Key takeaways
Trello is a visual collaboration tool, which offers a flexible and intuitive platform for managing projects of all sizes. By breaking down projects into manageable components — boards, lists, and cards — Trello ensures that every detail is tracked and progress is transparent. This guide delves into the core elements of Trello and explores its advanced features, customization options, collaboration capabilities, and integration potential, providing a comprehensive overview for both new and seasoned users.
What Is Trello Used For?
What is Trello used for in practical terms? Trello is a project management tool that helps you and your team organize tasks visually. It is similar to a digital version of a bulletin board, where you can write tasks on sticky notes and move them around to chart their progress.
One of the standout Trello features is its visual structure. Trello’s structure consists of three main components:
- Boards: Boards are the foundation of Trello’s organizational structure. Each board represents a project or a significant part of a project, providing a larger view of its progress. Whether you’re managing a marketing campaign or personal goals, Trello boards allow you to oversee all aspects of your project.
- Lists: Within each board, you can create multiple lists to categorize tasks or stages of your project. Typically organized in a linear workflow (with labels such as “To Do,” “In Progress,” and “Completed”), lists help you track the progress of tasks as they move through various stages.
- Cards: Cards are the most granular elements in Trello, representing individual tasks or ideas. Each card may contain details such as descriptions, comments, attachments, due dates, and more. You can move cards across lists to reflect progress or categorize them. Trello’s cards ensure that no detail is overlooked, making project management precise and transparent.
While there are many different project manager software platforms, Trello stands out with its unique visual system that allows you to keep track of your tasks at a glance, ensuring you know what’s in progress and what needs attention. For teams, this setup lends a sense of transparency, allowing everyone to see the status of a project in real time.
How Does Trello Make Project Management Easier?
Another great Trello feature is its drag-and-drop functionality. If you need to move a task from “To Do” to “In Progress,” you can simply drag the card to its new list. Such easy task movement makes Trello very intuitive for beginners, leaving very little learning curve for basic task management.
Additionally, Trello is highly customizable, in which you can:
- Change the board’s background for aesthetic appeal.
- Add labels to categorize tasks by priority or department.
- Create checklists within cards for subtasks.
- Assign due dates and members for each card.
These Trello features ensure it is used for fitting into just about any team’s workflow. Whether you need to track sprints in agile development or manage content production for a blog, you can tailor Trello to your team’s unique needs.
Read more: Trello Organization – Using Simplicity & Minimalism to Achieve Great Results
Collaboration features
Trello isn’t just about task tracking — it’s also about working together. One of its key strengths lies in how it enables collaboration within teams. Multiple users can interact on the same board, adding comments, sharing files, and tagging each other on specific tasks. The real-time updates keep everyone on the same page, which is particularly beneficial for remote teams.
Automation tools
Trello also includes an automation tool called Butler, which allows you to set up if-this-then-that rules to automate repetitive tasks. For example, you can create a rule that automatically moves cards to a “Done” list once all subtasks are checked off. Automations can also trigger reminders, schedule recurring tasks, and assign cards based on specific conditions. This helps cut down on manual work and allows you to focus on higher-priority tasks.
Trello’s templates
Trello offers a variety of templates to help teams get started quickly. Whether you are managing a product launch, an HR onboarding process, or a content calendar, there are pre-built templates for nearly every use case. Templates can also be customized, so you can adjust them to suit your team’s unique needs.
Power-ups
A significant part of what Trello is used for involves its integrations with other tools. These integrations, known as power-ups, enhance Trello’s functionality, making it possible to connect with platforms such as Slack for team communication, Google Drive for storing and sharing documents, and Jira, for more advanced project tracking. You can even add Gantt chart functionality.
When you integrate Trellos with your existing tools, the platform becomes a central hub where you can track tasks without switching between different applications.
Read more: Trello Add-ons, Third-Party Integrations, and Apps
Simple task tracking
One of the top things Trello is used for is task tracking. While many project management tools are packed with features you might never use, Trello focuses on the essentials. It lets you track a task from start to finish without getting distracted by unnecessary and overly complicated features.
Trello Plans & Pricing
By now you might be wondering, what is Trello’s cost? Trello offers multiple pricing tiers, ensuring there’s an option for everyone—from individuals to large enterprises.
- Free: The free plan is perfect for personal use or small teams. It includes unlimited cards and lists, 10 boards per workspace, 1 Power-Up (integration) per board, and basic automation with Butler, Trello’s automation tool. For casual users or those just starting out, the free plan is often more than enough to experience what Trello is used for.
- Standard: The Standard plan is $5 per user/per month. In addition to everything in the free plan, it offers unlimited boards, advanced checklists, and custom fields for cards. The Standard Plan is ideal for growing teams and expands on what Trellos is used for with more advanced features.
- Premium: The Premium plan is $10 per user/per month. It includes the dashboard, timeline, and calendar views; priority support; and unlimited automations with Butler. The Premium Plan is designed for teams that need advanced project tracking and features.
- Enterprise: The Enterprise Plan is custom-priced depending on the size of your organization, and it offers several additional features such as organization-wide permissions, advanced security features, and unlimited workspaces and users.
Each pricing tier builds upon the previous one, adding more features to support larger teams or more complex projects.
What Teams and Use Cases Are Best for Trello?
Trello’s flexibility means it can be adapted for almost any type of team. Here are some common use cases where Trello excels.
Remote teams
Remote teams often struggle with staying on the same page, especially when working across different time zones. Trello makes it easy for remote teams to stay organized with real-time updates and collaborative features. Team members can check the progress of tasks and make updates from anywhere.
Content production
For marketing and content creation teams, Trello is a great way to manage editorial calendars and content pipelines. You can create lists representing different stages of content production — such as idea generation, drafts, reviews, and publishing — and move cards through the workflow as articles, videos, or graphics progress.
Software development
While there are more feature-rich tools specifically designed for software development, many agile teams still use Trello to manage sprints and backlogs. The visual nature of Trello makes it easy to track which features or bugs are in progress, completed, or waiting to be worked on.
Is Trello Hard to Use?
One of Trello’s biggest selling points is its ease of use. Even if you’ve never used project management software before, Trello’s intuitive design makes it easy to jump right in. You don’t need hours of training or detailed manuals to get started.
Trello also offers a wealth of resources for new users, including:
- Templates: Pre-built boards for various industries and workflows
- Tutorials: Video guides and step-by-step instructions for beginners
- Community support: A thriving user community ready to answer questions or share tips
This simplicity makes Trello especially appealing for non-technical teams or individuals who want to organize their personal tasks without investing too much time in learning new software.
Alternatives to Trello
While Trello is a fantastic tool, it may not be the perfect fit for every team. Here are a few popular Trello alternatives and how they compare:
Asana
Asana is a project management tool that offers more advanced features for tracking dependencies and workloads. While Trello focuses on simplicity, Asana excels at handling complex projects with lots of moving parts.
- Pros: Better for larger teams with more complex workflows
- Cons: More of a learning curve than Trello
monday.com
monday.com is highly customizable and offers a wide range of features including time tracking and resource management. In our monday.com software review, we highlighted how the tool is ideal for teams that want more control over their workflows but are willing to invest time in learning the platform.
- Pros: More features than Trello, excellent for growing businesses
- Cons: Can be overwhelming for small teams or solo users
ClickUp
ClickUp as a project management tool offers a hybrid of task management, time tracking, and document storage. It provides a lot more features than Trello, but with that comes more complexity.
- Pros: Comprehensive, all-in-one solution
- Cons: May be overkill for smaller projects or teams that don’t need all the bells and whistles
How to Get Started with Trello
Trello is known for being easy to use, and getting started with it is a breeze. Here’s a step-by-step guide to setting up your first Trello board and getting your projects organized.
1. Sign up for an account
Go to Trello’s website and sign up for a free account. You can use your email or sign in with your Google or Microsoft account. Once you’re signed up, you’ll be taken to your dashboard, where you can create your first board.
2. Create your first board
Click on the “Create new board” button and name your board based on the project you want to manage (e.g., “Marketing Campaign” or “Product Development”). Choose a background color or image to make the board visually appealing, then hit “Create board.”
3. Set up lists
Next, you’ll need to create lists. Start with the basics, such as “To Do,” “In Progress,” and “Completed.” You can always add more lists later to fit your project’s specific needs.
4. Add cards
Within each list, you’ll create cards that represent individual tasks. Click the “Add a card” button, type the task’s name (e.g., “Write blog post”), and press enter. You can add as many cards as you need for each list.
5. Customize your cards
Trello cards are highly customizable. You can:
- Add descriptions to give more details about the task.
- Assign team members to specific cards.
- Attach files or links relevant to the task.
- Set due dates to keep everything on track.
- Create checklists for subtasks.
You can also color-code cards by adding labels, making it easy to see at a glance which tasks are high-priority, need approval, or belong to different departments.
6. Move cards through lists
As work progresses, drag and drop cards between lists. For example, when a task is started, move it from the “To Do” list to the “In Progress” list. Once it’s finished, move it to the “Completed” list. This visual representation keeps your workflow clear and organized.
7. Use Power-Ups for extra features
If you need more functionality, you can enable Power-Ups, which are integrations with other tools. For example, you can connect Trello to Slack for team communication or to Google Drive for file storage. You’re allowed one Power-Up per board on the free plan, but higher-tier plans let you use more.
8. Set up automations with Butler
Trello Automation or Butler eliminates repetitive tasks by enabling rule-based triggers, custom buttons, and scheduled commands. Automate actions such as moving cards when checklists are completed or sending notifications based on due dates, enhancing workflow efficiency.
By following these simple steps, you’ll have your first Trello board up and running in no time. As you grow more comfortable with Trello, you can start exploring advanced features like team collaboration, Power-Ups, and automations to make your project management even more efficient. Finally, there are plenty of Trello tutorials and courses out there to help you hone your Trello skills.
FAQs
Bottom Line
Trello is an easy-to-use, highly flexible project management tool that works for teams and individuals alike. Whether you’re tracking personal tasks, managing a team, or handling a complex project, Trello offers the tools you need to stay organized. This Trello overview of features, pricing, and how to use it should help you decide if it’s the right tool for your project needs.