Miro
7.1Innovation Workspace where retros happen on the same canvas as discovery and planning
Miro is the dominant online whiteboard, now sold as an AI Innovation Workspace. It pairs an infinite canvas with a 7,000+ template library (300+ retro formats among them), AI clustering by sentiment/keyword/author, Engage live polls and word clouds (included with Business since June 2026), Blueprints for reusable multi-board workflows, real-time and async collaboration, and a 250+ app marketplace with first-party two-way card sync to Jira, Azure DevOps, Asana, Linear and ClickUp. An official MCP server runs on every plan under per-tier daily call quotas.
Full review →
RetroTool
3.2Anonymous online retrospectives, no login required
RetroTool is a low-friction online retrospective board built by u2i, a ~60-person NY/Kraków software agency, as an internal tool it later opened up. Free anonymous retros run from a unique URL with no signup; paid tiers add private boards, team management, configurable retention and zero-knowledge encryption. The product works and is still used daily, but nothing has shipped visibly since 2024.
Full review →Summary
Miro scores 7.1 overall and is best for large product, design and engineering orgs that already run discovery, planning and retros on one canvas and want AI clustering plus deep Jira/Azure DevOps/Asana sync. It offers a free tier.
RetroTool scores 3.2 overall and is best for small or ad-hoc teams who want a free, no-signup retro board with private drafting, secret voting and a dozen standard templates — provided you're comfortable running on a tool whose last visible build is dated May 2024. It offers a free tier.
Miro leads on retro toolkit, fun factor, AI & insights, integrations, open platform and enterprise-grade. RetroTool leads on ease of use and value.
Across our eight scoring dimensions, Miro edges ahead with an overall score of 7.1. That said, the right pick depends on your team — see the dimension-by-dimension breakdown below.
Scores compared
| Detail | Miro | RetroTool |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Whiteboard | Retrospectives |
| Team size | Enterprise | Small |
| Free tier | Yes | Yes |
| Free limit | 3 editable boards, limited AI credits, 100 MCP calls/day, full 7,000+ template library, 250+ app marketplace; no private boards, SSO, guests, Blueprints or two-way integrations | Anonymous boards; unlimited cards, columns, action points and participants; 3 basic templates; private sections, secret voting, dot-vote limits, timer, grouping, action points with owner and due date; Markdown export; 12-month retention. A free registered 'Participant' account (not advertised on the plans page) adds access to private retros and cross-device drafts |
| Starting price | $8/user/mo | $10/team/mo ($100/team/yr billed annually) |
| Est. 3 teams × 8 people | $192/mo billed annually (Starter, 24 seats) | $30/mo (Individual — 3 teams x $10/team/mo, unlimited members per team; $300/yr = $25/mo billed annually) |
| Enterprise | Yes | No |
| Founded | 2011 | — |
| HQ | Amsterdam, NL | Poland |
| Data residency | United States · European Union · Australia · JP | — |
| Languages | 8 (English, Spanish, German, …) | English only |
| Export formats | Image · PDF · CSV | Markdown · Confluence |
| Features | 40 | 19 |
| Integrations | 12 | 0 |
Feature & integration comparison
Side-by-side checklist across features, integrations and security. Hover a note for details.
| Capability | Miro | RetroTool |
|---|---|---|
| Features | ||
| Custom templates | ✓ | ✓note |
| Anonymous input | ✓note | ✓note |
| Health Checks | — | — |
| Action tracking | ✓note | ✓ |
| Async mode | ✓ | — |
| Whiteboard | ✓ | — |
| Independent voting | ✓ | ✓ |
| Polling | ✓note | — |
| Icebreaker games | — | — |
| Agile Estimations | ✓note | — |
| Team Kudos | — | — |
| AI grouping/clustering | ✓ | — |
| AI action items | ✓note | — |
| AI Summaries | ✓ | — |
| Team Insights | — | — |
| In-meeting AI assistant | ✓note | — |
| Action dashboard | — | ✓note |
| Integrations | ||
| Asana | ✓note | — |
| Azure DevOps | ✓note | — |
| Basecamp | — | — |
| ClickUp | ✓note | — |
| Confluence | ✓ | — |
| GitHub | ✓note | — |
| GitLab | — | — |
| Jira | ✓note | — |
| Linear | ✓note | — |
| Microsoft Teams | ✓ | — |
| Monday.com | ✓note | — |
| Notion | ✓note | — |
| Shortcut | — | — |
| Slack | ✓ | — |
| Trello | ✓note | — |
| Security & Privacy | ||
| SOC 2 | ✓ | — |
| GDPR | ✓ | ✓note |
| SSO / SAML | ✓note | — |
| SCIM provisioning | ✓note | — |
| ISO 27001 | ✓ | — |
| On-premises | — | — |
| Public API | ✓ | — |
| Webhooks | — | — |
| MCP server | ✓note | — |
Miro — pros
- + Enormous template library (7,000+ board templates, 300+ retro formats) plus the Miroverse community gallery
- + AI clustering groups sticky notes by colour, tag, author, keyword and sentiment — real time saved on a 60-sticky board
- + First-party two-way card sync to Jira, Azure DevOps, Asana, Linear and ClickUp, so a sticky becomes tracked work in one click
- + <strong>Engage</strong> activities — live polls, word clouds, scales, ranking — are included with Business; participants join by QR code with no Miro account
- + Enterprise-grade SSO, SCIM, audit logs, SOC 2 Type II, ISO 27001:2022, ISO 42001 and US/EU/AU/Japan data residency; official MCP server on every plan
Miro — cons
- − Per-seat pricing: 24 people cost $192/mo on Starter (annual). The tier that actually matters for retros — Business, with two-way Jira sync, SSO, guests and Engage — is $480/mo
- − Recent G2 reviewers' loudest complaint is billing, not the canvas: guests converted to paid licences and prorated mid-cycle seat charges
- − No health checks, mood tracking or longitudinal team pulse; Engage Scales reads the room once, it doesn't draw a trend line
- − No recurring retros, scheduling, action carryover, cross-team rollup or action dashboard — facilitators rebuild structure each sprint, and actions only persist as Jira/Azure DevOps/Linear cards
- − SCIM, audit logs, domain control and data residency are Enterprise-only, and Enterprise starts at 30 seats
RetroTool — pros
- + Genuinely free anonymous retros with no account required
- + Three-click setup — unique URL, share, run
- + Per-column Private Sections keep drafting unbiased until people publish
- + Zero-knowledge encryption with custom passwords on the Company plan
- + Per-team flat pricing ($10 or $20/team/mo, 15%+ off annually) with <em>unlimited members per team</em>, not per-seat
RetroTool — cons
- − <strong>Dormant</strong>: the marketing build is dated 28 May 2024, the app still runs Meteor 2.9, the blog stopped in March 2022 and the legal pages are unchanged since August 2020
- − No native integrations with Jira, Slack, Teams or any agile-stack tool
- − No AI features (clustering, summary, action extraction, sentiment)
- − No health checks, recurring retros, async mode, or cross-team reporting
- − Export is Markdown only (plain or Confluence-flavoured), copied to the clipboard
- − Most templates, image cards, named participants, private invite-only boards and zero-knowledge encryption sit behind paid tiers
- − Not SOC 2; Google sign-in only, with no SAML SSO, SCIM or audit logs
Keep comparing
Other Miro comparisons
Other RetroTool comparisons
See alternatives
Not sure which to pick? Read our guide on how to choose a retrospective tool.