Canny.io Alternatives: I’ve Tried & Analyzed 25+ Product Roadmap & Discovery Software to Help You Make a Decision

canny.io alternatives

I used to be a marketer in the product management SaaS category and I’ve tried, analyzed and worked with  25+ different product management tools. Canny.io was one of them. Love the UX, but you it does not solve many basic product management, customer discovery and roadmap issues. So, I thought sharing the best Canny.io alternatives (nothing but with love).

Canny.io is a popular choice among product managers and teams for product road mapping and discovery. However, they are too expensive for many businesses (at least when you have a smaller team and just starting out). Many tools can offer greater value and better fulfill your needs. So I’ve tried and analyzed more than 25 different product roadmaps and discovery software and narrowed it down to the best three.

I used to be Head of Growth at Userpilot, during the tenure I evaluated all these similar products, used it internally and shared my opinion with my customers. You can see my credentials below on my Linkedin Profile. 

Userpilot intro 

By the end of this article, you’ll clearly understand the best Canny.io alternatives available and be able to make a decision that fits your business needs and is within your budget. So, if you’re ready to take control of your product development, read on to find the best Canny.io alternative for you. 

If you wanna skip out on reading the article, you can glance at the comparison table at the end of the article. It’ll give you a good idea of the platforms and help you find the best one for yourself!

But first, full transparency: I may receive commissions if you click on some of the links in this article, but it won’t cost you a thing! Also, the companies do not pay me to write these reviews. I test the products and services myself, and I support them regardless.

Table of Content

Canny.io: An overview

TL;DR on why Canny isn’t enough — You need more than just “upvoting features”.

Canny.io is a powerful feedback management tool designed to help businesses and organizations collect, prioritize, and act on customer feedback. With its user-friendly interface and advanced features, Canny.io makes it easy for teams to understand their customers’ needs and make data-driven decisions about product development, marketing, and customer support.

Even though Canny.io is a powerful feedback management tool, it suffers from some noticeable drawbacks. One of them is the high cost of the product and only upvoting features (which is a terrible idea in the first place according to some PMs).

Also, In this day and age, you can’t just rely on the upvoting feature but must actively look for ways to innovate your product management and improve your customer discovery. Feature priority, stakeholder management, etc., are a must-have nowadays for companies. 

With that in mind, I’ve searched for and tried Canny.io alternatives that offer unique features at different price points.  

Best Canny.io alternatives #1: airfocus (Modular, Affordable and The Overall Best)

Airfocus

airfocus is a powerful feedback management tool that helps businesses and organizations collect, organize, and prioritize customer feedback. Its intuitive user interface and unique features make it one of the most popular Canny.io alternatives. 

airfocus is a valuable tool for businesses and organizations looking to improve customer experience and make data-driven decisions. Its powerful features and easy-to-use interface make it easy for teams to collect, organize, and prioritize customer feedback. 

By using airfocus, businesses can gain a deeper understanding of their customers and make better decisions that lead to increased customer satisfaction and loyalty. 

It also uses the industry-standard Transport Layer Security protocol, which secures every connection between its servers and client browsers. Additionally, its users can keep utilizing their preferred development tools within one convenient platform with a wide choice of useful integrations, modules for unique product stacks, and editable templates.

Three unique features

Let’s look at some of the features of airfocus that I have found to be extremely helpful. 

Prioritization matrix 

Canny.io Alternatives:

A unique feature of airfocus is its ability to help users prioritize tasks and projects using a flexible prioritization matrix. This matrix allows users to quickly and efficiently evaluate the importance and impact of different tasks and projects, considering factors such as urgency, value, and risk. 

This feature is incredibly helpful for you if you want to prioritize a large number of tasks and projects and make sure they’re focusing on the most important ones first.

Advanced dependencies management 

Canny.io Alternatives: airfocus

airfocus also offers advanced dependencies management, a powerful way to manage and visualize the relationships between different tasks and projects. 

This feature allows users to create dependencies between tasks and projects, providing a clear and detailed view of them and making it easy to see how changes to one task or project might impact others. 

Detailed reports and analytics 

Canny.io Alternatives:

airfocus provides detailed reports and analytics, which allows users to see how their work is progressing over time and identify patterns and trends.

It includes metrics like progress, completion rate, and time-tracking. You can use them to optimize productivity and improve performance. Also, it allows users to see how their projects impact the business goals and objectives, which can be very beneficial for strategic decision-making.

Pros

  • Intuitive user interface 
  • Visual Road-mapping tool 
  • The decision-making framework
  • Built-in reporting and analytics
  • Accessible and direct communication with customers.
  • Availability of a free-trial

Cons

  • Not for solo creator startups, you need a team
  • Module-based is a new concept, you start with fewer important features and then expant

What others are saying 

airfocus has positive user reviews for its powerful features and interface. Many reviewers have noted the tool’s visual roadmapping feature as a standout feature, stating that it makes it easy to plan and execute product development strategies while keeping customer feedback in mind. 

Canny.io Alternatives

Reviewers have found airfocus to be a valuable tool for managing customer feedback and making data-driven decisions about product development. With its advanced features and user-friendly interface, airfocus is well-suited for businesses and organizations of any size that want to improve their customer retention. 

Pricing

Canny.io Alternatives:

airfocus offers a variety of pricing plans to fit the needs of different users and businesses. The plans include a free version with basic functionality.

Then it has an essential plan that starts at $19 per user per month, a professional plan that starts at $59 per user per month, and a business plan that starts at $109 per user per month. All of which offer 14-day card-free trials. 

Check out my in-depth airfocus review if you’re interested in using airfocus and want a more comprehensive analysis!

Best Canny.io alternatives #2: Upvoty (Best for Small Teams)

Upvoty is an advanced and user-friendly feedback management tool that helps businesses and organizations collect, organize, and analyze customer and employee feedback.

With Upvoty, you can quickly gather feedback from multiple channels (such as email, website, and social media) and create a centralized feedback hub for your team.

If you’re only looking at the upvoting feature of Canny.io, then Upvoty does it at a more reasonable price. As a result, it can be the more straightforward solution for smaller teams. 

Moreover, Upvoty allows you to quickly and easily sort through many reviews and identify the most recurring items. This powerful software also allows you to automate and streamline your workflow, providing greater visibility and control over your customer interactions.

Three unique features

Let’s go over some of Upvoty’s unique features. 

Advanced filtering and tagging 

Canny.io Alternatives:

A standout feature of Upvoty is its advanced filtering and tagging capabilities. This allows users to easily sort through large amounts of customer data and feedback to pinpoint the most relevant and actionable items.

This feature is especially useful for businesses or organizations that receive a high volume of feedback from multiple channels. It saves a lot of time for anyone looking for specific information to improve their business.

Customizable surveys and polls 

Another unique feature of Upvoty is its ability to conduct surveys and polls directly within the platform. It’s an excellent way for businesses and organizations to gather specific feedback on a particular topic or project.

This feature is highly customizable, allowing you to create a survey or poll that perfectly fits your needs and objectives.

Real-time notifications 

Upvoty also offers real-time notifications, which is a game-changer for managing feedback. This feature allows team members to be notified immediately as new feedback comes in, giving them the ability to respond quickly and efficiently. 

Real-time notifications can be especially beneficial for businesses that rely on a fast turnaround for customer service or support. With this feature, you’ll always get all the important pieces of feedback efficiently.

Pros

  • Ease of use
  • Advanced filtering and tagging feature
  • Customizable surveys and polls
  • Integration with a variety of tools
  • Vast analytics and insights
  • Ideal for smaller teams

Cons

  • The burden of cost 
  • Limited customization options for the surveys and polls

What others are saying

Upvoty has received positive reviews from a variety of users and reviewers. Users praise its intuitive interface and advanced filtering and tagging capabilities. Reviewers also appreciate its ability to conduct surveys and polls directly within the platform and the real-time notifications feature. 

Canny.io Alternatives:

Upvoty’s analytics and insights feature has also received positive feedback for its ability to provide a wealth of data and make sense of the feedback received. Its integrations with other tools such as Slack, Trello, and Jira also get a thumbs up from the reviewers. 

Pricing 

Canny.io Alternatives:

Upvoty offers a variety of pricing plans tailored to fit the needs of different businesses and organizations. 

The Power plan is their most popular plan. It is designed for small and medium-sized businesses and is priced at $15 per month. The Super Power plan comes at $39 per month, and the Unlimited Power plan comes at $75 per month. 

With a range of flexible pricing options, Upvoty makes it easy to find a plan that fits your business needs but works best when you’re using it for smaller teams.

Best Canny.io alternatives #3: ProductBoard (Best for Enterprises)

ProductBoard is a feature management software that helps product teams to track, prioritize and deliver product features. 

ProductBoard allows you to gather and organize product feedback, research, and stakeholder input and create a centralized product management hub for your enterprise. It also offers product teams a wide range of features and capabilities to track and manage product feedback, research, and stakeholder input. 

ProductBoard also lets you automate and streamline your product development workflow, providing better control over your product backlog, roadmaps, and releases.

If this little overview has got you hooked and you want to learn more about ProductBoard, I recommend this podcast, which has helped me greatly. 

Three unique features

Here are three features that help ProductBoard stand out.

Advanced customer research and feedback management 

Canny.io Alternatives:

One of the best features of ProductBoard is its advanced customer research and feedback management capabilities. It allows users to conduct customer interviews and surveys, gather feedback from multiple sources, then tag and segment it according to criteria like customer segments or user personas. 

With this feature, product teams can easily keep track of customer feedback and collaborate seamlessly with other teams to ensure customer success.

Intuitive roadmap and feature prioritization 

Canny.io Alternatives:

ProductBoard also offers an intuitive roadmap and feature prioritization system, a powerful way to manage and visualize the product backlog, roadmaps, and releases. 

This feature allows users to prioritize features based on different criteria, such as revenue potential, customer pain, and development effort. It makes it easy to identify the features you should build next. Besides, it is handy for Agile project management and workflow and ensures that the team’s workload is always aligned with the essential features.

Integration with other tools 

Canny.io Alternatives:

ProductBoard seamlessly integrates with various other tools, such as Zoho, Basecamp, Jira, Github, and Slack, making it easy to include feedback and product development work into existing workflows and tools. 

This feature is excellent for teams that use different tools to manage other aspects of their work and want to keep everything in one central location. The integration also allows for easy messaging and team collaboration, which is crucial for customer satisfaction.

Pros

  • Advanced research and feedback management
  • Easy-to-use interface
  • Criteria-based prioritization system
  • Integration with various tools
  • Analytics and insights

Cons

  • Burden of cost
  • Limited customization options

What others are saying 

Many reviewers have praised ProductBoard for its advanced customer research and feedback management capabilities. This makes it easy for product teams to conduct customer interviews and surveys, gather feedback from multiple sources, and then tag and segment this feedback according to different criteria. 

Canny.io Alternatives:

Its intuitive roadmap and feature prioritization system has also been well-reviewed, with many praising its ability to help teams prioritize features and manage their product backlog and roadmaps. Its integration with tools such as Jira, Github, and Slack, makes it easy to include feedback and product development work into existing workflows and tools.

Many reviewers have also appreciated the cloud-based nature of the tool and the inbuilt messaging and team collaboration feature, making it easy to use and access from anywhere. ProductBoard is a great addition to any project management solution and can serve as an effective to-do list for any product team or organization.

Pricing

ProductBoard starts with a 15-day free trial that gives you a taste of its capabilities. After that, the Essentials plan at $20 per user per month, and then the Pro plan is priced at $80 per user per month. You can also customize plans for your organization, and I think ProductBoard works best with their enterprise plan.

Final Thoughts

There are many product roadmap and discovery software options available today, but it can be challenging to know which is the right fit for your business. 

Upvoty is great for smaller teams, and ProductBoard shines when working with enterprises. But for most businesses, airfocus offers the most value. It offers advanced features such as a prioritization matrix, advanced dependencies management, and detailed reports and analytics, which are incredibly useful for managing and tracking tasks and projects.

Additionally, its user-friendly interface and customizable workflows make it easy for teams of all sizes to use and implement. Besides, its detailed dashboards and at-a-glance reporting help your team stay on the same page.

I strongly encourage you to give airfocus a try. So sign up for a free trial to experience the power of airfocus and see how it can take your team’s productivity and customer engagement to the next level.

Full Disclosure: If you click on some of the links in this article and purchase a paid plan, I may receive affiliate commissions (at no cost to you!). Regardless, the products and services I review are some of the best I’ve tried, and I support them personally. Head over to my privacy policy & affiliate disclosure to know more.

P.S. Check out my podcast (with 78 episodes and more on the way!) if you’re interested in actionable growth marketing and hearing from actual marketers about how they’re taking their businesses forward.

Comparison Table

Feature Canny airfocus Upvoty ProductBoard
Feedback Management Yes Yes Yes Yes
Voting and Prioritization Customizable Advanced Yes Yes
Integrations Jira, Trello, Slack Trello, Asana, Jira Slack, Jira Jira, Trello, Slack
Reporting and Analytics Advanced Yes No Yes
Roadmapping No Yes No Yes
Filtering and Sorting Yes Advanced No Yes

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