How to Move from Trello to monday.com (2026 Guide)

Quick answer: To move from Trello to monday.com, first audit your Trello boards, then decide whether each Trello list becomes a monday.com group or a value in a status column. Next, export or connect your Trello data and import it with monday.com’s import options (a Trello importer or a CSV/Excel file). After the import, fix column types, rebuild your Butler rules as monday automations, reconnect integrations and run both tools side by side for a short pilot before you switch Trello to read-only. A small team with a few boards can usually do this in a day or two; a whole department needs a planned rollout over a few weeks.

Updated October 2026

Trello is one of the easiest ways to start managing work: a board, some lists, some cards. Teams usually start looking at monday.com when they need more than that. Common reasons are reporting across many boards, typed data (numbers, dates, owners, budgets) and automations that go further than a card moving between lists. This guide walks through the move step by step: how Trello’s building blocks map to monday.com, how to get your data across, what to rebuild by hand, and what you gain and give up.

If you are still deciding between the two tools, start with our monday.com vs Trello comparison. This guide assumes you have already decided to move.

What changes when you move from Trello to monday.com

The biggest change is the data model. In Trello, a board is a set of lists and each card sits in one list. The card’s position tells you its stage, and extra details live in labels, checklists, Power-Ups and custom fields.

In monday.com, a board is closer to a structured table. Each row is an item, items are organised into groups, and every detail lives in a typed column: status, person, date, timeline, number, file, dependency and so on. The same board can then be shown as a table, a Kanban board, a calendar, a timeline or a chart. Many teams keep their Trello habits by opening the Kanban view first and moving to the table view once they trust the data.

That difference drives most migration decisions. In Trello, stage is a place. In monday.com, stage is usually a value in a column.

How Trello maps to monday.com

How to move from Trello to monday.com, step by step

Step 1: Audit your Trello workspace

List every board you have and mark it as active, reference or dead. For each active board, note the owner, the number of open cards, the custom fields, the Power-Ups in use and any Butler rules. This list becomes your migration plan. Most teams find that a large share of their boards do not need to move at all and can stay archived in Trello.

Step 2: Decide how lists become groups or statuses

This is the one design decision that matters most. Look at your lists:

• If the lists are stages (Backlog, To do, Doing, Review, Done), map them to a Status column. Each card’s list becomes its status value, and you can use groups for something more useful, such as sprint, month or client.
• If the lists are categories (Client A, Client B, Phase 1, Phase 2), map them to groups.

Keeping stages as groups works, but it makes automations and dashboards harder, because most monday.com reporting is built around column values.

Step 3: Choose a plan and set up your workspace

monday.com’s Free plan is limited to 2 seats, and paid plans are sold per seat with a 3-seat minimum. Features most Trello teams rely on, such as automations, integrations, timeline and calendar views and guest access, start on the Standard plan. Our monday.com pricing guide explains seat bundles and plan limits; check current pricing on monday.com pricing on Spotsaas before you buy. Then create a workspace for each team and invite users before you import anything, so assignees map to real people.

Step 4: Export or connect your Trello data

Trello lets you export a board as JSON from the board menu, and CSV export has been tied to Trello’s paid plans. Check what your plan allows. If you plan to use monday.com’s built-in Trello import, you may not need a file at all, because the importer connects to your Trello account. Either way, keep a full export of every active board as a backup before you change anything.

Step 5: Import into monday.com

monday.com offers several ways to bring data in:

1. The Trello importer: monday.com has offered a direct import from Trello in its board import options. You connect Trello, pick a board and map the fields.
2. CSV or Excel import: export to a spreadsheet, tidy the columns, then import. This gives you the most control over column types.
3. Rebuild by hand: for a board with a few dozen cards, rebuilding from a monday.com template is often faster and cleaner.

Import options and what they carry over change over time, so check the current import menu in your account. Start with one small, real board as a test before you import everything.

Step 6: Clean up the imported board

Imports rarely land perfectly. Check that each column has the right type (a date imported as text will not drive a calendar or timeline). Then confirm status labels and colours, people assignments, dates and subitems from checklists. Delete columns you no longer need. Archive cards that were already archived in Trello instead of carrying them into active groups.

Step 7: Rebuild your automations

Butler rules do not convert. Rebuild the ones that matter with monday.com’s automation recipes, which follow a “when this happens, do that” pattern. Common translations:

• “When a card is moved to Done, mark the due date complete” becomes “When status changes to Done, move the item to the Done group” or “notify the owner”.
• Due-date reminders become “When a date arrives, notify someone”.
• Recurring cards become a recurring automation that creates an item on a schedule.
• “When a card is added, assign a member” becomes “When an item is created, assign a person”.

Automations count toward a monthly action allowance on each plan, so start with the few rules your team actually depends on.

Step 8: Reconnect integrations

Go through your Power-Up list and find the matching monday.com integration or marketplace app for each tool, such as Slack, Gmail, Google Drive, Jira or GitHub. Some Power-Ups have no direct equivalent; decide whether you need that feature, can cover it with a column or automation, or can drop it.

Step 9: Set up views and a dashboard

Add a Kanban view grouped by status so the board feels familiar, then add the views Trello could not give you as easily: a timeline for planning, a calendar for deadlines, and a dashboard that rolls up status, owners and dates across boards. A dashboard is often the first thing managers notice, and it is a good reason for the team to stay in monday.com.

Step 10: Pilot, train and switch over

Run one team on monday.com for a week or two while Trello stays available. Name a champion who answers questions and adjusts boards. Write a one-page guide covering where work goes, which statuses mean what, and how to use updates and mentions. Once the pilot runs smoothly, set Trello boards to read-only or close them, so nobody keeps updating both tools.

What you gain and what you lose

Be honest about the trade-off. monday.com asks for a little more setup, and a team that only needs a simple shared to-do board may find it heavier than Trello.

Should you move? Choose monday.com if… or stay on Trello if…

Choose monday.com if you need reporting across projects, typed data such as budgets, hours or owners, timeline planning, or automations that span several boards. It also fits if other teams (sales, service, development) may join the same platform later.

Stay on Trello if your team is small, your boards are simple, the Power-Ups you depend on have no monday.com equivalent, or the cost of paid seats is hard to justify for what you track. If you are open to other options too, see our best Trello alternatives and best Kanban software guides.

Common migration mistakes to avoid

• Moving everything. Migrate active boards only; archive the rest.
• Importing before inviting users. Assignees will not map to people who are not in the account yet.
• Keeping stages as groups by default. Decide on purpose, board by board.
• Rebuilding every Butler rule. Start with the essential ones and watch your automation allowance.
• Running both tools indefinitely. Set a cut-over date and make Trello read-only.

Limitations to know before you start

No import is lossless. Comment history, attachments, card covers and Power-Up data may not carry over exactly, and Butler rules always need rebuilding. Plan limits on monday.com, such as seats, automation actions and some views, depend on your plan. Import tools also change over time, so test with one real board before you commit a whole department.

After the move: next steps

Once your boards are in, standardise them. Our walkthrough on how to set up a project in monday.com covers columns, views and automations in more depth, and our guide to monday.com templates for project management shows which starting points suit which kind of work. For an overview of both platforms, see the monday.com profile on Spotsaas and the Trello profile, and compare other tools in our best project management software guide or the project management software category.

Frequently asked questions