Excel or Trello for project tracking?

Should you use Excel or a project management tool?

A spreadsheet can be a useful shared project log

A small team may need a maintained table with task IDs, owners, due dates, status and the next action. Formulas and flexible analysis can be valuable when the project includes capacity or cost calculations. Modern Excel can support co-authoring with a compatible application, file and storage arrangement, so simultaneous editing is not exclusive to project software. Check the actual sharing and editing permissions. A well-owned shared workbook can work better than several inconsistent copies sent as attachments, but it still needs an agreed place and an accountable maintainer.

Which coordination problem are you trying to solve?

Use one eight-task example in both approaches

Consider a fictional product-page launch with three owner roles: Operations, Marketing and Web. It has 8 tasks, a planned handover and relative due days. These are teaching examples, not measured delivery times or records from an actual business.

T04, the product copy, is blocked while T02’s asset list is being prepared. T05 and T06 need the page and copy before review and enquiry checks. The useful question is whether someone outside the original conversation can find that chain and identify the next responsible person.

A board reorganises the work; it does not remove the handover

This editorial illustration groups the same eight tasks by status. It is not a screenshot or a tested result from Trello or another vendor.

Swipe the board sideways, or focus it and use the arrow keys, to see all four states.

If a task moves to Done without meeting its acceptance condition, the colour or column has not solved the delivery problem. Keep the definition of completion and responsibility visible in either system.

Does Trello Free fit the whole team?

Check the Workspace, not just one board. The reviewed Trello Free scope has up to ten open boards and ten collaborators, with guests and pending invitations included in collaborator counting. That can change a small team’s shortlist even when the sample project is tiny. Custom Fields are unavailable in Free Workspaces; Standard adds them and Advanced Checklists. If your process depends on structured customer references or checklist assignments, evaluate the retained paid scope rather than assuming the trial’s features remain. Read the free project-plan limits guide for the wider member and file questions. If the board has become view-only, use the Trello access checklist to separate plan capacity from board membership and roles.

What if your team already uses Microsoft 365?

Compare the spreadsheet approach with the actual Microsoft Planner access available to the team. Suite ownership can change incremental cost, but it does not establish that every premium planning feature is included. Inspect a real task assignment, a guest requirement and the report the project owner must produce. Keep the same brief for other options: The Planner profile and monday.com vs Trello comparison explain different product and plan boundaries. Avoid treating every product as equivalent merely because it displays cards.

How should you evaluate the move?

Give a consenting colleague the sample project and ask them to find the owner of T04, explain what prevents it from finishing and identify the work affected by a delay. Change one due day, add a permitted test attachment, prepare the normal status update and inspect access removal with a controlled test guest. Record observed difficulties and the retained account or plan. These are proposed exercises: this article reports no measured time saving, adoption result or usability winner. Keep unknown capabilities unresolved until the actual trial supplies evidence.

Which information must survive export?

Decide what the next maintainer needs: task IDs, owners, dates, dependency references, comments, attachments and change context. A CSV can be useful while omitting parts of an application’s working history. Check the exact export route and the material you can reopen outside the product. If a spreadsheet remains the place for cost analysis, agree how it stays aligned with the task system rather than maintaining two competing status registers. Use one authoritative location for each kind of information and name the person who maintains the connection.

Download the common project and handover checklist

Download the eight-task project example ↓

Download the side-by-side handover worksheet ↓

Use the same tasks, participants and required report in each approach. Leave observation and evidence fields blank until the exercise is performed. Follow the five-day project software trial if a wider rollout is being considered, or use the comparison scorecard to record your requirements and assessment.

Frequently asked questions