Notion vs Airtable for Creative Agency Operations in 2026

Most agencies didn’t run a formal evaluation when choosing their creative PM tool. So if you’re using Notion or Airtable, they likely didn’t win a head-to-head comparison—it just became your system by default.

And for good reason too. After all, both tools promise flexibility as a core benefit. And early on, that’s a huge win. But as you scale, your clients increase. Workflow complexity increases. Soon, you’ll find that the same freedom exposes how fragile these setups become.

This is a full breakdown of Notion vs Airtable for creative agency operations in 2026: what works and what breaks under pressure. We’ll also discuss  the price the operational debt the “break” creates. Let’s cap it off by introducing a client-ready alternative that’s a more agency-native solution.

Notion vs Airtable for agencies—A high-level comparison

Notion and Airtable are powerful tools that are widely used even inside creative agencies. But apparently, neither tool was designed around how you actually deliver work.

Here’s a high-level comparison of the two:

Notion vs Airtable for project management in creative agencies

So, some creative agencies adopt Notion or Airtable as their agency workflow tool. Why? Let’s look at this Notion vs Airtable review:

Where Notion works well for agencies

Notion performs best for work that needs explanation and shared understanding, and if the primary audience is your team. 

• Internal docs. Your brand guidelines, onboarding docs, team handbook, vision docs, campaign playbooks—Notion is excellent at turning chaos into readable clarity.
• SOPs. If your agency runs on repeatable processes, Notion gives you the space to document them beautifully. Step-by-step. Linked. Nested. Easy to reference.
• Early-stage project tracking. For 1-5 clients, project management is mostly manual fixes. You know everyone. You remember context. You can patch gaps. Notion supports basic coordination.

Where Airtable shines

Need to define fields? Define relationships and decide what counts as data and what doesn't? That’s where Airtable excels—when agency work becomes data-heavy and repeatable. 

• Structured workflows. When your agency's work starts repeating at scale—campaigns, content pipelines, production cycles—Airtable’s structure becomes comforting. Each row is a unit of work, like a task, a request, or a deliverable. And in Airtable, a linked record is a fixed relationship, like how a task is linked to a project, a project linked to a client, or that client linked to billing, campaigns, and/or retainers.
• Tracking data-heavy processes. If you’re juggling dozens of deliverables across clients, channels, and timelines, Airtable can keep up. Especially when every project has metadata: status, owner, priority, SLA, and revision count.
• Custom views for ops teams. Airtable earns trust by letting each team see the work the way they need to. Ops plans in timelines. Creatives move cards. Leadership reads rollups. No separate systems. No shadow spreadsheets. Just one source of truth, viewed three different ways.

Where both start to struggle

Despite their own pros, Notion and Airtable struggle once agencies scale—especially when client-facing work is involved.

• Managing client requests. Requests come in through email. Or Slack. Someone has to translate them into “the system.”
• Handling approvals and feedback. Comments scatter. Screenshots live everywhere. Decisions aren’t decisions until someone restates them in Slack.
• Maintaining consistency across teams. Every pod “uses the system differently.” Which means you don’t really have a system.
• Onboarding new hires into “the system.” In agencies using Notion or Airtable, new hires aren’t really learning a product. They’re learning your version of it. Both require guided tours, explain the logic, show them where things live, and warn them about what not to touch. Most of the time? Knowledge transfer is verbal, so if someone leaves, part of the system leaves with them. 

Notion vs Airtable for agencies: What breaks when clients get involved

Now, once clients enter the system, the tools are prone to breaking. And no, it’s not because they lack features. but because they were never built to handle the operational realities of client-facing delivery.

Client access is always a workaround

Notion and Airtable were not for handling clients. These are customers with their own needs, access rights, and questions. So, everything you try to do with them is a workaround. You share pages, toggle guest permissions, or send read-only links. And then you spend half your week policing them. In practice, this means:

• You have to manually control what a client sees or edits. They cannot see what your internal team sees.

• You spend time explaining the interface if the clients are not tech-savvy.

• Mistakes happen when a client edits the wrong field or comments in the wrong place.

• Requests and feedback often get scattered because the system wasn’t designed for external users.

Approvals and QA become email-driven again

Even if you’ve set up a Notion board or an Airtable base to track deliverables and approvals, the moment clients get involved, the workflow almost always fragments. 

• Comments live in Notion or Airtable, but some still come in via email. It’s hard to track and monitor which comment is the latest iteration.
• Slack threads spring up for clarification. 
• Figma proofing happens somewhere else. 
• Before you know it, the “single source of truth” exists nowhere. 

So, approvals get delayed because no one is sure which comment is final. And then, quality assurance turns into checking five places just to be sure. 

Billing lives somewhere else

No matter how meticulously you track tasks or project progress in Notion and Airtable, billing is always external. Stripe, QuickBooks, invoicing sheets, or custom spreadsheets are all separate from the workflow you’ve built. 

• That disconnect creates friction when explaining scope or charges to clients.
• Your delivery, your approvals, and your revenue all exist in different tools. These three things that matter most in an agency aren’t connected.
• Which ultimately means someone has to manually reconcile them, and it’s always a source of frustration and mistakes.

The hidden cost of operational debt

Operational debt is the cost of decisions that worked early but don’t scale. And those specific breaks mentioned above them. Here’s how they look in your agency workflows:

• Systems are not built to last. 
• Every workaround becomes permanent.
• Every new client adds friction instead of leverage.

At 20 Clients: 

You’re managing. Tasks are tracked in Notion, and projects mostly make it to delivery. Even if someone forgets to update a status, you can chase it down in five minutes. Manual fixes feel normal. Clients barely notice. 

At 50 Clients: 

The DIY magic starts to crack. Project managers track tasks differently. Some mark things done in their own spreadsheet, others rely on Slack confirmations, and no one basically remembers which “master list” is accurate. 

New hires spend their first week learning how your system works. Your current team spends half their time translating it into the “official” workflow. Frustration becomes part of the job description.

At 100 Clients: 

This is the nightmare. Workflows have diverged so much that you don’t even know who’s responsible for what. Approvals get lost, feedback goes unanswered, billing doesn’t match delivery, and the tools you once loved are holding you down. 

Your best people are burned out, leadership is stuck fixing systems instead of running the creative agency, and clients are starting to notice. The more clients you take on, the more each workaround multiplies friction. 

Are there better Airtable or Notion alternatives for agencies?

Sure. There are plenty of Notion alternatives for agencies, and a whole bunch of Airtable alternatives for creative agencies. 

And they all promise the same thing: neat dashboards, perfect databases, “all-in-one” organization. It’s shiny. It’s satisfying. But here’s the thing. It’s mostly for you. Your internal docs, your to-do lists, your SOPs. The moment you try to bring clients into the mix, most of these tools fall flat as an end-to-end agency workflow tool. 

Enter ManyRequests. Finally, a platform that’s built for how agencies actually deliver work: internal org meets client-facing clarity. 

ManyRequests as an agency OS (Not just another tool)

Here’s the thing: Notion and Airtable are flexible DIY systems. And that might mean spending more hours patching gaps than running your agency. Now, a purpose-built agency operating system? Call it ManyRequests. Perfect if you already have clients, projects, approvals, and billing—it gives you a home where all of that actually works together. No workarounds.

What changes when you use an agency OS

Clients submit requests through a portal

No more email threads. Clients log into a branded portal where requests, files, and conversations live in one place. You know exactly what’s asked, by whom, and when. Context never goes missing. 

Workflows are standardized

Every request follows a predictable path. Your team isn’t guessing which column to update, which page to check, or whose inbox to dig through. The system enforces the process, not the other way around. 

Approvals happen in one place

Comments, edits, and approvals are all in one centralized spot. No more chasing emails or Slack threads to figure out what’s actually approved. Decisions stick. Everyone knows where to look.

Agency reporting made easy

Need to see who’s overloaded, what’s pending, or how projects are progressing? Built-in reporting gives you the visibility you need without stitching together spreadsheets. Reporting made simple.

Billing ties directly to delivery

When requests, approvals, and billing live in the same system, billing stops being a separate job. You’re not cross-checking Stripe, spreadsheets, and task boards just to figure out what’s billable. Approved work is already accounted for. When something ships, it’s clear whether it’s in scope, used up, or ready to be billed.

Notion vs Airtable vs ManyRequests—which is your choice?

The right tool depends less on features and more on what role your system needs to play in your agency today.

• If your solo or just starting out and your work is mostly internal (documentation, thinking, and lightweight coordination), Notion still makes sense. It’s flexible, fast to adopt, and excellent at capturing context. Just don’t expect it to enforce consistency or carry client accountability without a heavy process layered on top.

• If your agency runs on structured data (repeatable workflows, operational reporting, and cross-team visibility), Airtable is the stronger option. It brings order where things would otherwise sprawl. But that structure comes at the cost of complexity, ownership, and ongoing maintenance—especially once clients are involved.

• ManyRequests comes into play when client-facing work becomes the core of your delivery. Built around how agencies actually operate: clients submitting requests, work moving through clear stages, approvals happening in one place, and billing tied directly to delivery. 

So the question isn’t really which among Notion vs Airtable vs ManyRequests is better. It’s what problem you’re solving now. Start using a system built for client delivery. Try ManyRequests free.

Frequently asked questions

Is Notion or Airtable better for agency workflows?

It depends on your stage and complexity. Notion is great for internal docs and lightweight project tracking. Airtable is better for structured, data-heavy internal workflows. 

Can Notion or Airtable replace a client portal for agencies?

Not really. You can share pages or grant guest access, but you will always have to find a workaround. 

Is ManyRequests a replacement for Notion or Airtable?

Yes, but it’s more than that. ManyRequests is built for agencies to handle client requests, approvals, delivery, and billing in one system. Notion and Airtable are DIY tools, while ManyRequests is purpose-built.

What’s the biggest risk of using Notion or Airtable for agencies?

The biggest risk is your operational debt. Workarounds, manual processes, scattered feedback, and disconnected billing all pile up.

How long does it take to set up ManyRequests for a real agency?

The client portal, approvals, reporting, and billing are pre-built—so most agencies are up and running in days, not weeks. For agencies moving from another tool, ManyRequests has full migration support.