What Is Miro?

Miro is a visual collaboration platform that was founded in 2011 by Andrey Khusid. Khusid originally created a digital whiteboard called RealtimeBoard in 2011 to communicate his ideas with his remote clients. This eventually evolved into Miro, which has over 20 million users worldwide today.

Recently in 2022, Miro raised $400 million in a Series C funding round. This brings its valuation up to $17.5 billion.

The idea behind Miro was to digitize traditional processes such as writing on a piece of paper or having face-to-face interactions by replacing them with modern tools such as docs and chat. Miro works similarly to Whimsical, as both tools utilize a visual approach to brainstorming and collaboration. Miro's wide range of features makes it feel like an online collaborative whiteboard to help you come up with creative ideas.

On Miro, users can choose to start work on a customizable empty board or get started with ready-made templates. Boards can be used for a variety of things ranging from project management, brainstorming, wireframe creation, and more.

Features of Miro

Miro has a few features to help you and your team collaborate online.

On Miro, your whiteboard can be customized to fit your needs. Each board is built in the form of a fully customizable infinite canvas. This allows you to collaborate and branch out your mind maps and ideas without limit.

Similar to other visual collaboration tools, Miro also features a drag-and-drop design which makes it easy for you to edit your visualizations. Boards also have tools such as shapes, arrows, and drawing to make it seem as if you’re collaborating on an infinite whiteboard.

On Miro, you can collaborate with your team members via chat and video calls to reduce the need to toggle between applications when working. Downloading the Voting Plugin allows your team members to vote on ideas that they resonate with, allowing for better flow on your projects.

Each Miro project starts as a blank slate, which can be quite a daunting task to start. However, this can be made simpler by using Miro’s templates to help you get started with your tasks.

Besides brainstorming and planning workflows, you can also manage projects with your team on Miro via a built-in Kanban-style project board. 

Additionally, Miro also integrates with other applications such as notion, slack, and box, which gives you the ability to use your favorite applications alongside the app.

What Is Miro Good For?

Being a virtual whiteboard tool, Miro has plenty of uses. The idea is that Miro can be used for brainstorming sessions, visualizing processes, research, creating wireframes, and more. However, there are also some limitations that come with Miro.

What Are Some Limitations of Miro?

Although Miro is a good tool when it comes to brainstorming and ideation, its limitations include a steep price plan, lack of features on the free plan, and difficult onboarding.

Miro’s pricing starts at $8 per user which is steep compared to other similar applications out there. The cost quickly adds up the more users you add to your projects. This means that startups might find it difficult to cope with Miro's pricing.

You can choose to use Miro for free, but its free plan is very light on features. For example, you will have to upgrade to a paid plan in order to use Miro’s video call feature. This makes Taskade a better free alternative to Miro as Taskade on the other hand offers free and unlimited chat and video conferencing built-in to every project so that you can communicate with your team without having to toggle between apps.

If you’re a newbie to Miro, you will find it hard to use. If you can master how to use Miro, it can be an effective tool to have in your arsenal. However, you will need plenty of hand-holding to learn how to effectively use Miro, which might just take too much of your time.

Finally, there have been reports of users experiencing slower boards as activity within the board increases. This can be annoying especially when you find yourself in a flow state of ideation.

We also wouldn't recommend using Miro when planning your projects. This is because project management on Miro is only limited to a Kanban view. This makes Taskade a better free alternative to Miro because Taskade has multiple project views to help you plan and execute your projects. 

How Much Does Miro Cost?

Miro offers its software at four different price points being the Free Plan, Team Plan, Business Plan, and Enterprise Plan. More on Miro's pricing below.

Miro Free Plan

Miro’s Free Plan is ideal if you’re trying out the software to see if it’s a good fit for yourself or your business. The Free Plan comes with access to templates, a maximum of 3 boards, and integrations excluding Jira and Confluence.

However, Taskade’s Free Plan would be a better free alternative because you get unlimited chat and video calls even with our free plan. Miro on the other hand offers video calls only on its paid plans.

Miro Team Plan

Miro’s Team Plan gives you access to unlimited boards and the ability to create and share your own templates with your team. You also get extra features such as video calls, voting, timer, and the ability to organize projects via kanban boards.

Miro’s Team Plan starts at $8 per month for each user.

Miro Business Plan

The Business Plan gives you the added ability to invite guests to your private boards. You can also organize smart meetings with a specific set of tools and create better diagrams with advanced packs.

Miro’s Business Plan starts at $16 per month for each user. 

If you’re looking to use Miro for your business, you can also consider the Enterprise Plan which offers premium support, data governance, and added security features. You will have to get in touch with Miro's sales team to find out more about the pricing for their Enterprise plan.

What Is Taskade?

Taskade is an online productivity and collaboration tool that was founded by John Xie, Dionis Loire, and Stan Chang in 2017. The Y Combinator-backed startup aims to help remote teams and individuals get work done faster and smarter.

Taskade is where remote teams get work done. With Taskade, you can organize projects and tasks, change between multiple project views, automate repetitive workflows, collaborate via built-in video chat with your team, and more, via an all-in-one unified workspace. 

Get a headstart on your projects and find a suitable structure for your notes via Taskade’s versatile collection of templates. Simply choose from a wide variety of templates and add them to your projects to get started instantly!

Taskade is a supercharged productivity app that both individuals and teams can use to collaborate on projects in real-time.

Taskade is the best free Miro alternative. Get started instantly for free today.

Key Features of Taskade

• Project Views. Visualize your projects in several different ways. Cycle between the List, Mind Map, Org Chart, and Board views to work the way you want. 

  • List View. This is the default view on Taskade. Create new lists here.
  • Board View. This view lets you work horizontally like a Kanban board. Visualize your workflow and tasks in this full-width view.
  • Mind Map View. This view lets you work in a horizontal tree-structured manner and map out what you have in mind.
  • Action View. Work in table view and stay organized with your task due dates, and more.
  • Org Chart View. Break down larger tasks into smaller ones to help you get things done.

• Zoom In, Zoom Out. Get a bird’s-eye view of the workflow by zooming out on all project views, or zoom in to focus on a specific area.
• Fold/Unfold. Fold (collapse) a parent task/bullet element to hide its subtasks. Indent outline elements with ⌨️ Tab and unfold lists with ⌨️ Shift+Tab.
• Real-time Communication. Chat and video conference with your team while collaborating in real-time on the same page. 
• 500+ Templates. Choose from 500+ templates across 26 categories to improve your productivity and workflows. Customize existing templates or create new ones across your workspaces.
• Multi-Select. Select and format multiple blocks or bulk assign them as tasks to other team members. You can also copy, paste, or indent selected blocks.

• Customize Sub-Tasks. Customize the format of your sub-tasks at individual levels. Choose from headings, numbered lists, shapes, and more.
• Recurring Tasks. Add due dates with start and end times to tasks within your project and set them to repeat daily, weekly, monthly, or even yearly.
• Move Tasks. Move and copy selected tasks to other projects across any workspace. You’ll receive a pop-up notification on completion.
• User Roles & Permissions. Manage collaborators and assign user roles/editing privileges (Owner, Admin, Editor, Checker, Viewer).

• Sort Tasks. Sort sub-tasks/children elements by completed/uncompleted stats or the due date. Task sorting can be accessed from a convenient pop-up menu.
• Search. Search within projects or globally across workspaces and subspaces. Instantly browse and jump between projects anywhere in the Taskade.
• Keyboard Shortcuts. Navigate projects, create content blocks, reorder elements, and complete tasks using a set of handy keyboard shortcuts.

• Team Calendar. Aggregate all tasks and projects in a shared calendar. The Taskade calendar integrates with Google (two-way), Apple, and Outlook. 
• Reorder Tasks. Lists in Taskade aren’t set in stone. Reorder tasks and find them a new home with intuitive drag-and-drop mechanics.
• Project History. See all the changes made by you and other collaborators. Click on the entries to navigate to the edited items within the project.
• Version History. Taskade saves snapshots of your project so that you can restore a previous version of your project with a single click.

• Export and Print. You can export your projects as plain text or markdown files. Attach them to emails, presentations, or for print.

• Cloud File Upload. Share files directly from Google Drive, Dropbox, Instagram, and Box in your projects with our integrations.
• Breakdown Larger Tasks. Organize your thoughts with Taskade’s unlimited hierarchy to break down large projects into tasks.
• Quick Search. Use CMD / CTRL + K to jump between any projects within Taskade web and apps.

For an exhaustive list of Taskade’s features, click here.

Taskade Pros

• Free-forever plan is loaded with features
• Real-time collaboration within the same project 
• Free built-in video call and chat function in each project
• Customizable templates to give you a headstart
• Work and chat in the same window, in the same app
• Frequent updates based on user/your feedback and suggestions
• Tabbed workflow for working with multiple Projects

Taskade Cons

• No custom APIs (yet)

Taskade Pricing

Taskade Free Plan

• Unlimited Tasks & Projects
• Unlimited Members & Guests
• Unlimited Folders & Teams
• Templates, Calendar, Repeat Tasks
• Real-time Collaboration
• Built-in Free Chat and Video Call

Taskade Unlimited Plan - Starts from $5/month

• Everything in Free, plus:
• Version History
• Advanced Permission
• Cloud Upload Integration
• 2-Way Calendar Integration

Click here for more information.

Is Taskade Right for You?

Taskade is a platform that can be used by individuals and teams working from anywhere. Use Taskade individually or collaborate with your team for weekly agendas, team meetings, note-taking, project management, product roadmaps, and more. 

Make use of customizable board views to visualize your projects into digestible smaller tasks. Multiple board views are available even on Taskade’s free plan, allowing you to get more work done the smarter way. Taskade is the perfect platform to help your team collaborate and think up creative ideas for your projects.

Are you part of a remote team? No problem! Collaborate with your team in real-time with free and unlimited chat and video conferencing available on every project. Automatic syncing ensures that your data is always up to date across devices. The idea is for you to collaborate effortlessly regardless of where you're working from.

Our customizable templates are available even with our free plan. Find the perfect template to help you get started with your project, and customize it to fit your needs!

Taskade is the simplest way to create task lists, checklists, and workflows. Manage projects and get more work done the simple way with Taskade.

Taskade is the best free Miro alternative. Try Taskade for free today.