FigJam by Figma: Best for friendly design

Figma, a collaborative interface design application company, launched FigJam (Figure A) in 2021. FigJam supports drawing tools, shapes, stickers, notes, text, connectors and stamps, along with section and table management features. You may also import images or insert links to web resources, including shared Google Drive files. Cursor chat enables an ephemeral conversation with collaborators that disappears when you exit the mode, while the comment system allows conventional comments on content anywhere on the board. FigJam offers a few more features than Jamboard, delivered with a cleanly designed user interface, as you might expect.

Figma’s ownership merits mention since Adobe, a creative content giant, announced an agreement to acquire Figma in September 2022; however, the deal was terminated in December 2023. While ownership doesn’t directly affect product features, the fact that Figma once sought to merge with a larger company may signal a long term potential for acquisition.

Pricing

Figma offers four FigJam pricing plans: Starter, Professional, Organization and Enterprise.

• Starter, which is free and lets you create up to three Figma and three FigJam files, with unlimited personal files and unlimited collaborators, among other features.
• Professional, $3 per editor/month billed annually ($36/year per user), includes all Starter features and adds unlimited FigJam files, open sessions, sharing permissions, team libraries, voting and more. Students and educators may access this edition for free.
• Organization, $60 per editor per year, includes all Profesional features plus organization-wide libraries, centralized content management, unified admin and billing options, and more.
• Enterprise, $60 per editor per year, includes all Organization features, plus dedicated workspaces, advanced design systems and guest access controls, along with many other user management and security features.

Miro: Best for enterprise integrations

Miro (Figure B), formerly known as RealtimeBoard, provides a robust set of features all centered around visual collaboration. Standard drawing tools are available to draw, add shapes (including flowchart and Unified Modeling Language symbols), sticky notes and text, along with many templates. Miro also lets you add a huge variety of content types, including images, spreadsheets, tables, kanban, code blocks, charts, diagrams and more. Timer, voting, chat, video chat and notes let you collaborate with others in various ways on your board content.

Miro lets you present your board to other people several ways. The Talktrack feature lets you record a video with your webcam (inset in a circle on the screen) as you navigate and discuss the board. The resulting video is saved and may be shared. Alternatively, you may present either the entire board, which hides many menus to emphasize your content or present frames, which allows you to define and navigate selected sections of content in order. Business and Enterprise editions offer access to facilitation tools to support activities such as voting and adding sticky notes or reactions.

Pricing

Miro offers four pricing plans for professional use: Free, Starter, Business and Enterprise.

• Free, which includes one workspace with three editable boards, five Talktracks, access to templates and support for integrations.
• Starter, $96 per member per year paid annually. This plan adds unlimited boards, high-resolution exports, collaboration with unlimited visitors on public boards, unlimited Talktracks, unlimited project folders, Private Mode sticky notes, version history, meeting features (e.g., timers, voting and video chat) and private boards.
• Business, $192 per member per year paid annually. This plan includes all Starter features, plus unlimited boards for every team and client, secure collaboration with unlimited guests on private and team boards, advanced shape access, enhanced meeting features (e.g., breakouts and voting) and more.
• Enterprise, which requires contacting sales for pricing. This plan includes all Business features plus added security, compliance, management and reporting capabilities, along with premium support.

Students, educators and educational institutions may access different Miro pricing plans.

• Student accounts are free and support up to 10 team members, availability for two years, unlimited boards, one workspace with unlimited projects, unlimited external visitors, among other features.
• Educator accounts are free forever and support all student features, plus support for up to 100 team members, along with access to training and forum resources.
• Institution accounts are available at a 50% discount from standard pricing and include all student and educator features, plus additional administrative and user management features, along with support.

SEE: How to use Miro as your whiteboard in a virtual meeting

Lucidspark by Lucid Software: Best for experimental AI

Lucidspark (Figure C) provides a board on which you may draw and add images, shapes, sticky notes, text and lines. The comments and task system lets board collaborators not only comment on specific board content but also assign work to a colleague. To aid explanation, you may define frame areas and designate paths, so as to show sections of the board in sequence. Visual activities templates support various types of sorting, rating and board engagement, along with additional timer and voting tools.

Lucidspark also offers menu customization and an experimental AI feature. Customize the left-side on-screen menu with a Tool pinning feature to show only the options you select. For example, if you rarely need Jira integration, you may unpin that option and it will not display on-screen, although you may still access it from the More menu. And a Collaborative AI option generates ideas from an entered prompt. For example, a prompt of “Best features of Lucidspark” created a 3×3 set of sticky notes, each filled with two or three words describing features such as “Integrated Video Chat,” “Seamless Integrations” and “Presentation mode.”

Pricing

There are four Lucidspark plans: Free, Individual, Team and Enterprise.

• Free, which includes three editable boards, unlimited shapes, drawing, emoji reactions, commenting, presentation mode, basic visual activities to gather feedback and aggregate results, among other features.
• Individual, $7.95 per user per month billed annually ($95.40/annually per user). This plan adds unlimited editable boards, 1 GB of storage, premium visual activities to gather feedback and aggregate results, and more.
• Team, three team user licenses for $27 per month billed annually ($324/annually for the 3 licenses, which is $108/user per year). This plan adds advanced controls for visual activities, chat, revision history and versioning, voting, a timer and facilitator tools, among other features.
• Enterprise licenses require contacting sales. This plan offers access to Lucidchart for diagramming and adds Team Spaces, many app integrations and access to various user management and security features.

Educators may access a variant of the Team plan for free; this provides teachers and students access to the mobile app and many Team features at no charge. An optional upgrade to a paid team plan for education adds centralized account management, audit logs and access to priority support.

Microsoft Whiteboard: Best for free use

Microsoft Whiteboard (Figure D) is free, but it does require a Microsoft account to view, create or collaborate on boards; therefore, this option may make the most sense for individuals or organizations who already use other Microsoft services, such as Microsoft 365.

Microsoft Whiteboard offers a standard set of tools that includes a pen, highlighter, ruler, notes, emoji-style reactions, text and shapes. You may also upload images to a board. Plus, Microsoft Whiteboard offers a large number of templates for all sorts of brainstorming, planning, meeting and learning activities. You may customize the board background color and select from a set of nine background grid designs. And there’s an included timer. Share the link to give collaborators access to all of these tools, too.

Pricing

Microsoft Whiteboard is free, although you must sign in with a Microsoft account to use it. A Microsoft account may be obtained for free.

Zoom Whiteboard: Best for Zoom meetings

The Zoom conferencing platform offers Zoom Whiteboard (Figure E), which may be used either with a web meeting or separately. For anyone with an existing Zoom account, Zoom Whiteboard merits consideration.

Zoom Whiteboard offers a large number of templates for brainstorming, diagramming, meeting, education or entertainment; or, you may simply create a new blank board. The system includes tools such as pens, shapes, lines, text, sticky notes and comments. You may upload images and PDFs to your board or add a mind map, table, kanban board or cards. In particular, cards let you assign tasks and track both dates and task status. Zoom boards also let you create multiple pages. As a presentation aid, you may add frames around your board content, then organize and present the frames in sequence. The timer and laser pointer may be useful during presentations or collaborations as well.

Pricing

Three Zoom Whiteboard editions are available: Whiteboard Basic, Whiteboard and Whiteboard Plus.

• Whiteboard Basic, which is included with Zoom One Basic and Zoom One Pro, includes three concurrent editable boards owned and 25 MB of storage, along with all core drawing, annotation, image and collaboration features.
• Whiteboard, $24.90 per user per year, and may be added to either the Zoom One Basic or Zoom One Pro plan. This plan adds unlimited concurrent editable boards owned and 1 GB of storage, along with version history and temporary lock features plus shared folders and personal labels.
• Whiteboard Plus, $70 per user per year and may be added to either Zoom One Basic or Zoom One Pro plans, adds unlimited storage and support for personal and organizational templates. Also, Zoom Whiteboard Plus is included as part of Zoom Rooms plans.

SEE: How to use the new Zoom Whiteboard for hybrid meetings

Apple Freeform: Best for Apple device users

Freeform (Figure F), a visual collaboration tool by Apple, is included with current devices that run iOS, iPadOS and macOS. The app is free, although only people who use Apple devices may use it. For example, Freeform would be an excellent option for a classroom where a teacher and students all use iPadOS or macOS devices, but would not be suitable for a situation where collaborators might use Windows, ChromeOS or Android devices.

Freeform offers numerous writing and drawing styles, including a pen, pencil, highlighter, crayon, ink and watercolor options. On devices that support an Apple pencil, you may leverage the system’s built-in handwriting recognition system, Scribble, to convert pencil strokes into text. Freeform lets you add notes, links, shapes and typed text. You may use a camera to capture a photo or upload an image, video, audio file or PDF to a board. Freeform works offline, so you can use it to capture ideas almost anywhere. Freeform allows up to 100 people to collaborate on a board, and it may be used with Messages or FaceTime.

Pricing

Freeform is available as one of the default apps on all modern Apple devices, including iPhone, iPad and macOS systems.