Trello

Overview

Trello was created by Fog Creek Software (the company later known as Glitch, and separately from Trello itself) and launched in 2011, popularizing the kanban board — columns of cards representing tasks that move through stages — as a general-purpose organizational tool well beyond its software-development origins. Atlassian acquired Trello in 2017 for $425 million, folding it into its broader collaboration suite alongside Jira and Confluence.

Trello’s core interaction model — drag-and-drop cards across lists — has become a template that a large number of both proprietary and open source tools have since copied. Its free tier caps the number of boards a workspace can have and limits automation (“Butler”) runs, pushing active teams toward paid tiers. Because the underlying kanban model is simple and well understood, several fully open source, self-hostable projects offer a near-identical experience without subscription limits or hosting your task data on Atlassian’s servers.

Key Features

• Kanban boards — Drag-and-drop cards across customizable lists
• Butler automation — Rule-based automation for repetitive board actions (limited on free tier)
• Power-Ups — Third-party and Atlassian integrations (calendar views, voting, custom fields)
• Templates — Pre-built board templates for common workflows
• Cross-platform sync — Web, desktop, and mobile apps with real-time sync

Use Cases

• Personal task tracking — Simple to-do organization using boards and cards
• Small team project management — Shared boards for sprint planning or content pipelines
• Software development workflows — Backlog and bug tracking via custom lists

Who It’s For

Trello is aimed at individuals and small teams who want a visual, low-friction way to track tasks without the overhead of a full project management suite. It’s free for individuals with limits, with paid tiers for teams needing more boards and automation.