ClickUp
One app to replace them all, which is both the pitch and the risk.
- Productivity
- Development
- Marketing
- from $7/mo
ClickUp is a work management platform bundling tasks, documents, whiteboards, goals, dashboards, chat and time tracking into a single product. Its strategy is explicit consolidation: replace the four or five tools a team currently pays for, at a lower combined price, and accept the complexity that comes with that ambition.
ClickUp ranking and coverage
- In Productivity
- #7 of 28
- Overall
- #26 of 122 tied
- Terms score
- 6.9 /10
- Referenced here
- 6 pages
Cost position 6.8 · Portability 5 · Subscription flexibility 9 - Ranked on published terms only: entry price against category peers, portability and subscription flexibility, equally weighted. This is not a quality score.How the rank is calculated.
ClickUp: the short answer
Every line below is drawn from facts verified on 19 August 2026.
- What it is
- One app to replace them all, which is both the pitch and the risk
- Best for
- Teams wanting to consolidate several tools into one subscription
- Starts at
- Free Forever plan; Unlimited from $7 per user/month billed yearly
- Free option
- Free plan available, 14 days on Business trial
- Biggest strength
- Exceptional feature coverage for the price
- Biggest drawback
- AI is a separate subscription at $9 a user a month, on top of a $7 plan
- Based on
- Primary-source research, not hands-on use
- Closest alternative
- Asana - More opinionated and considerably calmer to use day to day
- True annual cost
- from $84 a year on Unlimited, the cheapest paid tier ($7 a month)
ClickUp at a glance
| Best for | Teams wanting to consolidate several tools into one subscription, Small and mid-sized companies on a tight software budget, Organisations willing to invest time configuring a workspace |
|---|---|
| Category | Productivity, Development, Marketing |
| Starting price | Free Forever plan; Unlimited from $7 per user/month billed yearly |
| Free plan | Yes |
| Free trial | 14 days on Business |
| Pricing model | freemium |
| Company | ClickUp (Mango Technologies, Inc.) |
| Founded | 2017 |
| Headquarters | San Diego, California, United States |
| Founders | Zeb Evans, Alex Yurkowski |
| Platforms | Web, Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, Android |
| Public API | Yes |
| Browser extension | Yes |
| Mobile apps | iOS + Android |
| Self-hosting | No |
| Affiliate programme | Affiliate programme advertised; rates vary |
| Data source | Vendor pricing page and public records |
| Last checked | August 2026 |
ClickUp pricing
Prices below were read from the vendor's own pricing page on 19 August 2026. Pricing model: freemium. Free trial: 14 days on Business.
| Plan | Price | Billing | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free Forever | $0 | per month | Unlimited tasks and unlimited free plan members, 60 MB storage |
| Unlimited | $7 | per month | per user, billed yearly - $10 billed monthly. Unlimited storage, integrations and Gantt charts |
| Business | $12 | per month | per user, billed yearly - $19 billed monthly. Advanced automation, timesheets and granular permissions |
| Enterprise | Custom | Negotiated | White labelling, SSO, advanced permissions and managed onboarding |
| Brain AI | $9 | per month | per user - Unlimited Brain assistant, agent and AI chat, plus 1,500 AI Super Credits a user a month. Charged on top of a plan, not instead of one |
| Everything AI | $28 | per month | per user - The full agentic suite, with 5,000 AI Super Credits a user a month |
| AI Super Credits | $10 | per usage | Per 10,000 credits, shared across the workspace, for agents, AI fields and image generation |
What ClickUp actually costs over a year
A monthly price is not the same thing as a monthly contract. These are the plans above resolved both ways, per seat or unit where the plan is charged that way. Where a vendor quotes only a yearly figure it is divided by twelve rather than left out, and the Quoted column says which figure the vendor actually publishes.
| Plan | Quoted | Monthly | Over 12 months |
|---|---|---|---|
| Unlimitedper user, billed yearly | per month | $7 | $84 |
| Businessper user, billed yearly | per month | $12 | $144 |
| Brain AI add-onper user | per month | $9 | $108 |
| Everything AI add-onper user | per month | $28 | $336 |
Which ClickUp plan should you buy?
| Your situation | Recommended | Why |
|---|---|---|
| You want to try consolidating tools | Free Forever | Unlimited tasks and members, which is unusually generous. 60 MB of storage is the real cap. |
| A small team needs Gantt charts and unlimited storage | Unlimited | $7 per user billed yearly. The working tier for most teams. |
| You need advanced automation, timesheets and granular permissions | Business | $12 per user billed yearly, and where ClickUp starts replacing several other subscriptions. |
| You want something usable on day one | Do not buy ClickUp | Configuration is the price of the flexibility. Asana or Trello arrive with sensible defaults instead. |
| You need the deepest tool in one specific category | Buy that tool instead | ClickUp is broad rather than deep. Jira beats it at issue tracking, Notion at documents. |
Verdict by who you are
Small company consolidating subscriptionsYes
More capability per dollar than anything else in the category, and it genuinely can replace several tools.
Operations lead willing to configureYes
The flexibility rewards someone who invests in setting up views, statuses and automations.
Team wanting defaults that work immediatelyNo
Unconfigured ClickUp is overwhelming. This is the most common reason adoption fails.
Organisation that values stabilityCompare first
Feature releases are frequent, which brings both improvements and churn.
Software engineering teamCompare first
Workable, but Jira and Linear are purpose-built for delivery tracking.
Should you buy ClickUp?
Buy ClickUp if…
- Teams wanting to consolidate several tools into one subscription
- Small and mid-sized companies on a tight software budget
- Organisations willing to invest time configuring a workspace
Do not buy ClickUp if…
- Teams that want something usable on day one without setup
- Buyers who value stability over frequent feature releases
- Organisations needing the deepest tool in any single category
Key features
- Tasks with custom statuses, fields and multiple assignees
- Over fifteen views including list, board, Gantt, calendar and mind map
- Docs and wikis stored alongside the work
- Whiteboards for planning and diagramming
- Goals and targets linked to underlying tasks
- Native time tracking and timesheets
- Automation with conditional logic
- ClickUp Brain AI for summaries and generated updates
Integrations
- Slack and Microsoft Teams
- Google Workspace and Microsoft 365
- GitHub and GitLab
- Figma
- Zapier and Make
- ClickUp public API
ClickUp screenshots
Captured by us in August 2026 at 1440px, unedited. Interfaces change, so these show the product as it looked on the date we verified this profile. Pricing pages are captured from a US vantage point, so the currency shown matches the USD figures recorded above.
Our assessment
ClickUp offers more capability per dollar than anything else in its category. Business at $12 per user includes automation, timesheets, dashboards and docs that competitors split across separate products or higher tiers, and for a cost-conscious team replacing three subscriptions the maths is compelling. The price is complexity and pace. There are more settings than most teams will ever configure correctly, the interface is dense, and the release cadence that delivers so many features has historically brought performance and reliability complaints with it. It rewards a team willing to own the configuration and frustrates one expecting sensible defaults.
What works in ClickUp
- Exceptional feature coverage for the price
- Genuinely replaces several separate subscriptions
- Free Forever tier allows unlimited members and tasks
- Very wide range of views over the same work
What doesn't
- AI is a separate subscription at $9 a user a month, on top of a $7 plan
- Steep configuration burden before it becomes coherent
- Interface density overwhelms casual users
- History of performance and reliability complaints
- Not the strongest tool in any individual category
EveryAny Decision Score
3 of these 8 dimensions are calculated from verified facts; the rest are our judgement, shown as a band rather than a figure unless something specific sits behind them. How each score works.
- Cost position6.8/10
derivedentry tier at $7 a month against a category median of $9.99 a month across 28 comparable tools
- Portability5/10
derivedpublic API
- Subscription flexibility9/10
derivedfree plan, free trial, freemium, monthly billing
- Feature depthVery high
editorialour judgement, with no measurement behind it
- Ease of learningLow
editorialour judgement, with no measurement behind it
- CollaborationHigh
editorialour judgement, with no measurement behind it
- AI capability7/10
editorialCapable, and sold separately: Brain AI is $9 a user a month and Everything AI $28, on top of the plan price, with AI Super Credits at $10 per 10,000. Every rival in our project management comparison includes some AI in the plan itself.
- Professional adoptionHigh
editorialour judgement, with no measurement behind it
What leaving ClickUp would cost
moderate lock-in
ClickUp scores on public API. Portability 5/10 ; lock-in is the inverse. How this is calculated.
ClickUp competitors and alternatives
| Alternative | Why you might pick it instead |
|---|---|
| Asana | More opinionated and considerably calmer to use day to day. |
| Notion | Better if documents and knowledge are the centre of the work. |
| Linear | The opposite philosophy, and better for focused software teams. |
monday.com
Productivity
A colourful work OS you configure rather than adopt.
Checked Aug 2026
Asana
Productivity
Work management for teams that have outgrown a board but not hired a PM.
Checked Aug 2026
The consolidation argument, priced
The pitch is straightforward. A team paying for a project tool, a document tool, a whiteboard and a time tracker might spend $40 to $60 per person per month. ClickUp Business is $12. Even allowing that each individual component is weaker than the specialist it replaces, the gap is large enough to justify a serious evaluation.
Where it breaks down is when one of those components is load-bearing. If your whiteboard practice is central, Miro is meaningfully better. If documentation is the core asset, Notion is better. Consolidation is worth it when everything is a solid second best, not when one thing has to be excellent.
Configuration is not optional
ClickUp ships with an enormous surface area exposed. Custom statuses, custom fields, ClickApps, automations, views and permissions all need decisions, and the defaults do not make them for you. Teams that assign someone to design the workspace get a coherent system. Teams that let everyone configure their own corner get chaos faster than with simpler tools, precisely because there is more to configure.
Free Forever is unusually generous
Unlimited tasks and unlimited members at no cost is rare, and the constraint is storage rather than people. For a small team this is genuinely workable long term, and it makes evaluation easy: run it in production for a month before paying anything.
AI is a second subscription
The consolidation argument above compares $12 a user a month with $40 to $60, and AI is where that comparison needs a footnote. ClickUp’s AI is not a feature of the plan; it is priced beside it:
| What | Price | On top of |
|---|---|---|
| Brain AI | $9 per user a month | Any plan |
| Everything AI | $28 per user a month | Any plan |
| AI Super Credits | $10 per 10,000 | Either AI plan’s allowance |
So a team on Unlimited that wants the AI features pays $16 a user a month, not $7 - which is above Asana Starter, where AI Studio Basic is included with a credit allowance. Every other product in our project management guide puts some AI inside the plan.
Whether that matters depends entirely on whether you were going to use it. What it is not is included.
What the reviews consistently say
Two complaints recur across years of feedback: performance under large workspaces, and a release cadence fast enough that behaviour occasionally changes underneath you. Both have improved and neither has disappeared. If your organisation values stability above capability, that is a real consideration, and Asana is the calmer choice.
ClickUp questions, answered
- Is ClickUp worth it?
- ClickUp offers more capability per dollar than anything else in its category.
- How much does ClickUp cost?
- Free Forever plan; Unlimited from $7 per user/month billed yearly. The cheapest paid tier we recorded is Unlimited, published at $7 a month, which works out at $7 a month or $84 over a year. Verified against the vendor's pricing page.
- Does ClickUp have a free plan or free trial?
- ClickUp has a free plan. A free trial is available: 14 days on Business.
- What is the best ClickUp alternative?
- It depends on the job. Asana: More opinionated and considerably calmer to use day to day. Notion: Better if documents and knowledge are the centre of the work. Linear: The opposite philosophy, and better for focused software teams.
- Can I self-host ClickUp?
- No. ClickUp is a hosted service only, so your data lives on the vendor's infrastructure.
What this profile is based on
Every claim below is about our work, not about ClickUp. A "no" is recorded rather than omitted, because the difference between a tested review and careful desk research is the reader's to weigh. How we research a profile.
-
Prices read from the vendor : yes
Read from ClickUp's own pricing page on 19 August 2026
-
Plans and terms recorded : yes
7 rows, each with its billing period
-
Original screenshots : yes
2 captured by us: homepage, pricing page
-
Sources cited and dated : yes
1 primary source, each with the date it was read
-
Product used first-hand : no
Not tested. This profile is desk research from primary sources
-
Alternatives used first-hand : no
None, so comparisons here rest on published facts rather than use
-
Vendor contacted : no
Not contacted for this profile
Desk research from ClickUp's own pricing page, re-read on 19 August 2026 through a United States egress. Nobody here has configured a ClickUp workspace, so the claim that configuration burden is the commonest reason adoption fails is a reading of the vendor's own feature surface and of published user feedback, not a measurement of ours.
Where ClickUp appears on this site
6 other pages here reference ClickUp. Every one is listed below, so the figure can be checked rather than taken.
- Buyer guide Best project management software in 2026 ranked #3
- Article Founder Digital Hygiene Is a Procurement Habit listed as related
- Another profile Basecamp names it as a competitor
- Another profile Linear names it as a competitor
- Another profile Plane names it as a competitor
- Another profile Teamwork.com names it as a competitor
Counts pages on this site that name the product by choice - buyer guides, articles, deal records and other profiles. Category and directory indexes list everything automatically and are not counted.
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Provenance and freshness
When each fact was last checked
- Pricing ·
- Plans ·
- Free trial
- Features
- Platforms
- Integrations
- Affiliate programme
- Company details
Individually sourced claims
-
Unlimited is $7 per user a month billed yearly, or $10 billed monthly
ClickUp pricing ↗ · checked
-
Business is $12 per user a month billed yearly, or $19 billed monthly
ClickUp pricing ↗ · checked
-
The Free Forever plan includes unlimited tasks and unlimited members with 60 MB of storage
ClickUp pricing ↗ · checked
-
AI is priced separately: Brain AI at $9 per user a month, Everything AI at $28, and AI Super Credits at $10 per 10,000
ClickUp pricing, AI pricing section ↗ · checked
What has changed
-
August 2026
- Corrected free-plan storage from 100 MB to 60 MB, which is what the pricing page now states
- Recorded that AI is a separate per-user subscription - Brain AI at $9 and Everything AI at $28 - rather than a plan feature
- Re-confirmed Unlimited at $7 and Business at $12 per user a month billed yearly
-
August 2026
- Per-user pricing verified, yearly and monthly
- Added plan picker and verdicts
Sources & verification
Facts on this page were read from the sources below on the dates shown. Where a vendor does not publish a figure, we record it as not disclosed rather than estimating it.
- ClickUp pricing - checked 19 August 2026
Spotted something out of date? Email [email protected] and we will re-check it. Corrections are logged on the page.
