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The best engineering project management software help engineers deliver projects on time, to budget, and to exact specifications, while managing contributor accountability and stakeholder expectations throughout. They help engineers avoid disruptive roadblocks, costly mistakes, or jeopardizing client relationships.
Based on my testing of new and popular project management tools, I’ve create this list of the best project management software that meet the specific needs of engineers. They will all help you manage complex, agile engineering projects with clear communication among all contributors. I’ve also evaluated and compared their pricing, ease of use, customer support, and integrations with other commonly used software.
The Best Project Management Software for Engineers Tested by Our Experts
Monday — Best project management software for medium-large engineering firms
The Best Project Management Software for Engineers Reviewed
Below I’ll explore each tool on my list of the best project management software for engineering teams, outlining their key USPs, pricing, top features, and more.
1. Monday — Best Project Management Software for Medium-Large Engineering Firms
Starting Monthly Price
Starting Annual Price
Free Version
Projects
Integrations
Automation
Resource Management
$12/seat/mo
$9/seat/mo
Free Plan – 2 Seats
Unlimited
250-250,000 actions/mo
250-250,000 actions/mo
✅
Monday is a tool made not just for engineers but all industries. For starters, there are over 200+ built-in automation templates, perfect for engineering teams looking to automate their workflow.
Its free plan will only work for independent contractors or small teams as it allows just 2 free seats, compared to ClickUp and Wrike, which permit unlimited users on their free plans.
You can add unlimited users if you upgrade to Monday’s Basic Plan, though, and this costs just $9/month. With this plan, you can also create unlimited boards and items for project planning and tracking.
Monday is known for its invaluable automation capabilities; however, you’ll only get to apply them if you’re on the Standard plan ($12/month) or higher. This still equals great value for money.
This automation can trigger deployment or testing workflows within the CI/CD pipeline, for example, streamlining the process and reducing manual intervention.
2. Wrike — Best Free Engineering Project Management Software
Starting Monthly Price
Starting Annual Price
Free Version
Projects
Integrations
Automation
Resource Management
$9.80/seat/mo
Only for Business Plans Above
Free Plan – Unlimited Users
Unlimited
Unlimited
50-1500/seat
✅
Wrike offers engineers better visibility, especially if you have multiple projects piled up. Unlike others, it focuses on offering a holistic and cross-functional approach to improve team efficiency.
Running multiple projects through Wrike is easier thanks to its cross-tagging and resource management, which some providers, like Asana, for example, don’t have.
That said, the key USP here is that Wrike offers a free plan for unlimited users. This may leave you wondering why you get unlimited seats for free, but when you pay, you only get 2-25 users.
It’s all about the features you’ll get. By paying $9.80/month for its Team Plan, you won’t just be tracking your projects; you’ll have advanced analytics and access to different productivity apps, too.
With their resource management tools, you can track how much time your team spends on coding or debugging, for example, and its AI will help you identify historical patterns and frequent issues.
For resource management, you get workload charts and timesheets, making it well worth upgrading to its Business ($24.80/month), Enterprise, or Pinnacle plan if you have a larger team.
Pros
Customizable templates
Offers time-tracking and timesheets
Great for managing high-level projects and milestones
External and internal collaboration is allowed
Excellent integrations with the Apple operating system
3. ClickUp — Best for Engineers Needing Agile Project Management
Starting Monthly Price
Starting Annual Price
Free Version
Projects
Integrations
Automation
Resource Management
$10/seat/mo
$7/seat/mo
Free Plan – Unlimited Users
Unlimited
Unlimited
50-Unlimited Active Rules
✅
ClickUp, a popular project management app, is especially favored by software development and agile teams, making it a top choice for engineers, too.
Many of their features, such as Burndown and Burnup charts, are designed specifically for these kinds of projects. You’ll have access to different agile templates for various project methodologies, too.
This includes scrum and kanban, amongst others. What’s more impressive is that you’ll get these templates with unlimited tasks even if you’re just using its free plan.
However, you’ll be limited to 5 spaces, 50 automation actions, workloads, and some integrations such as Google Drive. You’ll have to pay $7 to access unlimited Spaces if you have 5+ clients.
Also, all of its paid plans have access to its new ClickUp brain, the platform’s AI that helps you fast-track your workflow with its 100+ prompts—only for an added $5/user.
ClickUp’s advanced functionality and customization make it a great choice for dev teams or any agile team with advanced needs, but it can be too complex for teams with lesser needs.
Pros
Offers lists and hierarchies for multiple projects
Can prioritize tasks and create dependencies
Offers multiple templates for agile teams
Highly customizable Dashboards
Better free plan features compared to Wrike and Monday
4. Smartsheet — Best Project Management Tool for Scaling Engineering Businesses
Starting Monthly Price
Starting Annual Price
Free Version
Projects
Integrations
Automation
Resource Management
$9/seat/mo
$7/seat/mo
Free Plan – 2 Sheets
Unlimited
Unlimited
Unlimited
✅
Since 2006, Smartsheet has grown from being just a spreadsheet-like project management tool to an incredibly robust platform. It can handle enormous datasets and lets you view them in multiple ways.
Its free plan is somewhat similar to Monday as it supports 2 seats, and it includes 2 sheets and access to Gantt, Grid, Card, and Calendar view, but its paid plans are cheaper (starting at $7/seat).
Smartsheet and Clickup have the same starting price of $7 per seat, but with Smartsheet, you’ll get more integrations—especially Google Workspace from the get-go.
Together with its evolution comes many features that set it apart from its rivals. With its critical path features and events reporting capabilities, scaling engineering teams can identify project risks.
Poor decisions can make or break your growth. Work Apps, Control Center, and Data Shuttle are all features that offer insight into the granular metrics of your team and project performance.
Pros
Automatic ticketing builder
Permission-based collaboration
Can integrate with other SaaS platforms
SSO-level Enterprise security
Has its own cloud/drive
Cons
Not suitable for multi-user editing (real-time)
Advanced analytics are only available on the Business plan
5. Zoho Projects — Best Budget-friendly Project Management for Engineers
Starting Monthly Price
Starting Annual Price
Free Version
Projects
Integrations
Automation
Resource Management
$5/seat/mo
$4/seat/mo
Free Plan – 3 Users
Unlimited
Unlimited
Unlimited
✅
Small construction and engineering teams are the perfect customers for Zoho Projects. Starting at only $4/seat, this piece of software offers the cheapest plans on this list.
The most expensive plan costs nearly the same as Wrike and Asana’s starting plans, for example. Does this make it inferior? No, despite the cheap price tag, Zoho really doesn’t fall short on features.
Their WBS (Work Breakdown Structure) feature will be particularly handy for engineering teams as it’ll help break down complex tasks. For example, you can segment projects into structural components.
Each component can be divided into tasks like design calculations, material procurement, construction activities, quality control checks, and safety measures, for example.
Zoho Project’s Business Rules can also easily streamline any approval process, reducing the manual effort of, say, routing purchase orders, for example, whilst ensuring you’re within budget.
You can get these on the Enterprise plan (just $9/seat). Plus, you have the Critical Path tool, which is cheaper than the Smartsheet alternative, and a custom domain, which only Zoho Projects has.
Ability to create activity-based automation triggers
It has more dashboard widgets compared to ClickUp
Cons
Built-in storage is limited to 500MB/upload
Limited integrations (e.g. no GitLab)
6. Asana — Best for Highly Customized Engineering Projects
Starting Monthly Price
Starting Annual Price
Free Version
Projects
Integrations
Automation
Resource Management
$13.49/seat/mo
$10.99/seat/mo
Free Plan – 10 Users
Unlimited
Unlimited
250-25,000/mo
✅
Asana offers the best online project management software when it comes to customization and flexibility. You get loads of different project views and highly customizable workflow templates.
For example, while Asana and Smartsheet offer the same features, Asana’s are more diverse. For example, the Advanced plan ($24.99) offers segmented workflow features.
This includes things like proofing, branch logic forms, time tracking, and even a two-way sync with Jira Cloud. That said, even the starter plan proves to be more than enough for many.
For $10.99, you get Asana’s signature Intelligence tool, which uses generative AI for goal tracking, status updates, and more. Plus, you get access to its workflow builder and 250+ automations/month.
This is more than what ClickUp offers in its Standard plan, for example, and to top it off, there’s a free forever plan for 10 users, which is generous but limited compared to ClickUp and Wrike.
With the free tier, you can create unlimited projects and tasks, though, however, reporting capabilities and integration options will be limited.
Overall, Asana is great for engineering teams, devs, and industrial designers. It’ll give you nearly unlimited freedom to customize your projects, tasks, and reports as you see fit.
We cover the platform in more depth in our Asana review.
Pros
Robust mobile app
AI-enabled reports and analysis
Can link different projects
One of few to offer the waterfall timeline view for free
Cons
Commenting and reviewing files can be tricky
Limited project export options (only via CSV)
7. Celoxis — Best Engineering Project Management System for Seasonal Projects
Starting Monthly Price
Starting Annual Price
Free Version
Projects
Integrations
Automation
Resource Management
Pay What You Use
Pay What You Use
14-Day Trial
Custom
Unlimited
Custom
✅
Celoxis offers both cloud and on-premise project management software, and it’s the only one on my list that offers a “Pay-What-You-Use” pricing scheme.
This makes it perfect for teams with dynamic and fluctuating workloads, like infrastructure inspections and engineering consultancies.
Unlike the other products on this list, it allows firms that work within budget constraints to scale up or ramp down resources during on and off-peak seasons, too.
However, Celoxis doesn’t just stand out because of its pricing. They’re known to provide comprehensive analysis of your projects. It uses RAG health indicators to track KPIs, for example.
Beyond this, they also offer EVA analysis to measure project performance and cost variance. These are critical for teams that are wary about their overhead.
Its profit and margin tracking provides valuable insights into costs, revenue, and margins, too, all in real-time. Having said that, Celoxis isn’t only for teams with a dynamic client pool.
It can also help businesses aiming to scale up in the future due to its pricing flexibility.
Pros
Customizable Gantt chart that can handle 10,000 tasks
Flexible pricing scheme
Provides a specific timeline of project progress
Cons
Mobile GUI isn’t very responsive
No portfolio management feature
8. LiquidPlanner — Best for Engineering Project Forecasting
Starting Monthly Price
Starting Annual Price
Free Version
Projects
Integrations
Automation
Resource Management
Annual Billing Only
$15/seat/mo
14-Day Trial
Unlimited
Unlimited
❌
✅
Lastly, LiquidPlanner. As it specializes in forecasting, this is a top project management app for engineers. It may sound similar to Celoxis’ profit and margin planning features, but it goes beyond that.
With a starting price of $15, you can create forecasting reports for your workload, resources, and overall goals. These tools can help engineers reduce work overload and bottlenecks across the board.
These planning features are available on all plans, too. However, for more advanced users out there, the Ultimate plan ($42/seat) is for you. For starters, you can build custom tools using their Open API.
This will allow you to integrate data such as code repositories and bug-tracking systems easily. Its popularity among engineers is also largely due to its resource and document management.
Pros
Time-based task assignments
Schedule creation based on project priorities
Can sync with your Gmail
Cons
The search function is limited
The UI feels a bit clunky
Top Engineering Project Management Tools Compared
To help you choose what’s best for your team, here’s a head-to-head comparison of the best project planning tools for engineers:
How We Review And Test Project Management Software
We base our recommendations on first-hand testing. All the project management software products we feature, have been tested based on the following criteria:
Features: We ensure the provider offers the basic functionality we’d expect, like task management and scheduling, resource management, built-in communication and collaboration capabilities, and reporting.
Integrations: We check what platforms the software supports for integration, looking for common business tools like CRM software, email marketing platforms, and document management tools.
Collaboration Capabilities: We assess and test the extent of collaboration on offer, including built-in chat, comment threads, mind mapping, and whiteboard capabilities.
Pricing and Scalability: We evaluate the value for money on offer based on the functionality, and we factor in the ease and price of scaling.
Customization: We check whether the platform offers things like custom fields, customizable dashboards, reports, and templates to check how easily the platform can be tailored to different businesses.
Security: During testing, we note what security measures are in place, including authentication protocols, access controls, data encryption, data backups, and compliance with regulations like GDPR.
Ease of Use: We assess how easy the platform is to navigate (across mobile and desktop), and we look for things like easy drag-and-drop functionality.
Reputation: To add to our own analysis of the tools we review, we also factor in feedback from other users to ensure we offer our readers a complete overview.
Support and Training: Some of the best project management tools do have learning curves. As such, we assess the level and quality of support on offer, including any online documentation.
The Benefits of Using Project Management Software for Engineering
Project management software is designed to help you plan and manage tasks and outcomes. But there are more benefits than those; here’s how engineering teams can leverage PM tools:
Data-Driven Decision Making
Most of the best project management software solutions offer distinct dashboards to track your KPIs. However, some programs also allow you to analyze your resource allocation, profit margin, and workload to prevent potential bottlenecks.
Engineering teams will have all the data they need at their fingertips to make better-informed decisions on the next steps. This also improves project visibility and even accountability.
Streamlined Workflows
Using a project management tool, you can set up your testing pipeline. Some tools offer code-based triggers while integrating with acquisition systems for immediate approval.
These tools are also invaluable for engineering teams, as you can automate repetitive tasks, set deadlines and reminders, and reduce manual effort and, therefore, errors and delays in projects.
Communication and Collaboration
Annotations and proofing can be a seamless process with the right project management tool. With built-in messaging boards and apps, you can communicate quickly with your team and share large files.
All project-related communications, documents, and tasks will be centralized and shared between clients, stakeholders, and engineering teams, fostering open communication.
Resource Management
Managing project resources like personnel, equipment, and materials can be a nightmare. This is far simpler with project management software which offers resource planning capabilities that’ll ensure your engineering team isn’t under or over-utilizing its available resources.
Risk Management
Many project management tools offer risk management capabilities for identifying, assessing, and mitigating project risks. This is key for engineers as it’ll allow your team to proactively manage project risks to minimize their impact on your project timeline or deliverables.
There are ample benefits beyond these core ones, including improved organization, better documentation and reporting, increased accountability, and real-time progress tracking.
If you need the user cases of engineering project management software brought to life, here are two examples of how they could be used in both a physical and digital engineering projects.
An engineering firm constructing a large bridge
Project management software will help with the scheduling of building milestones and tasks, as well as the allocation of resources across multiple contributing teams that include contractors, architects, builders, structural engineers, and surveyors among others. It will allow project managers to track progress, ensure the timely delivery of materials, and ensure the project stays on budget; it’ll make it easy to communicate this progress and ‘Budget vs Actual’ reports to the project sponsors and other stakeholders. It will integrate with engineering applications like CAD tools to work as a centralized platform that minimizes data inconsistencies and information silos — ultimately leading to a more successful project.
Digital engineers developing a new software platform
As well as helping schedule and manage project timelines and tasks during the software development, project management software will ensure all members of the team — such as developers, UX designers, and UAT testing teams — can communicate easily and in real time as they move through the phases of coding, testing, deployment, and iteration. The software can support the continuous deployment process by helping the team track and organise the various iterative versions and bugs. Most project management tools will integrate seamlessly with commonly used apps and software like development tools like Jira or GitHub to ensure there are no caps or disparities between data sets, ensuring all activity is synchronised, and its easy to see one-source-of-truth when reporting and making data-led decisions.
How I Tested the Best Engineering Project Management Software
Techopedia is the go-to for all things tech — from the best project management apps to CRMs, and VoIP services, the wider team of experts I work with has over a decade of experience testing these products.
In addition to the core project management testing framework outlined above in the methodology section, for this particular guide for engineers, I put emphasis on evaluating the following two things:
the advanced features and project views the software offers, like Gantt charts, Kanban boards, and critical path analysis — these are must-haves for engineers
how well it will integrate with your existing engineering toolkit — CAD software, bug tracking, and simulation platforms
Having tested all the new and most commonly used project management software tools I can get my hand on, I’m well placed to make educated comparisons that outline each one’s USPs and where they fall short, ensuring my guides are accurate and helpful.
How to Choose the Best Project Management Tool
Choosing the best engineering project management software isn’t easy. Here are the key factors to consider when deciding:
Task and Issue TrackingGantt and Timeline ManagementResource ManagementCollaboration FeaturesDocument ManagementRisk ManagementEngineering Software IntegrationsPrice + Scalability
As engineers often work on complex projects with numerous tasks and issues that need to be tracked and managed, it’s key to consider whether the tool you choose offers robust task and issue tracking capabilities like issue resolution workflows, for example.
Similarly, you’ll want to check what plan these capabilities are available on, as this will vary from provider to provider – and the plan may not fall within your budget range.
Nearly 10% of every dollar businesses spend is lost through the ineffective implementation of business strategy. This is why engineering teams should have a holistic view of each project.
Gantt and timeline project views let you clearly see the impact of changes on project timelines or ensure timely delivery of materials for construction projects.
This is an important consideration, as not all project management tools offer these dashboard views, or as with most features, certain ones may be reserved for higher-end plans.
On average, only 67% of projects are completed within the original budget. Overstretching your team and exceeding your budget are two main reasons for project failure.
Look for PM tools that offer resource management tools out of the box, and think of features like skills-based task assignments or equipment reservation systems.
Real-time messaging, document sharing, and task updates are vital to ensure everyone on the engineering team is on the same page, whether you’re collaborating on complex simulations or coordinating with clients on-site.
Your field of work requires that you store different types of documents and files, such as design drawings and technical documents. As such, it’s important to consider the document management capabilities on offer, such as version control, file sharing, and document collaboration.
Similarly, file size limitations are another factor to consider, as this varies from provider to provider and may depend on the plan you choose as well.
Ideal engineering project management software will offer you the ability to identify and mitigate potential risks with built-in risk assessment tools and prioritization capabilities. This is a key factor to consider as these tools will allow you to proactively address potential material shortages or equipment failures, for example, before they derail your project.
Look for software that can integrate with different tools such as CAD and even JIRA. Engineering projects have many complex layers. Having your data in one central location can help streamline communication and project updates.
Budget affects everything, especially when choosing software for your team. However, don’t just look at the price tag. Prioritize the feature-to-price value, balancing your budget with the functionality you need.
As important as considering your initial budget, you’ll want to keep scalability in mind when choosing a platform. Consider the price to scale with your chosen provider, the limitations of the higher-end plans, the functionality, and similar.
FAQs
What project management software do engineers use?
Popular options include Monday, ClickUp, and Wrike, but really, most of the best project management tools are great for various industries – the best one for you will depend on your specific needs and budget.
Do engineers need project management software?
Yes, project management software is critical for engineers. From organizing complex tasks to managing resources and timelines, project management software helps engineers work smarter to achieve their project goals.
What is the best project management software for engineers?
Monday is my top choice for the best project management software for engineers thanks to its all-in-one dashboard views for reporting and 250+ automation for different engineering workflows.
What is the best free engineering project management software?
Wrike is the best free option for engineers as it gives you unlimited seats and projects, supports 8 languages, and even includes custom work views and Wrike’s AI.
Techopedia’s editorial policy is centered on delivering thoroughly researched, accurate, and unbiased content. We uphold strict sourcing standards, and each page undergoes diligent review by our team of top technology experts and seasoned editors. This process ensures the integrity, relevance, and value of our content for our readers.
Nick Saraev is a writer & entrepreneur who pivoted from a path in medicine to forge a series of successful digital media businesses. He's been featured in Popular Mechanics, Apple News, & Bloomberg, and is an Amazon Kindle best-seller. He has extensive experience in the tech and SaaS industry, writing in-depth guides to help users grasp technical concepts better.
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