Microsoft Planner vs SharePoint list for tracking team work

Short answer: use Planner when your team needs a simple board of tasks, with a person on each task and a due date. Use a SharePoint list when your work is records with your own fields, such as orders, shipments, requests or approvals. Both come with Microsoft 365, so for most teams cost is not the deciding factor. Shape of the work is.

At a glance

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Planner numbers are for basic plans.

Note: Microsoft changes limits and prices, so check before you decide. I build trackers on SharePoint, so I have a side. Below I say where Planner wins, because it often does.

(A SharePoint list and a Microsoft List are the same thing. Microsoft Lists is the app. The lists are stored in SharePoint.)

What each tool is built for

Planner is a task board. You make a plan, split it into buckets, and add tasks. Each task has people assigned, a due date, a checklist and notes. You can see the plan as a board, a grid or a schedule. The Planner app in Teams also shows each person their own tasks from many places in one view (My Day, My Tasks, My Plans), including tasks from Planner and flagged emails.

A SharePoint list is a table that you design. Each row is an item. Each column is a field you pick: text, number, date, choice, person, yes or no, and more. You can show the same data as a grid, a calendar or a board. The list is stored in SharePoint, so it follows the same sharing and access rules as the rest of your site.

The key difference: Planner is built around one kind of record, a task. A list lets you build the record you actually have.

Limits side by side

Planner (basic plans), from Microsoft Learn:

• Active tasks in a plan: 3,000. Total tasks in a plan: 9,000.
• Buckets in a plan: 200.
• People assigned to one task: 20.
• Checklist items in one task: 20.
• Microsoft notes these limits can change without notice.

SharePoint list, from Microsoft Learn and Microsoft Support:

• Items in one list: up to 30 million.
• A single query or view can only process 5,000 items at one time, unless your sort and filter columns are indexed. Operations over this are blocked. Keep views filtered.
• File attached to a list item: 250 MB.

For a normal team tracker, both limits are far above what you will use. If you have tens of thousands of records, a list is the safer choice.

Price

Planner basic plans: Microsoft says users with a Microsoft 365 license get the Planner app. No extra cost.

Planner premium plans (Planner Plan 1, and the Project plans) need their own license. Microsoft says people without the premium license can still work on a premium plan but cannot use the premium features. Check Microsoft's current pricing page for the premium license price before you plan around it.

SharePoint lists: SharePoint is included in Microsoft 365 Business Basic, Standard and Premium, and in the Enterprise and Frontline plans. Microsoft's SharePoint limits page says so. No extra license for a list.

So a team that already pays for Microsoft 365 pays nothing more for either basic Planner or a list.

Comparison table

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Where Planner wins

Speed. You can start a plan in a few minutes with nothing to design.

One personal view. The Planner app in Teams collects a person's tasks from every plan in one place. A list does not do this by itself.

Checklists and task notes. Planner tasks have a checklist of up to 20 items and a notes area.

Simple teams. If your question is "who does what by when," Planner answers it with less setup.

Premium option. If you later need dependencies and schedules like a project plan, Planner has paid premium plans for that, and basic plans can grow into them. Check the license rules first.

Where a SharePoint list wins

Your own record. Delayed shipments, purchase requests, equipment loans, client onboarding: these need fields that a task does not have. A list holds them.

Size. Up to 30 million items per list, versus 9,000 total tasks in a Planner plan.

Filtered views. Make one view per owner, per status or per site, all from the same data.

Approvals and reminders. Power Automate can start an approval when an item changes and send reminders for late items. Planner connects to Power Automate too.

Access control. Lists follow SharePoint permissions, so your IT team manages who sees what with the same accounts.

Reporting. Grouped views, a SharePoint page or Power BI can show totals from your own columns.

Pick Planner if

• Your work is tasks: a person, a date, a few notes.
• Fewer than a few thousand open tasks per plan.
• People want one personal to-do view across projects.
• You do not need custom fields or approvals.
• You want to start today with no design work.

Pick a SharePoint list if

• Your work is records, such as orders, requests, shipments or cases.
• You need custom fields and several filtered views of the same data.
• You need approvals or automatic reminders.
• You expect thousands of items, or years of history.
• You want one tracker that your manager can open and filter without asking you.

Use both

Many teams use both. Planner holds the small to-do items for a project. A list holds the records the project is about. If you are moving off a spreadsheet, start with a list. See "Replace a spreadsheet tracker with a SharePoint list" and "SharePoint project tracker example" on this site.

How to choose in four steps

1. Write down one example of the thing you track. If it is "a task for a person," pick Planner. If it has five or more custom facts, pick a list.
2. Count how many items you expect in a year.
3. Ask if you need an approval or a reminder that fires on its own.
4. Try one real week of work in the tool you picked before you move everyone.

When to get help

You can build all of this yourself in Microsoft 365. If you would rather have it built and tested for your team, I do that. A tracker like this is a fixed price: $5,000 for one, built in 2 weeks. See "What a SharePoint tracker costs". Bring one example of the problem to a free call.

Tell me what's still manual

I am Al Davies. I run 250 High Street LLC and build SharePoint trackers and Power Automate flows for operations teams. I work remotely. The first call is free, and I will not try to sell you anything.

See trackers I built: Tools I built

FAQ

Updated 2026-10-27.

Is Microsoft Planner free?

Basic Planner comes with a Microsoft 365 license, so there is no extra charge. Premium plans such as Planner Plan 1 need their own license.

Can a SharePoint list work like a Kanban board?

Yes. A list can show a board view grouped by a choice column, such as Status. It is less polished than Planner for task work, but it works.

How many tasks can one Planner plan hold?

3,000 active tasks and 9,000 tasks in total, with 200 buckets.

Can I use Planner and a SharePoint list together?

Yes. Both can sit in the same Teams channel as tabs. Use Planner for small tasks and the list for the records those tasks relate to.

Which is better for approvals?

A SharePoint list with Power Automate. A flow can start when an item is created or changed and ask a person to approve in Teams or Outlook.

Sources

• Microsoft Learn, Planner limits
• Microsoft Learn, Manage the Planner app in Teams
• Microsoft Learn, SharePoint Online limits
• Microsoft Support, Manage large lists and libraries
• Microsoft Learn, Get started with Power Automate approvals
• Microsoft Learn, Microsoft Planner limits

Related guides

• Microsoft Planner vs Trello for a small team
• Monday.com vs SharePoint for a 50-person team
• SharePoint list vs Excel for team tracking: which one fits?
• SharePoint vs Google Drive for a small team