| Functionality | 6 <p>Linear focuses on delivering exceptional functionality required for planning and building software products. including excellent product planning, cycling planning and issue tracking functionality. However, this means that compared to other PM tools, Linear lacks some common functionality, e.g. timeline/ Gantt view for tasks, adding custom fields, time-tracking, an automations module.</p> | 6 <p>ProjectManager has most of the functionality that any team will need. More importantly, these features are done well. Reporting, automations and task management are all strong and easy to use. However, none of ProjectManager's features are exceptional - they do the basics and they do them well - that's it. For example, automations are only offer 12 action and 7 trigger functions and no integrations with email, slack etc.</p> |
| Ease of Use | 9 <p>Using Linear is a delight. Its keyboard-first design allows you to breeze through workflows with ease—most actions, like creating a new task, are just a single shortcut away (press “C,” and you’re good to go). With its streamlined functionality, finding key information and navigating core workflows feels intuitive. Thanks to its smooth onboarding process, most startup employees can feel comfortable with the platform in just 1-2 hours, even with minimal guidance.</p><p>That said, Linear isn’t the most beginner-friendly tool. For users less familiar with keyboard shortcuts, it can feel a bit daunting at first. Plus, it offers fewer templates and less in-app guidance compared to alternatives like Asana or Monday, which might leave some teams wishing for a little more hand-holding.</p> | 8 <p>The learning curve here is not steep at all - the product is usable right from the word go. We estimate that a start-up employee would require about 1 hour and some guidance to be comfortable using all key functionalities.</p><p><br></p><p>Most key functionalities are very intuitively located. However some are hidden. For example, automations are not well-labelled on the UI.</p> |
| Look and feel | 9 <p>If you like modern, minimalist app designs with a touch of elegance, then you will love Linear. Every Linear page is beautifully laid-out and colour-coded, every interaction & transition is silky smooth, and page loads are lightning fast.</p> | 6 <p>ProjectManager has some colour customisation available. That being said, it could do with a touch more finesse in places. It is by no means an unattractive piece of software but it's nothing special.</p><p><br></p><p>Loading times are fast at ~ 1 second per page.</p> |
| Customisability | 4 <p>Linear proudly admits that it is inflexible —and for good reason. They believe overly flexible software lets everyone create their own workflows, which eventually leads to chaos. For instance, you can’t add custom fields in Linear or build your own bespoke workflows. You’re also limited to just two task (or issue) views: board and list. It’s a “less is more” philosophy, designed to keep things simple and focused.</p> | 5 <p>ProjectManager could do better here, but still has some good customisation. You cannot create a custom report in ProjectManager - there are only self-serve reports available. However, the level of filtering available when choosing which projects, tasks, tags etc. should be measured when creating these self-serve reports is extensive. Automations, on the other hand, could do more customisation wise. They offer basic automations - but no email templates or integrations with 3rd parties, e.g. sending a message in Slack.</p> |
| Ease of Setup | 8 <p>Linear offers a self-serve free trial and lets you purchase directly—no need to deal with sales. If you're familiar with agile methodology, then setting up Linear should be a breeze since it anticipates everything you need, including sprints, Kanban board, and a backlog. You can get started with a project and a few tasks within 10-20 minutes, with full customization taking 1-2 hours.</p> | 7 <p>Offers a self-serve free trial and allows purchase without needing to talk to sales. Getting started and setting up a few tasks and subtasks should take 20-30 minutes, but it lacks a rich library of templates. Full setup should take less than a day.</p> |
| Customer Support | 9 <p>Linear’s support team is easy to reach—you can submit a question directly in the app. When tested, their response time was impressive (under an hour), and the support agent was both knowledgeable and genuinely helpful.</p><p>The Linear team has also been open and responsive to feedback.</p> | 7 <p>Personalised support is not available via in-app chat but is available on email and and over the phone. Responses are fast and helpful.</p><p><br></p><p>Self-serve materials are of great depth and quality. In particular, their onboarding materials essentially tell you all you need to know to use the ley functionality and leaves you feeling in control of the product.</p> |
| Integratability | 7 <p>Linear might not boast the extensive list of integrations you’ll find with other project management tools, but it likely covers everything a tech startup needs for software development. The integrations it does offer are top-notch—high-quality and thoughtfully crafted. Plus, if you need something more specific, Linear provides an API for building custom integrations.</p> | 5 <p>ProjectManager integrates with some tools natively but relies heavily of Zapier for most integrations. For example, Salesforce, Jira, onedrive, dropbox are all available only through Zapier.</p><p><br></p><p>However, ProjectManager offers an API to build custom integrations where necessary. </p> |
| Ease of Migration | 9 <p>Linear makes it easy to export all your key data—workspace, team members, projects, and tasks—directly into CSV format through a self-serve option. You can also export data via its analytics module or by integrating with Google Sheets. For anything else, Linear’s API has you covered, giving you full control over exporting additional data.</p> | 8 <p>Exports of all key data, reports and dashboards are available to PDF and/or excel.</p> |
