Plaky Review UK 2026: Is This Free Project Management Tool Worth Using?
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Introduction: Are You Still Managing Projects in Spreadsheets?
If you’re running a small business, freelancing, or managing a growing team in the UK, there’s a good chance your “project management system” is actually a spreadsheet — possibly a very complicated one with colour coding only you understand. It works, until it doesn’t.
Plaky is a board-based project management tool from CAKE.com that has been gaining attention largely on the strength of its free plan. But is it good enough to use day-to-day, does it suit UK sole traders and small teams, and where does it fall short?
Here’s the honest answer, including the pricing details worth checking before you commit — because CAKE.com’s other products have changed in ways that are easy to miss.
What Is Plaky?
Plaky is a project management tool built by CAKE.com, the company behind time tracking app Clockify and team communication tool Pumble. It uses a board-and-card structure similar in concept to Trello: you organise work into columns such as “To Do”, “In Progress” and “Done”, and move task cards through them as work progresses.
It launched as a straightforward alternative to tools like monday.com and ClickUp, with a different positioning — rather than competing on features, Plaky competes on accessibility.
Key Features
Board, Table and List Views
The core view is a Kanban board: clean, easy to understand, quick to start with. You can switch to a table view if you’d rather see tasks in rows and columns, which suits people migrating from spreadsheets, and a list view for a simpler linear display.
For many small teams those three views cover everything they need. You won’t find a native Gantt chart or sophisticated timeline view the way you would in heavier tools — more on that below.
Task Cards and Custom Fields
Each card holds a reasonable amount of information: assignees, due dates, priority levels, labels and a description. You can add custom fields to boards, which lets you tailor Plaky to your workflow rather than forcing your work into a rigid structure.
That’s genuinely useful for teams with slightly unusual processes — a marketing agency tracking campaign deliverables, or a building contractor managing jobs with custom status columns.
The Clockify Integration
This is where Plaky does something smart for its audience. Because Clockify comes from the same company, the two integrate natively. From inside a Plaky task you can start a Clockify timer with one click, and the time logs against that specific task automatically.
For anyone billing hourly — freelancers, consultants, agencies, tradespeople quoting on project work — that removes real friction and reduces the chance of forgetting to log time.
One important caveat if you’re planning a free Plaky-plus-Clockify stack. Clockify’s free plan is now capped at five users, and two features freelancers usually need — billable rates and data export — sit on its Basic tier at €3.99 per seat per month. So the combined free setup works for a solo user or small team tracking hours for their own information. If you’re billing clients from those hours, budget for Clockify’s paid tier even if Plaky stays free.
Collaboration and Permissions
You can assign tasks to people, comment on cards, and use mentions to flag things to colleagues. It covers team collaboration basics well.
Permissions and access controls exist but are simple compared to enterprise-grade tools. For a small team on straightforward projects that’s fine. For a larger organisation with complex role-based access needs, look elsewhere.
Automations
Plaky offers some automation — changing a task’s status when a due date passes, notifying someone when a card moves. The depth is modest compared to monday.com or ClickUp and their extensive, sometimes overwhelming, automation builders.
If your processes are straightforward, Plaky’s automations will do. If you need complex multi-step workflows, you’ll hit limits.
Plaky Pricing: What to Check Before You Sign Up
Plaky prices in euros, not pounds or dollars. That gets misreported constantly, and for a UK buyer it means exchange rate exposure plus any foreign transaction fee your business account applies each month.
| Plan | Billed annually | Billed monthly |
|---|---|---|
| Free | €0, unlimited users | — |
| Pro | €3.99 per seat | €4.99 |
| Enterprise | €8.99 per seat | €10.99 |
| cake.com Productivity Suite bundle | €12.99 per seat | €15.99 |
There are three tiers, not four. Plaky runs Free, Pro and Enterprise — some comparison articles list a middle “Business” plan that doesn’t exist.
The Free Plan Is Unlimited on Users, Not on Everything
The headline claim holds: Plaky’s free plan covers an unlimited number of users, along with unlimited spaces, boards, items and views. That’s genuinely unusual, and it’s the strongest reason to choose it. It’s also worth confirming precisely because CAKE.com capped Clockify’s free tier at five users during 2026 — Plaky hasn’t gone the same way.
But “unlimited file storage” is not accurate, and you’ll see it claimed widely. Free caps at 10 MB per file, rising to 25 MB on Pro and 100 MB on Enterprise. If you share design files, video or graphics-heavy PDFs, that’s the first limit you’ll hit.
The other free-tier constraints worth knowing before you build a workflow around it:
- 6 fields per board (unlimited from Pro)
- 7-day activity log (6 months on Pro, unlimited on Enterprise)
- Dashboards limited to 1 board each (up to 15 on Pro, 30 on Enterprise)
- No automations (1,000 actions a month on Pro, unlimited on Enterprise)
- No Gantt view, no private boards, no viewer role
Free does include chart view, summary row, member and admin user roles, and My tasks.
What Pro Adds at €3.99
Gantt view, private dashboards and boards, unlimited fields, multiple charts view, a viewer role, 1,000 automation actions a month, conditional colouring, bulk actions, invite and team permissions, a timeline field, 25 MB per file, a 6-month activity log, and board and task templates.
For a small business that has outgrown the free tier, €3.99 a seat is a modest step — and 1,000 automation actions is more than monday.com Standard offers at £11 a seat.
Enterprise at €8.99
Board permissions, dashboard and board ownership management, dashboards up to 30 boards, unlimited automations, 100 MB per file, unlimited activity log, custom user profiles, custom subdomain and single sign-on.
The cake.com Bundle
At €12.99 per seat per month billed annually, or €15.99 monthly, the Productivity Suite packages Plaky with Clockify time tracking and Pumble team communication at Enterprise feature levels, against a combined standalone value CAKE.com puts at €27.97 per seat. Note the bundle excludes Data regions for Clockify.
What Plaky Does Well
It’s clean and easy to learn. New team members get up to speed in an hour or less. No steep learning curve, which matters if you’re a small business owner without time to run training.
The Clockify integration is seamless. If time tracking matters to your business, one-click timers from inside a task is a meaningful differentiator.
It handles “getting off spreadsheets” well. If your team is ready to move from a shared Google Sheet to something purpose-built, Plaky is a low-friction first step.
The free plan is positioned as genuinely usable, not a trial designed to frustrate you into upgrading — subject to confirming its current limits.
Where Plaky Falls Short
No advanced resource planning. You can’t see at a glance who’s overloaded and who has capacity. monday.com and ClickUp offer workload views for redistributing work; Plaky doesn’t.
Reporting is basic. No meaningful reporting dashboard, no burndown charts, no built-in time analytics. You’d lean on Clockify’s reporting for time data — and note that exporting that data requires Clockify’s paid Basic tier.
No native Gantt or timeline view. If your projects involve dependencies, where Task B can’t start until Task A finishes, you’ll struggle to visualise that in Plaky. This matters for anyone used to timeline planning.
Not an upgrade from monday.com. If you’ve been using monday.com, ClickUp or Asana and want something more powerful, Plaky is a step backwards. It’s built for teams moving up from spreadsheets, not teams outgrowing established platforms.
The ecosystem is still maturing. Third-party integrations are more limited than established players offer. If you rely on specific UK tools like Xero or QuickBooks, check compatibility before committing.
Who Should Use Plaky?
A strong fit for:
- UK freelancers and sole traders wanting a simple way to manage client work without paying for software they’ll use a fraction of
- Small agencies already using Clockify who want project management and time tracking to talk to each other
- Small teams currently on spreadsheets who want structure without a steep learning curve
- Startups watching costs who need something functional now with room to grow
Not the right fit for:
- Teams needing advanced reporting, resource planning or complex automations
- Businesses with strict role-based access requirements
- Anyone looking for an upgrade from monday.com or ClickUp
- Teams that need everything billed in pounds with no currency exposure
How Does Plaky Compare?
Trello uses a similar Kanban layout and has a free tier with its own limits — check the current board and workspace caps, as Trello has revised these. Trello has a larger third-party integration ecosystem and a longer track record. Plaky’s advantage is the native Clockify link, which Trello doesn’t have.
Asana is worth a price anchor because its figures are clear: Personal is free for up to two users, Starter is £9.49 per user per month on annual billing (currently £8.49 promotional) or £11.59 monthly, and Advanced is £20.99 (£16.99 promotional) or £25. Asana bills in pounds, and AI features are included on all paid plans.
That two-user free cap is the useful comparison. Whatever Plaky’s current free limit turns out to be, Asana’s is tight — so if a free plan for a team of more than two is your requirement, Plaky is worth checking on that basis specifically.
FAQ
Is Plaky free for UK businesses?
Yes, and the free plan covers an unlimited number of users along with unlimited spaces, boards, items and views. The real limits are 6 fields per board, a 7-day activity log, 10 MB storage per file, one board per dashboard, and no automations. Paid tiers are Pro at €3.99 per seat and Enterprise at €8.99.
What currency does Plaky charge in?
Euros. Pro is €3.99 per seat per month billed annually or €4.99 monthly; Enterprise is €8.99 or €10.99. Plaky is frequently quoted in pounds or dollars elsewhere, which is wrong — account for the exchange rate and any foreign transaction fee your business account applies.
Does Plaky work with HMRC’s Making Tax Digital?
No. Plaky is project management software with no connection to MTD. If you use Clockify alongside it, you can export time logs to inform invoicing in Xero or QuickBooks — though export requires Clockify’s paid Basic tier at €3.99 per seat. Your MTD obligations are handled by your accounting software.
Is Plaky suitable for sole traders?
Yes, particularly if you juggle multiple clients and want a simple visual system. The Clockify integration is especially useful if you bill hourly — bearing in mind that billable rates in Clockify are a paid feature, so the fully free version of that workflow tracks your time without pricing it.
How does Plaky compare to Trello?
Both use Kanban boards. Plaky’s built-in Clockify integration is its differentiator; Trello’s larger Power-Up ecosystem and longer track record are its. Compare their current free tier limits directly, as both have changed.
Conclusion: Our Honest Recommendation
Plaky isn’t the most powerful project management tool available, and it isn’t trying to be. What it does well is give small UK businesses and freelancers a clean, functional way to manage work more effectively than a shared spreadsheet, at a price point built around accessibility.
If you’re a freelancer or small agency already using Clockify, adding Plaky is an easy decision — the one-click time tracking alone saves enough friction to justify it. Just be clear that the fully free version of that stack tops out at five Clockify users and won’t handle billable rates or data export without Clockify’s €3.99 tier.
If you’re a small team on spreadsheets feeling the strain, Plaky is an accessible, low-risk first step into proper project management.
If you’ve outgrown monday.com and need something more powerful, look elsewhere.
Before you commit, check the 10 MB per-file limit against how you actually share work, and remember you’ll be billed in euros — so factor in the exchange rate and any foreign transaction fee.
Try it free, see whether it fits your workflow, and only consider upgrading if you hit the limits. For the right team it’s a genuinely useful tool.
Pricing and features correct at time of writing. Plans and capabilities are subject to change — always confirm current details on the provider’s website before purchasing.