Trello
Simple card boards for tracking work, with Atlassian Intelligence summarising cards, drafting descriptions and suggesting next actions.
What you'd use it for
Tracking work as a shared board of cards you drag from To Do to Done, with nobody needing training to use it.
- Drag cards between columns to track a task's status, no setup required
- Set Butler automation rules that move a card, assign someone, or post a comment when a trigger fires
- Have Atlassian Intelligence summarise a card's comment history instead of scrolling it
- Ask Atlassian Intelligence to draft a card description from a rough note
- Get an AI-suggested next action on a card based on what is already on it
The verdict
Trello is still the fastest way to get a team looking at the same list of work, and Butler's automation runs keep a simple process honest without extra tooling. The AI layer genuinely helps with summarising and drafting card content, but it sits behind the Premium plan, a real cost jump from the free board most people arrive expecting. It suits small teams and personal task tracking well; anyone needing dependencies, real reporting, or more than a couple of custom fields will outgrow it fast.
What it costs
| Tier | Price | For | Includes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | An individual or a small team keeping work organised without formal process. | Unlimited cards, up to 10 boards per workspace, and the core Kanban board experience. |
| Standard | $5 USD per user/month billed annually ($6 billed monthly) | A team that has outgrown the free board limit. | Unlimited boards, advanced checklists, custom fields, and 1,000 workspace automation (Butler) runs a month. |
| Premium | $10 USD per user/month billed annually ($12.50 billed monthly) | Teams wanting multiple views of the same work and AI features. | Timeline, calendar, dashboard and map views on top of the board, plus admin controls and AI-assisted card content. |
| Enterprise | $210 USD per user/year | Large organisations needing organisation-wide administration and security controls. | Unlimited Standard/Premium features across every workspace in the organisation, plus enterprise-grade admin and security. |
Read from Trello's own pricing page on 25 Sep 2026. Vendors change prices without notice.
What you need to start
- Trello account, no credit card needed for the Free plan
- Premium plan or its 14-day free trial to use any Atlassian Intelligence feature
A few minutes to a working free board; the AI features need the Premium plan or its no-card 14-day trial before you can try them.
Your first run Sign up free and you land on a board with three ready-made lists (To Do, Doing, Done); adding your first cards and dragging one across takes a few minutes, no tutorial required.
Where it breaks
None found.
Browser-based with well-regarded desktop apps (Windows, Mac) and mobile apps (iOS, Android). Owned by Atlassian, so AI features run on the shared Atlassian Intelligence layer used across Jira and Confluence too.
First entry in this reference. There is no previous check to compare it against.
When not to use it
Not for teams that need task dependencies, detailed reporting, or many custom fields, since Trello's simplicity is the whole point and stretching it past a handful of straightforward workflows is where ClickUp or Asana take over. Not for anyone wanting the AI features for free, as they sit behind the Premium plan, not Standard.
Trello was the board-and-card interface before “Kanban board” became a category every project tool copied, and it remains the one most people recognise on sight — a column for To Do, one for Doing, one for Done, cards you drag between them. That simplicity is still the entire pitch: nothing here needs training, which is not true of most of what has since tried to out-feature it.
Atlassian’s ownership shows up mainly in what got added on top rather than what changed underneath. Atlassian Intelligence — the same AI layer used in Jira and Confluence — can now summarise a card’s comment history, draft a description from a rough note, or suggest a next action, without altering the board itself.
What Butler automates without you
Butler, Trello’s built-in automation, moves this past a static board: rules that move a card, assign someone, or post a comment when a trigger fires happen without you clicking anything, up to 1,000 runs a month on the Standard plan. That is real, if modest, autonomy — enough to keep a simple workflow honest without needing a separate automation tool.
Where it starts to strain
Trello’s honesty problem is the one every simple tool eventually has: it works beautifully for a handful of straightforward workflows and starts to strain once a team needs dependencies between tasks, real reporting, or more than a couple of custom fields. At that point, tools like ClickUp or Asana earn their extra complexity — Trello’s value is precisely in staying simple past the point most tools have already added five things you don’t need.
Alternatives
Asana
Project and task tracking with timelines, dashboards and forms, plus an AI layer that can triage incoming requests and draft status updates from real project data.
Records & databasesAgentsClickUp
Tasks, docs, goals and dashboards in one workspace, with an AI layer that summarises, writes and answers questions across everything you have stored in it.
Records & databasesAgentsmonday.com
Work and project boards where AI drafts status updates, assigns tasks, and can build a whole automation from a typed sentence.
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