Best Task Management Software for Small Business of 2025

Asana is one of the most popular and comprehensive task management platforms on the market, and it’s also one of the most budget-friendly. It’s remarkably scalable, designed to help teams across departments manage their work, from daily to-do lists to large-scale initiatives. The platform allows you to set company-wide goals, and provides resource management, project management, workflow automations, and more to help you manage the small steps required to hit those goals. There are several good reasons why 85% of Fortune 100 companies use Asana.

Asana’s real strength is in its flexibility. Its intuitive interface and wide array of available views make it accessible for everyone and adaptable to fit changing project and team needs. Like any task management tool, there can be a learning curve, but the sheer range of personalization available and the support of an AI studio to assist you when you can’t quite figure out the right view makes Asana our top choice.

Disclaimer: Trello is the task management tool we use here at Cobanker. That’s in large part because it’s such a useful tool for businesses that are starting out and looking to grow quickly. (Like us!)

Trello is based on the Kanban methodology, which basically means it uses cards and columns to organize projects. It’s highly intuitive, making it extremely easy to build projects from scratch and onboard new team members — two essential features for startups. Trello’s “boards, lists, and cards” system is instantly recognizable and easy to adopt, providing a clear visual representation of a project’s workflow from start to finish.

If you do need more functionality, Trello can scale with you through “Power-Ups” that add functionality like automation, integrations with other apps, and different views. That said, when you’re really ready to scale and incorporate several different departments, Trello is not as functional at supporting interdepartmental initiatives. It’s outstanding for managing focused projects, but struggles to scale.

monday.com is a seriously scalable and customizable work operating system (Work OS) that goes beyond basic task management to support comprehensive project management initiatives. Its colorful, spreadsheet-like interface makes it easier to break down complicated projects into accessible task lists, track their progress, and manage who is doing what at any given time. It’s a feature-loaded platform that is incredibly customizable to suit your team’s unique needs.

Most small businesses will find monday.com is far more comprehensive than they need, but it’s a particularly valuable partner for companies with many different departments or service-based companies that work with many different clients and want individual boards to manage each. (Marketing agencies love monday.com.) The platform excels at workflow automation and provides a central hub for teams to manage projects, marketing campaigns, client communication, and more.

Smartsheet is a great tool for small business owners who are new to task management but still need a scalable tool to manage projects, automate workflows, and handle cross-team coordination. It may look complex, but with options for Table, Timeline, Grid, Gantt, Board, and Calendar views, you can truly adapt it to fit your needs. Plus, the integrated AI makes it easier to ask questions about your board, gather deeper insights about your work, and make changes easily. The platform supports real-time collaboration, and the flexible, data-driven approach allows users to build custom solutions for a wide range of use cases.

Smartsheet has delivered solutions for a number of big-time clients, including cutting Uber’s marketing lifecycle development time almost in half.

Developed by Atlassian, Jira makes this list because it’s the industry standard for Agile software development teams. Admittedly, Jira will not be right for the vast majority of small business owners, but if you’re building apps, software, or other digital products, Jira is as good as it gets for task management.

Although its primary audience is developers, Jira’s customizable workflows and powerful reporting tools make it a great option for any team that works with complex, iterative projects. Beyond IT and development teams, it can be a powerful partner for marketing teams looking to reach new audiences or retain existing ones, design teams scaling creative output, or operations teams that want to improve efficiency. The robust reporting tools make it easier to identify and track issues, while project management features support planning, tracking, and releasing updates — whether they’re technical or more operational.

Wrike is a versatile project management tool that’s a great option for businesses of all sizes. Wrike aims to provide a “360-degree” overview of all projects with intuitive table and calendar views for projects, helping to reduce wasted efforts.

One interesting wrinkle is the way you build tasks, which are framed as “Requests.” You can customize your workflows and easily create new “Requests” from team members whenever you need to add a task to a project. All workflows can be automated to help maximize productivity, and Wrike’s reporting and analytics are a huge asset for data-driven teams.

Wrike’s proofing and approval features make it particularly popular with marketing and creative teams, especially in the retail space.

ClickUp aims to be an all-in-one solution for complex organizations with many teams and departments working together toward a common goal. It’s a popular choice among well-funded tech startups given its ability to combine task management, project management, document management, goal-setting, and more into a single application.

ClickUp offers powerful AI to streamline task management and organization, and offers cool features like a built-in Wiki and whiteboards to centralize internal information. For example, one startup I consulted with used ClickUp’s Wiki as the hub for its HR policies and Employee Handbook, while the board views powered task management throughout the organization. It served as essentially a single repository for the company’s most important information, reducing the risk of siloing and work falling through the cracks.

That said, ClickUp is not an intuitive platform. We had regular training on how to leverage certain features, so adoption isn’t easy, especially when you’re onboarding new employees. It is an attractive option, however, for tech-savvy teams and growing businesses on a budget.