Migrating from Smartsheet to Wrike
Wrike and Smartsheet both handle cross functional project management and marketing campaign management, but they differ on pricing — Smartsheet comes in $0.8000000000000007/user/mo/user/mo lower. This guide covers how to move your team across without losing data, context, or momentum.
At a Glance
- Spreadsheet-familiar interface makes adoption easy for teams transitioning from Excel — minimal training needed for basic use
- Extremely powerful Gantt chart and dependency tracking capabilities, ideal for traditional project management and waterfall methodologies
- Robust automation engine with conditional logic, approval workflows, and automated notifications that scale across the organization
- Extremely versatile work management platform — supports Gantt, Kanban, table, calendar, and workload views in a single workspace
- Powerful resource management and workload balancing with real-time capacity insights (Business plan and above)
- Built-in proofing and approval workflows for creative assets — images, videos, PDFs — making it ideal for marketing and creative teams
You gain with Wrike
- +time tracking
Migration Steps
Audit and export your current workspace
Before touching Wrike, document what lives in Smartsheet: projects and tasks, custom fields, automations, integrations, and team permissions. Export a full CSV backup — most tools support this from Settings → Export. Pay particular attention to any custom fields and workflow automations that your team relies on daily.
Set up your Wrike workspace
Create your Wrike workspace and replicate your project structure using tasks and projects. Wrike starts at $9.8/user/mo/user/mo with a free tier available — budget $0.8000000000000007/user/mo more per user. Run with a single pilot team before migrating everyone.
Map your workflow equivalents
Find the closest Wrike equivalent for each Smartsheet feature your team relies on. projects and tasks in Smartsheet maps to tasks and projects in Wrike. Wrike supports custom fields — recreate your Smartsheet field schema here first. Gantt-style timeline views are available if your team used them in Smartsheet. Prioritise the critical path: task creation, status tracking, and assignment.
Import your data
Wrike supports CSV import for tasks and projects and has 20+ native integrations. After importing, rebuild your key automations — Wrike's automation engine can replicate most rules you had in Smartsheet. Start with your most active project rather than importing everything at once.
Onboard your team
Run a 30-minute walkthrough covering the daily workflow: how to create tasks and projects, update status, and find your board. Expect a moderate ramp — most engineers and PMs hit their stride within a week. The biggest adjustment is usually the project hierarchy.
Run Smartsheet in parallel for two weeks
Keep Smartsheet read-only while your team works primarily in Wrike. This reduces risk and lets people reference historical context — old decisions, archived tickets, past sprint data — without slowing the migration. After two weeks with no new work going into Smartsheet, archive the workspace and make Wrike the official home.
Ready to switch?
Read the full Wrike review for pricing, integrations, and team fit details.