MS Project vs Planner

Where the move from Project Online
to Planner costs you

Where the move from Project Online
to Planner costs you

Where the move to Planner
costs you

Planner is a basic project management tool, more a task tracker.


Planner could work for you if you manage a dozen medium-size projects and a team of less than 20.


You don't need portfolio management, and you're looking for a nice-looking project management tool inside Microsoft 365 ecosystem using only out-of-the-box features, without the option for deep customization.

Basic plan is free, but covers almost nothing from real project management. Premium adds depth — at a price comparable to stronger alternatives.


*Teams Tasks and Project for the Web — both are now Planner. Microsoft merged these tools over the years.

Leaving Behind · Project Online

What you rely on

What you
rely on

∞ Custom fields

Custom fields

Full

Gantt & Baselines

Native

Time Tracking

Effort

Planned + actual hours in the box, plan and reality stay aligned

Fields & Views

Unlimited custom fields, scoped per project / task / resource, views per role

Permissions

Deligation, flexible roles and groups

Desktop Client

Edit project plans off-line, share as a file externally and with couleagues

Moving To · Planner

What Planner gives & costs

10

Custom fields max

$30/u/mo*

Top tier, same as PO

+2

Tools to add tracking

Inside Microsoft 365

Navigate and link documents in SharePoint, surface the plan right inside Teams

Clean UI

A clean, modern interface for basic task management — list, board, a few views

Effort

No native time tracking. You rebuild it on Power Apps + Power Automate — a second tool over the first

Cost vs Depth

Even on the top Planner Premium tier, significantly fewer functions than Project Online — at the same price

Get a right-fit assessment →

* Planner and Project Plan 3 — $30.00 user/month, paid yearly. Microsoft pricing, as of 20 June 2026.

The Real Work

What you rebuild from scratch

What you rebuild from scratch

Moving from Project Online to Planner Premium isn’t an export-import. These five carry over as work, not data.

01

Workflows

Project initiation, closure, change requests — the approval chains rebuilt on the new platform’s triggers.

02

Custom fields

Best rebuilt directly in dedicated Power Apps forms, not forced into Planner’s ten-field cap.

03

Dashboards

The look can stay. The data structure changes entirely — data import and the semantic model get fully reworked.

04

Documentation

Every user and administrator guide, rewritten for the new environment and its real screens.

05

Team training

PMO, project managers, and executives trained on the new system before cutover, not after.

This is the part that breaks quietly if no one plans it.

Map your migration →

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Planner Premium?

Plain Planner is a simple task tracker — a task board, no dependencies, no Gantt chart, no real schedule. Planner Premium (Plan 1, $10/user/month) steps up to medium-weight project management: scheduling, task dependencies, and a Gantt chart. Plan 3 ($30/user/month) goes further — portfolios, baselines, critical path, and the Project desktop app.

Assessment

Everything above — plus how it connects into your wider ecosystem: CRM, finance systems, Office 365, executive dashboards, document templates, and the policies built around them. Deliverable: Migration scope document — what migrates, what gets rebuilt, what stays, and where it connects.

Can I link Planner to Project Online?

Not in any real, two-way sense. They're separate products with different data models — there's no native sync that keeps a Planner plan and a Project Online project in step. What people usually want here is a migration, not a link: moving the plan, the structure, and the history from Project Online into Planner. That's a one-time transition, not a live connection.

Target Architecture

For most Project Online environments, the right destination sits inside the Microsoft ecosystem — Planner Premium, Dataverse, Power Apps, SharePoint, Power BI, Power Automate, or a hybrid with Project Desktop / Project Server. Where your team already runs on a different platform (or would love to move to one) — Jira, ClickUp, Asana, Smartsheet, Monday — the assessment in Layer 1 determines whether that's the better path forward. Deliverable: Architecture proposal with platform decision rationale.

Planner and Project — Plan 3 vs Plan 5?

Plan 5 belonged to the old Project Online line, built for portfolio management at the enterprise level. It's no longer the plan to look at — Project Online is retiring, and Plan 5 with it. On the current Planner pricing page there are two paid tiers: Plan 1 ($10) and Planner and Project Plan 3 ($30). Plan 3 is the top tier now, and the one to compare against what you had.

Data Migration

Transfer of projects, tasks, milestones, resources, metadata, documents, permissions, reporting structure — with full mapping logic. Deliverable: Migrated tenant with verified data integrity.

Is Planner the same as Project Online?

No. Planner carries roughly a third of what Project Online did. It's good for quickly laying out a project schedule and working on it across a team. But it isn't a replacement for Project Online — it's an independent product with different logic, different capabilities, and a different architecture underneath.

Reporting Rebuild

Project Online uses OData for Power BI. The new Project for the web / Planner Premium layer connects through Dataverse and Power Platform — your reports get rebuilt on the new model, not patched. Deliverable: Rebuilt dashboards, validated against the old reporting logic.

Can I keep notes and export reports in Planner?

Yes for notes, with limits. You can keep notes in a task's Description field, break work down with a checklist inside the task card, and discuss the project in the linked Teams channel. That covers day-to-day capture. Export is where it stops short. Planner has no built-in way to produce a well-formatted report or PDF — for that you need additional development on the Microsoft Power Platform, pulling the data out and shaping it into the report you actually want.

Automation and Governance

Approval workflows — project initiation, change requests, closure — plus reminders, status flows, notifications, dashboards, document links, and permissions, restored in the new environment. Deliverable: Working workflows on Power Automate against new triggers.

Does Planner fit me?

Yes, if you're a smaller organisation running short-term projects (up to about six months), your projects are fairly standard, you want to lay out a plan quickly, and you don't need to dig into the heavier machinery of advanced project systems — light configuration is enough for you. No, if you run complex plans with materials, costs, and external teams who also need to work inside the plan. That's where Planner's ceiling shows up fast.

Training and Adoption

PMO, project managers, and executives continue working — not handed "a new tool without the old logic". Deliverable: Training session + documentation package + 30-day handover support.

Ready to move from
Project Online without friction?

MOVE FROM
PROJECT ONLINE WITHOUT DISRUPTING
YOUR BUSINESS

Get a specialist-led transition plan built around your business —
not a forced move into a fixed tool

Request transition support

Slava Shamak

15 years migrating & building PMOs

MS Certified · PMP · MS Project exams

Clients across 20+ countries

Slava Shamak

Project-systems specialist · 15 years migrating & building PMOs

Microsoft Certified · PMP · MS Project exams 74-343 & 74-344

Clients across 20+ countries

MOVE FROM
PROJECT ONLINE WITHOUT DISRUPTING
YOUR BUSINESS

Business-first project-systems specialist helping companies move smarter — not just faster — through automation and the right-fit to your company ecosystem solution

Request transition support

Slava Shamak

15 years migrating & building PMOs

MS Certified · PMP · MS Project exams

Clients across 20+ countries

Slava Shamak

Project-systems specialist · 15 years migrating & building PMOs

Microsoft Certified · PMP · MS Project exams 74-343 & 74-344

Clients across 20+ countries