Padlet Alternatives 2026: 5 Free Options
Padlet alternatives: Miro, WeKan, PLANKA, Excalidraw and 1 more. Prices and licenses checked October 25, 2026.
•3 min read•Learning & Everyday Apps
Verdict:Leave Padlet if the free plan's three padlets and 20 MB uploads keep getting in the way. Padlet's Neon plan allows 3 total padlets, unlimited posts and 20 MB per upload, and its Platinum plan is $15 a month or $120 a year. None of these options reproduces Padlet exactly, so pick by what you actually do with it. For visual brainstorming and workshops, Miro's free plan gives three editable boards with unlimited members. For organised work with columns and cards, WeKan and PLANKA are free to self-host, which suits schools and teams that already run servers. Excalidraw and tldraw cover live sketching and diagrams for free, and work well for a lesson where everyone draws on one canvas. The trade-off is that Padlet's strength is the open wall where students paste links, images and recordings with almost no training, and none of these tools match that for non-technical groups. Plan for a short migration: export what you need, rebuild boards by hand, and test with a real class or group. If you only exceed three boards a few times a year, deleting old padlets may cost less than switching.
Quick comparison
| Tool | Price | Platforms | Best for | Tested |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Miro | Free (Free plan: 3 editable boards with unlimited team members); paid from $8 per per member/month, billed yearly (Starter) | Web | Visual brainstorming boards | Docs only |
| WeKan | Free (MIT-licensed Kanban app you host yourself) | Web, Self-hosted | Self-hosted card boards | Docs only |
| PLANKA | Free (Free Community edition for personal, internal and nonprofit use); paid from EUR 36 per month for 5 users, Pro Self-Hosted, billed annually (EUR 7.20 per user) | Web, Self-hosted | Team boards on your own server | Docs only |
| Excalidraw | Free (Free web app with real-time collaboration and end-to-end encryption); paid from $6 per user/month, Excalidraw+ | Web | Quick shared sketches | Docs only |
| tldraw | Free (Free whiteboard web app with instant collaboration; no paid plan or limits shown on the homepage) | Web | Free collaborative drawing | Docs only |
| Mural | Free (Free: 3 editable murals at a time, unlimited view-only visitors, 1 workspace, no guests); paid from $9.99 per member/month, billed annually (Team+; $12 billed monthly) | Web browser | Whiteboard | Docs only |
Independent comparison. Paid placements are labelled separately; editorial links earn no affiliate commissions. Learn more.
Good fit if
- You run workshops and want a visual canvas (Miro is the pick)
- You want a Kanban board on your own server (WeKan is the pick)
- Your group needs a quick shared sketch space (Excalidraw is the pick)
- You need a free board for a nonprofit team (PLANKA is the pick)
Not ideal if
- You rely on Padlet features or integrations that these tools do not replicate
Padlet today: Free (Neon (free): 3 total padlets, unlimited posts, 20 MB per upload, recordings up to 5 minutes audio and 2 minutes video) (Padlet pricing, checked 2026-10-23).
Why people look for Padlet alternatives
Padlet's free plan caps you at 3 padlets, with 20 MB uploads and 2 minutes of video recording. Platinum lifts that to unlimited padlets at $15 a month or $120 a year, but it is still one user. Role-based permissions, user management and the analytics dashboard only arrive with the Team plan at $19.99 per Maker monthly, while SSO and LMS integrations sit on School & District, which starts at $1,200 a year for 10 teachers.
Miro
Compared with Padlet: Free plan with 3 editable boards and unlimited team members. Miro is a whiteboard rather than a wall of posts, so you lose Padlet's simple post-and-comment layout but gain diagrams, frames and workshop tools.
Price: Free (Free plan: 3 editable boards with unlimited team members); paid from $8 per per member/month, billed yearly (Starter) (Miro pricing, checked 2026-10-23).
Platforms and license: Web. Proprietary.
Best for: Visual brainstorming boards.
WeKan
Compared with Padlet: MIT-licensed Kanban you host yourself, free. It organises cards in lists rather than free-form walls, so it fits project work better than Padlet's student boards, and needs someone to run a server.
Price: Free (MIT-licensed Kanban app you host yourself) (WeKan pricing, checked 2026-10-22).
Platforms and license: Web, Self-hosted. MIT (open source).
Project activity: 21.1k GitHub stars · latest release v12.65 (Oct 25, 2026) · last commit Oct 27, 2026
Best for: Self-hosted card boards.
PLANKA
Compared with Padlet: Free Community edition for personal, internal and nonprofit use, self-hosted. A clean Kanban app, but under a source-available licence, not open source, and not a Padlet-style open wall for pasting media.
Price: Free (Free Community edition for personal, internal and nonprofit use); paid from EUR 36 per month for 5 users, Pro Self-Hosted, billed annually (EUR 7.20 per user) (PLANKA pricing, checked 2026-10-22).
Platforms and license: Web, Self-hosted. PLANKA Community License (source-available, not open source).
Best for: Team boards on your own server.
Worth knowing: The license bars running it as a commercial hosted service for third parties.
Excalidraw
Compared with Padlet: Free MIT web whiteboard with real-time collaboration and end-to-end encryption. No posts, uploads or comment threads like Padlet, so it covers sketching and diagrams only; Excalidraw+ is $6 a month.
Price: Free (Free web app with real-time collaboration and end-to-end encryption); paid from $6 per user/month, Excalidraw+ (Excalidraw pricing, checked 2026-10-22).
Platforms and license: Web. MIT (open source).
Project activity: 134.7k GitHub stars · latest release v0.18.1 (Apr 21, 2026) · last commit Oct 27, 2026
Best for: Quick shared sketches.
Worth knowing: Excalidraw+ has a 14-day trial; annual billing saves 14%. Hand-drawn look, not a formal-shape library.
tldraw
Compared with Padlet: Free whiteboard web app with instant collaboration and no limits shown on its homepage. Like Excalidraw it lacks Padlet's post and attachment model, so use it for drawing, not for collecting student contributions.
Price: Free (Free whiteboard web app with instant collaboration; no paid plan or limits shown on the homepage) (tldraw pricing, checked 2026-10-23).
Platforms and license: Web. Source-available SDK (development use only without a license key); tldraw.com is a free web app.
Best for: Free collaborative drawing.
Worth knowing: Free web whiteboard. The homepage did not state a license for the app or the SDK.
Other popular options (paid)
Mural
Compared with Padlet: Free plan gives unlimited members and murals, but only 3 are editable at a time; Team+ is $9.99 per member monthly billed annually. A facilitation canvas with voting, timer and templates rather than Padlet's post wall.
Price: Free (Free: 3 editable murals at a time, unlimited view-only visitors, 1 workspace, no guests); paid from $9.99 per member/month, billed annually (Team+; $12 billed monthly) (Mural pricing, checked 2026-10-25).
Which one to pick
- You run workshops and want a visual canvas: Miro
- You want a Kanban board on your own server: WeKan
- Your group needs a quick shared sketch space: Excalidraw
- You need a free board for a nonprofit team: PLANKA
Limits of this review
Docs-only for Miro, WeKan, PLANKA, Excalidraw, tldraw: we did not install or run them, so feature claims come from vendor pages and we did not test import from Padlet. Vendor prices and free limits change; confirm on the linked pricing page before you buy or migrate.
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Kevin Fan
Kevin Fan is a SaaS founder. He runs Free Instead Of, which tracks free and open-source alternatives to paid software and checks each price and free-plan limit against the vendor's own pages.
Methodology
Based on official pricing and product pages checked between 2026-10-22 and 2026-10-25: Padlet, Miro, WeKan, PLANKA, Excalidraw, tldraw, Mural. Prices, free limits and licenses are the figures shown on those pages on those dates. No tool on this page was installed or run. No accounts were created.