The Best Online Collaboration Software We’ve Tested for 2026

Todoist is wonderful for writing down what your team needs to do and assigning tasks to the right people. It offers stellar apps for every major platform (and the web) and even generates productivity reports. A paid Pro account is reasonably affordable, too, especially considering it offers an AI assistant and unlimited activity history.

Multi-platform users: Even if your workflows span multiple platforms, Todoist can keep up, thanks to its widespread availability.

Small and growing teams: If you need to work collaboratively but don’t need the depth of a dedicated project management app, Todoist is the perfect compromise. It offers enough functionality to keep your team organized without ever becoming overwhelming.

Asana is among the most capable and customizable work management tools we’ve tested. You can use it to make and track lists, manage workflows and ideas, and much more. You can even configure it as a full-fledged project management app, even if that’s not necessarily how you can get the most out of it.

Multidisciplinary companies: Asana’s incredible flexibility makes it one of the best apps for managing teams with diverse sets of needs, whether you’re a big company or a startup with just a few people.

Teams on a strict budget: Not only are Asana’s premium plans affordable, starting at just $10.99 per user per month, billed annually, but its excellent free plan works for small teams of up to two members.

Canva is an all-in-one platform for creating graphics, from branded assets to slide decks and much more. You get a ton of functionality for free, including limited access to Canva’s AI tools and millions of templates. Premium accounts include even more animations, audio files, fonts, graphics, photos, and videos to fuel your creativity.

AI fanatics: Canva offers an entire suite of AI functionality, called the Magic Studio, that encompasses everything from an AI copywriting assistant that can embody your brand’s style to the ability to turn prompts into entire presentations, and much more.

Small teams: If your team doesn’t have a dedicated graphic designer, Canva makes it easy for just about anyone to quickly create attractive graphics.

Figma is a collaborative interface design and live prototyping platform. It works much like a virtual whiteboard app, enabling you and your team to work together in real time. The different modes for designers, developers, and presenters all work seamlessly to create a single environment for conceptualizing, planning, creating, and finalizing interface design projects.

Designers and developers: If you have a team of designers and developers who need to work together to plan out a complex interface design project, Figma should be your first choice. It should support just about any third-party app in your workflows, too.

Educators and students: Although Figma’s premium plans can get expensive, educators and students can access a more complete version of Figma than what’s available to regular users for free.

With a good balance of features, an interface that anyone can learn to use, and reasonable pricing, GanttPro is one of the best project management apps for beginners. We appreciate that it includes a critical path feature, custom task fields, a kanban board view, and a Save History feature that allows multiple undos.

Beginners: GanttPro’s intuitive design makes it ideal for teams new to project management. However, seasoned project managers might want to look elsewhere.

Fans of Gantt charts: Although GanttPro has other display options, it organizes your projects into Gantt charts by default. It lets you add a good amount of data to tasks and customize what you see at a high level.

Lucidchart is an online diagramming tool that can help you build out a floor plan and design the app of your dreams. Thanks to a huge object library and a similarly impressive variety of templates, it’s easy to use Lucidchart to plan out almost anything. Its rich collaboration features also make it simple to work on diagrams with teammates.

Established teams: Lucidchart’s free plan is limited, so to get the most out of Lucidchart, you need to pay for a premium plan, starting at $12 per person per month for teams. The good news is that this tier unlocks commenting features, premium templates, unlimited objects, and more.

Online collaborators: Lucidchart doesn’t have any desktop apps, and its mobile apps don’t work offline, so you need an internet connection to use the app. Of course, no one would be able to work with you remotely in real time otherwise.

Microsoft’s productivity apps are the best at what they do, bar none. You might find Google Docs more familiar for collaboration, but Microsoft 365 is just as capable for real-time coauthoring. Microsoft’s suite is not merely worth the money; it’s an amazing bargain considering all you get (including 1TB of OneDrive storage).

Individuals or small businesses: While Microsoft 365 is an excellent suite of software for individuals or even small teams, we recommend Microsoft 365 Business for larger companies, thanks to its array of administrative tools and business-focused apps.

Microsoft users: If you already use some Microsoft software, be it an old copy of Microsoft Word, Copilot, or Windows, Microsoft 365 is a natural, familiar choice.

Microsoft’s OneNote comes close to perfecting digital note-taking. It supports everything from free-form sketching to voice notes, alongside cross-platform syncing and easy-to-use organizational tools. It’s the first app you should try if you want to take notes, and its free version is very capable. OneNote lets you share notes at the Notebook level, and it supports co-authoring.

Beginner note-takers: If you don’t have any specific note-taking needs, OneNote is a major upgrade over typing something into the Notes app on your iPhone or a text document.

Microsoft users: As a Microsoft app, OneNote works seamlessly with OneDrive storage and other Microsoft 365 apps. If you sign up for a Microsoft account for any reason, it’s at least worth checking out OneNote.

Miro has the best feature set of any whiteboard app, including tools for asynchronous and real-time collaboration. We especially appreciate Miro’s ease of use and its wonderful templates, which help you see all the ways you might incorporate it into your work. Subscriptions are also fairly affordable.

Remote teams: If your team spans different time zones or has different working hours, Miro’s asynchronous collaboration tools help keep everyone involved. Remote work arrangements make this likely.

Visual learners: Not everyone enjoys brainstorming in a text document or spreadsheet. Miro makes visual-first collaboration accessible and intuitive for entire teams.

Slack is easily the most beloved team messaging app available, despite costing more than others. People love its layout and the ability to deeply personalize their settings and tailor the experience. It even takes the win over Microsoft Teams in our head-to-head comparison.

All professionals: No matter the size of your team, you need a reliable way to communicate with everyone that’s not email. Slack’s accessibility and robust feature set make it the top option.

Budget-conscious users: If you don’t want to spend a dime on business messaging, Slack’s generous free plan lets you set up a custom workspace. You also get the core abilities to access 90 days of messaging history, create channels, and share files.

GoTranscript is a highly accurate transcription service offering both AI- and human-generated transcripts. Thanks to its affordable pricing structure, accessible interface, and support for a wide variety of languages, GoTranscript is worth a look for beyond-basic transcription work. Teams leads can set up Workspaces in which coworkers can edit, share, and upload documents.

Academics, lawyers, and medical professionals: GoTranscript’s human-based transcription service is a great choice if you work in fields in which the highest level of accuracy is necessary. It also offers HIPAA-compliant transcriptions if you need them.

Non-English speakers: With support for an impressive 140+ languages, chances are good that GoTranscript has specialists who can transcribe recordings from speakers of any nationality.

Zoom is the biggest name in video conferencing for good reason, and Zoom Workplace builds on top of that core meeting functionality to create a capable, robust collaboration platform. It has an accessible interface, a feature-rich free version, a helpful AI companion that can summarize or transcribe meetings, and a long list of integrations, among other features.

Teams with diverse communication needs: If your team requires more than email or a business messaging app to communicate, Zoom Workplace is the most advanced video meeting platform you can use. There’s a good chance that most people already know how to use it, too.

Remote teams: If your team is entirely remote, Zoom Workplace has all the tools you might expect, including breakout rooms, polls, screen sharing, remote mouse and keyboard control, and more. All of those features make online collaboration seamless.