ClickUp vs. Asana: Which project management software should you use? [2025]

If you're anything like the average software user, you've signed up for a bunch of apps you're not actually using. It's a problem that costs millions of dollars a year for some businesses. So naturally, in each software category, there are products that step in to become an "everything app," aiming to become your digital headquarters and in the process, helping you cancel those unused apps and save money.

In the world of project management tools, ClickUp is that app—positioning itself as an all-in-one platform that can replace your task manager, document hub, chat platform, and whiteboard tool all at once. With features ranging from mind mapping to built-in video recording, ClickUp wants to be the only workspace your team needs. Meanwhile, Asana is on the other end of the spectrum: strictly focused on project management. Rather than trying to do everything, Asana has spent years perfecting its core features, becoming the reliable choice that countless teams trust to keep their projects running smoothly.

I've spent extensive time testing both platforms to compare their strengths, limitations, and ideal use cases. In this article, I'll explain the pros and cons of Asana and ClickUp to help you decide which you should use.

Table of contents:

• Asana vs. ClickUp at a glance

• ClickUp is more robust—but with a steeper learning curve

• Asana is easier to set up and more intuitive to use

• Both platforms offer powerful AI features

• ClickUp offers user-friendly automations for free

• ClickUp has a stronger free plan and offers more value—but AI costs extra

• Asana has more native integrations, but both apps integrate with Zapier

Asana vs. ClickUp at a glance

Here's a breakdown of the key differences between these two project management apps:

• Asana is best for teams focused on pure project management. Its streamlined workflows, intuitive design, and enterprise-ready features make it the go-to choice for organizations that need reliable task management without feature bloat.

• ClickUp is best for teams seeking maximum flexibility. Its extensive toolkit, granular customization options, and generous free tier make it perfect for organizations that want to build their ideal workspace from the ground up—and don't mind the learning curve.

ClickUp is more robust—but with a steeper learning curve

Asana is pretty solidly in the project management app category. ClickUp, on the other hand, is a central workspace for team collaboration: it's a project management tool, shared inbox, to-do list, internal knowledge base, whiteboard, chat app, and OKR tracker all in one. While ClickUp's extra features are a net positive, the drawback is that they make the app more complex to learn.

When it comes to standard project management, both Asana and ClickUp offer the typical views to display your projects: list, board, timeline, Gantt, and calendar views. Here's what a board looks like in Asana.

Other than the color scheme (and even that's not all that different), ClickUp's board view is pretty similar.

But ClickUp goes well beyond the standard options. In ClickUp, you can embed views from other apps like Airtable and Miro, and even make changes to them within ClickUp. (Note that some of these embedded views, like Google Calendar, only allow you to track changes and not make modifications within ClickUp.)

There are also other unique features, like a documentation area, chat option, mind maps, and a digital whiteboard. While these aren't traditional "views"—they don't convert your tasks into a mind map or anything—it's really nice to have these options built in.

The whiteboard feature even lets you quick-add embeds from Figma, YouTube, and Google Workspace, which makes it easy to create dynamic vision boards in a few minutes.

Within ClickUp, you have almost endless customization options. You can easily create custom dashboards to track anything from tasks to timesheets to custom embeds from around the web. ClickUp also contains multiple hierarchy levels, starting with Spaces for different teams or categories of work. Then, within each Space, you have the option to create individual Lists of tasks or items—or you can organize those Lists into separate Folders.

Of course, if you're using a project management app for the first time, or you're just looking for something more traditional and easier to navigate, ClickUp's options could be overwhelming. Personally, I find the Lists and Folders to be a little redundant. I experienced almost immediate decision fatigue when I was trying to set up my ClickUp workspace for the first time. (For instance, should each client get their own List within a Folder, or should I put all my client work into a single List?) But for larger teams that need complex data hierarchies, I can definitely see the value.

Asana's views and features are more than enough for true project management, even at a large organization, so it can be the better choice if you want to go the more traditional route.

Asana is easier to set up and more intuitive to use

The simplicity of Asana's features is echoed in its usability: clear navigation and labels, along with a contrasting color palette, make it pretty easy to find your way around. ClickUp, on the other hand, uses some obscure labels ("LineUp" and "Trending," for example), and all the options can make it hard to find what you're looking for.

Asana's side navigation menu is simple, with several icons and labels to take you to wherever you need to go, whether that's your tasks, reporting, or anything else. And if you get lost, it's easy to find your way back to the home screen, where you'll find your priorities, recent projects, and collaborators. Asana's HQ is set up pretty nicely, with a customizable background and widgets that you can arrange to your liking.

Within a project, there's a simple Add task button, or you can click into any section and add a task directly into it.

From there, it's easy to drag and drop tasks, so they're in the right section and order. Once you've created a task, you can add subtasks, assignees, and a due date, each in a click. 

It's also easy to color-code your tasks or events in the calendar view, so they stand out a bit more and are easier to parse. 

None of this is novel or surprising, but that's the point: Asana does exactly what you expect it to, which makes it easy to navigate.

ClickUp's interface, on the other hand, isn't as intuitive. For starters, from a distance, ClickUp seems a little like a blank piece of paper. Everything kind of looks like it's written in pencil, with fine fonts and a lot of light gray. I will say, though, that the home page has improved in recent months. It's now a dashboard with customizable widgets, so you can choose which views work best for you. But again, that leaves a lot of upfront work to you as you set up your ideal workspace—and the default home dashboard can easily get too busy.

Bugs and laggy performance are common issues for ClickUp, even after the ClickUp 3.0 update (which supposedly boosted the app's performance by 2x). Loading times were often slow in my testing: it regularly took 4-5 seconds to load different project views, and on one occasion the app "timed out" and I had to refresh it entirely. I also had issues with a buggy template that loaded a blank screen instead of content.

One thing ClickUp's interface has going for it is the task tray in the top-right corner. No matter where you are in the app, you can create a new task or doc, add a note or reminder, create a video clip, or pull up your calendar. I also appreciate that you can sync your Google Calendar to ClickUp so that your upcoming events appear on your agenda alongside ClickUp tasks.

All the must-haves are there in ClickUp, but because of the design—and the overwhelming number of features—it's a bit harder to find your way around. 

Both platforms offer powerful AI features

Asana's AI implementation is mainly focused on project management use cases. One standout feature is Smart Projects, which can build complete project frameworks from just a name—type "Website Design Project," and Asana gives you everything you need to get started fast.

Asana's AI suite also includes practical tools like Smart Goals for refining objectives, Smart Charts for AI-generated charts, Smart Rules for natural-language automation creation, Smart Chat for finding information quickly across projects, and Smart Summaries for condensing project updates into actionable highlights.

ClickUp Brain takes a broader approach: it offers standard-issue generative AI writing features (like spell check and quick replies) in addition to project management-specific AI tools. One unique feature is Connected Search—you can ask questions about work happening across your entire tech stack. For example, you could ask "Which customers from our Google Sheets list attended last quarter's event?" or "Show me all GitHub commits linked to this feature launch task." ClickUp Brain also offers AI-powered standups and team updates, voice and video transcription, and automated project status summaries.

The pricing models differ significantly. Asana includes AI features in their paid plans, with usage limits (Starter: 150 monthly AI actions, Advanced: 1,500). ClickUp charges an additional $7 per user per month for unlimited AI usage through ClickUp Brain.

Worth noting: Some of Asana's most powerful AI features are part of a new product called AI Studio, which is currently in beta and available only to Enterprise customers.

ClickUp offers user-friendly automations for free

Even if you've never automated anything before, it's simple to get started using one of ClickUp's 100+ pre-built automation templates. Then, once you've got the hang of it, you can create your own custom automations based on whatever trigger and condition you want. Automatically change assignees, priorities, or task statuses based on any sort of custom logic.

Asana's automation interface isn't quite as intuitive. There's a solid selection of pre-made automations, but they're cumbersome to access (you need to go to Customize > Rules > Add > Browse Library). While automations in Asana have a bit of a learning curve, they're also more powerful, especially when you draft your automations visually using Asana's flowchart-style automation designer.

While ClickUp's automations are a bit easier to use and Asana's are a bit more powerful, both apps have essentially the same impressive set of automation features. The key difference is what you get on the free plan: ClickUp gives you 100 automations/month for free, while Asana doesn't offer automation until you upgrade to a paid plan (and even then, you only get 250 automations/month).

ClickUp has a stronger free plan and offers more value—but AI costs extra

ClickUp's Unlimited plan starts at just $10/user/month, including unlimited storage, integrations, dashboards, and core features like Gantt charts and goals. Stepping up to the Business plan at $19/user/month adds advanced automations, workload management, and timeline views, plus deeper team features like custom permissions and advanced dashboard customization.

But there's a catch to ClickUp's pricing advantage: if you want AI features, you'll need to add ClickUp Brain for an extra $7/user/month. Once you've taken that into account, ClickUp's entry-level plan is actually pricier than Asana's. Even so, you get more for your money with ClickUp, which has features that you won't find in Asana, like collaborative docs, whiteboards, and mind maps.

Asana's Starter plan costs $13.49/user/month and includes Asana AI right out of the box, along with project dashboards, timeline views, and 250 automations per month. The Advanced plan jumps to $30.49/user/month, adding features like workload management, approvals, and a much higher automation limit of 25,000 per month.

For free users, ClickUp is extraordinarily generous. You get unlimited users, tasks, and surprisingly advanced features like sprints, mind maps, and dependencies—though storage is capped at 100MB. Asana's free plan is more modest but still solid: you get unlimited tasks, projects, and storage, but you're limited to 10 users and fewer view options. If you're a small team doing basic project management, Asana's simpler free tier might actually be easier to work with than ClickUp's feature-packed but potentially overwhelming free version.

Asana has more native integrations, but both apps integrate with Zapier

Any project management app becomes more powerful when you can connect it to the other apps in your tech stack. Both Asana and ClickUp offer native integrations in their free plans. Asana natively integrates with an impressive list of 250+ apps, while ClickUp connects with closer to 50.

But because both Asana and ClickUp integrate with Zapier, you'll be able to connect them with thousands of other tools, so you can automatically add tasks to your project management app or set off workflows whenever you mark a task as complete. Learn more about how to automate Asana and how to automate ClickUp, or get started with one of these pre-made workflows.

ClickUp or Asana: Which should you use? 

The right platform for you comes down to what you need and what will help you get your work done most efficiently. 

Choose Asana if: 

• You're new to project management apps 

• You want a traditional project management tool

• You prefer simplicity and get frustrated by bloated apps

• You're a small team (or don't mind paying for more than 10 users)

Choose ClickUp if: 

• Your budget is $0

• You're interested in a more robust collaboration app beyond project management

• You value advanced customization—and are prepared for a learning curve

ClickUp is one of the best Asana alternatives for people who want more from their project management software, but Asana is still the old reliable that many teams—including Zapier—use for their project management.

Related reading:

• Asana vs. Jira: Which is best?

• Trello vs. Asana: Which project management app should you choose?

• Trello vs. Jira: Which should you use?

• The best enterprise project management software

• ClickUp vs. monday: Which should you use?

• Asana vs. Smartsheet: Which is best?

• The best AI project management tools

This article was originally published in June 2022 by Holly Stanley and has also had contributions from Nicole Replogle. The most recent update was in November 2024.