Backlog vs Smartsheet

Which one do AI engines recommend, and how do they differ on price, fit and features?

The short answer

Smartsheet is the stronger AI pick in Project Management: it has a visibility score of 20.8 versus 4.1 for Backlog, and ranks ahead in 80% of the answers that name both.

Choose Backlog if…

You want a free plan to start
You need a self-hosted or on-premises option
Flat tiers pricing suits your budget better than per seat
Strong backlog management for complex, scaled engineering

Choose Smartsheet if…

You want the brand AI engines rank higher (20.8 vs 4.1)
You want a lower entry price ($12 vs $35)
AI answers describe it more positively (36% vs 0% positive)
You need SOC 2 or ISO 27001 or GDPR or FedRAMP or HIPAA (BAA) coverage

AI visibility side by side

Latest weekly run · Nov 3

Metric	Backlog	Smartsheet
Visibility score	4.1%	20.8%
Change vs last week	New	New
Rank in Project Management	#18	#6
Share of voice	1.6%	6.3%
Mentions this run	9	35
Positive in AI answers	0%	36%

The stronger value in each row is marked with a ✓.

Visibility score trend

Weekly runs over the last 60 days

Backlog 0pp · Smartsheet 0pp over 0 weekly runs.

Engine by engine

Smartsheet leads on 3 of 3 engines

ChatGPT

25.6%

AI Mode

2.6%

17%

Perplexity

7.6%

19.8%

BacklogSmartsheet

Head to head in AI answers

5 engine answers name both brands

1Backlog ranked higher

4Smartsheet ranked higher

Prompt	Engine	Backlog	Smartsheet
Top project management tool options for B2B SaaS companies	Perplexity	#10	#8
Best project management tool for enterprise	ChatGPT	#7	#1
Best project management tool for enterprise	Perplexity	#5	#1
Compare the leading Project Management platforms	Perplexity	#13	#6
Best project management tool with AI features	Perplexity	#8	#9

Features, pricing & fit

Dimension	Backlog	Smartsheet
Pricing model	Flat tiers	Per seat
Entry price	Free; paid from $35 / mo	$12 per seat / mo
Free plan	Yes	No · 30-day trial
Deployment	Cloud-hosted by Nulab, with an on-premises self-hosted option on the customer's private servers	Cloud-based
Compliance	—	SOC 2, ISO 27001, GDPR, FedRAMP, HIPAA (BAA)
Support	Email support from the customer team, 1:1 online training session, Dedicated customer success associate, Enterprise customer success manager	Help and learning content, Smartsheet Community, Web-based ticketing, Smartsheet University (add-on)
Founded	2004	2005
Headquarters	Fukuoka, Japan	Bellevue, Washington, USA
Employees	—	1,001–5,000
Funding	IPO · $6M raised	Post-IPO equity round
Best for	Business and software development teams that need task tracking, issue management and Git repositories with simple pricing	Organizations running project, portfolio and operational work at scale, including enterprise PMOs.