European Alternatives to Trello
Trello is a Kanban-style project management tool owned by Atlassian. All boards, cards, and project data are stored on Atlassian's US-controlled cloud infrastructure.
Why Switch from Trello?
- ⚠Data stored on Atlassian's US cloud — subject to US legal jurisdiction
- ⚠Limited features compared to European alternatives
- ⚠Free plan severely restricted: power-ups and automation limits
- ⚠Atlassian has moved Trello to its US Jira cloud infrastructure
Is Trello GDPR Compliant?
Is Trello GDPR compliant? Trello is owned by Atlassian, acquired in 2017 for $425 million. Atlassian hosts Trello on Amazon Web Services (AWS) — a US company subject to the CLOUD Act. All Trello boards, cards, attachments, and comments are stored on this US-controlled infrastructure. EU organisations storing work involving personal data (HR processes, customer service, project data with names or contact details) in Trello face GDPR compliance obligations they may not be meeting.
Trello GDPR compliance features: Atlassian provides a Data Processing Agreement and processes data under EU-US standard contractual clauses. Trello Business and Enterprise plans include enhanced compliance features and EU data residency options. However, the standard free and paid consumer plans used by most Trello teams have limited compliance controls and minimal data deletion functionality.
Trello Power-Ups and third-party integrations: Trello's Power-Ups (integrations) can connect boards to dozens of third-party US tools. Each integration that accesses Trello board data may process personal information without users realising another data transfer is occurring. For organisations with comprehensive GDPR compliance requirements, managing data flows across Trello's integration ecosystem is extremely complex.
Trello GDPR Germany: German data protection authorities recommend assessing all US-hosted project management tools before using them to process personal data. Teams using Trello cards to manage customer service requests, HR onboarding, or any workflow involving personal information of EU residents need to document this processing formally. Many German teams have transitioned to European alternatives to simplify this compliance burden.
European Kanban and project management tools provide structural GDPR compliance. MeisterTask (Germany, Munich) offers a nearly identical Kanban interface to Trello with data stored on German servers. Taiga (Spain) is open-source and self-hostable with Kanban and Scrum support. OpenProject (Germany, Berlin) provides comprehensive project management including Kanban boards and Gantt charts. All operate exclusively under EU law.
1 European Alternative
Sorted by privacy score
Taiga
Agile project management for cross-functional teams. Kanban and Scrum.
| Tool | Score | Privacy | Pricing | OSS | EU Data | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
#1Taiga Agile project management for cross-functional teams. Kanban and Scrum. Verified | 82 | 86 | Freemium | ✓ | ✓ | 🇪🇸 |
Agile project management for cross-functional teams. Kanban and Scrum.
Trello vs. European Alternatives — Feature Comparison
| Feature | Trello | MeisterTask | Taiga | OpenProject |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EU Servers | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ | (Self-host) |
| Open Source | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Self-Hosting | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
| GDPR Compliant | ⚠ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Scrum Support | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Free Tier | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
✓ = available · ✗ = not available · ⚠ = limited / US data transfer risk
Frequently Asked Questions
What are European alternatives to Trello?
Taiga (Spain) offers Kanban and Scrum boards in a polished open-source platform. MeisterTask (Germany) is a Trello-like Kanban tool with excellent UX. OpenProject (Germany) provides Kanban alongside full project management.
Is MeisterTask similar to Trello?
Yes — MeisterTask has a nearly identical Kanban board interface to Trello. It adds automatic actions, integrations, and a cleaner design. Data is stored on German servers and the company is headquartered in Munich.
Is Taiga free?
Yes — Taiga.io offers a free cloud plan for small teams. Self-hosted Taiga is completely free and open-source. Paid cloud plans for larger teams are competitively priced.
Can I import my Trello boards into a European tool?
Taiga and OpenProject support importing from Trello via CSV or the Trello export JSON format. Cards, labels, members, and due dates can be imported with good fidelity.
Is Trello GDPR compliant?
With significant limitations. Trello is owned by Atlassian (Australian-US) and hosted on AWS (US CLOUD Act). All board data is on US-controlled infrastructure. The free plan has minimal GDPR compliance features. MeisterTask (Germany) offers a nearly identical interface with German data storage, and OpenProject (Germany) provides comprehensive GDPR-compliant project management — both self-hostable.