TLDR (Summary)
Monday.com handles team project management but stops at task boards, so invoicing, proposals, contracts, payments, and client portals all need separate tools on top. The 3-seat minimum on every paid plan means solo freelancers pay $36-72/month before adding any of those missing tools. Plutio is a fully branded platform where proposals, projects, time tracking, invoicing, and client portals are all connected. When a proposal gets signed, the project creates itself, tracked hours flow into invoices, and clients check progress and pay from a branded portal.
The 3-seat minimum that triples the cost for solo freelancers
Monday.com's pricing page advertises $9/seat/month, but every paid plan requires buying at least 3 seats, so the actual starting price is $27-72/month depending on the tier and billing cycle.
The 3-seat minimum applies to every paid tier: Basic ($12/seat monthly), Standard ($14/seat monthly), and Pro ($24/seat monthly). For a solo freelancer, the cheapest paid option is $36/month for 3 Basic seats billed monthly, and the Pro plan with time tracking and full automations costs $72/month for those same 3 seats.
After 3 seats, pricing jumps in blocks: 3, 5, 10, 15, 20. A team of 4 pays for 5 seats. A team of 6 pays for 10. The jump from 3 to 5 seats adds 67% more cost for one additional person. The jump from 5 to 10 doubles the bill for a single extra team member.
Trustpilot reviewers call the pricing misleading. One January 2026 reviewer wrote: "You can only purchase 3 seats as a minimum, which for a solo business is pointless. The pricing structure is VERY misleading." Monday.com holds a 2.7 out of 5 rating on Trustpilot from over 3,300 reviews, with billing complaints appearing in nearly every negative review.
Auto-renewal adds to the frustration. Subscriptions renew without email notification, and users who miss the 30-day cancellation window report being denied refunds. One reviewer described the experience as a "scam" after auto-renewal charged the full annual amount with no prior warning.
Monday.com advertises $9/seat. A solo freelancer actually pays $36-72/month for a plan with two empty seats, and missing the renewal window locks in another full year.
What Monday.com handles well for project management
Monday.com delivers visual project boards with Kanban, Gantt, timeline, and calendar views plus automations that reduce manual work across team workflows.
The interface updates in real-time. Switching between table, Kanban, Gantt, calendar, and timeline views happens without rebuilding the project structure. Automations trigger when a status changes: reassign tasks, send notifications, or update connected boards without manual intervention.
Monday's integration library connects with over 200 tools, including Slack, Google Workspace, Jira, and GitHub. For development teams and agencies managing internal projects, the workflow customization handles multi-step processes with conditional logic.
The 2025-2026 updates added AI features for task prioritization, improved dashboards, and formula columns. Monday CRM, a separate product at additional pricing, added pipeline management and lead tracking for sales workflows.
For team-based project management where multiple people collaborate on internal work, Monday.com covers task tracking and workflow automation. The gaps show up when a freelancer needs the business side: proposals, contracts, invoicing, payments, and a place where clients see project progress without seeing internal boards. Monday handles the project work but not the business operations that follow.
Monday.com covers project boards and team automations. For freelancers who need to bill clients, send contracts, and share progress externally, every business function requires a separate subscription.
What Monday.com doesn't do for freelancers
Monday.com handles internal project management but has no invoicing, proposals, contracts, payments, or client-facing portals, so freelancers manage every business function in separate tools.
No invoicing or payments
Monday.com has no native invoicing. Generating invoices from tracked time, sending payment requests, or collecting payments through the platform isn't possible. Every invoice requires FreshBooks, QuickBooks, or Stripe running alongside, and the invoice data doesn't connect to project progress or milestones in Monday.
No proposals or contracts
Monday.com has no proposal builder, no contract templates, and no e-signature functionality. Sending a proposal means opening PandaDoc, DocuSign, or Bonsai separately, creating the document from scratch, and then manually updating Monday when the client signs. A signed proposal doesn't create a project automatically.
No client portal
Monday boards are internal. Sharing a board with a client exposes internal notes, team discussions, and task details that aren't meant for external eyes. There's no branded client portal where clients check progress, approve deliverables, or download files without seeing the full project management backend.
Time tracking requires the Pro plan ($72/month minimum)
Built-in time tracking only exists on the Pro plan and above. Basic ($36/month minimum) and Standard ($42/month minimum) plans need external tools like Toggl or Harvest for time tracking. Even on the Pro plan, tracked time doesn't feed into invoices because invoicing doesn't exist.
Features locked behind escalating tiers
Advanced automations, time tracking, formula columns, and dependency views all require higher-tier plans. A Trustpilot reviewer described it as "continuous add-on fees for AI features, marketplace tools, additional modules" where meaningful use requires the Pro version plus paid extras on top. Each upgrade applies to all 3+ seats, multiplying the cost increase.
Monday.com does project management. Sending the first proposal, tracking billable hours, generating invoices, and collecting payment all require separate tools that don't connect to the project board.
Sign up / Pricing is VERY misleading. You can only purchase 3 seats as a minimum, which for a solo business is pointless.
The real cost of a Monday-based freelance workflow
Monday.com's subscription is the starting point. Adding invoicing, contracts, and time tracking tools to cover every gap pushes the monthly cost past $100.
The monthly math for a Monday-based freelance workflow in 2026:
- Monday Pro: $72/month (3 seats x $24, the minimum plan with time tracking)
- FreshBooks or QuickBooks: $21-30/month (invoicing and payments)
- Bonsai or PandaDoc: $19-25/month (proposals and contracts)
- Total: $112-127/month for four tools that don't share data
The Standard plan saves on Monday's subscription ($42/month) but requires adding Toggl ($9/month) for time tracking, pushing the total to $89-106/month for five separate tools.
Then there's the time cost. Finishing a project on Monday, switching to PandaDoc for the proposal, opening FreshBooks for the invoice, and emailing the client because there's no shared portal adds hours of non-billable admin each week. Asana research estimates workers lose roughly 200 hours per year switching between applications.
Plutio at $19/month covers projects, proposals, contracts, time tracking, invoicing, and client portals in one place. The pricing is flat per workspace, not per seat. The subscription alone saves $93-108/month over the Monday stack, and the connected workflow removes the hours spent copying data between tools.
A solo freelancer pays $112-127/month for a Monday-based workflow. The same functions cost $19/month on a platform where the project, the invoice, and the client portal are already connected.
Where Monday.com users are switching in 2026
Freelancers leaving Monday.com look for platforms that keep the project management but add invoicing, contracts, and client portals without per-seat pricing.
For the full freelance workflow in one platform
Plutio starts at $19/month with no seat minimums and connects proposals to projects to invoicing in one flow. When a client signs a proposal, the project creates automatically with tasks, timelines, and a branded client portal. Time tracking feeds directly into invoices. For freelancers who need to manage projects and bill clients from the same platform, Plutio replaces the 3-4 tool stack. The full Plutio vs Monday comparison covers feature-by-feature details.
For project management with a free tier
Asana offers a free plan for up to 10 users with core task management features. Paid plans start at $11/user/month with no seat minimums. Asana has the same gaps as Monday (no invoicing, proposals, or client portals) but the free tier and single-seat pricing make Asana cheaper for solo users who only need project management. See the Asana deep dive for trade-offs.
For proposals, contracts, and basic projects
Dubsado at $35/month handles the opposite side of the workflow: proposals, contracts, invoicing, and intake automation. Project management is basic, but the business functions that Monday lacks are built in. For freelancers whose main frustration is sending invoices and contracts, Dubsado covers that gap. See the Dubsado deep dive for trade-offs.
For a broader comparison, the project management tools comparison covers pricing, features, and trade-offs across 8 platforms.
The common thread: every platform Monday.com freelancers switch to either costs less or includes the business features that Monday requires 2-3 extra tools to cover.
With Plutio we don't jump between apps anymore! Everything from projects to invoicing is finally connected in one fully-branded app.
How to switch from Monday.com to Plutio
Most freelancers complete the transition in 1-2 weeks by finishing active Monday projects while starting new clients on Plutio.
- Start a free trial: Plutio offers 14 days of full access with no credit card required. Every feature, including projects, invoicing, proposals, time tracking, and client portals, works from day one.
- Export project data: Monday.com supports board export to Excel/CSV. Download active and archived boards, including task names, statuses, dates, and assignees. File attachments need to be downloaded separately from each item.
- Import client contacts: Export contacts from Monday as a CSV and import them into Plutio. Client names, emails, and details carry over in minutes.
- Set up a project template: Create one project template with the standard task list, milestones, and deliverable structure. Every new project starts from the template instead of manual setup.
- Start new clients on Plutio: Send the next proposal from Plutio. When the client signs, the project creates automatically with the template structure, portal access, and contract attached.
- Cancel Monday.com before auto-renewal: Monday subscriptions renew without email notification. Set a calendar reminder for the cancellation deadline. Users who miss the 30-day window report being denied refunds.
The hardest part of switching from Monday.com isn't the data migration. The hardest part is finding one platform that replaces both Monday and the 2-3 business tools stacked on top of Monday. Starting with a platform that covers projects, proposals, invoicing, and client portals removes the need to rebuild a multi-tool workflow from scratch.
The switch happens between projects, not mid-project. New clients start on Plutio while Monday.com projects finish naturally.
