Kanban Tool vs. Smartsheet

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Kanban Tool
Score 8.7 out of 10
N/A
Kanban Tool is a visual project management application based on Kanban that helps companies visualize workflow, track project progress, analyze and improve business processes. Some key features include: time tracking and time reports, real-time collaboration and Kaban analytics.
$6
per month per user
Smartsheet
Score 8.2 out of 10
N/A
Smartsheet is an online project management and collaboration tool. It includes automated alerts, instantaneous updating and sharing across team members, resource management, nested tasks organized in a hierarchy, a Gantt chart view, exportable and automated reports, and integration with email.
$9
per month per user
Pricing
Kanban ToolSmartsheet
Editions & Modules
Kanban Tool Team
$6
per month per user
Kanban Tool Enterprise
$11
per month per user
Kanban Tool On-Site Team
$720
per year per 10-user pack
Kanban Tool On-Site Enterprise
$1,320
per year per 10-user pack
Pro
$9
per month per user
Business
$19
Per User / Per Month
Enterprise
Contact Sales
Premier
Contact Sales
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Kanban ToolSmartsheet
Free Trial
YesYes
Free/Freemium Version
YesNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Kanban ToolSmartsheet
Features
Kanban ToolSmartsheet
Project Management
Comparison of Project Management features of Product A and Product B
Kanban Tool
6.5
13 Ratings
16% below category average
Smartsheet
9.1
129 Ratings
18% above category average
Task Management8.713 Ratings9.8126 Ratings
Resource Management6.48 Ratings9.8108 Ratings
Gantt Charts1.03 Ratings9.0109 Ratings
Scheduling6.811 Ratings9.8111 Ratings
Workflow Automation7.711 Ratings9.0100 Ratings
Team Collaboration6.913 Ratings10.0122 Ratings
Support for Agile Methodology7.311 Ratings8.481 Ratings
Support for Waterfall Methodology3.96 Ratings8.979 Ratings
Document Management6.79 Ratings8.9101 Ratings
Email integration7.39 Ratings9.1100 Ratings
Mobile Access8.610 Ratings8.196 Ratings
Timesheet Tracking8.06 Ratings9.762 Ratings
Change request and Case Management8.28 Ratings8.269 Ratings
Budget and Expense Management3.04 Ratings8.275 Ratings
Professional Services Automation
Comparison of Professional Services Automation features of Product A and Product B
Kanban Tool
5.7
6 Ratings
28% below category average
Smartsheet
8.0
66 Ratings
6% above category average
Quotes/estimates5.55 Ratings7.944 Ratings
Invoicing5.55 Ratings7.737 Ratings
Project & financial reporting3.04 Ratings8.660 Ratings
Integration with accounting software9.01 Ratings7.932 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Kanban ToolSmartsheet
Small Businesses
Stackby
Stackby
Score 9.1 out of 10
Stackby
Stackby
Score 9.1 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Planview AgilePlace
Planview AgilePlace
Score 9.6 out of 10
Planview AgilePlace
Planview AgilePlace
Score 9.6 out of 10
Enterprises
Planview AgilePlace
Planview AgilePlace
Score 9.6 out of 10
Planview AgilePlace
Planview AgilePlace
Score 9.6 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Kanban ToolSmartsheet
Likelihood to Recommend
8.7
(13 ratings)
9.4
(147 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.1
(2 ratings)
9.0
(24 ratings)
Usability
9.1
(6 ratings)
9.2
(17 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(1 ratings)
Support Rating
8.3
(4 ratings)
8.1
(45 ratings)
Online Training
-
(0 ratings)
7.0
(1 ratings)
Implementation Rating
8.2
(1 ratings)
10.0
(6 ratings)
User Testimonials
Kanban ToolSmartsheet
Likelihood to Recommend
Shore Labs
Kanban is well suited for a fast-paced working environment for larger teams who want continuous communication with users. Kanban is good for rapid development and daily meetings for updates and statuses. Kanban is less suited for smaller teams or groups who don't require collaboration and constant communication with involved users. Kanban is time-consuming and it takes additional effort outside of your regular work to maintain and manage the tool.
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Smartsheet
Smartsheet shines for collaboration. When you have multiple people involved with planning events Smartsheet makes it easy to share and collaborate. For instance, multiple people can be in Smartsheet working at the same time. Also setting permissions for exactly those who need to know is quite easy with Smartsheet. For data analytics and general spreadsheet purposes Excel is better but for project management and event planning Smartsheet is superior
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Pros
Shore Labs
  • It provides a good basic overview of where tasks are on a timeline (particularly helpful for a pull-based approach).
  • It provides a good collaborative space to have multiple folks commenting on multiple tasks.
  • It does a good job of managing very basic visual elements of an agile development cycle.
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Smartsheet
  • Its hard to overstate the value of familiarity. Being able to use a tool that has some familiarity takes away the time needed to train and orient employees on a new tool and allows an organization to hit the ground running.
  • Smartsheet covers most of the basics of a project management tool, the usual tasks, milestones and project viewing options.
  • For data viewing, you get multiple data viewing options including a calendar view (good for marketing teams and those who work around scheduling), Kanban, Gaant etc
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Cons
Shore Labs
  • Kanban does not show the task or story clearly. You have to open the project separately to view the details of the project.
  • Kanban gives a higher level project management view but it lacks customization and personal settings features.
  • I would like to see Kanban provide mobile access to their tool, data, and board. This would be very useful for all companies and provide an increase in efficiency and productivity.
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Smartsheet
  • Smartsheet set up is similar to Excel, yet when you upload an Excel file, things like conditional formatting are lost. Smartsheet has its own conditional formatting, and you have to reinstate the rules. It would be great if those would apply automatically once a file is uploaded
  • Some Smartsheet management and access rules can take some tweaking to work properly. This may be a case of offering more info to admins so they can apply these better and with more efficiency
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Likelihood to Renew
Shore Labs
We are more likely than not to renew our use of Kanban. Even with its limits, it still is a good product that fulfills our needs.
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Smartsheet
It definitely meets our needs as far as organizing and archiving our tasks and files. As we train more staff to view it, I see opportunities for more improvement, which I am sure this program can handle. I look forward to seeing continued improvement from Smartsheet on their capabilities and functionality.
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Usability
Shore Labs
The integration with Teams is well suited. This works wonderful for my
company. Our team can easily prioritize tasks based on their importance.
It help our team identify and reduce inefficiencies in workflow. With
great visibility in data our team can make informed decisions. Ensuring
clear accountability and responsibility of team members
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Smartsheet
Smartsheet is very easy to learn. However, while I have been able to pick it easily, Microsoft Excel and Project super users that I have trained on Smartsheet get bogged down in the differences and can find it frustrating. Explaining the differences ahead of time and why Smartsheet is being chosen instead of a different software seems to counteract those reactions
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Support Rating
Shore Labs
This is the best tool I had a chance to work with- since I started to use it I saved a lot of time and I made my work go smoothly.
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Smartsheet
I give this rating because it fills a niche in the market. MS Project scares many away from proper task management but there are limited tools our there, especially cloud-based that are mobile-friendly. Smartsheet fills this market gap, especially for small to medium-sized businesses. IT is not fair to compare it to MS Project, but fairer to see what gaps it fills.
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Implementation Rating
Shore Labs
No answers on this topic
Smartsheet
It's absolutely paramount to take a few minutes to actually play with the software. It's nearly impossible to do anything wrong or make a mistake which cannot be fixed easily. Under the help menu is Live Training option. After you familiarize yourself with the commands, watch the live training for some in depth understanding of how to make the software fit your needs perfectly.
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Alternatives Considered
Shore Labs
We've only tried JIRA Agile and KanbanFlow before. Kanban Tool was the one that our team actually liked and enjoyed working with. Also - it's been much easier to get started with and to understand than some of the other two (JIRA in particular). Although JIRA has many more features that we would have possibly used, the user feedback on it was so poor we were afraid that the negativity would create time wasted and less "job satisfaction" amongst the team.
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Smartsheet
Jira and Redmine are much more robust and technologically advanced project management solutions. I enjoy using either when managing a very large project. However, I prefer to use Smartsheet for my smaller to medium sized projects. As for Google Drive - I would say that Google sheets and Smartsheet are almost identical in my opinion when it comes to functionality. Personally I prefer to manage smaller projects via Google Drive, but it is a personal preference!
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Return on Investment
Shore Labs
  • Better communication and organization of ongoing projects.
  • We are a very small team, with many areas to work on. Having everything in one system gives us a lot of visibility.
  • Greatly reduced costs from using other tools that were much more expensive.
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Smartsheet
  • This has really opened up collaboration across teams. A lot less working in silos.
  • It hasn't fully replaced any one tool so it means having to go to another place. Hopefully, we can eliminate a tool or two in the next six months.
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ScreenShots

Kanban Tool Screenshots

Screenshot of Visual project management tool - Kanban board from Kanban Tool.Screenshot of The collection of Power-Ups form Kanban ToolScreenshot of Kanban Tool board example, with My Work widget, Recurring and Postponed Tasks visible in the side panel. User's own background selected.Screenshot of Kanban Tool  board example. Default light theme applied.Screenshot of Kanban Tool - an open card view, with comments in the side panel. The choice of what fields show on cards is with the user.Screenshot of Kanban Tool's free Power-Ups  for user's own activation.