Project Management for NGOs, Without the Per Person Bill
Track programme delivery, spend against restricted budgets, and donor reporting dates, with every volunteer and field worker included at no extra cost.
Free forever plan · No credit card required · Set up in minutes
What does NGO project management need?
Nonprofit programmes are judged twice: once on whether the work happened, and again on whether the money was spent the way the funder was told it would be. Most organisations doing this have a small core team, a much larger group of volunteers and field staff, and a hard limit on what they can justify spending on software. What that needs is a shared plan everyone can reach, budget tracked against the work, and a price that does not grow every time somebody joins. Orangescrum is flat priced with unlimited users, and there is a free open source edition.
Why programme delivery gets hard to prove
Delivery, spend, and a report you can stand behind
Unlimited users
Volunteers, field staff, and partner organisations all included, because the price does not depend on headcount.
Budget per programme
Set a budget for each project or grant line and watch actual cost build from logged work.
Reporting on activity and cost
Pull progress and effort by project, so each funder's report starts from the same live record.
Reporting deadlines as milestones
Donor reporting dates tracked as real milestones with owners, not as a note in someone's calendar.
Activity history
A permanent record of who did what and when, which is what an auditor or a funder review actually wants.
Partner access
Role based permissions per project, so an implementing partner sees its own programme and nothing else.
How a programme is tracked
Where nonprofits use it
Which edition includes what
| Capability | CloudManaged SaaS | Self-HostedOn-premise / private cloud | Open SourceCommunity Edition |
|---|---|---|---|
| Projects, tasks, and boards | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Unlimited users | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Time logging | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Milestones and calendar | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Runs on your own servers | ✗ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Reporting and analytics | ✓ | ✓ | ✗ |
| Budget and cost tracking | Pro | ✓ | ✗ |
| Timesheets | Pro | ✓ | ✗ |
NGO project management FAQ
Is there a genuinely free option?
Yes, two of them. There is a free forever cloud plan covering one project and one user, and there is the Community Edition, a free and open source release under the AGPL license that you host yourself with no user limit. Many small organisations run the Community Edition indefinitely and never pay us anything.
Do we pay per volunteer?
No. Every paid plan is a flat monthly price with unlimited users: Basic 29 dollars a month, Pro 69, Premium 349. Adding fifty volunteers costs nothing extra, which is usually the reason nonprofits pick us over per seat tools.
Can we track spend against a restricted grant?
Yes. Give each grant its own project with a budget, define your rates, and actual cost builds from logged time as the work happens. You see a line heading over while there is still time to reallocate, instead of finding out in the quarterly finance report.
Is this an accounting or fund accounting system?
No, and it is worth being direct. We have no general ledger, no fund accounting, no restricted and unrestricted fund segregation, and no donation processing. We track project budget, logged effort, and project cost, and finance teams export that into whichever accounting system they already use.
Do you handle fundraising or donor relationships?
No. There is no donor CRM, no fundraising pipeline, no campaign or appeal tracking, and no gift processing. Orangescrum is for delivering the programmes, and a fundraising tool sits alongside it.
What does the Community Edition leave out?
The Community Edition includes projects, tasks and subtasks, Kanban boards, calendar view, time logging, milestones, checklists, comments, and role based permissions. Reporting and analytics, Gantt charts, budget and cost, timesheets, and the wiki are in the Cloud and Self-Hosted editions.
Can field teams update work from a phone?
Yes. It runs in a browser on any device, so a field worker can update a task or log time from a phone without a separate license or a separate app to buy.
Can partner organisations be given limited access?
Yes. Permissions are role based per project, so an implementing partner is added to its own programme only. You keep visibility across everything while each partner sees just its own scope.
Spend the budget on the programme, not the software
A free open source edition, a free cloud plan, or unlimited users from 29 dollars a month.