Mural vs. Whimsical

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Mural
Score 6.5 out of 10
N/A
MURAL (formerly Mural.ly) from Tactivos (DBA MURAL) in San Francisco is described by the vendor as a digital workspace and visual collaboration tool, designed for creative teams to make the process of design more efficient for distributed teams, working remotely.
$12
per month
Whimsical
Score 8.5 out of 10
N/A
Whimsical is a visual workspace application from the company of the same name in Denver, allowing users to create collaborative wireframes, mindmaps, flowcharts, and sticky notes.
$12
per month per editor
Pricing
MuralWhimsical
Editions & Modules
Starter
$12
per month
Plus
$20
per month
Enterprise
Contact sales team
Pro
$12
per month per editor
Business
$18
per month per editor
Enterprise
$240
per year per editor
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
MuralWhimsical
Free Trial
YesNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoYes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsPlans are billed annually.17% discount for annual billing on Pro and Business plans.
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
MuralWhimsical
Considered Both Products
Mural
Chose Mural
Very similar to Miro
I used Trello at the beginning of the pandemic but completely dropped it when I discover tools like Mural
Survey Tools have more capabilities that are required sometimes but asking client to vote directly on the board in different ways serves me well most …
Chose Mural
We used Miro as well and it was not as intuitive and easy to use as Mural is. Most take much longer to understand how to operate Miro , whereas this is not the case for Mural. It is very intuitive and offers a cleaner layout
Chose Mural
I like it better than Miro because MURAL's more informal feel makes it encourage conversation and use. Miro also let's you bury too much information "inside" the notes making it really easy to lose sight of important data. I like MURAL better than LucidSpark because of how …
Chose Mural
Mural has a User Interface that is easier to understand, which allows us to bring newcomers to brainstorm and design sessions without investing time in learning. Mural has more dinamic objects that impact on the presentation and visibility of the work, like having Post it notes …
Chose Mural
Mural has [a] more fun, [user-friendly], and easy to understand [design]. Other [applications] are a little faster.
Chose Mural
MURAL has an extensive number of features and shapes and sticky notes to differentiate between the collaborators. The chat feature is amazing on MURAL itself for amazing discussions. Having a Scenario map, empathy map, Persona grid, Team, or opportunity canvas are some of the …
Chose Mural
We selected MURAL for ease of use, templates, guest access, price point and support.
Chose Mural
Mural has many more features PLUS it is so much easier to invite guests and get them engaged right away - 100% better experience overall. I felt like Mural had many more features and felt much more like the in-person experience vs. Jamboard. It is well worth the investment in …
Chose Mural
I have tested a number of project management, workflow, and whiteboarding tools. All of them have their drawbacks. Some are too prescriptive and too process orientated, whilst others lack the simplicity of MURAL (formerly Mural.ly).
Chose Mural
A couple of features I particularly appreciate are the content library (even though it should be improved) and the possibility to use multiple templates from different companies. Also the call feature looks interesting, even though I never used it so far. Overall, MURAL …
Chose Mural
Mural was easier to use and share compared with Whiteboard. Whiteboard's functionality is limited. It is also integrated into Teams in an odd way that makes it difficult for team members to refer to old whiteboards. Mural as a stand alone web app is better.
Chose Mural
Similar from perspective of what I've used them for as of this date.
Chose Mural
I have had an experience of working with all the three above mentioned tools--Miro, InVision, and Lucidchart--and I can confidently say that MURAL (formerly Mural.ly) beats all these three tools when it comes to performing any kind of online collaboration activities, which …
Whimsical
Chose Whimsical
Clickup's mind mapping tool was very basic and hard to use from my perspective. Whimsical was by far easier and did what I wanted for a SaaS/cloud-based mind mapping tool. Xmind is fine as a desktop app, but updating the app was a pain whereas, with Whimsical I don't have to …
Chose Whimsical
Miro has a slight edge in UI but Whimsical is not far behind.
Chose Whimsical
Whimsical is so much easier and has a better interface, so I think it's more suited to our workflow if compared to other tools like Google Charts. I really love this tool and I'm looking to learn and use it even more, as it helps us optimize our time, planning, and delivering …
Chose Whimsical
Whimsical is much easier to learn than Lucidchart. We had coworkers up and running on Whimsical with little to no training. It's intuitive and just makes sense and it never freezes or times out, unlike some other tools we've used in the past. The monthly cost is also …
Chose Whimsical
I like the wireframing/web mockups a little better in Whimsical. I still do use Miro for some other uses (simple sprints/onboarding exercises).
Chose Whimsical
Whimsical nails early stage project exploration. Whether it’s mapping, wire-framing, or simply whiteboard collaboration, Whimsical provide a flexible toolset that puts you and your team in the correct mindset to explore ideas without feeling committed to a specific direction. …
Chose Whimsical
I've tried a few different services similar to Whimsical, and like the simplicity of Whimsical - as it's very easy to learn how to use and begin creating. The price is also better than a lot of competitors. There are quite a few options for creating wireframes, flowcharts and …
Chose Whimsical
Whimsical has a flexible interface and a more cost-friendly plan than Lucidchart. Whimsical allows you all the room to create whatever comes to mind in one space, whereas with other products, you have to create a separate document to use the different functions. Other apps like …
Chose Whimsical
Whimsical is simpler and easier to use than InVision. Not as many design capabilities, but much better interface.
Best Alternatives
MuralWhimsical
Small Businesses
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Score 9.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
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Score 9.1 out of 10
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Score 8.3 out of 10
Enterprises
Whimsical
Whimsical
Score 8.5 out of 10
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Score 8.3 out of 10
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User Ratings
MuralWhimsical
Likelihood to Recommend
9.6
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
Usability
7.0
(0 ratings)
8.0
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
9.0
(0 ratings)
5.7
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
MuralWhimsical
Likelihood to Recommend
Remote Collaboration: In a remote or distributed work environment, Mural shines. It enables teams to collaborate effectively in real-time, bridging geographical gaps and facilitating virtual meetings, workshops, and brainstorming sessions. Workshop Facilitation: For facilitators leading workshops or team-building activities, Mural provides interactive templates and tools for engaging participants and achieving specific objectives.
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It's extremely well-suited for rapid wire-framing of concepts, as product teams can quickly collaborate on any idea and create a visual blueprint of it. Whimsical could provide more intuitive feature prioritization templates. The current templates lack the necessary detail and could be further enhanced from a UI/UX standpoint.
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Pros
  • Ability to follow other users' cursors makes it easy for a group to understand what a particular person is explaining
  • Drag-and-drop components for ease of use
  • Quick and easy way to provide access to internal/external users as MURAL (formerly Mural.ly) is a SaaS product
Read full review
  • Simple to use
  • Tons of uses
  • Can be customized with themeing
  • Can organize all your boards pretty much however you want
Read full review
Cons
  • It'd be nice that the zoom regulation could be easier to manage
  • The advanced features are a little bit easy to adopt. Why not adding some agile trainings, or some other tools to facilitate their adoption
  • A faster and easier way to Integrate with ms office
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  • It can be a little frustrating trying to line things up exactly right but that's probably more user error than anything
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Usability
Overall, MURAL is really easy to use, but there are a couple downsides. It's really easy to make areas of the board consistent because double clicking adds stickies that match those around the current one. It's really easy to connect the elements. And it's really easy to organize elements. Inconsistent controls, Panning, Line Connections, and latency are the only issues I had. My biggest issue is that the MURAL mouse buttons are very different from
most similar software. This always causes me problems switching to a
graphics software or 3D modelling software. Because MURAL uses the same button to pan and move elements, it's really easy to move things when panning around. The lines can also be a (sometimes huge) problem because thew will occasionally disappear or connect to things incorrectly. I think this is tied to latency issues which, in addition to causing phantom lines, can sometimes cause confusion to your team.
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Whimsical is overall very easy to learn and remember. One issue with the usability occurs when you attempt to move connected boxes around the workspace. Frequently connections break or do not add easily, causing further disconnects. You can manually fix these issues, but it's a oprobem that seems would have an easy fix
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Support Rating
Chat support tends to get back to you within a few hours and are always helpful.
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I reached out to support, as I was interested in possibly investing in the organization, and they quickly and happily informed me they are a bootstrap organization and do not take on investors at this time. The swift response and information readily available for my consumption was extremely helpful and shows how solid the team behind it is.
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Alternatives Considered
I like it better than Miro because MURAL's more informal feel makes it encourage conversation and use. Miro also let's you bury too much information "inside" the notes making it really easy to lose sight of important data. I like MURAL better than Lucidspark because of how fast the pages load, especially links within the board. Any app is better than Microsoft whiteboard which is appalling unusable and feature incomplete.
Read full review
ClickUp's mind mapping tool was very basic and hard to use from my perspective. Whimsical was by far easier and did what I wanted for a SaaS/cloud-based mind mapping tool. Xmind is fine as a desktop app, but updating the app was a pain whereas, with Whimsical I don't have to worry about that. Also, I wanted to continue working on a mind map wherever I was, even if I didn't have my laptop or device with me and Whimsical allows me to do that.
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Return on Investment
  • Mural allows us to draft communications for clients that aim to increase the NPS of the organization
  • Mural allows us to keep up with the agile framework, which reduces Time to Market of our products and initiatives
  • Mural allows us to identify blockers in our day to day tasks, which reduces the Cicle Time of our Kanban cards
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  • We've been using free version, so it's a no brainer.
  • As it helps us focus on the information organization process, we don't lose time redoing work due to the lack of planning before doing design or code.
  • We can collaborate on the same project, so it's easier to get things done as we're working from home as well.
Read full review
ScreenShots

Mural Screenshots

Screenshot of the brainstorming templates that brings more minds to the table and helps turn good ideas into extraordinary work.Screenshot of energizers and icebreakers that help teams feel connected and open-minded so they can tackle big problems.Screenshot of strategic plan sharing, to improve people's sense of safety and expectation, leaving more brain space for creativity and innovation.Screenshot of retrospectives, which help teams get better and happier over time.