Are you using Atlassian’s Confluence to keep your projects organized and progressing?
If so, you're not alone. The widely-recognized tool offers plenty of features, but it’s not the only solution in town.
If you need something snappier than Confluence can provide, a number of feature-rich work management software may serve your agency better.
Limitations of Confluence
While Confluence is a well-known and perfectly capable collaboration tool, it possesses some significant drawbacks that can hinder a user’s experience:
The learning curve can be quite steep for new users. This issue can hurt adoption rates, especially if you have team members who don’t have much technical knowledge.
The editing experience can be slow and complex, which is inefficient and wastes time.
The search function doesn’t always live up to expectations. Users can get frustrated trying to find the documents they need.
The price increases as you add more integrations and add-ons. Small businesses or agencies on a tight budget can feel nickel-and-dimed by them.
We’ve pinpointed eight of the best Confluence alternatives on the market. One of them could be the project management tool that helps your agency thrive.
8 Confluence alternatives for project planning and collaboration
1. Teamwork
Designed specifically for agencies, Teamwork’s robust functionality and suite of features make it a powerful alternative to Confluence.
All-in-one team productivity solution
Teamwork has many capabilities, including team chat, customer relationship management, and a content collaboration hub. Whether your team is in-office or located across the globe, they can participate in real-time updates and knowledge sharing.
Teamwork’s built-in time-tracking features keep projects focused, on time, and profitable, helping ensure that your agency never leaves money on the table. With Teamwork, your team members can even create detailed timesheets so it’s quick and easy to see where time is spent.
But you can track a lot more than time with Teamwork. Our resource and workload management capabilities keep you on top of your team’s day-to-day tasks and the tools they need to complete them. Not only does this allow you to make sure you always have the resources on hand to help your clients reach their goals in future projects, it also makes it easy to see which team members are being over- or under-utilized and make adjustments as needed.
Simple and sleek user interface
Confluence can seem a bit old-school and clunky. Teamwork, with its customizable dashboard and clean layout, simplifies how users access the information they need to do their jobs. The tool makes it easy for agencies to manage the entire client lifecycle from one place.
“Ensure your documentation is short and sharp and make much more use of people-to-people communication.” ~ Bentley and Borman
Built for client work
Teamwork was designed for every member of an agency. It includes key client work features like invoicing, QuickBooks integrations, and unlimited free clients and freelance collaborators. It helps everyone involved keep control of their workflows and schedules, stay on top of task management, and proactively know what’s going on.
Ready-to-use functionality
Unlike Confluence’s steep learning curve, Teamwork has out-of-the-box usability. Being easy to learn increases adoption rates and cuts down on costly ramp-up time.
Additional features
Get instant visibility into performance, project health, profitability, and resource utilization with robust reporting capabilities.
Use one of the many Teamwork automation templates to cut down on repetitive tasks, or customize your own.
Work where you want with the tool’s mobile apps, whether you use iOS, Android, Windows, Chrome, or Microsoft Office.
Choose how granular you get with information with Teamwork’s collapsible projects and subtasks.
Never miss a billable minute when you use the time tracking tool.
Teamwork’s pricing options
Free forever: $0 up to five users
Starter: $5.99 per user per month
Deliver: $9.99 per user per month
Grow: $19.99 per user per month
Scale: Custom pricing
2. Asana
Credit: AppSumo
As a cross-functional software tool that fosters team collaboration and task management, Asana gives Confluence a real run for its money.
Asana is the perfect choice for small and medium-sized teams, remote teams, and teams that aren’t technology experts. With its visually appealing boards and straightforward design, almost everyone enjoys the user interface.
Asana's pricing options
Basic: Free forever, but best for individuals or teams just starting with project management
Premium: $10.99 per user/month
Business: $24.99 per user/month
Enterprise: Quoted by the sales team
Key features
Stay organized and focused with the Boards feature that gives you to-do lists, maps out project timelines, and overlaps your calendar with your schedule.
Manage shared projects with Kanban boards, tasks, subtasks, milestones, and sections.
Stay informed with real-time project data dashboards.
Transparently tie communication to teams by using task comments, status, messaging, and project and team conversations.
3. Basecamp
This project management tool has so many features it could be referred to as the Swiss Army knife of software. Pair that with its ability to keep track of multiple clients, and it’s a smart choice for agencies and remote teams.
Companies looking to lessen the number of tools they use into a one-stop solution may be drawn to Basecamp’s broad array of features.
Basecamp's pricing options
The tool offers two pricing plans, both with a 30-day trial period:
Basecamp: For smaller teams, $15 per user/month
Basecamp Pro Unlimited: $299 per month for unlimited users
Key features
The Hey menu houses every notification you need to know about, so you’re always in the loop.
The file-sharing feature supports Figma, Airtable, Dropbox, Google, and more.
“All Access” gives everyone on your account a way to see and join projects.
Automatic check-ins avoid time-consuming standup meetings.
It has unlimited space to share and store docs, files, and graphics for every project.
4. ClickUp
Credit: ClickUp
Focused on productivity, ClickUp gives users a way to build an internal wiki, master document management, and closely align with other team members to deliver projects. When it comes to organization and collaboration, it’s every bit as powerful, if not more so, than Confluence.
ClickUp says it’s for every type of team, but it fits best with teams needing both robust features and a significant amount of customization.
ClickUp's pricing options
Free plan
Unlimited: $5 per member/month
Business: $12 per member/month
Business Plus: $19 per member/month
Enterprise: Custom-quoted by sales
Key features
Real-time collaborative editing allows team members to work together directly inside documents.
Embed view makes it possible to add videos, bookmarks, and tasks to your document.
Hierarchy setup gives users both flexibility and control.
Hundreds of available templates make it easy to create use cases, tasks, checklists, views, and more.
Intuitive real-time collaboration features like two-way calendar sync, assign comments, mentions, markdown, permissions, and more ensure every team member is as informed as they need to be.
Robust task management software
Plan, track, and monitor all aspects of your tasks across every project or break them down even further with subtasks.
5. Nuclino
Another great alternative to Confluence is small-but-mighty Nuclino. With its modern, streamlined, clutter-free navigation system, this software’s functionality is quickly creating a steady stream of happy subscribers.
Small companies that want to maximize their team collaboration efforts but don’t want to get overwhelmed by features will love Nuclino.
Nuclino's pricing options
Free plan
Standard: $5 per user/month
Premium: $10 per user/month
Key features
The internal knowledge base keeps information organized.
The intuitive, clean platform is user-friendly.
The workspaces and collections features facilitate organization and productivity.
Markdown commands help with formatting content seamlessly.
6. Jira
Jira is a viable Confluence alternative for project management software because of its feature-rich platform and tons of flexible options. Jira is scalable, making it appealing to larger teams or fast-growing companies. However, its endless usability and friendly design make it a good option for smaller teams, too.
Jira's pricing options
Free up to 10 users
Standard: $7.75 per user/month for up to 35,000 users
Premium: $15.25 per user/month
Enterprise: Custom quoted by the sales team
Key features
Maintain full visibility and give teams context with the roadmaps feature.
Easily connect Jira with your current project management and other tools, as it boasts a network of 3,000+ apps and integrations.
Agile boards keep users on track with project goals.
Customized workflows smooth out the edges of any project, big or small, based on your specific needs.
7. monday.com
Credit: monday.com
Highly visual and able to manage multiple projects, monday.com is just as feature-rich as Confluence but with more appeal to agencies. The tool works well with freelancers and sales and marketing teams who want a more streamlined project experience.
monday.com's pricing options
Individual: Free for up to two users
Basic: $8 per seat/month
Standard: $10 per seat/month
Pro: $16 per seat/month
Enterprise: custom quoted on a client-by-client basis
Key features
Plan, view, and manage projects from the broadest lens to the most granular detail with over 10 views (including Gantt and Kanban charts).
Workdocs give users a place to collaborate in real-time, embed boards, dashboards, and videos, as well as seamlessly connect them to workflows.
Directly share files, collaborate, and communicate to shorten feedback loops and keep the project moving forward.
Set up code-free, customized automations to save time on repetitive tasks and decrease the hours spent in meetings.
Teamwork.com is built for agencies
Looking for a smarter way to keep your team’s tasks organized? See how Teamwork.com is designed to help agencies like yours better serve your clients.
8. Wrike
Credit: Wrike
Rounding out our list of the best alternatives to Confluence is the all-in-one software tool Wrike. Like Confluence, it’s packed with features and can handle complex projects for big companies.
However, its look and feel are more modern and appealing. It also offers an enormous number of integrations, including Salesforce, Google Drive, Slack, Tableau, and an easy-to-use API. Wrike helps teams build their workflows and seamlessly collaborate with each other.
Wrike’s pricing options
Free plan
Team: $9.80 per user/month
Business: $24.80 per user/month
Enterprise: Custom quoted by sales
Pinnacle: Custom quoted by sales
Key features
Sharable dashboards and real-time reports offer key insights that are vital to reach your goals.
Access Roles feature gives you control over who can access shared spaces and projects.
External Requestor Collaboration provides a way to communicate with non-Wrike users and outside parties.
Multiple views let you customize how you organize and track projects.
Modernize your project management processes with Teamwork
If your agency wants a better way to schedule and collaborate on projects, many tools are available outside of Confluence. Consider what you want the software to accomplish, think about user experience, factor in the integrations you’ll need, and find a software program that aligns well.
Is your agency looking for a way to manage multiple clients, stay on top of tasks, and proactively mitigate bottlenecks? Teamwork can do all this and more.
Trust the project management software designed especially for agencies. We provide the features and usability you need to crush every project and effectively scale your agency.
