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ProofHub vs Smartsheet - Comparison 2025

ProofHub vs. Smartsheet

Last updated on

Reviewed by Camin McCluskey

Stackfix Co-Founder & CTO

CM

Smartsheet and Proofhub serve distinct project management needs, with Smartsheet excelling in data-intensive, technical work through its spreadsheet-like interface and robust automation capabilities. It's ideal for larger organizations requiring sophisticated workload management and extensive integrations.

Proofhub, conversely, shines in its ease of use and communication features, making it perfect for teams prioritizing quick adoption and seamless collaboration. While Smartsheet offers superior automation and customization options, Proofhub provides a more intuitive, visually appealing experience with better built-in communication tools.

ProofHub Product Logo

Advantages of ProofHub

Proofhub offers superior built-in communication features
Unlike Smartsheet which lacks built-in chat, Proofhub provides robust in-app communication tools including group chats, individual messaging, and task comments. This integrated approach keeps all project-related communication in one place, which we found particularly valuable for teams that need to collaborate closely on projects.
Proofhub is significantly easier to use for basic project management
We found Proofhub's interface much more intuitive and user-friendly compared to Smartsheet's spreadsheet-based approach. While testing, we estimated new users could become proficient in Proofhub within 1-2 hours, whereas Smartsheet required several days of learning. This makes Proofhub particularly valuable for teams that need to get up and running quickly without extensive training.
Proofhub has better visual appeal and interface design
During testing, we found Proofhub's interface more visually appealing with thoughtful touches of color and well-structured UI compared to Smartsheet's plain, spreadsheet-like appearance. This makes daily use more pleasant and helps with quick visual processing of information. While Smartsheet focuses on functionality, it lacks the visual polish that Proofhub offers.
Smartsheet Product Logo

Advantages of Smartsheet

Smartsheet is significantly better at automating workflows
We found Smartsheet's automation capabilities to be exceptional, with conditional logic and a large selection of pre-built trigger and action functions. Teams can choose from about 25 templates for pre-prepared automations or create custom ones. In contrast, Proofhub completely lacks automation capabilities, making it less suitable for teams looking to streamline repetitive tasks.
Smartsheet has much better workload management
Smartsheet provides sophisticated workload management through features like workload heatmaps and schedules, allowing managers to see who has capacity and who is overallocated. Proofhub only shows basic task assignments, making it harder to balance team workloads effectively.
Smartsheet has broader integration capabilities
Smartsheet offers more comprehensive integration options, including Zapier and JIRA, which are notably absent from Proofhub. This makes Smartsheet more suitable for teams that need to connect their project management tool with other business systems.
Smartsheet offers superior form creation capabilities
Smartsheet's form creation feature is outstanding, allowing teams to build highly customizable forms with various question types, conditional logic, and cosmetic customizations. Forms can automatically populate sheets and create tasks. Proofhub lacks any form creation capability, making it less effective for teams that need to gather structured input from stakeholders.

ProofHub is best for

  • Businesses with a moderate number of active projects (5-10 projects at a time)
  • Who need intuitive task management with visual dashboards and need granular custom reporting capabilities
  • And/or who want seamless team communication and need built-in chat with project-specific group discussions.

Smartsheet is best for

  • Businesses with a high number of active projects (10+ projects at a time)
  • Who need granular data collection and analysis through highly customizable forms that automatically populate spreadsheets
  • And/or who want sophisticated resource management with features like workload heatmaps and capacity tracking.

ProofHub is less good for

  • Businesses with a high number of active projects (10+ projects at a time) who need sophisticated workflow automation and extensive third-party integrations
  • Who need advanced resource management capabilities and workload visualization for team capacity planning
  • And/or who need advanced project templates and sophisticated document management with extensive customization options.

Smartsheet is less good for

  • Businesses with a low number of active projects (3-5 projects at a time) who need simple, intuitive task management without spreadsheet complexity.
  • Who need real-time document collaboration and built-in chat features for quick team communication
  • And/or who need seamless integration with developer tools like GitHub or support desk solutions like Zendesk.

Gallery

ProofHub logoProofHub
ProofHub screenshot
Smartsheet logoSmartsheet
Smartsheet screenshot

Pricing, features & ratings

ProofHub logo

ProofHub

Starting at

$50

Billed monthly

Pricing calculatorVisit Website
Smartsheet logo

Smartsheet

Starting at

$12

user / month

Billed monthly

Pricing calculatorVisit Website
Stackfix Verdict
Functionality
5

Functionality

5/10

<p>ProofHub does the basics well and that's about it. It offers easy to use task management features like creating subtasks, dependencies, simple but effective timesheets and strong custom and self-serve reporting dashboard. It offers no automation and limited integrations.</p>
8

Functionality

8/10

<p>Smartsheet has all the functionality that companies will need - including some more sophisticated functions required only my large companies. Smartsheet offers: excellent portfolio management features, cell history, strong automation and some nifty team capacity reporting features.</p>
Ease of Use
9

Ease of Use

9/10

<p>ProofHub is very easy to use. We estimate that an average start-up employee would require around 1-2 hours before being proficient at using all key functionalities.</p><p><br></p><p>Processes are intuitive and require few clicks to find. This goes even for the more advanced features like custom reporting.</p>
5

Ease of Use

5/10

<p>Smartsheet is designed to function in a similar way to a spreadsheet. If you are comfortable using these or have used them before, learning your way around Smartsheet will be easier. However, even if this is the case, processes can be a bit fiddley compared to other project management tools. We estimate that average start-up employee and would require a few days and some guidance before being able to use the product fluently.</p><p><br></p><p>Key information and processes are generally easy to find but not always easy to perform.</p>
Look and feel
6

Look and feel

6/10

<p>Nice touches of colour and and well-structured UI make ProofHub visually acceptable The home page in particular organised all salient information into an easy-to-read and attractive set of widgets, though it lacks that touch of elegance offered by more modern competitors. </p><p><br></p><p>Loading times are fast ~1 second.</p>
6

Look and feel

6/10

<p>Smartsheet lacks colour and is generally a bit plain to look at. That being said, the software is visually acceptable and for the most part has fast loading times (~1 second). When first creating a new project or workspace, loading times can be slower (upwards of 6 seconds) - but this is a one off occurrence.</p>
Customisability
8

Customisability

8/10

<p>Custom reports, dashboards, widgets on the homepage and fields are the best features here. Custom reports allow you to collect data on based on any custom fields you have assigned to projects and tasks and display such information using bar charts.</p><p>Cosmetically, you can use white-labelling to make your workspace consistent with your branding and aesthetic. Custom domain names are also available.</p><p><br></p><p>There is no customisable automation is available.</p>
8

Customisability

8/10

<p>Smartsheet has some very strong customisation features. The most impressive being their forms which are customisable in almost every way - from question type to, condition logic, to cosmetics etc. Automation is also nicely customisable with a vast array of action and trigger functions, as well as conditional logic available. Smartsheet could benefit from a few more task views - other similar project management tools offer far more!</p>
Ease of Setup
7

Ease of Setup

7/10

<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>
8

Ease of Setup

8/10

<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, because it has a very rich library of templates. Full setup should take a day or two at most.</p>
Customer Support
6

Customer Support

6/10

<p>ProofHub push their self-serve materials, albeit they are of strong depth and quality - with videos and articles covering almost all queries you could have. However, no personalised in-app chat is available. You must click through their self-serve materials until you arrive at a 'questions and queries section' where you can complete a form and receive an email response. Responses usually take less than 12 hours and are usually helpful.</p>
6

Customer Support

6/10

<p>Personalised support is available via email and and in-app chat. The in-app chat feature is not something to rely on too much as responses are not always fast. Email agents are very accommodating, useful and fast (relies in less than 6 hours).&nbsp;</p><p><br></p><p>Self-serve materials are strong but not exceptional. They do not have 'how to's' for every feature. This is likely to drive traffic to their paid 'Smartsheet University' where they charge to teach you basic, intermediate and advanced functions in Smartsheet.&nbsp;</p>
Integratability
5

Integratability

5/10

<p>ProofHub is let down by its lack of integrations with only 14 available and some useful software -like Zapier, Zendesk, Notion and Jira - missing. That being said basic integrations like Quickbooks, email and Slack work well.</p><p><br></p><p>To mitigate this, however, ProofHub offers an API for custom integrations.</p>
7

Integratability

7/10

<p>Smartsheet offers integrations with most third-parties that companies will need. However, some notable exceptions are Notion, Github and Zendesk.</p><p><br></p><p>Smartsheet also offers can API that allows teams to build custom integrations where necessary.</p>
Ease of Migration
8

Ease of Migration

8/10

<p>All self-serve and custom reports are available to export to CSV or PDF file with one click.</p>
8

Ease of Migration

8/10

<p>Key data and custom reports are available self-serve to export to a CSV file.</p>
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