charges
- Per user, billed yearly, top plans quoted
- Main limit
- Team stops at 15 users, Business at 200, seats sold in groups of five
7 Jira
Best for software and technical teams on Atlassian tools
Jira ranks seventh on this list because of who it is for. It is built around issue tracking, and a software or technical team that already uses Atlassian tools should buy it. Standard and Premium are billed per user, and Premium costs more. For business teams it is the product on this list least suited to the work, because simple task boards are not what it was designed to be.
Watch for. Automation allowances rise by plan, from 400 steps a user a month on Standard to 750 on Premium. Sandboxes need Premium.
- How it charges
- Per user, with a free plan to 10 users and Enterprise quoted
- Main limit
- Free stops at 10 users, Premium needed for sandboxes and unlimited storage
How this list was ranked
Each product is placed by how well buying it holds up against building, for a company of 50 or more employees. The first test was caps. Automation, API and user limits are what make a company outgrow a project tool, so products with fewer published caps rank higher. The second was the per-seat price over five years, and the third was whether the tool suits business teams or only technical ones.
Custom is third because for most companies project management is a standard need. It moves up only when projects carry money and client data that a task tool has no place for.