Implementing the best business management software for your company in 2024 will help you boost successful project delivery rates, support team collaboration, and identify bottlenecks that may be slowing you down.
With my extensive experience reviewing and testing business management software, I have compiled a shortlist of the best providers on the market right now. I considered key features such as workflow automation, collaboration tools, and third-party integrations for a seamless user experience.
The Best Business Management Software Tested by Our Experts
Smartsheet – Best for low-code project management automation
ClickUp – Best project management software for remote work teams
Wrike – Best project management software for scaling organizations
The Five Top Business Management Software 2024
- monday.com – Best for building custom workflows across teams
- Smartsheet – Best for low-code project management automation
- Celoxis – Best PM software for customer-facing teams
- ClickUp – Best project management software for remote work teams
- Wrike – Best project management software for scaling organizations
Monday.com – Best for building custom workflows across teams
Monday.com is an all-in-one business management software tool. Indeed, Monday.com covers every business department, with tools for HR, marketing, sales, task and project management, software development, and operations, among others.
The platform is particularly good for supporting product development. From roadmap planning to bug tracking and sprint management, Monday.com will be at your side every step of the way.
As you’ll probably have multiple departments in your organization on Monday.com, you’ll also need an effective communication channel. Monday.com provides two options – you can either use board discussions or integrate your account with Zoom for audio and video meetings.
If project management is your priority, you’ll be happy to know Monday.com provides a number of views, including Kanban, Timeline, Calendar, Map, and Chart views.
This gives you a lot of options as to how you visualize content, for example, tracking the progress of tasks over time or using the columns of a Kanban board to progress tasks through a workflow and towards completion.
Monday.com also has some impressive security settings. Along with two-factor authentication and access restrictions, it also provides a panic mode that allows you to lock down your entire account in the event that one of your employees’ credentials is compromised.
To reduce risks to confidential data, Monday.com also allows you to create private boards, workspaces, and docs. This way, only a select few will have access to key company assets.
I didn’t notice any significant drawbacks during testing, though some users reportedly find the mobile app tricky to navigate, and it can sometimes be difficult to track items across different dashboards.
Nevertheless, it’s a comprehensive product range that offers an exhaustive toolset for integrated businesses – and it frequently tops lists of the best project management software products.
Smartsheet – Best for low-code project management automation
Smartsheet is one of the few project management products on the market that lets you create custom-made work apps. The Smartsheet WorkApps tool is a no-code platform that enables you to quickly build intuitive web and mobile apps.
If you want to make a training app for new recruits, for example, you can simply collate your existing sheets, forms, and reports using the WorkApps builder. You can also pull files and media directly from the web before putting everything together in a fully functional app with built-in, multi-level security.
You can also make these apps available to your team while they’re under development, so you can work on them collaboratively – but it’s possible to set them up in just a few minutes.
Smartsheet is generally a strong product, but its customer support isn’t as extensive as it could be. The free plan only gets you access to the learning center and community forum, while the paid Pro plan only offers email support.
ClickUp, on the other hand, offers 24/7 live chat support on all plans, and Wrike offers multi-lingual support for all users.
However, Smartsheet does make up for this in other ways. For instance, its automation capabilities are particularly impressive. On the free plan, you get access to 100 automations per month, which you can use to create recurring workflows, respond to approval requests, and automate task updates.
Managing large teams with Smartsheet is also made easier by its integrations with top communication and project management tools, such as Dropbox, Slack, Microsoft 365, and Google Workspace. All of this adds up to it being a great tool for tracking tasks and projects at scale.
Celoxis – Best PM software for customer-facing teams
Celoxis provides a robust set of project management features, including dynamic project planning, project accounting, and project tracking, and it’s the only tool on our list that offers custom plans. You can build your own plans, only paying for the features you need, and you can choose to run on-premises or from the cloud.
If you use your own in-house servers, no third party will have access to your data, providing an additional degree of security. At the same time, however, you’ll need a tech team to manage the hardware and a reasonable amount of space to set up the server.
On the other hand, if you use Celoxis from the cloud, you’ll have access to enterprise-grade infrastructure, delivering state-of-the-art performance without additional investment – and it’ll be the better option for most businesses.
Looking at the product’s features, Celoxis offers a bunch of built-in workflow apps to make your life easier. For instance, there’s an app that flags the risks associated with projects, and there’s a native bug-tracking app that can be used to test new software – plus, as with Smartsheet, you can create your own custom apps.
Celoxis offers a great deal, and it’s arguably easier to navigate than competitors like ClickUp.
The one thing that might be a setback for some organizations is that it doesn’t have a free plan. That’s certainly mitigated by its free demo, however, and if that’s not enough, you can take advantage of Celoxis’ 30-day free trial, which provides more than enough time to judge whether it’s the right software for you.
ClickUp – Best project management software for remote work teams
ClickUp is a great business management tool for those looking for an affordable all-arounder. Its prices are low, but you won’t have to sacrifice on features. There’s even a free plan to get you started – and it’s among the best free project management software products around.
One of the benefits of ClickUp is that it doesn’t place caps on functionality. For instance, on the free plan, you can add unlimited tasks and new members to your projects, while on the Unlimited plan, the first paid plan, you get unlimited dashboards, integrations, Gantt charts, custom fields, and storage.
This means you won’t have to upgrade to higher-tier plans just because your business is growing. You’ll only need to upgrade if you want access to more tools.
Like many popular tools, ClickUp incorporates AI functionality, and it’s included with all paid plans. You can use the AI tool to craft fresh content within seconds and to improve existing content, provide new ideas, correct grammar, and simplify and summarize copy.
The AI tool can also be used to generate action items. To make the platform easier to use, ClickUp comes with 100+ fully-templated prompts, which you can adjust and build on for your own needs.
Overall, ClickUp is an excellent business management platform. One thing that might bother new users is its rather complex interface, and it’s harder to navigate than Monday.com or Smartsheet.
There are a lot of features and functionality to familiarize yourself with, but once you master the platform, ClickUp has a lot to offer, and it’s an extremely strong all-arounder.
Wrike – Best project management software for scaling organizations
Like ClickUp, Wrike has a generous free plan, but it stands out for its resource management features. The platform can provide a quick estimate of the resources you’ll need for a project or over a calendar period, so you can plan ahead and avoid taking on tasks that may block pre-existing deadlines, for example.
This remote work tool also gives you a centralized view of each employee’s workload, capacity, and availability so you can effectively triage new tasks, distributing the workload equally.
It’ll also give you clear insights into the time and money spent on a project so you can regulate spending and stay on budget.
Managing collaborative teamwork on the platform is simple. Multiple individuals can work together on a doc and leave comments. Your team can also cross-tag work and create duplicates so different departments can track project progress without waiting for access.
Wrike also has an AI tool that helps with more than just content generation. It assesses new projects, addresses risks associated with them, and provides you with to-do lists to help you manage delivery.
If a project is out of your capacity, for example, the tool will help you with planning and ensure you don’t make unrealistic promises to clients.
One area where Wrike could do better is with storage. ClickUp offers unlimited storage on all its paid plans, but Wrike’s storage capacity only runs from 2GB to 15GB, depending on the plan you pick.
This isn’t really enough for a large business using the platform as an information repository. However, if you already have third-party storage, this shouldn’t be too much of a problem – and it’s otherwise an excellent project management solution.
The Best Business Management Software Solutions Compared
There are a lot of different business management solutions available on the market today, and they cater to a wide range of use cases. Here’s a comprehensive breakdown of the top 30 business management software tools currently available.
| Provider | Best For | Starting Price | Free Trial | Compatibility | Number of Integrations |
| Monday.com | Cross-departmental collaboration | Free / $9/user/month – 3 user minimum (annual) | Free plan for two users / 14-day trial | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, browsers | 200+ |
| Smartsheet | Low-code project management automation | Free / $7/user/month (annual) | Free plan for one user, two editors / 30-day trial | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, Linux, browsers | 350+ |
| Celoxis | Customer-facing teams | Custom | 30-day trial | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, Linux, browsers | 400+ |
| ClickUp | Comprehensive workplace app for teams on a budget | Free / $7/user/month (annual) | Free plan / 14-day trial | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, Linux, browsers | 1,000+ |
| Wrike | Resource management | Free / $9.80/month (annual) | Free plan / 14-day trial | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, browsers | 400+ |
| Kintone | No-code application building | $24/user/month – 5 user minimum (annual) | 30-day trial | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, Linux, browsers | 36 |
| Hub Planner | Capacity planning and team scheduling | $7/resource/month (annual) | 14-day trial | Browsers | Via Zapier |
| Visor | SaaS integrations connecting the workplace | Free / $9/user/month – 2 user minimum (annual) | Free plan | Browsers | 5+ |
| QuickBase | Best for no-code applications and workflows | $35/user/month – 20 user minimum (annual) | 30-day trial | iOS, Android, browsers | 40+ |
| GanttPRO | Gantt chart-based management | $7.99/user/month – 5 user minimum (annual) | 14-day trial | iOS, Android, browsers | 7+ |
| Nifty | Real-time progress reports | Free / $5/user/month (annual) | Free plan / 14-day trial | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, Chrome, browsers | 9 + 2,000+ via Zapier |
| FigJam by Figma | Design-oriented businesses | Free / $3/user/month (annual) | Free plan | iOS, browsers | 30+ |
| Microsoft Project | Basic collaboration needs | $10/user/month | One-month trial | Windows, browsers | All Microsoft apps |
| Airtable | App building for startups and small businesses | Free / $20/user/month (annual) | Free plan for five editors | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, browsers | 35+ |
| Forecast | AI-powered planning | Custom pricing | Demo | iOS, Android, browsers | 35+ |
| Paymo | Project management for freelancers | Free / $5.90/user/month (annual) | Free plan / 15-day trial | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, Linux, browsers | 15+ |
| MeisterTask | Remote teams | Free / $12/user/month (annual) | Free plan / trial | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, browsers | 30+ |
| Quire | For small teams looking to combine Kanban and to-do lists | Free / $7.65/user/month (annual) | Free plan for ten users / 30-day trial | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, browsers | 20+ |
| Backlog | Cross-functional teams | Free / $35/user/month (annual) | Free plan / 30-day trial | iOS, Android, browsers | 15+ |
| MindGenius | Brainstorming and visual planning | $14/user/month (annual) | 14-day trial | Browsers | 10+ |
| Asana | Managing the complete customer journey | Free / $10.99/user/month (annual) | Free plan | Windows, Mac, Android, iOS, browsers | 380+ |
| Hubstaff | Automated time tracking | $4.99/month – 2 user minimum (annual) | Free plan for 1 user / 14-day trial | Windows, Mac, Android, iOS, Linux, browsers | 30+ |
| Planview AdaptiveWork (formerly Clarizen) | Enterprises driving strategy | On-demand pricing | Demo / 30-day trial | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, browsers | 100+ |
| FunctionFox | Online timesheets | $5/month ($35/month for first user) | Free trial | iOS, Android, browsers | N/A |
| Confluence | Community collaboration and support | $6.05/month | Free plan / 7-day trial | Windows, iOS, Android, browsers | 595 and 1,000+ apps |
| Basecamp | Employee calendar management | $15/user/month (annual) | 30-day trial | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, browsers | 90+ |
| LiquidPlanner | Predictive scheduling | $15/user/month (annual) | 14-day trial | Browsers | 3 + Open API and Zapier |
| awork | Intuitive work management | $8.80/user/month (two years) | 14-day trial | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, browsers | 25+ |
| Birdview Project Management (formerly Easy Projects) | Project management for fast-moving teams | $9/user/month (annual) | 14-day trial | iOS, Android, browsers | 2,000+ |
| ProWorkflow | Real-time client collaboration | $18/user/month (annual) | 14-day trial | Windows, Mac, iOS, Android, browsers | 14 |
Why You Need Business Management Software
Wondering why you should use business management software? Here are some of the reasons why you cannot do without one:
Healthy Team Discussions
Creatively designed business management software effectively fosters productive team communications. It transforms an unproductive office setting into a place for constructive discussions.
With the launch of this technology, employees may interact with all departments more easily and respond to team members quickly using various chat tools. Thus, by integrating the entire workforce, business software may help firms achieve exceptional outcomes.
Improved Customer Service
A business management system may assist companies in keeping track of consumer data and preferences, resulting in improved customer service. Such a system will boost customer service by providing staff with the necessary resources to perform their duties effectively.
It’ll also help staff provide greater satisfaction to clients by automating processes and supplying them with accurate, current information.
More Strategic Decisions
Duplicate data from many departments might make it challenging to make informed choices. You may be unsure which information is correct and what can be used to carry out your plan and achieve your objectives.
Instead of evaluating which data is correct, an integrated business management system will help you make faster and more strategic decisions. It even allows you to view your company as a whole, enabling you to make plans.
Centralized business management
The main advantage of business management software is the ability to handle a wide range of company applications from a single hub.
Instead of dealing with several controls, interfaces, passwords, and providers to meet ongoing business demands, you may benefit from a streamlined management solution managed through a single system. Any changes made to the program or related data are reflected in all linked apps.
Allows You to Avoid Mistakes
You can run into mistakes or lose your data while transferring data from one platform to another. You’ve two options: either accept the errors or spend much time and money restoring and verifying everything.
Using business management software eliminates the need for repeated data imports. You just need to input your data – your program will handle the rest. Additionally, all-in-one business management software may improve your data management and organization while protecting your company from errors and multiple entries from human inputs.
How to Choose the Best Management Software for Your Business
Investing in management software can help streamline your business operations, improve productivity, and boost overall efficiency. To help you make an informed decision, I’ve compiled a list of key factors to consider before investing in management software for your business.
Features Offered
When choosing management software for your business, it’s essential to consider the features offered. The software should provide reporting functions that align with your company’s needs. It should be easy to run reports, analyze data, and identify areas for improvement. The software shouldn’t complicate things but rather save time and increase productivity.
Scalability
When choosing management software for your business, it’s essential to remember that your business will evolve and expand over time. The software you choose should be able to accommodate this growth and have the necessary functionality and capacity to keep up with your changing needs.
You should look for software that can easily add new features, support more users, and handle more data without requiring a complete system overhaul. A scalable software solution can provide long-term benefits for your business, helping you stay competitive and grow.
Pricing
Budget is an essential factor to consider when purchasing software for your business. You should determine your budget and find a product that fits your price range.
Consider licensing fees, monthly usage fees, customization costs, training, and support costs. Planning for every cost involved is important, from implementation to ongoing support.
Customization Options
Every business is unique, and its software needs will vary. Find a software company that can customize its product to meet your specific needs and requirements.
A one-size-fits-all approach may not work for your business. Thus, it’s essential to personalize the software to remove features you don’t need and add those that you do.
Ease of Use
Ease of use is a crucial factor when selecting business management software. Employees must adapt to the software quickly and easily without extensive training. It’s essential to research all available options to find the most user-friendly model that meets your needs.
If you purchase a more extensive software version, understand the provider’s implementation plan to ensure a smooth transition. User-friendly software programs can increase productivity, streamline workflows, and reduce the learning curve for new employees.
Customer Support & Security
Ensure your chosen software offers optimum security for your business and personal data. Check the company’s compliance regulations and privacy policy.
Ensure the software company provides customer support during your business hours and has local support teams. This will ensure that you have the support needed to help recover business data or address any questions or concerns that may arise.
More Business Management Software Resources
I’ve explored the best business management software products in this guide, but we have many more guides and resources addressing different business use cases for you to check out.
- The Best Workflow Management Software
- The Best Online Collaboration Software for Teams
- The Best Resource Management Software
