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Asana vs Trello

Two fact sheets from our own research, side by side — pricing, platforms, API access and status re-checked by us rather than quoted from the vendors. Asana starts at $10.99, Trello at $5. Both have a free tier. Both ship a public API.

AsanaWork management for tasks, projects and portfolios with credit-metered AI agentsTrelloKanban boards for teams, with AI that drafts whole boards and summarises cards and comments

Side by side

FactAsanaTrello
CategoryTask & Project ManagementTask & Project Management
Pricing modelFreemiumFreemium
Starts at$10.99 month$5 seat_month
Public APIYesYes
PlatformsWeb, macOS, Windows, iOS, Android, API, Slack AppWeb, macOS, Windows, iOS, Android, API
CompanyAsana, Inc.Atlassian
Launched20082011
Last verifiedSep 6, 2026Sep 6, 2026

What our research says

Asana

Asana is a mature work-management system whose AI story is unusually concrete: agents are built from the same rules engine teams already use, and billed from an account-level credit pool instead of a per-seat AI surcharge. The catch is that the free tier is now effectively a two-person demo, so any real team lands on a paid plan immediately.

Pros

  • AI credits pool across the account rather than being sold per seat
  • No seat cap on paid plans, so adding collaborators does not force a tier jump
  • Well-documented public API plus native desktop, mobile and Slack clients
  • Portfolios, goals and reporting cover the layer above day-to-day tasks

Cons

  • Free plan is limited to two collaborating users
  • Portfolios, goals and advanced reporting sit behind the $24.99 tier
  • AI credit consumption per automation is not published, so budgeting is guesswork

Trello

Still the easiest board tool to hand a non-technical team, and the AI additions are sensibly scoped - board generation and summarisation rather than an agent that reorganises your work. The limits are the old ones: a board is a board, and anything needing dependencies or resourcing outgrows it.

Pros

  • AI-generated boards turn a written goal into a populated board rather than an empty template
  • Summarisation works on both card descriptions and long comment threads
  • Inbox captures tasks from email and chat without leaving those tools
  • Apps on every platform plus a long-stable public API and a large Power-Up ecosystem

Cons

  • Calendar, timeline and dashboard views are held back until the $10 Premium tier
  • Free workspaces cap at ten collaborators, which small teams hit quickly
  • The board model does not express dependencies, so complex plans go elsewhere

Which one fits

Choose Asana if you need

  • Cross-functional teams coordinating work across many projects and owners
  • Ops people who want automations and intake agents without writing code
  • Organisations that need portfolios, goals and reporting above project level

Choose Trello if you need

  • Small teams that need a shared board today with no setup ceremony
  • Personal and side-project tracking, where the free tier is genuinely enough
  • Teams already inside Atlassian who want Jira's neighbour rather than Jira

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