Wunderlist vs Trello is a battle of the online work management applications.
Which you choose depends on what you need now and what you might need in the future.
Here we look at the two apps side by side to allow you to decide which is the best for you.
Why Would You Need Wunderlist or Trello?
So, you are one of those people who has a million things to do and you are writing to-do lists everywhere. You crave a way of organising these activities into some sort of order and access these details wherever you are.
You might be the manager of a team and need to allocate tasks to people or you might need to communicate with a partner or member of a group something that you need doing.
If you are any or all these people then you need Wunderlist or you need Trello.
Both Trello and Wunderlist can be used as a project management tool for businesses or as a personal organisational tool for the individual. Both are easy to use and both are free in their basic form.
What Makes a Great Online Organisational Tool?
As Trello and Wunderlist have such a lot in common, we are going to have to get into the nitty-gritty to separate these two great applications for project managers.
We need to consider what will make one of these tools better than the other. Here are some hoped for features from the best online organisation tools:
Easy-to-see tasks
You need to be able to easily see what you need to do, what you are in the midst of doing and what has been done.
Preferably you would be able to see this both as a list and in a calendar, so you can see when important deadlines are approaching.
The visualisation of tasks is key to an application being a useful tool. You effectively need an easy way to carry around that whiteboard that you store in the corner of the office or on the kitchen wall.
Manage deadlines
You need an application that notifies you when an important deadline is approaching and helps you see these deadlines clearly.
Communicate with your team
Even if you are using the app for personal use, you might want to be able to organise with your partner or with your family what needs to be done.
However, crucially, if you are using it as a work management tool then you need to be able to communicate with others what needs to be done and by whom.
Therefore, an effective work management tool needs a feature for allocating tasks to individuals, so they can be held accountable.
Organise information
You need somewhere where you can add images and files that link to the tasks that need to be done. Therefore, the best work management tools will allow you to upload and organise files and images effectively and efficiently.
Scalability
If you are working in business then it is no good if the application cannot grow with the business.
If, after a period of growth, you need to swap to another tool, then it is going to cause issues of implementation and the migration of important data.
Therefore, the best applications will scale with your needs and continue to be useful no matter how successful you become.
Wunderlist
Wunderlist helps you plan for all you must do – whether it is professional or personal – big task or small task. You can create a task, set a due date, ask for a reminder and assign to-do lists to others.
For each task you can then create subtasks, breaking larger goals into actionable activities. 25 subtasks are provided free before you could pay.
You can collaborate within Wunderlist by sharing your lists with others, up to 25 times if you use the free app or unlimited if you upgrade to the Pro app for $4.99 a month.
It is also possible to leave comments on tasks and there is a notes section to capture ideas.
Wunderlist allows you to upload files and attach these to tasks.
You get an allocation of 5MB for free but a generous unlimited amount in the Pro package. This is made simple to organise with the use of folders for different types of task.
It is possible to send an email to Wunderlist – by simply forwarding emails with actions included straight to the app. You can also add to Wunderlist from the internet.
An added bonus – you can print your lists with just one click for some old school sharing!
The Business app helps you to create lists for each project that your team needs to complete. The shared lists can be managed by anyone you give responsibility to – helping with a delegation.
There is added security with a 256-bit-encrypted real-time sync – which means lists are always up-to-date and always safe. There is also a central activity centre, which can be viewed to keep everyone informed of what people are doing.
So: it is easy to view tasks and you get notifications sent via push, email or in-app notifications – keeping you up to date when deadlines are close.
You can share your lists with a team and organise activities into folders for each of use. These to-do lists can be commented on, for ease of communication and notes can be produced for capturing ideas.
You can upload files and organise these into tasks and add to tasks from email and the web. And, with the option of buying the Pro app and for more security the Business app, Wunderlist can grow with your needs.
Trello
Trello is a project management tool that uses the Kanban system. This sounds hard but it is essentially the whiteboard with your post-it notes on that move from column to column depending on the status of the task.
Is it to-do, being done or already complete? Then, move the sticky note along the lists to show what is going on.
Simple, right.
Trello invites you to create a board for each project. You then set up lists and within these lists create cards, which are essentially the same as post-it notes.
The cards are enhanced with lots of features, including comments, file uploads, due dates and checklists.
The idea is that a card would represent a task and everything to do with this task is stored in the card.
This means that organisation of files, comments and due dates is organised in one place – making it easy for people invited to the board to access information.
There is also a calendar view, which allows you to see all the deadline dates laid out in one place.
Trello remains useful to use for free for a long time. There is the option to upgrade and receive some of the features required for bigger businesses and enterprises.
The main feature that is unlocked by subscribing is the use of unlimited Power-ups.
Power-ups are apps that you can download into cards that add functionality – whether it is a schedule for that particular task, customisable buttons, or a representation of your Agile sprint.
These Power-ups essentially allow you to turn Trello into the project management tool that you need it to be.
At an Enterprise level, you get all the security features you need to keep data secure with such a lot of users involved.
Trello is therefore highly scalable from a personal to small business, to large business to enterprise level.
It is easy to use and offers a great visualisation of the workflow of a single project and with the collections board, of the entirety of the company you work for.
The calendar function allows you to see the deadlines that are coming and with integrations with apps like Slack, you can easily communicate with team members what they need to complete a task and by when.
Which Is Better?
Both work well to simply organise tasks and subtasks. There is the option to upload and organise files into folders or within cards.
There are places to communicate with team members and ways of easily allocating tasks. For personal, everyday use Wunderlist is more accessible and offers push notifications to act as reminders.
It scales to some degree but you quickly need to subscribe to get the features needed for business. The lack of a calendar view makes it difficult to visualise the whole project, though the activity centre gives a decent overview.
However, if you are looking for a fully scalable application that offers business-level functionality, then Trello is the better option of the two.
The simple Kanban system allows you to clearly see a workflow and the different boards, with the collection screen, offers a single dashboard to view the whole company.
Trello needs integration with a communication app such as Slack to improve communication – and this is its one downside in comparison to Wunderlist.
Wunderlist’s notifications act as the reminder tool you need, which is only available in Trello if messages are pushed to a third-party app.
It is close to the two apps, but when pitting Wunderlist vs Trello, Trello has the pedigree to deal with all levels of user need.
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