The short version
This comparison is built from the two official pricing pages, both captured on 2026-09-14 (Trello: full rendered page; ClickUp: both billing states — full detail in our ClickUp pricing check). It is a terms comparison; we did not run a project in either product.
Both tools anchor on Kanban, and both have a genuinely usable free tier, but the free ceilings point in different directions:
- Trello Free ($0): up to 10 collaborators per workspace, up to 10 boards, unlimited Power-Ups per board, 250 Workspace automation runs/month, cards/checklists/attachments. It stays card-centric: Gantt-style timeline/table/dashboard/map views are not on the free plan.
- ClickUp Free Forever ($0): unlimited free-plan members and unlimited tasks, but 60 MB total storage, 5 spaces, 1 form, 3 whiteboards, 250-listed features with several planning views trial-only (Gantt, Timeline, Workload), and only 1 day of activity history.
For a 6-person team running a handful of visual boards, Trello free fits entirely within its limits. For a 12-person team that wants everyone on the account free, ClickUp is the only one of the two that allows it — the cost being the 60 MB storage ceiling.
Pricing side by side
| Trello | ClickUp | |
|---|---|---|
| Free | $0, 10 collaborators, 10 boards, 250 automation runs/mo | $0, unlimited members/tasks, 60 MB, 5 spaces, 1 form |
| Paid entry | Standard $5/user/mo yearly ($6 monthly) — unlimited boards, 1,000 automation runs | Unlimited $7/user/mo yearly ($10 monthly) — unlimited storage, Gantt, integrations, time tracking |
| Mid | Premium $10/user/mo yearly ($12.50 monthly) — Calendar/Timeline/Table/Dashboard/Map views, admin controls | Business $12/user/mo yearly ($19 monthly) — dashboards, 5K automations, SSO, advanced reporting |
| Top | Enterprise $17.50/user/mo billed annually ($210/user/yr) — org-visible boards, multi-board guests, Atlassian Guard SSO | Enterprise custom — SAML/SCIM, audit log, HIPAA, data residency |
| Storage on paid | unlimited (250 MB/file on Standard per the captured table) | unlimited from Unlimited |
| Automation on free | 250 runs/mo | automation integrations on Business; native features on free |
| AI | paid AI features starting at $5/mo banner (“let AI do the busywork”) | trial on free; Brain $9, Everything AI $28 per user separately |
| SSO | free SSO/provisioning via Atlassian Guard on Enterprise (Guard itself starts at $4/user/mo as a separate subscription, per the page footnote) | Google SSO on Business; SAML/SCIM on Enterprise |
The same $5–$12 buys different products
- Trello sells board depth. Standard’s headline additions are unlimited boards, card mirroring and more automation (1,000 runs); views beyond boards (Calendar/Timeline/Table/ Dashboard/Map) are held until Premium at $10. The product stays deliberately simple — a board, list and card model — and you pay to remove the board/automation caps.
- ClickUp sells platform breadth. Its $7 Unlimited unlocks unlimited storage, Gantt charts, integrations, custom fields, goals, resource management, Chat and email-in-app — a much wider surface than Trello Standard, at $2 more per user. ClickUp Business at $12 is roughly level with Trello Premium at $10 on views/admin, with ClickUp adding 5,000 automations and SSO.
- The simple-team discount is real. A team that wants “Trello but unlimited boards for everyone” pays $5/seat; the equivalent “unlimited storage and Gantt for everyone” is $7 on ClickUp. Trello is cheaper for the narrow use case; ClickUp is cheaper per feature for the broad one.
Free-tier ceilings in practice
Trello free breaks at board count and automation: 10 boards/workspace is generous for a single project but tight for an agency with one board per client; 250 automation runs/month is ~8/day, enough for simple recurring moves but not a power workflow. The 10-collaborator cap is per workspace, and Power-Ups being unlimited on free (a change from older, capped plans) removes the historic integrations paywall.
ClickUp free breaks at storage and view trials: unlimited members is the headline advantage, but 60 MB shared storage is the tightest free ceiling in mainstream PM software (Trello’s free page lists card attachments without a total-cap figure comparable to that), and the planning views — the reason a team leaves pure Kanban — are trial-only rather than included. A team that adopts ClickUp free for the seats tends to convert over attachments and Gantt, not over people.
AI: bundled banner vs metered add-on
Trello’s pricing banner pushes paid AI features “starting at $5 a month” as an add-on across plans; ClickUp offers trial AI on free and then sells Brain $9 or Everything AI $28 per user/month as a full second ladder (with $10-per-10,000 super credits). Neither vendor folds full AI into the headline seat price, but Trello’s AI entry (~$5) is materially cheaper than ClickUp’s ($9/$28) — relevant for a team that specifically wants AI task drafting without paying for the all-in-one suite.
Who should pick which (terms-level)
- Pick Trello if the work is genuinely board-shaped, the team is ≤10 people (or you’ll pay Standard at $5), you want the lowest paid entry price and the least learning curve, or you’re already in the Atlassian ecosystem (Guard/Jira/Confluence).
- Pick ClickUp if you have 10+ people who need free seats, you need docs/Gantt/chat/goals in one tool rather than board-only Kanban, and you accept 60 MB free storage and paid AI as the trade-offs.
- The crossover: small visual-workflow team → Trello (free or $5). Growing multi-view, multi- team operation → ClickUp ($7–12), with AI priced separately either way.
No star rating: pricing-page analysis only. For the full ClickUp breakdown and the Asana comparison, see ClickUp pricing check and Asana vs ClickUp.
Methodology & sources
- trello.com/pricing — captured 2026-09-14 via local egress proxy, full rendered text and full-page screenshot; the 10-user/10-board free limits, 250 automation runs, $5/$10/$17.50 prices (and $6/$12.50 monthly equivalents) and the Atlassian Guard footnote are page text.
- clickup.com/pricing — captured the same day in both billing states with a free-tier crop; evidence and limits reused from the same-day ClickUp pricing check.
- Checked 2026-09-14. Pricing pages change; re-verify before committing a budget.
