Open Source Kanban Tools

There are still many open source kanban tools available, contrary to open source projects for Scrum tools that have mostly ended being transformed in a limited offer that supports a main commercial product. The simplicity of the Kanban approach has allowed open source software developers to create and maintain Kanban tools based on various platforms. This article lists pure Kanban open source tools and doesn’t include open source project management tools that mixes for instance Scrum and Kanban techniques, neither tools that are mere task managers. Do not hesitate to contact us if you think that there is an open source project of a Kanban tool missing in this list. We will gladly add it in a future update.

Updates
January 9 2023:
* added Kanri, Kards, Fogga-Kanban, Vindigo
July 19 2022:
* added Godello, Kanban Electron, nullboard, Project-Tracker, Taskcafe
December 7 2020:
* added Donko, Leantime, Planka

Bz Kanban Board

Bz Kanban Board is an open source kanban tool that allows you to visualize your Bugzilla product milestones with a Kanban inspired board. The goal is to compliment an existing Bugzilla workflow, so the board columns represent the bug statuses and the cards represent the bugs. Cards can be opened to view comments or add a new comment. Cards can be dragged from one column to another to change the bug status. Bz Kanban Board is implemented as a single-page application using Ajax with the Bugzilla 5 server REST API.
Website: https://github.com/leif81/bzkanban

Donko

Donko is an open source kanban web application that aims for simplicity.
Website: https://github.com/HigorLoren/donko

Fogga-Kanban

Fogga-Kanban is an open source kanban web single-page application built with React, Redux and React Router.
Website: https://github.com/heysafronov/fogga-kanban

Godello

Godello is a Trello-inspired open source kanban board made with the Godot Engine and GDScript, powered by an online real-time collaborative backend made with Elixir and Phoenix Channels (with the possibility of additional backend languages and frameworks). Godello provides support for multiple Kanban Boards with Lists and Cards, ordering and positioning of Lists and Cards by dragging and dropping, in place editing (example: clicking a card’s title to edit it), support for hundreds of lists and cards in the same board, without loss of frame rate, card description and TODO list.
Website: https://github.com/alfredbaudisch/Godello

Kanbanara

Kanbanara is an open source web-based Project Management System that uses the Kanban methodology. It is written in Python 3.6+ and utilizes MongoDB and CherryPy. Its Kanban board features projects, user-definable workflow with custom states, support for epic, feature, story, enhancement, defect, task, test, bug and transient cards, global and personal WIP limits, role-based columns (Owner, Reviewer or Quality Assurance), support for ghost cards (cards on their way to you or your own cards currently being reviewed or in QA), blockable cards, hidable cards, deferable cards, 46 card styles including a customizable one.
Website: https://sourceforge.net/projects/kanbanara/

Kanboard

Kanboard is an open source Kanban project management software based on PHP that focuses on simplicity and minimalism, allowing you to drag and drop tasks to manage your project. The number of features is voluntarily limited. You can limit your work in progress to focus on your goal
Website: https://kanboard.org/, https://github.com/kanboard/kanboard

Kanban Board App

Kanban Board App is an open source Kanban style task management board app. This tool allows managing tasks with multiple boards and in team / story lanes.
Website: https://github.com/shellyln/kanban-board-app

Kanban Electron

Kanban Electron is an open source cross-platform Kanban board desktop application made with Electron and Nuxt.js, with a focus on simplicity and user experience.
Website: https://github.com/trobonox/kanban-electron

Kanri

Kanri is an open source cross-platform, offline-first Kanban board desktop application with a focus on simplicity and user experience. Made with Tauri, Nuxt.js v3 and Tailwind CSS. It aimed to be the official successor to Kanban Electron. Kanri makes use of the popular Kanban method used in areas like software-development to organize tasks, using boards, cards and columns, just like it can be found in other apps like Trello or Jira. Kanri is a Kanban board desktop app for Mac, Windows and Linux with a familiar layout (inspired by Trello) with a focus on simplicity and user experience. All of your data is saved locally and can be fully exported at any time, so there are no privacy concerns. Furthermore, the app is customizable with themes and custom backgrounds,
Website: https://github.com/trobonox/kanri, https://www.kanriapp.com/

Kards

Kards is a simple open source cards-based kanban board web app heavily inspired by Trello, the UI is also pretty similar to that of Trello. You can create upto 512 unique kanban boards with different names, which holds cards. Each card can hold an unlimited number of items/tasks each. All items support drag and drop between cards as well as within the same card to reoder. All data is stored locally on the computer by the browser. This whole project was written in HTML, CSS, and pure vanilla JavaScript with no external dependencies.
Website: https://github.com/waterrmalann/kards

Leantime

Leantime is an open source lean project management system for innovators. It has been designed to help manage projects from ideation to delivery. Leantime features task management using kanban boards, table and calendar views; idea boards & idea kanban boards, research boards using the Lean Canvas, retrospectives and project reports.
Website: https://github.com/Leantime/leantime

Multikanban

Multikanban is a simple JavaScript-based open source kanban board for multiple personal projects.
Website: http://www.multikanban.com/, https://github.com/mezod/multikanban

Nullboard

Nullboard is a minimalist open source kanban board, focused on compactness and readability.
Website: https://github.com/apankrat/nullboard

Planka

Planka is an open source Trello-like kanban board built with React and Redux. Planka allows creating projects, boards, lists, cards, labels and tasks. You can also add card members, track time, set a due date, add attachments and write comments.
Website: https://github.com/plankanban/planka

Project-Tracker

Project-Tracker is an open source kanban tool. It is a Trello-like a project tracking app with kanban board and time management from Jira build with ReactJs.
Website: https://github.com/kubahrom/project-tracker

TaskBoard

TaskBoard is an open source Kanban-inspired app for keeping track of things that need to get done. The goal of TaskBoard is to provide a simple and clean interface to a functional and minimal application for keeping track of tasks. It is not trying to be the next Trello or LeanKit. TaskBoard has an AngularJS frontend, a PHP backend and uses a SQLite database.
Website: https://github.com/kiswa/TaskBoard

Taskcafe

Taskcafe is an open source project management tool with Kanban boards. Taskcafe allows you managing tasks through a Kanban board interface (set due dates, labels, add checklists). You can view all your current assigned tasks through the My Tasks view
Website: https://github.com/JordanKnott/taskcafe

Vindigo

Vindigo is an open source kanban planning tool focused on productivity and usability for your team. At its core, Vindigo offers an efficient way of creating, listing, and viewing your projects tasks. Inspired by other great planning tools, vindigo provides you with plenty of customization and extensibility, allowing it to fit your specific needs.
Website: https://github.com/VindigoApp/vindigo

Wekan

Wekan is an open-source Trello-like kanban tool built with Meteor. Wekan allows creating Kanban boards, on which cards can be moved around between a number of columns. Kanban boards can have many members, allowing for easy collaboration, just add everyone that should be able to work with you on the board to it, and you are good to go! You can assign colored labels to cards to facilitate grouping and filtering, additionally you can add members to a card, for example to assign a task to someone.
Website: https://wekan.github.io/

Resources on using Kanban in software development

* Kanban Definition by the Agile Alliance
* Kanban for Skeptics
* Kanban Guides
* Implementing Lean “Sustaining Kanban” in Software Development
* Aspects of Kanban
* Kanban Myths and Misconceptions
* The Official Guide to The Kanban Method by Kanban University