The Pros and Cons of Using Smartsheet Software

Companies today face increasing pressure to manage vast amounts of data while maintaining complex workflows across departments. Smartsheet has evolved from a simple spreadsheet-like platform into a powerful Advanced Work Management (AWM) solution designed to address this challenge. Trusted by over 85% of Fortune 500 companies, with success stories ranging from McLaren Racing to Uber, Smartsheet helps organizations manage projects, automate processes, and connect critical systems. Its unique grid interface allows teams to track work, visualize timelines, and deploy no-code solutions with enterprise-grade security.

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In this updated article, we will explore the key pros and cons of using Smartsheet software, focusing on its latest features, including AI and advanced premium solutions, to help you determine if it is the right fit for your business. For organizations with budget constraints, AceProject presents a cost-effective alternative to Smartsheet. Unlike traditional per-user pricing models, AceProject employs a per-project pricing structure, which can deliver substantial cost savings for teams managing multiple projects.

Smartsheet – Advanced Work Management Platform

Smartsheet stands out by offering the familiarity of a spreadsheet combined with the power of a modern project management platform. This cloud-based solution is built to support teams across nearly every industry and function—from IT portfolio management and marketing operations to client services and finance. At its core, Smartsheet utilizes flexible Views (Grid, Gantt, Card, Calendar) and powerful Formulas to organize and visualize work.

The platform has significantly ramped up its intelligence, introducing AI-powered tools for generating formulas, analyzing data, and summarizing content. Combined with extensive automation and a growing suite of premium applications (like Control Center and Brandfolder), Smartsheet ensures enterprise-level governance and security while driving greater velocity of work across the organization.

The Pros or Advantages of Smartsheet

Smartsheet has cemented its position as a highly capable platform, particularly for large organizations managing complex processes. Its comprehensive approach addresses the diverse needs of modern businesses, from operational efficiency to strategic oversight, making it a trusted choice for top brands worldwide. These are the most commonly highlighted advantages, reflecting the platform’s focus on power and enterprise scale.

AI-Powered Intelligence and Data Analysis: Smartsheet now embeds AI directly into the platform, offering a major advantage. AI tools assist with personalized insights, formula generation, summarizing content, and analyzing large datasets, enabling teams to move faster and tackle complex challenges without needing to be data experts.
Highly Adaptable Grid and View System: The software’s core is its familiar, flexible spreadsheet-like interface. This makes it instantly accessible to users comfortable with Excel while providing multiple dynamic views (Gantt, Card, Calendar, Timeline) for planning, execution, and visualization, easily accommodating any project methodology.
Comprehensive Enterprise-Grade Security: Smartsheet prioritizes data protection with robust security features, making it trusted by over 85% of the Fortune 500. This includes advanced controls like SAML-based SSO, two-factor authentication, Customer Managed Encryption Keys (CMEK), and detailed administration and audit logs.
Advanced Portfolio and Resource Management: For organizations needing to manage work at scale, Smartsheet offers premium add-ons like Control Center for consistent project execution across a portfolio, and Resource Management by Smartsheet for optimal staffing, scheduling, and capacity forecasting.
Robust, Scalable Automation Capabilities: The platform features no-code automation workflows that allow users to streamline repetitive tasks, set reminders, and manage multi-step approval chains across systems. This reduces administrative overhead and ensures consistency and compliance across departmental processes.
Extensive Integration and Connector Ecosystem: Smartsheet connects seamlessly with hundreds of popular cloud tools, including Slack, Google Workspace, and Adobe Creative Cloud. Furthermore, premium connectors like Data Shuttle, Jira Connector, and Salesforce Connector allow for the automated import, export, and synchronization of data, unlocking siloed information.
Real-Time Collaboration and Content Management: Smartsheet empowers distributed teams through in-sheet conversations, sharing controls, and a centralized file library. Collaboration is enhanced by Proofing tools that streamline the review and approval of creative assets, cutting down on email chains and version confusion.
Powerful Reporting and Workload Tracking: The platform offers advanced reporting options, including dashboards, charts, and custom reports that draw data from multiple sheets. Premium features like Work Insights and dedicated team utilization dashboards enable managers to analyze performance, track KPIs, and make data-driven decisions on resource allocation.

The Cons or Disadvantages of Smartsheet

While Smartsheet is powerful, its unique design and pricing structure can present challenges for certain users, particularly small teams or those new to project management. Understanding these limitations is essential for making an informed decision. The following points outline the key disadvantages to consider when evaluating whether Smartsheet aligns with your organization’s needs and resources.

Steep Learning Curve and Spreadsheet-Based Complexity: Smartsheet’s flexibility, based on its spreadsheet foundation, can also be its greatest barrier to entry. New users often find its combination of formulas, sheets, reports, and dashboards complex, requiring significant setup time and dedicated training to implement and maintain efficient, enterprise-wide solutions.
High Cost for Full Functionality and Advanced Features: Many of Smartsheet’s most powerful tools, including its dedicated resource management app, portfolio governance (Control Center), and advanced data connectors (Data Shuttle, DataMesh), are not included in the standard Business plan. These premium features require specialized, custom-priced plans (Enterprise or Advanced Work Management), making the full solution prohibitively expensive for small or budget-conscious organizations.
Pricing Tiers and Minimum User Constraints: The pricing structure can be awkward for smaller, growing teams. The entry-level Pro plan is limited to 10 users, while the Business plan has a minimum requirement of three members. This lack of a clear, cost-effective path between single users and medium-sized teams can create scaling friction.
Potential Performance Issues at Extreme Scale: Although Smartsheet is constantly optimized, some users managing massive sheets containing thousands of rows, extensive formulas, and numerous linked reports may still report noticeable slowdowns or sluggish loading times. This can reduce efficiency in highly complex, data-heavy project environments.
Reliance on Formulas and Excel Logic: For project managers or business users who prefer purely graphical, database-centric, or kanban-style tools, Smartsheet’s core reliance on formulas and cell logic (familiar to Excel users) can feel unintuitive, complicated, and prone to error if not meticulously managed.
Limited Core Mobile and Offline Functionality: While the mobile app allows users to check real-time updates, access dashboards, and manage basic tasks on the go, it lacks the full depth and formula editing capabilities of the desktop application. The platform’s reliance on real-time data means true offline functionality for complex work remains limited compared to some competitors.

Smartsheet Key Features

Understanding Smartsheet’s key features is essential for maximizing your investment and determining if the platform aligns with your organization’s needs. From AI-powered tools to advanced security controls, each capability plays a crucial role in streamlining workflows, enhancing collaboration, and driving project success across your teams.

AI-Powered Tools

Smartsheet AI enables users to move faster by generating rich formulas, analyzing data for personalized insights, summarizing sheet content, and suggesting clear task descriptions, ensuring teams can tackle challenges without needing to be subject matter experts.

AI Integrations: The platform supports connecting to enterprise AI tools to surface insights and automate actions across your entire technology stack.

Flexible Views and Dashboards

Provides an essential, user-friendly interface for organizing and visualizing data. Users can switch between Grid, Gantt, Table, Board, Calendar, and Timeline views to manage and track projects efficiently.

Dashboards and Work Insights: Customizable dashboards and widgets provide high-level, real-time visibility and offer work insights, making it easy to track KPIs and make data-driven decisions.
Formulas and Functions: Offers rich formulas and functions for dynamic calculation and logic, akin to a traditional spreadsheet.

Automation & Document Generation

Streamline tasks with no-code, versatile workflows that can be customized with multiple actions and conditions across devices, email, and communication platforms like Teams and Slack.

Automated Workflows: Users can save time with ready-to-use templates or design their own for tasks like reminders and conditional actions, tracking performance with ease.
Document Generation: Enables the creation of custom PDFs, automated form processes, contract preparation, and document signing (DocuSign integration) directly within Smartsheet using sheet data.

Extensive Integrations and Connectors

Boosts productivity by connecting to popular cloud tools, eliminating constant app-switching, and creating a single source of truth.

Core Integrations: Includes native connections with tools like Microsoft Teams, Slack, Google G-Suite, Office 365, and Adobe Creative Cloud.
Premium Connectors: Advanced connectors like Data Shuttle, Salesforce Connector, and Jira Connector automate the import, export, and synchronization of data with external systems.

Team Collaboration & Content Management

Empowers teams to execute with speed and efficiency by centralizing communication and content.

File Library and Proofing: Streamlines work by managing project-critical content on one platform, including advanced Proofing features for faster delivery of creative assets.
Conversations and Notifications: Facilitates asynchronous collaboration through in-sheet conversations and real-time updates via notifications.

Advanced Portfolio & Resource Management (Premium Features)

These specialized tools are designed for organizations with complex, large-scale operational needs.

Control Center: Establishes best practices to deliver consistency and visibility at scale for project execution and reporting across a portfolio.
Resource Management by Smartsheet: Optimizes resource utilization, helping mobilize the best team for the job, keep budgets on track, and forecast hiring needs.
Dynamic View: Manages multi-step processes securely by sharing only the necessary information to the right people at the right time, maintaining control over row/cell access.

Enterprise Security and Governance

Streamlines management of user access, security settings, and billing details for efficient project control and compliance.

Security Controls: Offers features like Customer Managed Encryption Keys (CMEK), E-signatures, Data Retention Controls, and Smartsheet Regions to safeguard data and ensure compliance.
Administration: Centralized Admin Center tools, Enterprise Plan Manager, and Event Reporting enable control over users, access privileges, and account settings.

Smartsheet Use Cases

Understanding real-world use cases is essential for evaluating whether Smartsheet aligns with your organization’s specific needs and workflows. By examining how different departments and industries successfully implement the platform, you can identify practical applications, anticipate potential challenges, and make informed decisions about adoption and investment.

IT Portfolio Management: Smartsheet is critical for IT teams to manage complex technology portfolios. It allows them to track mission-critical projects from the initial idea phase through implementation. Teams can use it for backlog management, visualize progress using different views, and integrate with development tools like Jira to maintain a unified source of truth across technical and business stakeholders.
Marketing Management/Creative Operations: Creative agencies and in-house marketing teams use Smartsheet to standardize creative work requests and manage the high volume of assets. By implementing structured workflows and utilizing the Proofing feature, teams can automate the review and approval process, ensuring brand consistency and dramatically streamlining campaign delivery and external client collaboration.
Services Delivery/Client Delivery: Consulting firms, professional services, and client-facing teams rely on Smartsheet for accurate project execution and profitability. They use the platform to manage client engagements, monitor billable hours, optimize workloads using Resource Management, and share real-time project updates with clients securely, resulting in improved delivery accuracy and higher client satisfaction.
Financial Services/Government: Due to its enterprise-grade security (SSO, CMEK) and compliance certifications, Smartsheet is ideal for sectors handling sensitive data. Financial and legal teams use it to manage complex cases and audits, enforce strict access controls, and ensure regulatory compliance, utilizing detailed activity logs to secure and track every transaction.
Construction/Manufacturing: For industries with tangible assets and critical schedules, Smartsheet provides the structure needed to manage operations. Teams leverage structured workflows and resource planning tools to streamline production schedules, track inventory and materials, and improve cross-departmental coordination between the field, the warehouse, and the office, ultimately reducing costly downtime.
Enterprise Project Management Office (PMO): The PMO utilizes the platform, particularly the Control Center premium feature, to bring consistency and oversight to the entire organization’s work. They establish standardized best practices and templates to govern all projects, deliver executive-level portfolio visibility, and make crucial decisions regarding budgets and risk management across multiple business units.
Small and Medium Business: For growing teams, Smartsheet offers scalable solutions that move beyond basic task lists. Customizable dashboards and templates help these businesses build repeatable operational processes, stay organized during periods of rapid growth, and accelerate their trajectory without sacrificing the transparency or control needed to manage a larger team.

Smartsheet Pricing and Costs

For growing teams that need structure and scalability, Smartsheet’s plans provide flexible solutions to manage projects, programs, and processes all within a single platform. The pricing is structured per member/user, with significant savings offered when choosing annual billing over monthly billing.

Free Plan ($0 per user/month): Ideal for individuals or very small teams starting with structured project management. It offers basic views and unlimited sheets, forms, and reports, along with AI Essentials. It’s a great way to explore Smartsheet’s core workflow flexibility at no cost.
Pro Plan ($9/month paid annually or $12/month): Designed for people and teams wanting to track, share, and manage projects. This plan is limited to a maximum of 10 Members. It includes rich formulas, all core views (Gantt, Board, Table, Calendar), and 250 automations per month, making it suitable for essential project tracking and core collaboration features.
Business Plan ($19/month paid annually or $24/month): Suited for medium to large organizations looking to align people, projects, and programs. This plan requires a minimum of 3 Members. It expands capabilities with the Timeline view, team workload tracking, Admin capabilities, and critically, unlimited automations (1 TB storage).
Enterprise Plan (Custom Pricing): Created for large organizations needing heightened security, advanced AI capabilities, and company-wide controls. This plan is available via custom pricing for 10+ Members and includes all Business features plus advanced controls like AI formulas, texts, and charts (New), SAML-based SSO, Collections (New), and the Enterprise Plan Manager for heightened security and governance.
Advanced Work Management Plan (Custom Pricing): Built for organizations aiming to manage large-scale portfolios of work and connect across complex systems. This plan is available at custom pricing and includes all Enterprise features, plus premium add-ons such as Control Center, Dynamic View, Data Shuttle, DataMesh, and dedicated Salesforce and Jira connectors for advanced operational oversight.

If you’re currently weighing your options to determine which Smartsheet tier is the right investment, we’ve published a detailed article on Smartsheet Pricing Plans & Costs to guide you through the different pricing plans available.

Conclusion

Smartsheet stands out as an exceptionally powerful and versatile platform, capable of handling project management and advanced operational workflows across the largest enterprises. Its unique combination of a familiar grid interface, no-code automation, and new AI-powered intelligence makes it an invaluable tool for driving efficiency and making data-driven decisions. The platform’s robust security features, extensive integration capabilities, and scalable architecture ensure it meets the demanding requirements of Fortune 500 companies while remaining accessible to growing teams.

While its initial complexity and the custom pricing required for its most powerful features (like Control Center and Resource Management) can be daunting, the platform delivers unparalleled governance and scalability. If your organization requires a secure, flexible, and powerful work management solution that can handle complexity, scale across hundreds of departments, and seamlessly integrate with your existing tech stack, Smartsheet is a top-tier contender worth exploring.