Based on 7 verified reviews published in the last 18 months
TrustRadius Community Insights are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when relevant, HG Insights data.
Overview
Synthesised from 7 reviews | Last Published April 23, 2026
This product assessment synthesizes insights from 7 recent reviews covering overall satisfaction, strengths, weaknesses, and ROI related to Microsoft Planner. Microsoft Planner is primarily used for task and project management, often across multiple teams or for individual projects. A majority of reviewers find it suitable for basic project tracking, with 5 out of 7 reviews reflecting this utility. The tool's value proposition centers around simple project planning and team collaboration, but it falls short for organizations needing advanced features. Indeed, 2 out of 7 reviewers consider its functionality too limited for sophisticated business needs. While some users report improved team efficiency (2 of 7 reviews), others cite reduced productivity due to functional limitations (2 of 7 reviews), indicating a variable ROI depending on the complexity of the use case.
Pros
Facilitates basic project planning, particularly using Kanban-style boards.
Enhances team collaboration through integrated features.
Improves team efficiency in some contexts, especially when aligned with Agile methodologies.
Cons
Lacks advanced project management features such as Gantt charts.
Offers limited customization options.
Can reduce productivity if users expect more advanced functionality than it provides.
Microsoft Planner is a software program integrated into the Microsoft Suite and costs no additional funds to use. Once logged into our Okta instance, we have access to MS Planner. Recently, we were mandated to move away from Monday.com for project management software, and our Corporate IT team suggested we replace it with MS Planner. After extensive research and experimentation, we quickly found that MS Planner is an inferior planning tool and is certainly not a project management tool. It is a very elementary task list... and I mean *really* elementary. I prefer to use sticky notes at my desk rather than MS Planner. In short, there are very few use cases for a sophisticated SaaS business to use MS Planner.
Pros
Friendly UI.
Integration with Outlook.
Simple to-do list.
Cons
Customizations of any kind.
Grouping of items in grid view.
Timeline column instead of start date/end date.
Savable templates.
Not a project management tool.
Likelihood to Recommend
There are a few examples where MS Planner would be suitable for employees at a mature organization. In my opinion, if you have Outlook or Teams, you already have built-in calendars and to-do lists. If you need a project management tool, you have two options: either pay for MS Project or use an alternative tool like Monday, Asana, or Jira. Regardless, their free versions are much more sophisticated than Microsoft's (MS Planner). Any team wishing to put together a halfway-decent project management board will need to look elsewhere, as MS Planner is only suitable for a personal to-do list.
I primarily use it for my recurring tasks and occasionally for cross-team projects. This is a very user-friendly tool that allows me to stay on top of my assigned tasks and complete my work promptly. The automatic reminder feature is beneficial, especially on days when I’m too busy with my overall workload.
Pros
Task Management.
Collaboration Features.
Integration with Microsoft 365.
Cons
User experience enhancements.
Advanced customization.
Offline access.
Likelihood to Recommend
Microsoft Planner is a user-friendly visual tool for organizing tasks and workflows. It’s great for team collaboration, integrates seamlessly with Microsoft 365 tools like Teams and Outlook, and offers flexibility for projects of all sizes. Additionally, it provides mobile and web access for seamless productivity on the go. That’s a big plus right there.
I use Microsoft Planner daily. I use it to organize my projects throughout the year and on an individual project basis as well. It allows me to have a big picture view of the years projects but can also be break down individual projects to help stay on track or delegate tasks.
Pros
I love the ability to tag and untag others as needed
I love the ability to customize the tag labels and that there are so many options
I love the ability to add comments and it notifies the others tagged in the task
I love that the task description can be changed as needed without notification to others assigned to the task
Cons
I wish there were more color options for labels or that they were customizable beyond the ones given
I wish the comments section of the task card could be edited even for typos
When there is more than one label, I would like to be able to choose the labels that appears first by dragging and dropping
Likelihood to Recommend
I think the planner is well suited for collaborative projects where multiple people would benefit from having eyes on the status of a project. Or in the instance that multiple people are dividing the workload to ensure that duplicate work isn't being completed. I also think that it's valuable for a single individual to keep track of their competing priorities.
Microsoft Planner fits those looking to implement basic kanban style project planning and delivery. Because it typically comes with the Microsoft 365 suite and doesn't require additional licensing cost, it allows organisations already embedded in the Microsoft eco-systems to enable collaboration across individuals, teams and cross-team. It has all the features needed for a basic planning board, without unnecessary bloat.
Pros
Kanban
Project planning
Collaboration
Cost and access
Cons
No ability to @ tag users
No GANTT charts
No interdependencies for tasks
Limited reporting capability
Likelihood to Recommend
Where organisations have small projects which don't require complex or advanced features such as Gantt charts. When an organisation is already committed to Microsoft 365 Licensing costs, and need a simple project planning board solution to collaborate across teams, without committing to another platform. Where there is concern about sensitive internal data being shared with external vendors, and a secure Microsoft environment has already been established.
Microsoft Planner is used to organize activities in different projects, especially for the ones managed with Agile practice. With Planner, the Scrum Master (but also the traditional Project Manager), has an immediate view about the different activities/objectives for every Sprint or deadlines and about the tasks assigned to every component of the group. So you can immediately understand if a team's member has more or less things to do respect the other members of the team. Moreover, you can immediately understand if there are activities with delay or with critical points that needed to rescheduled in the future. In our company planner is integrated in MS Teams, so with only one platform we can manage projects both on the calendar point of view but also with interactions among team's members
Pros
It helps to give to every task a different priority level
It helps to check the job amount for every team's member
It gives an overall view about delays and done activities
Cons
When you mark a task as "done" it disappears from the checklist
There isn't a back up when you cancel tasks (maybe could be useful a confirm message before the cancellation)
The "note camp" can't be delete
Likelihood to Recommend
I think Planner is a good platform for manage projects especially if I think that is integrated in MS Teams so, with a unique platform you can have the control about the project, about all the documents linked to the same project and at the same time, with the possibility to chat with other team members without change platform. I think also there are other platform (like Jira or Trello) which are better in terms of layout
The majority of our services use Microsoft Planner to manage their work efficiently. Its integration with Microsoft Suite and other products such as Microsoft teams/office365 makes it easier for you and your team to manage tasks.
We used it to view the project process and the assignments assigned to each team member. It also provides useful information about the progress of the project or if we don't meet our timelines.
It also helps you to create different team/groups for a common project and helps leads to manage multiple projects at one place with multiple groups
Pros
It helps you to create a proper project plan and multiple tasks
Integration with other Microsoft products
Easy task Management and progress tracking
Cons
Integration with other suites like Google/Gmail
User Interface
Likelihood to Recommend
Microsoft Planner is a well-suited tool if you want it to be integrated with other Microsoft tools. It helps you to manage multiple projects with multiple different teams to manage their tasks and see the overall project status at a place. It also helps teams to share files in the respective group and everyone in the group will be notified of any newly added tasks.
However, If it is required to follow agile effectively with proper story points then would recommend going with more powerful tools like JIRA to manage things in a more effective manner and (JIRA cloud) have integration available now with team also which is a great add-on
VU
Verified User
Team Lead in Information Technology (10,001+ employees)
We use the Microsoft Planner in our organization heavily to create, manage and orchestrate the simple to complex project plans / tasks. The ability to create, edit, view and share the plan, files and timelines with the internal and external team is helpful and versatile. The smooth integration of native Office 365 apps improves the usability of Microsoft Planner. It is amazing that each new plan created in Microsoft Planner automatically creates a new Office 365 group.
Pros
Project plan creation, managing, assigning the tasks within the team and tracking the status in real time
File sharing, orchestrating the communication
It enables us to communicate and collaborate with other users, and receive progress updates via various means.
Cons
Microsoft Planner has the basic and common set of features that most other project management software already have, MS should think of adding some exclusive features apart from the traditional feature sets
Microsoft Planner misses on native ability to manage and note the time expense of professionals working on the tasks
Existing Gantt chart layout can be improvised by adding navigation and clear from tasks dependent on each other
Likelihood to Recommend
I would recommend Microsoft Planner to anyone who is using Office 365 apps and would like to leverage the best in class native connector to link the tasks, documents and conversation from the other Office 365 apps with their Planning platform. The ability of Planner to integrate and connect with Office 365 cloud is really commendable and highly useful. It has all the required features that one would need for creating, managing plans and tasks for simple - really complicated and large enterprise level projects!
Microsoft Planner is used to manage projects and initiatives for different teams inside the organization. It is also used to manage day-to-day activities of different teams working on a single project. Managers use it as a tool to manage roadmaps for different active and upcoming projects in their department.
Pros
Manage active items in progress with detailed information
Time planning and deadline management
Categorization of different projects
Cons
Tagging, labeling, and details for individual cards
Reporting and dashboards
User experience and interface
Likelihood to Recommend
Microsoft Planner is well suited for task planning needs for managing different projects. It is well suited for tracking tasks, planning sprints, assigning tasks to other team members, viewing deadlines, and tracking timelines. It also helps with Microsoft Teams integration and sharing task details with other members via Teams.
It could be improved in terms of providing more details to individual tasks/cards, dashboarding, and export capabilities.
VU
Verified User
Consultant in Information Technology (10,001+ employees)
Microsoft Planner gives my team an intuitive, collaborative, and visual task management experience to get the job done. It's a simple tool to use but it adds a lot of productivity, allowing better performance. Like any organization[al] tool, it requires constant updating.
We are already using the kanban panel, but we are not yet integrated into MS Project. We plan to use this feature soon.
Pros
Easy and intuitive kanban panel.
Very beautiful visualization dashboard.
Great integration for iOS system.
Cons
Does not allow you to view all tasks and sub-tasks (checklist) in a nested view.
Comments have character limits that can make it harder for teams to communicate exactly what they want to share.
There is no way to mention a teammate in a comment and share files and documents in the conversation (collaborative tool???).
Likelihood to Recommend
Since it is part of the Office 365 suite of products, you’ll end up paying for plenty of tools you’ll not be using. To function properly, we must use all the other tools in Office 365 plus Microsoft Project. It's interesting for medium and big teams and it's a good tech resource for Microsoft users. It is a suitable product for companies that have a good Microsoft product contract.
In our organization, MS Planner is used only (for the moment) by the software development team to follow shared dev tasks across technical domains or projects. It suits us because these use cases required a very simple and accessible lightweight tool, dislike MS Project. We also [chose] it because of its integration with MS Teams and Microsoft 365.
Pros
Simple and lightweight UI.
MS 365 integration, especially MS Teams.
Built-in MS 365 tool (no extra licencing).
Very user friendly Mobile access.
Cons
No timeline.
Impossible to link dependent tasks.
No notifications outside the portal (except mail).
Likelihood to Recommend
Well suited for very light, quick and easy team tasks management. Not suitable for large project management, or enterprise context, in which MS Project-like software would be recommended.
VU
Verified User
Engineer in Information Technology (1001-5000 employees)
