monday.com vs Asana vs ClickUp (2026): Plans & Pricing

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This is an editorial research comparison based on official documentation, pricing pages and the sources listed below — how we review. Prices and plans change often; confirm on the vendor’s site.

monday.com, Asana and ClickUp are three general-purpose work-management platforms that often end up on the same shortlist. All three handle tasks, timelines, dashboards and automation. All three have added AI agents that run on usage credits. And all three are built for cross-functional work, not just engineering tickets. The differences are in structure, how much setup they need, how they price seats and AI, and how well they connect to a software team’s tools.

This comparison is for founders, operations leads and engineering managers choosing one platform for a mixed team. If your work is mostly engineering issues, a dedicated tracker may suit you better, and our pillar guide to project management software for software teams covers that side, including Linear and Jira.

A note on scope: monday.com sells several products on one platform, including work management, CRM, service and dev. We compare monday work management, the core product, against Asana and ClickUp. Where it matters for software teams, we also cover monday dev, its product for engineering teams. This is an editorial research article based on each vendor’s pricing pages, help centers and announcements, checked in October 2026. We did not run our own benchmarks.

Quick verdict

In our assessment, monday work management is the most approachable of the three for teams that think in spreadsheets and want visual boards fast. Asana is the most structured, with goals, portfolios and approvals, and it suits companies that plan top-down. ClickUp packs the most features per seat (docs, chat, whiteboards, sprints and agents) but asks for the most configuration. For engineering teams, monday dev and ClickUp both include sprints and GitHub sync. Asana relies on integrations and its new Command product.

At a glance

Dimension	monday work management	Asana	ClickUp
Core model	Boards of items (rows) and columns	Projects of tasks, rolled up into portfolios and goals	Spaces, Folders, Lists and tasks
Free plan	Up to 2 seats, 3 boards, 3 docs	Personal: 2 users, unlimited tasks and projects	Unlimited free-plan members and tasks, 60 MB storage
Entry paid plan (yearly)	Basic: $9 per seat/month, 3-seat minimum	Starter: $10.99 per user/month	Core: $9 per user/month (regular price shown: $12)
Monthly billing	Basic $12, Standard $14, Pro $24 per seat	Starter $13.49, Advanced $30.49 per user	New plans: yearly only on the price cards; legacy plans offer monthly
Engineering features	Separate monday dev product: sprints, GitHub two-way sync (Standard+)	GitHub integration, two-way Jira Cloud sync (Advanced+), Command by Asana for dev teams	Sprints and sprint points, GitHub integration on every plan, GitLab and Bitbucket
AI model	Monthly AI credits per plan; Sidekick assistant and agents	AI Studio credits plus AI Teammates requests ($0.50–$0.60 each beyond the allowance)	Pooled AI credits per user; Brain and Super Agents
Higher-tier controls	Enterprise: portfolio and resource management, multi-level permissions, 99.9% uptime SLA	Enterprise: SAML, SCIM, capacity planning, view-only licences	Enterprise: SAML SSO, SCIM, audit logs, HIPAA options, data residency

Structure and ease of setup

monday.com is built around boards. Each board is a table of items with typed columns (status, person, date, numbers and so on). Higher plans add more views: Timeline, Gantt and calendar views start on Standard. That spreadsheet-like model is easy to pick up, which is monday’s main strength. The trade-off is that cross-board structure (dependencies across teams, portfolios) arrives only on higher plans. Portfolio and resource management are listed under Enterprise.

Asana is more opinionated about planning than the other two. Tasks live in projects, projects roll up into portfolios, and portfolios connect to company goals. Approvals, proofing, forms branching, time tracking and resource management are on the Advanced plan. This makes Asana a good fit when leadership wants to see how work ladders up to objectives. It feels more formal than monday for small, informal teams.

In our assessment, ClickUp is the most flexible of the three and the most demanding. Its Workspace, Spaces, Folders, Lists and tasks hierarchy, custom task types, custom fields and 15+ views can model almost any process. Without conventions, it can also grow messy. Our full ClickUp review covers its limits, including long-running performance complaints on ClickUp’s own feedback board.

Features for software teams

If engineers will live in the tool, check this section carefully.

monday dev is a separate product priced from $9 per seat/month billed yearly, also with a 3-seat team size. It adds Scrum templates, capacity planning, AI daily stand-ups and sprint summaries on Basic. Standard adds sprint management with story points, a roadmap and a two-way GitHub sync for bugs and features. Pro adds epics, tasks and subtasks hierarchy, agile reporting, time tracking and a feedback and request portal. If your engineers and the rest of the company both use monday, you can run them on the same platform.
Asana connects to GitHub to show pull request status, review status and build status on tasks, and its pricing page lists a two-way Jira Cloud sync on Advanced and above. That is useful when engineering stays in Jira and the rest of the company plans in Asana. In September 2026 Asana announced Command by Asana, a “planning and product development system for builders” that links release planning, meetings, the codebase and coding agents. Asana’s announcement gives no public price and asks customers to contact their account manager, so we could not compare it plan for plan.
ClickUp includes sprints, sprint points (trial-limited on lower plans), backlogs and a GitHub integration on every plan. That integration covers branch and PR creation from tasks, status updates from GitHub, and synced commits and pull requests. ClickUp also lists GitLab and Bitbucket integrations.

None of the three matches a dedicated issue tracker for engineering-only teams. If that is your situation, read our Linear vs Jira comparison before committing.

Automation and AI

All three meter automation and AI, and the units differ, so compare carefully.

monday.com

Automations and integrations are counted in actions per month: 250 of each on Standard, 25,000 on Pro and 250,000 on Enterprise. Each paid plan also includes monthly AI credits for its Sidekick assistant, agents and AI features, with more available to buy. The pricing page shows 1,000 credits on Basic, 2,000 on Standard and 3,000 on Pro. In its 10-seat example, monday prices those credits at $10, $20 and $30 a month and applies a matching “special monthly discount”, so the total equals the seat price. We read that as a promotion, so check whether it still applies when you buy.

Asana

Starter includes unlimited automations. Asana’s AI comes in two forms. AI Studio, its no-code AI workflow builder, includes 50,000 to 200,000 credits per billing account per month depending on plan. AI Teammates (ready-made agents) include 5 requests per user per month, capped at 50 or 250 per account. Extra AI requests cost $0.50 each in prepaid packs or $0.60 pay-as-you-go, billed monthly in arrears. Asana says admins get a usage dashboard and alerts at 65% and 85% of the allowance.

ClickUp

The new plans include 1,000 automations per month on Core, 10,000 on Business and 1 million on Enterprise. AI credits are pooled across the workspace: 1,000 per user per month on Core, 1,500 on Business and 3,000 on Enterprise. Extra credits cost $10 per 10,000. ClickUp estimates a Super Agent run at 100–300 credits, and credits do not roll over.

In our assessment, Asana’s per-request AI pricing is the easiest to forecast. ClickUp’s pooled credits offer the most included AI on paper but are the hardest to predict. monday sits in between.

Seats, free plans and billing rules

Seat rules can change the real price more than the headline rate does.

monday.com: the free plan allows up to 2 seats. Paid plans start from 3 seats and are priced by team size, which you pick on the pricing page. Teams above 40 seats need a quote. Prices exclude tax and depend on billing country. Yearly billing is paid in one upfront instalment. monday’s FAQ says yearly plans cancelled within 30 days may get a partial refund.
Asana: paid seats are sold in increments of 1 from 2 to 5 users, then in steps of 5 up to 30, 10 up to 100, and larger steps beyond. Starter includes unlimited free guests. Asana’s pricing page says it offers no refunds. Cancelling keeps access to the end of the paid period.
ClickUp: the free plan allows unlimited members. On paid plans, all internal members are billed and upgrades apply to the whole workspace. Each workspace is billed separately. ClickUp offers a 30-day refund on a first paid subscription.

Pricing compared (as of October 2026)

All prices are USD per seat or user per month, before tax, from each vendor’s pricing page. ClickUp figures are for its new plans, which new workspaces start on. Existing workspaces may still be on Unlimited ($7 yearly, $10 monthly) or legacy Business ($12 yearly, $19 monthly).

Tier	monday work management	Asana	ClickUp
Free	$0, up to 2 seats	Personal: $0, 2 users	Free Forever: $0, unlimited members
Entry	Basic: $9 yearly / $12 monthly	Starter: $10.99 yearly / $13.49 monthly	Core: $9 yearly (regular price shown: $12)
Mid	Standard: $12 yearly / $14 monthly	Advanced: $24.99 yearly / $30.49 monthly	Business: $17 yearly (regular price shown: $25)
Upper	Pro: $19 yearly / $24 monthly	Enterprise: custom	Enterprise: custom
Top	Enterprise: custom	Enterprise+: custom	MAX: $100 yearly (regular price shown: $120)
Engineering add-on or product	monday dev: Basic $9, Standard $12, Pro $20 per seat yearly ($12, $14.50, $25 monthly)	Command by Asana: price not published	Included in the same plans

monday’s monthly figures come from the structured pricing data on its pricing page. The visible cards show yearly prices, with monday advertising savings of 18% for yearly billing. monday dev’s pricing page shows monthly rates of $12 (Basic), $14.50 (Standard) and $25 (Pro) per seat. See monday.com pricing · See Asana pricing · See ClickUp pricing

For a 10-person team on the mid tier billed yearly, the list prices work out to about $120 a month on monday Standard, $250 on Asana Advanced and $170 on ClickUp Business. These are not like-for-like feature sets: Asana Advanced includes portfolios and goals that monday reserves for higher tiers. Compare the features you will actually use.

Prices verified against each vendor’s official pricing page (listed under Sources). Plans, promotions and renewal prices change often — confirm on the vendor’s page before you buy.

Which should you choose?

Choose monday.com if you want a quick path from spreadsheet to shared boards and visual dashboards, and your team is happy with a board-per-workflow model. Add monday dev if engineers will use the same platform. Visit monday.com
Choose Asana if you plan from goals down to projects, need approvals and portfolios, want predictable per-request AI pricing, or need to keep engineering in Jira while the rest of the company plans in Asana. Visit Asana
Choose ClickUp if you want docs, chat, whiteboards, sprints and AI agents in one subscription, and someone on the team will own the configuration. Visit ClickUp

FAQ

Which monday.com product should a software team buy?

monday dev, if engineers will run sprints in monday. It includes sprint management, story points and GitHub sync, which work management does not list. If engineers use Jira, Linear or GitHub Projects and only the rest of the company needs monday, work management is enough.

Are AI features extra on these platforms?

All three include some AI in paid plans and charge for usage beyond an allowance. monday uses monthly AI credits per plan, Asana sells extra AI requests at $0.50–$0.60 each, and ClickUp sells extra credits at $10 per 10,000.

Why does a two-person team pay for three seats on monday.com?

monday’s FAQ says paid plans start from 3 users. A two-person team can use the free plan (up to 2 seats) or pay for the smallest 3-seat bundle.

Monday.com vs Asana vs ClickUp: Project Management Compared