We Evaluated the 8 Best Trello Alternatives for Creative Agencies [2026]

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Who doesn’t know Trello? It’s simple. Easy to use. It’s clean. It’s iconic. Truly built for tasks. But what makes Trello great for tasks is also what makes it an issue. It’s built for tasks, and only tasks. Not clients.

Meanwhile, creative agencies live in feedback loops, brand approvals, and a hundred tiny change requests. So, when it’s time to scale client-facing workflows, creative agencies tend to outgrow Trello. This guide highlights the eight best Trello alternatives for 2025. With real comparisons, you also get a migration guide and some workflow improvements.

Why agencies need a Trello alternative for design teams

Trello is a visual board champion. It’s simple, familiar, and instantly workable. Everything inside Trello is easy to skim, easy to shift, and easy to get moving on.

Trello’s strengths

• Its visual Kanban boards display work as cards so your team can instantly see what’s in progress, what’s done, and what’s stuck.
• Nails simplicity. You drag and drop, and you're done.
• By itself, Trello is pretty simple. But you can extend what it does through Trello's Power-Ups (their term for integrations or add-ons). 

But if you’re running a creative agency, this is where it also starts to fall short.

Trello’s limitations for creative agencies

• There are no native client portals or white-labeling. This means you can’t deliver to clients under your brand or give them a dedicated space for updates—Trello doesn’t offer that out of the box. 
• When creative work enters the review and approval stage (the back-and-forth limbo that agencies live in), Trello lacks tools for approvals, proofing, and QA.
• Projects equate to clients, so ultimately, it equals invoices. Trello doesn’t inherently link service delivery to billing or service metrics.

• Limited reporting on utilization and revenue. That’s why, if you want to see which projects are profitable, or how your team’s time adds up, Trello doesn’t give you that level of insight natively.

Yes, Trello was built for teams. But for creative agencies and design teams? You need more. The good news is the market’s caught up. It now offers Trello alternatives built to address the specific pain points creative teams face.

Feature comparison: Top Trello alternatives for 2025

This feature matrix makes it easy to see at a glance which tools handle agency workflows natively, which need integrations, and which fall short.

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Deep dive: Trello vs Competitors

Let’s get into the real comparison work. Once you evaluate today’s top Trello competitors from the perspective of project management for creative agencies, you start to see which platforms scale with client work and which ones don’t.

ManyRequests

If you’ve grown weary of many disconnected apps, ManyRequests is the best Trello alternative for design teams.

It gives your clients clarity, your team focus, and your agency one system you can actually scale without breaking. These features make ManyRequests particularly useful when you’ve got multiple clients, recurring production, and you’re trying to avoid missing anything important.

Strengths:

• Built from the ground up for creative agencies. So, the workflow logic aligns with your world: brief, review, revise, and deliver.
• ManyRequests replaces the multiple tools an agency typically uses. Instead of paying for and switching between separate apps for client portals, project tracking, CRM, billing, time tracking, and reporting, ManyRequests brings all those functions together into a single platform.
• A client portal for agencies, ManyRequests is designed with the client experience front and center. They get a smooth, professional experience without being crammed into your internal workflow.
• Ties deliverables, time, and billing into one system, you gain clarity on utilization, profitability, and delivery efficiency. No more guessing.

Limitations:

• Because of its comprehensive suite of features and all-in-one capability, ManyRequests comes at a price that may be a bit on the higher end for those just starting out.

Asana

Asana is a platform that supports evolving teams. It’s definitely a tool that brings your creative production, strategy, client commitments, and delivery timelines together. You’re less likely to lose track of who’s waiting, what’s blocked, and what that means for the client.

Strengths:

• Whether your team prefers boards, lists, timelines, or calendars, Asana adapts. You don’t have to force your agency process into the tool. It is the tool that bends to you.
• Asana puts everything in one place: goals, projects, tasks. That means fewer silos and fewer “I didn’t know that changed” moments.
• Built to grow with you: Asana doesn’t break when your agency doubles clients, projects, or team size. Workflows stretch. Teams stay connected. Projects don’t slip through the cracks.

Limitations:

• Many of the deeper controls, analytics, and enterprise-level features are available only in higher tiers.

Wrike

Wrike orchestrates work at an agency scale: briefs arrive in one place, teams are aligned across departments, and clients are involved without being messy and disruptive. It’s a Trello alternative for design teams that need structure, accountability, and oversight alongside flexibility.

Strengths:

• Wrike can build views, dashboards, and layouts that reflect your creative processes.
• When you have creative teams, account teams, strategy teams, external partners, and clients all intersecting, Wrike’s architecture helps coordinate the overlap.
• Gives clarity when you’re juggling briefs, revisions, approvals, assets, and client emergencies, knowing who’s overloaded, what’s coming, and where the bottlenecks are.
  
  

Limitations:

• Its depth and flexibility might feel heavy for a small team

Jira

Initially built for devs, Jira brings that level of discipline and visibility to agency workflows where every asset, approval, revision, and deadline needs to be traced.  It has also become known as a Trello alternative for design teams, giving structure when you’re juggling layered projects, client reviews, dependencies, and accountability across teams.

Strengths:

• Jira has unmatched traceability, thanks to its detailed project history and auditing. You can track every asset, every revision, every handoff. 
• Jira lets you tailor workflows, states, fields, and approvals for your agency rather than you trying to fit your agency into the tool.
• Jira provides a shared structure that enables clean handoffs among creative, strategy, accounts, and production.

Limitations:

• Giving clients a branded portal experience often requires significant custom configuration.

Notion

Notion collapses multiple tools while still letting your team live in the creative zone. More than tracking tasks, you want your clients, your creative, your process, your knowledge base, and your brand all under one roof, right? Notion gives you that unified canvas.

Strengths:

• Instead of separate apps for docs, project tracking, SOPs, and client dashboards, you can fold them into Notion and reduce tool‑sprawl.
• Also doubles as a knowledge base for your assets. From guides for processes, brand guidelines, asset libraries, and past campaign data, Notion becomes your creative team’s second brain.
• Because it’s flexible (whether your process is super structured or wonderfully messy, you can build the system that fits you), your team can tweak the workflow as you deliver work.

Limitations:

• Some users mention that large databases or heavy usage slow down pages.

Kanbanq

Kanbanq is a Trello alternative that’s lean, attentive, and aligned with how you actually deliver creative work. It’s also a Kanban‑first platform created for teams that care about clarity and momentum. Fewer clicks, less clutter, more headspace for creativity.

Strengths:

• With its lean interface and focus on backlog, your creative pipeline stays unblocked and moving forward. Like in a delivery flow, it helps the entire production flow run faster and more smoothly.
• Your agency doesn’t need to break the bank to adopt something clean and capable. The cost barrier is lower than many traditional tools.
• Kanbanq’s AI handles the admin so your team can actually do the work they were hired for.

Limitations:

• For agencies with dozens of teams, complex approval chains, and 100+ clients, the minimalist approach might feel too lightweight.

ClickUp

You know that dizzying dance between ten apps and five inboxes? ClickUp kills that. Instead of wrestling with scattered tools, you get a workspace where everything that matters converges—client briefs, creative work, revisions, deadlines, metrics.

Strengths:

• One platform for everything, not just tasks. ClickUp lets you manage creative work, accounts, and admin all in one place.
• You can shape ClickUp to mirror your process with custom workflows that bend to your agency’s rhythm.
• When your team grows, you add more clients, and you take on bigger jobs. ClickUp is built to grow with you, rather than forcing a tool swap mid‑growth.

Limitations:

• Overwhelming for smaller teams or minimal use‑cases.

Monday

Monday is like the hub for operations: client requests, creative work, approvals, delivery, and reporting, all wired together so everyone sees the same story in real time.  Monday is like a studio control room where everything’s connected, visible, and responsive.

Strengths:

• Your teams, your clients, your deliverables combined in a workspace where people actually see what they should, cutting down on “Where’s that feedback?” loops.
• Instead of starting from zero, Monday has templates and structure, so you could hit the ground running.
• AI-assisted efficiency for creative throughput: AI-backed support accelerates routine planning and reporting, freeing time for higher-value creative work.

Limitations:

• Some agencies report that customizing Monday to fit their unique process can be complicated.

Why ManyRequests stands out

Among all the Trello alternatives, let’s put the spotlight on ManyRequests, which was actually built with creative agencies in mind. Here are four major reasons it deserves that spotlight:

1. It keeps Trello’s visual simplicity, but adds the client-side you’ve always needed.

You still get the drag-and-drop clarity your team knows, but now clients have their own space for requests, revisions, and approvals. No more duplicate boards or messy email threads because ManyRequests consolidates all of that into a single client workflow.

2. It skips the complexity of enterprise tools.

While platforms like Asana or Monday can feel like overkill for smaller teams, ManyRequests stays light, visual, and human. No 40-step setup. No tech headache. Just a system that fits how creative work actually flows.

3. It brings creative QA, proofing, and billing under one roof.

Trello can’t handle the full client cycle, but ManyRequests does. You can manage creative delivery, feedback, and payment without hopping across five tools or hiring someone just to “keep things updated.”

4. It scales without adding friction.

Growth shouldn’t mean rebuilding your process. As your agency adds clients, projects, and creatives, ManyRequests grows with you without disrupting your workflow or forcing you into another round of tool shopping.

Explore Trello alternatives built for agencies

If you almost always end up with multiple Trello boards per client, rethink your workflow. Look into Trello alternatives built explicitly for creative agencies and stop managing clients across scattered Trello boards, email threads, and a patchwork of apps. 

Keep up with ManyRequests. Our platform centralizes your agency work, client approvals, and billing. Plus, we can actively bring your existing Trello boards into the platform. Our dedicated migration service (yes, we’ll help import your clients, projects, subscriptions, and even add your custom portal domain) ensures nothing gets lost, no messy manual transfers, and no headaches for your team.

Try ManyRequests for free.

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FAQs

Can I easily migrate Trello boards to ManyRequests?

Yes. ManyRequests offers a dedicated migration service designed for agencies moving their operations to a single platform. Our migration support. will help you import teams, clients, projects, and subscriptions, and even customize your portal so the switch looks and feels seamless.

Does ManyRequests replace Trello completely?

For most creative agencies, yes. ManyRequests keeps the visual clarity that Trello users love while adding client-facing workflows, approvals, proofing, and billing. 

Can I use ManyRequests for internal projects only?

Yes. While ManyRequests shines for client-facing workflows, it also works perfectly for internal agency projects. You get the same simplicity, task tracking, and visual clarity without exposing anything to clients until you choose to.

What makes ManyRequests different from Asana or Monday for agencies?

ManyRequests avoids the complexity of larger platforms while giving agencies essential features out of the box. Unlike Asana or Monday, it combines Trello-style visual workflows with client portals, proofing, QA, and billing.

Is ManyRequests suitable for design teams?

Yes! Design teams benefit from ManyRequests’ centralized proofing, feedback loops, and client approvals. It keeps visual projects organized, and scales as your creative team and client roster grow.

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