A Linear alternative for startups
You do not have a process problem yet. You have a nobody knows what anybody is doing today problem, and those need different tools.
Why startups use Linear
If you are shipping software, Linear is a joy and the whole team will happily live in it.
Where it stops
It is engineering shaped. The moment sales, support or design is on the critical path, half the company is outside the tool, and there is no calendar in it for anybody.
The week startups actually have
Six people wearing eleven roles, priorities that changed on Tuesday because a customer said something, and a set of tools that arrived one at a time and now need somebody to keep in sync. The thing that hurts is not tracking. It is that half the week evaporates into work nobody planned.
You are running four tools and syncing them by hand
A tracker, a doc, a chat and a calendar, and a person who quietly spends an hour a week copying between them.
In UnaTask: Tasks, projects, dependencies, calendar, meetings and booking in one place, at one price with nothing held back in a tier above.
Priorities change and the plan does not
A customer conversation on Tuesday makes half of Wednesday wrong, and there is nowhere to see what got displaced.
In UnaTask: Move a block and see what it pushed. The plan is a thing you can rearrange rather than a list you rewrite.
Nobody wants to administer software
The tools that would answer this are platforms, and a platform is a rollout, and nobody at a six person company has a rollout in them.
In UnaTask: Useful on the first day, before anybody configures anything.
The founder is the bottleneck and it is invisible
Everything routes through one or two people and nobody can see how loaded they already are before adding to it.
In UnaTask: Team availability, so handing something over is a decision made with the week in front of you.
On the things startups asked about
| What it does | Linear | UnaTask |
|---|---|---|
| Time blocking on a calendar | No | Core |
| See who has room | Yes | Core |
| A free plan | Yes | Yes |
What it costs
For a team of 5, billed yearly, Linear is about $480 a year and UnaTask is €480 plus VAT. The two are quoted in different currencies, so we have not subtracted one from the other.
Linear: Free tier, then around $8 to $14 per seat per month.
Common questions
Why do startups use Linear?
If you are shipping software, Linear is a joy and the whole team will happily live in it.
Where does Linear stop working for startups?
It is engineering shaped. The moment sales, support or design is on the critical path, half the company is outside the tool, and there is no calendar in it for anybody.
Should we leave Linear?
Not necessarily, and we would rather say so. Keep Linear if you ship software and you want the sharpest place there is to track issues and cycles. Move if the missing piece is the week itself: hours on a calendar, for everyone, before the work is promised.
How long before it is useful?
The same day. There is nothing to configure before it works, which is deliberate: a tool that needs a rollout is a tool a small team never finishes adopting.
What does it cost as we grow?
€10 per seat per month, or €8 billed yearly, plus VAT. One price, every feature. There is no tier above you holding the part you will eventually want.
Linear details checked June 2026.