Our review of Wrike

Wrike is a project management tool created in 2006. With its broad functional scope, this software is ideal for complex projects and large teams.

Although Wrike can be more difficult to set up for small teams, its qualities mean that it is used by over 20,000 customers worldwide.

Read our review of Wrike in this article!

My opinion of Wrike in a nutshell

Wrike: Functional scope

Task management and planning

On Wrike, work is carried out in building blocks: tasks. They can be added to projects and contain information such as duration, status, due date, person responsible, comments, etc.

These tasks can be divided into sub-tasks, which can be transformed into stand-alone tasks if required. Tasks can be added to files, bookmarked, duplicated or made recurring.

On Wrike, the Gantt chart provides an overview of project progress. It lets you create tasks directly, track their progress and view pending tasks.

It also lets you plan or reschedule tasks and update the project timeline with a simple drag-and-drop action. Finally, it lets you filter tasks by status, owner, start and end dates, etc.

Collaboration and communication

Users can choose how, and to whom, to share projects and folders, and communicate with comments or mentions. The tool does not offer team chats, audio and video calls, but these are accessible via integrations.

Wrike facilitates collaboration thanks to customizable dashboards, which organize a team’s work by customer, project, calendar, etc. They provide an overview of current tasks and sub-tasks, and track their deadlines.

Wrike allows you to download and share external files, as well as view Word, Excel and PowerPoint files directly, so there’s no need to download them. Project and task files can also be shared with colleagues or customers.

The “Working hours” feature helps you manage days worked or not, and see when a team or individual employees are working. It can be used to add vacation days and overtime.

Reporting & Time tracking

Time tracking is used to record billable hours and invoice a customer, or to estimate the duration of tasks and projects. With Wrike, it’s included for Business accounts and above. It works on mobile applications, especially offline.

You can enter the time manually, or measure it using the application’s built-in timer. Wrike allows you to create a time log report, and depending on the subscription, it is possible to export time records.

Wrike’s time tracking is less efficient than that of dedicated tools, and does not work for pointing. It is also less user-friendly than other project management software: in particular, it can only be started by opening a task.

Wrike provides an overview of projects and tasks through reports, which can be updated at any time with the latest data. You can use a predefined report template or create a customized report.

A Report Generator helps you create new reports. For example, the project risk reporting model uses artificial intelligence to analyze active projects and give the probability of each project being completed on time.

Customization possibilities

Wrike lets you manage a project from start to finish, thanks to its task system, with people assigned to carry it out, a deadline, attachments, customizable status options, and its many traditional tools, such as the Gantt chart.

What sets Wrike apart from its competitors, however, is that it is not only dedicated to project management, but also to work-in-progress management. This includes tasks that don’t necessarily have a final deliverable or a fixed deadline.

For non-project work, Wrike lets you create folders in any space and store them there. Within a folder, the tool offers the choice of organizing work in different formats and views: list, table, Gantt chart…

The Wrike home page is divided into three dashboards. The one on the left shows the latest notifications and assignments, the central one contains shortcuts to your work and the one on the right quick links to smart folders and tools.

This dashboard system is very easy to use. It’s also highly modular, thanks to the four building blocks in which work is carried out: spaces, folders, projects and tasks.

Automation on Wrike

Free and Professional Plan users only have access to the default workflows. Business and Enterprise users, on the other hand, have access to customized workflows, enabling them to create and modify team workflows.

The Automation Engine is an integrated tool that automates the most frequently used workflows to reduce manual work. It lets you create a variety of automation rules, using triggers and actions.

Customer reviews of Wrike

• Customers highlight the way Wrike helps teams work together to create a natural workflow. They appreciate how the tool enables projects to move forward efficiently, and therefore plays a real role in their success.

• On the downside, some customers find Wrike unintuitive and sometimes confusing. Others deplore the quality of customer service, with changes in service levels without any real warning from customer support.

Wrike also features many detailed case studies on their Youtube channel. For example, this video explains in detail the preparations for the 75th anniversary campaign of the San Francisco 49ers:

Customer support at Wrike

Wrike’s customer support can be reached via a number of different options: email, telephone, live chat or a ticket system. However, it’s not always very responsive, and sometimes doesn’t provide customers with enough information.

Wrike’s Help Center is very comprehensive. A space where you can ask questions, and get results in the form of an article, or shared by the community. Wrike offers a community space where you can ask questions or share best practices.

To help users learn how to use the tool, Wrike also offers interactive training, videos and up-to-date notes. Finally, a rich database is also available on the Wrike Help Center, and monthly webinars are organized.

Wrike: Integrations

Depending on their package, Wrike users can integrate more than 150 other tools: cloud storage platforms for Free users, and numerous productivity applications for Professional and Business users.

Wrike also enables the use of add-on modules dedicated to integration. The pay-as-you-go Wrike Integrate module, for example, unlocks over 400 custom integrations. Some modules are even free, like the one dedicated to Microsoft Teams.

Wrike: Price list

Wrike offers 4 different plans:

• Free : provides access to task and sub-task management on web, desktop and mobile applications. Allows you to work with internal and external collaborators, with up to 2GB of storage per account.
• Professional : $7.50/month per user: gives access to shareable dashboards, interactive Gantt Charts, and productivity tool integration (MS Project, Excel, RSS)
• Business : $9.80/month per user: gives access to numerous extensions, integrations and features, such as personalized workflow, automation engine, time tracking, as well as 5 GB of storage per user.
• Enterprise : $24.80/month per user: adds access parameters and administrator functions, develops the automation engine. Provides access to audit reports and 10 GB of storage per user.

Wrike: Alternatives

For smaller teams, we recommend lighter, less expensive, and easier-to-install solutions such as Monday, Clickup, or Notion.

For larger teams, Wrike is a very solid solution, but for better customer support you can look atAsana, and for agile project management we recommend Jira.

In terms of pricing, Basecamp will soon be more attractive with its unique plan for unlimited users.