Table Of Contents
Project Management Software for a 10-50 Person Company: Orange vs Trello, Asana, Jira, monday and ClickUp
Disclosure: Orange belongs to the City Profit group, which publishes this site. Competitor prices come from the vendors’ public pricing pages in September 2026 and change often, so check them before you sign anything.
Why the price of project software becomes a CFO topic at 25 people
A five-person team can run on any free plan. The bill starts to matter when a company grows past 20 or 30 people and every new hire, contractor and part-time manager needs a seat. Per-seat pricing scales with headcount, not with the value you get from the tool, and it punishes exactly the businesses that add people faster than they add revenue.
Orange takes the opposite approach. It is a Kanban tool (boards, cards, columns, owners, deadlines) priced per team: Free for up to 15 users and 15 boards with no expiry, Starter at $1,500 a year for up to 25 members, Pro at $2,500 a year for up to 50. The plans stop there, so a company above 50 people has to ask the Orange team for terms.
The numbers: annual list price for 10, 25 and 50 users
The table uses annual billing and list prices before tax. Jira Free covers up to 10 users, Trello Free covers up to 10 collaborators per workspace, and Jira’s per-user rate falls in tiers, so its cost is shown as a range.
| Tool and plan | 10 users | 25 users | 50 users |
|---|---|---|---|
| Orange (Free / Starter / Pro) | $0 | $1,500 | $2,500 |
| Trello Standard ($5 per user) | $600 | $1,500 | $3,000 |
| Trello Premium ($10 per user) | $1,200 | $3,000 | $6,000 |
| ClickUp Unlimited ($7 per user) | $840 | $2,100 | $4,200 |
| Jira Standard (about $6.5-7.9 per user) | $0 (Free plan) | about $1,960-2,370 | about $3,910-4,750 |
| Asana Starter ($10.99 per user) | $1,319 | $3,297 | $6,594 |
| monday Basic (€9 per seat) | €1,080 | €2,700 | €5,400 |
Where Orange wins and where it loses
The honest reading of the table is more nuanced than a sales page would like. Orange Starter costs exactly what Trello Standard costs at 25 users. Below that, Trello is cheaper: at 20 users it is $1,200 against $1,500. Orange Pro ($2,500) only beats Trello Standard once you pass 41 users. The clear Orange advantages are the free tier (15 users and 15 boards against Trello’s 10 collaborators and 10 boards) and the comparison with the heavier suites, where a 50-person company pays $4,200 to $6,600 a year for features it may never open.
What you give up with a Kanban tool
Orange shows what has to be done, who owns it and what is finished. It repeats tasks daily, weekly or on a custom interval, keeps an activity history, holds deleted items in a 30-day recycle bin and protects sign-in with a one-time code sent by email. It deliberately does not try to be Scrum software with story points, a Gantt chart with dependencies, an ERP or a CRM. If a process depends on those, buy the specialised system for that process only.
Which business should pick what
IT and software companies
Keep engineering on Jira (or a similar tracker) for sprints, releases and code links. Move everyone else, meaning marketing, HR, finance, customer success and the founder’s office, onto a flat-priced Kanban board. In a 40-person company with 25 engineers, that means about 25 Jira seats (roughly $1,960-2,370 a year at list price) plus 15 non-engineers at $0 on Orange Free, instead of 40 Jira seats at roughly $3,130-3,800.
Manufacturers of physical goods
Production scheduling and materials planning belong in your ERP or MES. The layer around them does not: new product launches, supplier problems, quality checklists and maintenance routines that repeat every day or every week. A board with recurring tasks and an activity history covers that layer without a per-seat bill for the 30 office and workshop-lead accounts that only need to see a card.
Professional services and agencies
Client deliverables, monthly reports and onboarding steps fit a board with columns for each stage and a recurring card for each monthly obligation. Keep client conversations in your email or CRM, and use the board for internal ownership and deadlines. Agencies of 10 to 50 people are the group where a flat team price saves the most, because headcount often includes freelancers who log in twice a week.
A 30-day pilot that settles the argument
- Count real weekly active users, not licences. Many companies pay for seats nobody opens.
- Pick one team and one recurring process, for example content production or supplier onboarding.
- Rebuild that process on a Free plan of two tools, Orange and the one you use now.
- After 30 days compare three numbers: tasks finished on time, hours spent updating the board, and the annual quote at your headcount.
- Decide with the numbers, and re-run the check when headcount crosses 25 or 50.
Frequently asked questions
Is Orange free for a 12-person team?
Yes. The Free plan covers up to 15 users and 15 boards with no expiry date.
Can Orange replace Jira for a software team?
For sprint planning with story points, no. It suits teams that need boards, owners and deadlines. Many IT companies use Jira for engineering and a Kanban tool for the rest of the business.
What does the team price include?
Pricing is per team, not per seat. Starter allows up to 25 members and Pro up to 50, and all plans include boards, repeating tasks, activity history and the 30-day recycle bin as described on the Orange tool page.
Test it on a real process. Orange is free for up to 15 people, no card needed to look around.
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Project Management Software for a 10-50 Person Company: Orange vs Trello, Asana, Jira, monday and ClickUp