Project and task management decision
Teamwork
A capable engineer can build a useful subset (projects, tasks, timers, simple resource calendar, and basic profitability) in a few weeks, but reproducing Teamwork's integrations, SOC2 certification, scale, and AI features is not realistic for a solo builder.
Visit website↗Open-source builds that already do this
Every project below is open source and already does this job today. Fork one, self-host it, or take the parts you need - the build prompt further down assumes an empty file, and this is the shortcut past that. Licences differ; check the one on each card before you ship. All Teamwork alternatives, with the arithmetic →
What a replacement has to do
- Create a project from a template, add task lists and assignments, track time against tasks, schedule/allocate people on a shared calendar, and track budget vs actual to compute basic project profitability.
What it still won’t have
- 150+ integrations marketplace and pre-built connectors
- SOC 2 Type 2 certification and associated compliance assurances
- Enterprise-grade scale, uptime SLA, and hosted backups
- Advanced AI teammates and forecasting that integrate with third-party models
- Vendor support, onboarding services, and training resources
What remains hard
- Compliance and regulation
SOC 2 Type 2 certified, with private data that's never used to train third-party models.
First-year cost
Keep paying
Paying is—cheaper in year one.
On cash alone, building overtakes the subscription at 3 seats.
Money you would actually spend
Time you would spend
—
What you would spend
What we assumed
The verdict above measures whether you could build it. This one is only about money.
Runnable build prompt
Build a minimal self-hosted Teamwork-like app using Next.js + Node (Express), PostgreSQL, Redis, and Tailwind. In scope: user/org auth, project templates, create project from template, task lists/tasks/subtasks with assignees and due dates, start/stop time tracker and manual timesheets, per-user availability calendar and simple allocation UI, per-project budget, configurable billable/cost rates, and a profitability report (budget vs actual). Out of scope: integrations marketplace, SOC2 compliance, advanced AI forecasting, and enterprise multi-region hosting. Provide REST APIs, a basic web UI, input validation, error handling, unit tests for core modules, and docker-compose for local dev and a one-page deploy README.
How we checked
How the score was reached
- Partly verdict base52
- An open-source build was found+5
- 5 cited sources+3
- Hard moats found in the evidence-3
- Evidence score57
The base comes from the verdict. Everything under it is a check that either happened or did not, and each one is a fact frozen in this record rather than a judgement made at render time - so the same evidence always produces the same number.
How scoring works →Cited sources · 5
Every page the run actually retrieved.
- official productTeamwork.com — Home
- official pricingWebsite Project Plan Template | Teamwork.com
- official productEvery Feature Built for Client Work | Teamwork.com
- open sourcefrappe/erpnext
- open sourceopf/openproject
Integrity checks
What held up, and what did not.
