Plane versus Microsoft Planner: A comparison for software development teams

In the fast-evolving world of software development, efficient project management is critical. Whether you're running a startup with a small dev team or managing large-scale projects in a corporation, choosing the right project management tool can streamline workflows and boost team productivity. With the plethora of tools available today, it’s easy to get overwhelmed. Among the most popular options are Microsoft Planner, integrated into the Microsoft 365 ecosystem, and Plane, an open-source tool designed specifically with development teams in mind.

In this article, we'll compare these two tools — Microsoft Planner and Plane — in terms of their features, ease of use, collaboration capabilities and pricing. We'll take a close look at how each platform serves the needs of software development teams and, ultimately, which one is better suited for managing complex development workflows.

Overview

Microsoft Planner

Microsoft Planner is part of Microsoft 365 and is integrated with Microsoft Teams, To Do, and Outlook. Basic Planner, included with Microsoft 365 business plans, covers task assignment, checklists, buckets, progress tracking, and Grid, Board, Schedule, and Charts views. It is designed for general task management rather than software projects.

In 2024 Microsoft merged Planner with Project for the web. Features such as backlogs and sprints, goals, the Timeline (Gantt) view, and task dependencies now require a premium license, starting with Planner Plan 1. Advanced scheduling such as baselines, critical path, and the Project desktop app sits in the higher Planner and Project plans. Project Online, Microsoft’s older cloud project tool, was retired on September 30, 2026.

Plane

Plane is a modern, open-source project management tool built with software development in mind. It offers flexible workflows, five layouts (List, Board, Calendar, Gantt, and Spreadsheet), Cycles for sprints, Modules, Intake, and Pages in one workspace. Its open-source Community Edition is free with no user limit, and Plane runs in the cloud, self-hosted, or fully air-gapped, so teams decide where their data lives.

Plane integrates with the tools developers already use, including GitHub, GitLab, Slack, and Sentry, and it has an MCP server for AI agents. Real-time collaboration and a modern interface keep software teams connected and productive.

1. Feature Comparison

Plane-specific features

Plane includes several features built for software teams that Microsoft Planner does not offer, even with a Planner Plan 1 license. These are the ones that matter most for development work.

Work item relations

• Parent: The Parent property allows you to designate a parent issue for the current issue you’re creating. This feature helps establish a clear hierarchy, enabling users to track and manage dependencies between larger, overarching tasks and their subtasks or related work items.
• Blocking: The Blocking property enables you to link the current issue to other issues that it is preventing from being completed. This helps teams easily identify blockers and manage task dependencies, ensuring smoother progress on projects.
• Blocked by: The Blocked by property connects the current issue to other issues that are preventing it from being completed. This allows teams to quickly see what tasks need to be resolved first to unblock progress, improving workflow efficiency.
• Relates to: The Relates to property links the current issue to other issues that are closely connected or associated. This helps to establish a relationship between similar or complementary tasks, improving context and collaboration across teams.
• Duplicate of: The Duplicate of property flags the current issue as a duplicate of another existing issue. This helps avoid redundancy and ensures that teams don’t waste time working on identical tasks, keeping project management streamlined.
• Cycles: Cycles in Plane help teams organize their work into focused sprints or iterations, allowing for time-bound goals and task management. This feature enables teams to plan, track, and execute their work effectively over specific timeframes, promoting productivity and progress.
• Modules: Modules allow teams to break down their projects into distinct areas or categories. They serve as containers for grouping related work items, including tasks, bugs, features, and epics, ensuring that work is organized and managed efficiently across different project sections.
• Intake: Intake is a Plane-only feature that lets Guests create issues following which Admins and Members can move these issues inside a project. Intake can take bug reports, feature or service requests, or raise a ticket by stakeholders, customers, or clients. Issues created in Intake can then be accepted to move them to the Project’s workflow.
• Pages: Pages in Plane let you write specs, meeting notes, and requirements next to the work they describe, with real-time collaboration. On paid plans, the workspace Wiki adds nested pages for company-wide documentation, so teams don't need a separate docs tool.
• Publish: Admins can publish any Plane project as a public board in Kanban or List layout. Anyone with the link can see work items, their state, priority, and due dates without signing up, and you can let visitors comment, upvote, and react. It's an easy way to share a public roadmap or bug tracker with users and customers, while attachments, cycles, modules, and member details stay private. On paid plans, you can also publish views and Pages.

2. Design and User Experience (UI/UX)

Microsoft Planner follows the design of the Microsoft 365 apps it sits in, such as Teams and To Do. It is built for straightforward task management with buckets, cards, and checklists.

Plane offers a modern interface built for software teams. It’s fast and responsive, with drag-and-drop work items, customizable layouts, and real-time updates, so teams can manage complex projects without extra tools or plugins.

3. Pricing

Basic Microsoft Planner is included with Microsoft 365 business subscriptions. Features software teams usually need, such as backlogs and sprints, the Timeline (Gantt) view, and task dependencies, require a premium Planner license on top of Microsoft 365.

Plane’s free Community Edition includes Cycles for sprints, Modules, Intake, Pages, and all five layouts, including Gantt, with no user limit. It can be self-hosted at no cost.

Prices as listed in October 2026. Microsoft also requires a Microsoft 365 subscription.

The key takeaway: Plane includes the sprint and Gantt features software teams need on its free plan, and its paid plans cost less per user than Planner’s premium licenses.

Shared Features

• Task Management

Microsoft Planner provides task management features including creating and assigning tasks, checklists, labels, and status updates. Sprints, backlogs, and dependencies are available with a Planner Plan 1 license or higher.

Plane, on the other hand, is built with software development workflows in mind. It excels in managing more granular tasks, allowing users to create and track issues with rich text descriptions, attach files, and reference related issues. This level of detail helps development teams stay organized, especially when dealing with complex projects.

Additionally, Plane's List, Board, Calendar, Gantt, and Spreadsheet layouts give teams multiple ways to visualize and manage work on every plan.

• Views

Both tools offer several views. Planner's Grid view is a list of tasks; Plane offers two equivalents, the List and Spreadsheet layouts, with different levels of detail. Plane's Gantt layout is included on every plan, while Planner's equivalent, the Timeline view, requires a Planner Plan 1 license. Both tools offer Board (Kanban) and calendar-style views, and Plane shows more work item properties directly on cards and calendar entries.

• Customization & Flexibility

In terms of customization, Microsoft Planner is relatively limited. It offers a simple, uniform structure where tasks are organized into buckets, but there are few options for teams to customize workflows beyond this. For teams needing more advanced project tracking, integrations with Power Automate or Microsoft Project are necessary, further complicating the setup.

By contrast, Plane offers significant customization options, allowing teams to create tailored workflows that match their specific needs. You can organize tasks into Cycles (sprints), break down large projects into smaller Modules, and create Pages for documentation that sync with task boards. These features make Plane a more versatile tool, ideal for software development teams that operate in agile environments​.

• Categorization & Labels

Planner offers custom categorization of issues and tasks with labels. While it’s possible to create labels and custom fields in Planner to mimic the default issue properties of Plane, they are not as neatly integrated as in Plane. Plane comes out of the box with many useful issue/task properties which are integrated within other Plane features. Plane is also set up with many useful categories and labels which are a standard in software development, omitting the need for the user to create custom properties and labels from scratch.

• Collaboration & Teamwork

Microsoft Planner integrates tightly with Microsoft Teams, enabling team communication and collaboration. Through Teams, users can discuss tasks, share files, and track progress. However, the collaboration features within Planner itself are somewhat limited to commenting on tasks​. Even though collaboration is seamlessly integrated into the Microsoft ecosystem, it can become a hassle if you want to collaborate with people outside of your company's domain. Depending on the permission settings for Microsoft Teams and SharePoint, external people would need to first be registered with a guest account to the domain and then be able to join a specific team within MS Teams to be able to collaborate.

Plane, on the other hand, was built with collaboration at its core. Its real-time collaboration features ensure that teams can work together on issues and tasks without missing a beat. With GitHub Sync, developers can synchronize their Plane tasks with GitHub issues, streamlining collaboration between project management and code repositories​. Although not deeply integrated into another ecosystem, it is fairly easy to invite users into a workspace for collaboration.

• Integrations

Microsoft Planner integrates with Microsoft 365 apps such as Teams, Outlook, and To Do. Connections to developer tools like GitHub or Slack typically go through Power Automate or third-party connectors.

Plane integrates natively with GitHub, GitLab, Slack, and Sentry, and offers an API, webhooks, and an MCP server for AI agents. Work items update in real time from pull requests and commits, directly from the codebase.

In summary: Why choose Plane over Planner?

Plane was built from the ground up for software development teams. For teams looking for a Microsoft Planner alternative, Plane stands out for four reasons:

1. Built for software work: Cycles, Modules, work item relations, Intake, and Pages are included on every plan, with no premium license needed for sprints or Gantt.
2. Flexibility and customization: teams can shape workflows, layouts, and work item types to match how they work.
3. Developer integrations: native GitHub, GitLab, Slack, and Sentry integrations, plus an API and an MCP server.
4. Open source, cost, and control: the Community Edition is free with no user limit, paid plans start at $6 per user per month, and Plane can run in the cloud, self-hosted, or air-gapped.

If your team writes software and has outgrown task lists, Plane gives you a complete project management tool without stacking premium licenses on top of Microsoft 365.

Frequently asked questions

Q1. Is Plane a good alternative to Microsoft Planner?

Yes, for software teams. Plane includes sprints (Cycles), Gantt, Intake, Pages, and GitHub and GitLab integrations on its free plan, while Planner needs a premium license for sprints and the Gantt timeline.

Q2. Does Microsoft Planner have sprints and a Gantt chart?

Yes, with a premium license. Backlogs and sprints, task dependencies, and the Timeline (Gantt) view require Planner Plan 1 ($10 per user per month, billed yearly) or higher. Basic Planner in Microsoft 365 does not include them.

Q3. Is there a free, open-source alternative to Microsoft Planner?

Yes. Plane’s Community Edition is open source under AGPL-3.0 and free to self-host with no user limit.

Q4. Can I self-host Microsoft Planner?

No. Planner runs as part of Microsoft 365 in Microsoft’s cloud. Plane can run in the cloud, on your own servers, or in an air-gapped network.

Q5. Can Plane work alongside Microsoft 365?

Yes. Teams can keep Microsoft 365 for email and documents while running projects in Plane, with single sign-on on Plane’s Business plan (or Pro when self-hosted).