Overview
What is Microsoft Project?
Microsoft Project is a project management software. It provides core PM functionality, including agile workflow support and resource management. Project can be deployed in the cloud or on-premise.
App, Web, and Desktop Local Project Management
Business Problem: To record project progress quantitatively and time consumption by getting …
Planning is a breeze with Microsoft Project
Moved away but came right back!
The best software for managing large projects
Strong, established tool for traditional planning, need more for today's projects
Project lifecycle managed with Microsoft project.
The best project management solution hands down.
A Workhorse for Scheduling
Effectiveness in planning new projects.
MS Project great tool for dedicated PM, less useful for casual users
Microsoft Project review from scheduling and cost management standpoint
Very efficient corporate tool for companies with Microsoft based IT
Project planning and management at its best
Jiho's Microsoft Project Review on 2021/05/20
Awards
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Popular Features
- Gantt Charts (103)10.0100%
- Scheduling (105)9.999%
- Task Management (106)9.090%
- Resource Management (103)6.969%
Reviewer Pros & Cons
Pricing
Project Plan 1
$10
Project Plan 3
$30
Project Plan 5
$55
Entry-level set up fee?
- No setup fee
Offerings
- Free Trial
- Free/Freemium Version
- Premium Consulting/Integration Services
Product Demos
Microsoft Project 2021 Overview And Features Walkthrough
Features
Project Management
Project management software provides capabilities to streamline management of complex projects through task management, team collaboration and workflow automation
- 9Task Management(106) Ratings
This includes the ability to plan, track, collaborate and report on tasks.
- 6.9Resource Management(103) Ratings
Resource management is workload planning to maximize resources.
- 10Gantt Charts(103) Ratings
Gantt charts are charts that show tasks or events along the y-axis displayed against time along the x-axis.
- 9.9Scheduling(105) Ratings
Scheduling capabilities allow users to set schedules on tasks, and create timelines and milestones.
- 8.5Workflow Automation(82) Ratings
Workflow automation is the ability to route work requests along an approval process automatically.
- 7.7Team Collaboration(95) Ratings
Team collaboration capabilities let team members work directly with each other and provide team updates.
- 7.6Support for Agile Methodology(79) Ratings
Agile is a time boxed, iterative approach to development that builds software incrementally instead of trying to deliver it all at once near the end.
- 8.2Support for Waterfall Methodology(79) Ratings
Waterfall methodology is a tradition development method that is linear and sequential.
- 7.2Document Management(76) Ratings
Document management provides for centralized management of all project documents.
- 6Email integration(81) Ratings
Email integration allows work requests to be made directly from email.
- 7.9Mobile Access(66) Ratings
Mobile access is the ability to access the software from a smartphone or tablet.
- 8.4Timesheet Tracking(72) Ratings
Timesheet tracking is the ability to track all billable and non-billable hours for each project.
- 8.4Change request and Case Management(62) Ratings
Change request and change management enables tracking of all customer requests including priority and timeframe.
- 6.3Budget and Expense Management(82) Ratings
Budget and expense management provides the capability to track all expenses by employee or department and link them back to department. It also enables hourly rates to be set.
Professional Services Automation
Features that support professional services organizations
- 7Quotes/estimates(53) Ratings
Ability to create, manage and send project fee proposals to customers
- 7Invoicing(44) Ratings
Ability to create, manage and send invoices to clients during or after completion of a project
- 6.9Project & financial reporting(73) Ratings
Ability to analyze project and financial data based on custom criteria to gather insights and improve business performance
- 6.9Integration with accounting software(49) Ratings
Real-time, two-way sync with accounting or financial software to facilitate project and financial reporting
Product Details
- About
- Integrations
- Competitors
- Tech Details
- FAQs
What is Microsoft Project?
Microsoft Project Integrations
Microsoft Project Competitors
Microsoft Project Technical Details
Deployment Types | On-premise |
---|---|
Operating Systems | Windows |
Mobile Application | No |
Frequently Asked Questions
Comparisons
Compare with
Reviews and Ratings
(692)Attribute Ratings
Reviews
(1-25 of 49)App, Web, and Desktop Local Project Management
Business Problem: To record project progress quantitatively and time consumption by getting data from third party contractors Online
Product : Project Online bundled with Share point helps to record progress collaboratively online. With Custom Fields and Custom JS code approval flow, Quantity Schedule Format was designed.
Use Case: Turnkey Construction Projects around 700 Km radially geographically distributed needed to be tracked. Project Progress by Time Schedule and Quantity Schedule executed by third party is to be reported.
- Scheduling of Tasks on time basis or on custom criteria
- Collaborative Task Assignment and getting Progress Inputs Online
- Road Maps, Numerous Reports help assess the projects
- Readily available apps from Share point Store MS Office store are useful for extending the functionality of the product eg Custom Dashboards
- Calculating Project Progress based on Custom Fields( which are used to measure Task Progress on Special Performance Criteria )
- Simplifying CSOM and JSOM customization
- Not limiting Support to Only Out of The Box features
Planning is a breeze with Microsoft Project
- The ability to diagram specific aspects of each project or task
- The ease of execution
- Ability to make modifications (assignments, dates, schedules, diagrams, monitoring)
- Has some limitations related to performance in areas of visual analysis
- The configuration is not the simplest--the use is perfect, but after configuring it
The best software for managing large projects
- Microsoft Project has features that can be customized, as well as its APIs are well documented and allow integration with other tools.
- Can be customized for agile project management.
- Its documentation is well done and as it has many users, doubts and problems are easily resolved within the community itself. However, Microsoft's technical support is efficient.
- it is an old tool that has already improved a lot in its use; however, it needs to be better developed to follow agile projects.
- Advanced features require training.
- Reports are not enough.
Project lifecycle managed with Microsoft project.
- project management
- Dependency tracking
- resource management
- task management
- reporting
- scheduling concerns
- UI could be improved
- Resource utilizations charts
- scope management
The best project management solution hands down.
- One thing it has is good integration with other Microsoft Office products and tools. More than likely most environments will already be using MS products such as Word, Excel, and Powerpoint, so it makes it easier to integrate documents, files, etc. with Project.
- It also offers many good tools for communications, which makes it beneficial for those that are using communication tools such as Outlook and Skype.
- Could be too advanced for those that are new to Project Management software, or those that are just starting out in Project Management. Since MS Project has many tools/features built into the program this can be overwhelming to new users in how to do certain things, or where to find the tool for doing something
- There is a cost to this software, and if buying standalone licenses it can be expensive. It usually doesn't come bundled with the standard Office 365 suite. This is technically considered an add-on, and if you are on a subscription for the software, it can be cheaper.
Effectiveness in planning new projects.
- I love the Gantt Chart that Microsoft Project offers me, because it provides me with a view from various aspects, it provides me with exact details about the fulfillment of tasks over a period of time, it also allows me to make comparisons with the necessary data and the fulfilled data. by the employees, in order to know exactly if the project's expectations have been met.
- I love the Gantt Chart that Microsoft Project offers me, because it provides me with a view from various aspects, it provides me with exact details about the fulfillment of tasks over a period of time, it also allows me to make comparisons with the necessary data and the fulfilled data by the employees, in order to know exactly if the project's expectations have been met.
- The alert system for the fulfillment and delay of assignments is perfect. Microsoft Project allows me to configure the task system, I can assign the necessary tasks to fulfill the project, and the software alerts me immediately if the managers are fulfilling the assignments.
- The main drawback encountered while using Microsoft Project is that it does not allow me to modify the template or the general user design. For me, the UI that this software has is quite simple, and I would like to apply different templates or modify the layout of my MS Project workspace, currently it is not possible.
- Sometimes the software crashes suddenly, throwing an error code, and the software closes immediately. This has happened to me when I am going through the detailed reports on my gantt chart, it is not something that affects me that much, but I think they should fix it.
- I have not had any other problems with Microsoft Project, it has been an exemplary software that has helped me to maintain a very good project planning in general.
- DETAILED PLANNING ON LARGE SCALE/COMPLEX PROJECTS. Task interactions dependencies.
- Very detailed resource management. You're able to track across the projects the utilization of all of your resources.
- Powerful cost management. You can track costs for your resources, for your individual tasks, and quickly update any additional cost requirements for the projects, map those costs against your budget and get a detailed report of your burn rate to mitigate possible budget risks.
- Complexity. With great power and flexibility comes a high level of complexity that makes some of the more advanced features very difficult to use on a day-to-day basis. i.e. being able to get several calendars integrated into a project for different kinds of resources is great but it takes a long time to get a handle on that and make it work for you.
- Unless you have an MS Project Server setup and all of the team members licensed with an MS Project Account working on a project are limited to those PMs and collaborators with a full license even for minor updates.
- The tools to present projects to other team members and present updates have not been updated to reflect the needs of the current PM, every view and presentation has to be manually cured to be presentable to the board and that is a very time consuming process.
- Changing status, colors or updating items automatically based on dates or other tasks is out of the question unless you really have a full set of VBA knowledge and the time to make it happen.
If on the other hand, you have less than 50 tasks and two or three stakeholder or members on your team then the MS Project is definitely overkill because it demands the full attention of the PM for extended periods of time to make sure that the information is relevant.
- Scheduling the tasks
- Defining the interdependicies
- Analyzing the critical path
- Live seamless collaboration across team members
- Templates to suit a variety of use cases
- More visual analytics
After an experience with MS Project server that wasn't very successful, "traditional" MS Project helped PMs to manage plannings and shared resources.
- Gantt chart and tasks planning
- Tasks dependencies and delay impacts
- Shared resources management
- Project timeline visualisation
- Hidden costs can rise very quickly (licencing, training...)
- Not available inline and not included in Office 365
- Old fashioned and not intuitive to use
- Assigning task to the team
- Manage multiple projects one view
- Allow to manage TEAMS and assign projects and task
- Online version a little different in some cases
- Big picture view.
- Gantt timeline view.
- Collaboration with MS Teams.
- Integrating with non-MS collaboration tools.
- It get more functionality it can become expensive.
- More visualization tools to analyze trends.
The Impressive Rise and Potential of MP
- Microsoft Product integrations, including sharing and reminder notifications.
- Interactive Gantt chart.
- More efficient, reliable project and DevOps integration.
- Training resources for new users.
Project works for us!
- Graphs
- Timelines
- Crashes ocassionally
- Some graphs get too busy
Works well if you’re a PM, challenging for a business end user.
- Timelines.
- Calculations.
- Easier to learn all of the capabilities it can do.
- % compete does not shade in Gantt unless you manually add that line style.
A good value for money software for any corporate
- Microsoft Project has an easy user interface and easy to edit documents.
- It provides good visuals to prepare Gantt charts and define critical paths.
- More complex assignments are not much flexible.
- It's not a very EPC friendly software.
Great tool for project management
- Resource allocation.
- Project tracking.
- Expensive license - Online it is available as free with Microsoft Office but the offline license for desktop use is too expensive.
- The online version of Microsoft Project does not have Gantt charts and project tasks like the offline version does.
- Resource allocation - Assign resources for project tasks and allocate the percentage of their involvement.
- Track the project status - Enable people to track the progress of the tasks and risks associated with activities.
- Visualization - Provide the flexibility to visualize the status of the project and risks associated with dashboards and help to present data in a useful manner to executives.
Feature-rich Project Management Tool
- Lots of templates.
- Can be used offline since it's a desktop application.
- It's an expensive license.
- Doesn't work well if you open a newer file with an older version of Project.
Best bang for your buck
- Plan project tasks.
- Execute project tasks.
- Provides management tracking of project completion.
- The clunky interface is occasionally hard to use.
- Help articles are not always clear and concise.
- Feature integration is lacking.
Microsoft Project continues to meet our large organization's project management requirements.
- Visually shows gantt charts of progress in project workstreams
- Shows the elapsed time for tasks to be completed
- Visually identifies the team members assigned to their work streams and if they are behind or on target
- Seems overly complicated for users sometimes in using Project and its functionalities
- Hard to share files for those folks who do not have MS Project, and then have to print out for them
- Can be confusing since it looks and feels like MS Excel
Most Popular Project Management Tool
- It is part of Office365 subscription. The look and feel is similar to other tools like excel. Helps in creating project plans, Gantt charts, work break down structures etc.
- Helps in resource allocation and tracking the projects. There is an option to use it to capture timesheets too.
- Helps project managers in producing weekly status reports and integrates well with other collaboration tools like Skype, sharepoint etc.
- The user experience can be improved.
- More tutorials can be provided online. It takes time to master this tool. It can be made much simpler and easy to learn on the fly.
- The tool can be made more catered towards to agile, scrum project management methodologies.
- MS Project is fairly easy to use. Adding Projects, Activities, Tasks, etc. are easy to add, and adjust when necessary.
- It offers many different views, so based on your own needs, it is very flexible.
- The reporting functionality is terrific. You can customize what you need to look at, from a full-blown project, or a more slimmed down version of just key milestones.
- It can be a little more difficult to work with when you use all of the hooks, bells and whistles that are available. It will take some time for the Novice user to pick all of this up.
- The columns (if all are used) offers a very crowded view, but I have never used all of these columns and most are hidden, so this may not be an issue to most users of MS Project
- Graphics need to be brought into the 21st Century.
- Being a Microsoft product, Project integrates extremely well into the Microsoft family of applications!
- Furthermore, the user interface is similar to other Microsoft applications. Therefore, there is a valuable familiarity out of the box.
- Project is incredibly detail-oriented and always receiving valuable updates. Project Online is now the cloud-based version of Project.
- Scheduling works really well for the most part. One can be extremely detailed with Gannt charts and other project management metrics!
- Remote work can be challenging - as Project must be downloaded to a specific computer.
- Upgrading to the top of the line version can feel like a requirement. There is a lot of functionality that is not available unless in the most expensive pay-tiers.
- Microsoft Project can be extremely expensive on a per user basis. Other tools can be much more cost-effective - especially for more basic project management needs.
Excellent cost vs. benefit for Project Management
- Budget management - You can easily set the available budget and indicate for each activity/resource the necessary amount. Therefore, it is good for the plan & actual budgets.
- Project management - Key elements such as progress management and critical path.
- Basic charts - Gantt charts are really developed and compelling.
- Planned versus actual budgets - Track progress.
- Baseline management - Manage and versioning of baseline.
- Resources allocation - Redistribute and rebalance resources across activities.
- Overall financial management - Microsoft Project is not indicated for complex financial management, such as Net Present Value, S-Chart, and others. It is strongly suggested to complement this capability with either an Excel or integration with SAP or Oracle Primavera Unifier.
- KPIs and dashboards - Microsoft Project still lacks advanced charts and analytics. This should be complemented as well with other tools/software.
It is not well suited for heavy CAPEX projects, but you can complement it with Excel spreadsheets or any other tools specific to the financial management of the project and portfolio.
Microsoft Project for Financial Projections
- Auto schedule for holidays and weekends without referencing an outside calendar.
- Allocate resources for accurate projections.
- Visualize actual construction progress in the timeline.
- Multiple views and reports for presentation to construction crews and clients.
- Import other schedules from Excel would be nice, but that's asking a lot.
Great Project Management Tool
- the simpleness of tracking budget for a project
- track projects on a task level basis
- real time what if scenarios in terms of task delay
- better built in Visualization capability like One Pager offers as an add on
- sometimes it feels the software is too big and complex to manage really simple projects
- There are not many choices of nice icons to use
The biggest issue this helped me resolve was that I can now view the actual schedule and make changes if I need to rather than getting a PDF of the schedule and having no control of the document. The benefit of this is that I can edit the schedule to realize hypothetical scenarios and dates for a particular project.