Adobe Workfront vs. Smartsheet

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Adobe Workfront
Score 7.7 out of 10
N/A
Adobe Workfront, acquired by Adobe in late 2020, is a web-based project-management tool. It is designed for both IT and marketing teams, but can be implemented for any kind of project. Workfront offers all the features standard to project management platforms, as well as resource allocation, automation, and agile workflow.N/A
Smartsheet
Score 8.4 out of 10
N/A
Smartsheet is an online project management and collaboration tool. It includes automated alerts, instantaneous updating and sharing across team members, resource management, nested tasks organized in a hierarchy, a Gantt chart view, exportable and automated reports, and integration with email.
$12
per month per user (up to 10 users)
Pricing
Adobe WorkfrontSmartsheet
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Pro
$12
per month per user (up to 10 users)
Business
$24
per month per user (3 user minimum)
Enterprise
Contact Sales
Advanced Work Management
Contact Sales
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Adobe WorkfrontSmartsheet
Free Trial
NoYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeOptionalNo setup fee
Additional DetailsA discount is offered for annual billing.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Adobe WorkfrontSmartsheet
Features
Adobe WorkfrontSmartsheet
Project Management
Comparison of Project Management features of Product A and Product B
Adobe Workfront
8.6
Ratings
12% above category average
Smartsheet
9.0
Ratings
16% above category average
Task Management10.00 Ratings10.00 Ratings
Resource Management9.00 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Gantt Charts9.00 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Scheduling8.00 Ratings10.00 Ratings
Workflow Automation8.00 Ratings8.10 Ratings
Team Collaboration8.00 Ratings10.00 Ratings
Support for Agile Methodology8.00 Ratings7.00 Ratings
Support for Waterfall Methodology6.50 Ratings8.90 Ratings
Document Management6.80 Ratings8.90 Ratings
Email integration10.00 Ratings9.90 Ratings
Mobile Access8.00 Ratings8.00 Ratings
Timesheet Tracking10.00 Ratings10.00 Ratings
Change request and Case Management9.00 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Budget and Expense Management10.00 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Professional Services Automation
Comparison of Professional Services Automation features of Product A and Product B
Adobe Workfront
6.0
Ratings
23% below category average
Smartsheet
9.1
Ratings
19% above category average
Quotes/estimates5.10 Ratings8.80 Ratings
Invoicing6.10 Ratings9.70 Ratings
Project & financial reporting6.40 Ratings8.90 Ratings
Integration with accounting software6.40 Ratings8.90 Ratings
User Ratings
Adobe WorkfrontSmartsheet
Likelihood to Recommend
8.9
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.0
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Usability
9.0
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
Availability
9.1
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Performance
9.1
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
10.0
(0 ratings)
8.1
(0 ratings)
In-Person Training
5.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Online Training
8.9
(0 ratings)
7.0
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
8.3
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Configurability
5.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
1.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
8.2
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
1.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
1.0
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
Adobe WorkfrontSmartsheet
Likelihood to Recommend
Workfront enables us to manage all our projects effectively while providing a comprehensive overview of team resources. The Resource Planner helps the team identify their capacity to determine whether they are over- or under-allocated. This information is crucial for project planning and ensuring team members do not experience burnout.
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The Smartsheet platform is extremely similar to Microsoft Excel, so if you are familiar with Excel, you will pick Smartsheet up quickly. Even if you aren't Smartsheet has a relatively simple user interface, meaning just about anyone can learn it. One thing to note is that the interface is that some may consider the interface so simple that they feel the need to look for more robust platforms. If you have a small to medium project that needs to be manages in a central hub, Smartsheet would be a great fit. If you have a very large project, I might consider looking into more advanced platforms.
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Pros
  • Routing. Workfront's capabilities to route tasks to multiple people far exceeds the capabilities of SharePoint in terms of back-end configuration required and ability to track task status.
  • Form Creation. Workfront forms have a better UX than SharePoint as well as the ability to customize forms based on certain responses.
  • Project Management Tracking & Reporting. The ability to track task and project statuses and send reminders/alerts when parameters are set are very helpful. Additionally, the reporting capabilities are very helpful when tracking multiple projects across multiple functions to deliver to leadership.
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  • The easy to use dashboard has enabled us get comprehensive view of projects across the entire business.
  • It has streamlined internal communication with ease of sharing information across different teams.
  • Smartsheet automates our workflows, enhances collaboration and ensures there are no data silos.
  • I like that it saves time for us and ensures we spend less time switching between apps.
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Cons
  • Notifications (sometimes I am emailed when I am tagged, other times I am not)
  • Certain file formats do not render correctly in Workfront Proof (eg, .XLS files)
  • It can be difficult to manage projects if you have not been assigned the correct permissions.
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  • Smartsheet set up is similar to Excel, yet when you upload an Excel file, things like conditional formatting are lost. Smartsheet has its own conditional formatting, and you have to reinstate the rules. It would be great if those would apply automatically once a file is uploaded
  • Some Smartsheet management and access rules can take some tweaking to work properly. This may be a case of offering more info to admins so they can apply these better and with more efficiency
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Likelihood to Renew
All that I've said already is why. I suppose the clearest way to say it is that at this point? I cannot imagine running the 300+ active projects in eMarketing without AtTask; it simply wouldn't be possible and even more; I wouldn't imagine why we'd try to find an alternative tool when we have one meeting our needs.
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Smartsheet has made my work life easier. Reduced my email significantly. Smartsheet and SaneBox have got me leaving the office with 0... Yes 0 emails in my inbox. My inbox would reach 150-250 email per day. Smartsheet brought that number down significantly and SaneBox took it the rest of the way. Do yourself a favor and check out SaneBox, too.
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Usability
For my needs, it's easy to jump in and out of, make changes and update projects, and check in with my employers. I haven't used to it create my own projects, they're created by my employer as we go, I suspect it's not hard to use in that way, but I don't have first-hand knowledge.
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Smartsheet is very easy to learn. However, while I have been able to pick it easily, Microsoft Excel and Project super users that I have trained on Smartsheet get bogged down in the differences and can find it frustrating. Explaining the differences ahead of time and why Smartsheet is being chosen instead of a different software seems to counteract those reactions
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Reliability and Availability
Maintenance is required, but usually after work hours, Some days the proofing tool function is not operational, but this is a new function of the tool that WF is working out. the kinks on. Chrome is the best browser to use the system in and we find Firefox and Explorer lose some view functionality - Gantt Chart, Resource Grid
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No answers on this topic
Performance
Workfront's performance has been very good. Everything always feels very fast and snappy in my experience. We have integrated it with custom scripts to create folder structure for media managing our projects. It works very well.
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No answers on this topic
Support Rating
I haven't directly interacted with the Workfront support team, but my sense, from speaking to the person in our organization who's job this is, is that they are generally very responsive to support requests, and very supportive an pro active in making sure that those requests are taken care of in a timely manner.
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They're a smaller company but they've always given great service when we rarely need to reach out. Pretty good online content but a bigger user base would help to produce more content in a self-sufficient community much as we see with Salesforce. To be fair we haven't needed their direct customer support very often. The sales guys are nice and not too pushy!
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In-Person Training
It was from my boss, not a rep from AtTask.
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No answers on this topic
Online Training
The training is very easy to use and you can simply choose the topics included in the course(s) that are most important to your training needs. After each training course, you are tested on what you have learned. If you need a refresher course, they provide Course Catalogs as well as instructor-led courses & workshops.
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No answers on this topic
Implementation Rating
We have implemented and integrated Workfront into three departments (R&D, Marketing, and IT). All have experience overall performance gains in productivity. R&D has developed a record number of new products, while streamlining and reducing workloads. Complex projects are now easily managed and delivered. Marketing has expanded the management of media and collateral, implemented more campaigns and increase brand value. IT projects are all now visible and managed. Helpdesk is being converted to the system allowing for better visibility and management of day to day requests from our growing company
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Work with the Smartsheet support team to get the best overall. If no one in your organization has used Smartsheet before, the support team will get things started. We had a couple of people who had used this product before and it was a great help in getting our framework together how we wanted to use it.
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Alternatives Considered
While I consider Jira to have a somewhat different targeted use case from Adobe Workfront, they definitely overlap in some of their capabilities. As mentioned earlier, I find that Adobe Workfront is better at tracking progress and managing resources for larger projects that cross a number disparate teams or stakeholders. Meanwhile, Jira is better for tracking individual projects within a single team or smaller tasks, something that can be a bit harder to do at scale in Adobe Workfront.
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Smartsheet is a dedicated project management tool that is built on spread sheet principles. When compared to Microsoft's own offering, Smartsheet came out on top in some areas like dedicated project management features vs having to build custom features to Microsoft 365. However when you compare them on price, Microsoft 365 definitely has more value than Smartsheet.
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Scalability
We have been using Workfront for about 3 years. During this time they continue to be a very stable project management system. Workfront's overall scalability is able to handle increased loads of work. When using Workfront for a project management tool for the web team, we store documents, images & video's without any issues. They work with their customer's to provide the best project management system in the market today! I highly recommend Workfront for all project management needs. Workfront strives to deliver unique technology solutions to growing companies!
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No answers on this topic
Return on Investment
  • Positive - we get more work done in a timely fashion because all team members are using Workfront.
  • Negative - projects can get held up quickly due to user error (e.g., someone not using Workfront or checking notifications)
  • Positive - we have a good gauge of where personally we are with projects, and how are team members are spending their time.
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  • Our positive ROI has decreased the overall cost in project management as it reduced the amount of MS project licenses we needed.
  • We have also seen a positive ROI on using the cloud storage and it automatically supports proper version control.
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ScreenShots

Adobe Workfront Screenshots

Screenshot of Tasks in Adobe WorkfrontScreenshot of Work Requests in Adobe WorkfrontScreenshot of Review Functionality in Adobe WorkfrontScreenshot of Adobe Workfront Planning