OnboardHive vs Teamwork: Onboarding Front End vs Delivery Back End (2026)

Last updated July 2026

Here is the honest version most comparison posts skip. OnboardHive and Teamwork.com are not really fighting over the same job. One helps you win the client and get them set up. The other helps you deliver the work and bill for it. This guide shows you where the line sits, so you buy the right tool instead of forcing one to do both.

We verified Teamwork.com pricing and features on their live site in July 2026. Where our older notes were out of date, we say so.

Quick verdict

OnboardHive is a client onboarding platform. It links your proposal to your onboarding in one passwordless link. The client reads the proposal, signs, confirms payment, fills out intake forms, and uploads assets, all without a login. You get read analytics that show you what the client actually looked at.

Teamwork.com is a project management and client services (PSA) platform. It is built for the work that happens after the deal closes. Think Gantt charts, time tracking, capacity planning, budgets, and profitability reports. It is very good at running billable client projects at scale.

So the real answer for most agencies is not "which one." It is "which end of the journey hurts more." If your pain is a messy, slow start with new clients, OnboardHive fixes that. If your pain is delivering and tracking profit on live projects, Teamwork wins. Plenty of agencies could use both: onboard in OnboardHive, deliver in Teamwork.

TL;DR

• OnboardHive owns the pre-sale and onboarding step: interactive proposals, e-signatures, read tracking, AI kickoff briefs, and a passwordless client portal.
• Teamwork.com owns delivery: Gantt timelines, time tracking, resource and capacity planning, budgets, and profitability tracking.
• Teamwork uses Proofs for creative approvals. It does not offer interactive sales proposals, section-level read analytics, or e-signatures.
• Teamwork clients log in as free "client users" with limited access. OnboardHive clients get in through a magic link, no account or password.
• Teamwork paid plans start at $9.99/user/month (Basics, annual). OnboardHive starts free, then $15.83/month flat for Pro (not per user).
• Choose OnboardHive to fix the client's first two weeks. Choose Teamwork to run the next six months of the project.

At a glance

Who should read this

Read on if you run an agency, studio, or service business and you are trying to figure out whether you need an onboarding tool, a project delivery tool, or both. This is written for owners and operators who care about the client's first impression and about hitting margins on delivery. It is not written for enterprise IT buyers who need a huge PSA suite. If that is you, Teamwork's higher tiers are worth a demo.

What is OnboardHive?

OnboardHive is an AI-powered client onboarding platform for agencies and service businesses. The idea is simple: win the client and onboard the client on the same link.

You send an interactive proposal. The client opens it, and you see the opens, the active read time, and every re-open in real time. When they are ready, they sign the agreement, confirm payment, fill out intake forms, and upload their files. All of this happens in a branded client portal reached through a passwordless magic link, so there is no account to create and no password to reset.

Behind the scenes, OnboardHive's AI reads the intake answers and drafts a kickoff brief for your team. A "radar" feature flags where a client has stalled and can send auto-reminders on Pro and higher. It is the front door of the client relationship, kept tidy.

What is Teamwork.com?

Teamwork.com (sometimes still called just "Teamwork") is a project management and PSA platform built for teams that do billable client work. It launched in 2007 and has grown into a full delivery suite.

Inside, you get task and project management with Gantt, board, list, and table views. You get native time tracking tied to budgets, resource and capacity planning, retainer management, and profitability reporting. It also has intake forms, a proofing tool for creative approvals, and free "client users" so clients can join projects.

Teamwork is where the work gets planned, tracked, delivered, and billed. Its whole design points at the months after a deal is signed, not the days before it.

Feature comparison

This table uses the same feature set we use across our comparisons, so you can line tools up fairly. "Partial" means the tool does some of it but not the full job.

The pattern is clear. OnboardHive wins the top of the table, the sales and onboarding rows. Teamwork wins the bottom, the delivery and operations rows.

Pricing comparison

We checked Teamwork.com pricing live in July 2026. A note on our older research: earlier plan names like "Deliver, Grow, and Scale" are out of date. The current plans are Free, Basics, Accelerate, Optimize, and Enterprise. The $9.99 entry price still holds on the Basics plan (annual).

The key pricing difference is the model, not just the number. OnboardHive charges a flat monthly price, so a 3-person or 10-person agency pays the same. Teamwork charges per user, so cost grows with your team. A team of 8 on Teamwork Basics runs about $80/month at $9.99 each. Add the Accelerate features most agencies want, like capacity planning and smart forms, and you are near $200/month for that team.

Note on AI: Teamwork includes TeamworkAI on paid plans during an introductory period, with usage-based credits launching in September 2026. Confirm current terms before you buy.

Ease of use

OnboardHive is narrow on purpose, so it is quick to set up. You build a proposal, set the onboarding steps, and send one link. Most people are running in an afternoon.

Teamwork is broader, so there is more to learn. Reviewers often praise its depth but say the many views, settings, and add-on products take time to master. That is the trade you make for a full delivery suite. For a small team that just wants tidy onboarding, it can feel like a lot.

AI features

Both tools use AI, but for different jobs.

OnboardHive's AI reads intake form answers and drafts a kickoff brief, so your team starts a project already briefed. Its radar spots stalled clients and nudges them. The AI serves the onboarding moment.

TeamworkAI serves the delivery moment. It surfaces insights on at-risk projects, spots bottlenecks, forecasts workload, and suggests task changes based on past data and current capacity. It is aimed at helping you deliver on time and protect margin.

Automation

Teamwork is stronger here for delivery workflows. It offers automation across projects, from 100 automations on Free up to 100,000 on the top tier, plus triggers, forms, and integrations that move work along.

OnboardHive's automation is focused. It sends auto-reminders to stalled clients (Pro and up) and moves clients through onboarding steps. It is not a general workflow engine, and it does not pretend to be.

Integrations

Teamwork lists 150+ integrations, including Slack, Google Workspace, Microsoft Teams, Dropbox, QuickBooks, HubSpot, and Salesforce, plus a developer API and Zapier. If you need to plug into an accounting or CRM stack, this is a real strength.

OnboardHive integrates with Google Drive, Notion, Slack, and Dodo Payments for payment confirmation. A public REST API and a native Zapier app are not listed on the site today, so confirm with OnboardHive if those matter to you.

Client portal and access

This is where the two tools feel most different.

OnboardHive gives each client a branded portal reached by a passwordless magic link. The client clicks and lands right where they need to be. No sign-up, no password, no friction. That matters most in the first week, when a bad login can stall a deal.

Teamwork uses free "client users." They are a real license type, and they cost nothing, which is nice. But they log in to the Teamwork app with standard credentials, and their view is limited. They can see up to 5 projects from their company, add tasks and comments, and upload files. They cannot see profitability, manage members, or use planning tools. It is a delivery collaboration space, not a polished onboarding front door.

Proposal tracking

OnboardHive is built around this. You see opens, active read time, re-opens, and real-time alerts, down to which section the client spent time on. That tells you when a client is warm and when a deal is going cold.

Teamwork does not offer interactive sales proposals or read analytics. Its higher Optimize plan adds "quotes" for billing, and Proofs handles creative review and approval. Useful, but a different job from tracking whether a prospect read your pitch.

Delivery, budgets, and profitability (Teamwork's home turf)

Let us be fair and clear about where Teamwork simply wins.

If your pain is delivery, Teamwork is the better tool. It has Gantt timelines for planning, native time tracking tied to budgets, resource and capacity planning so you do not overload people, retainer management, and profitability reports that show whether a project actually made money. OnboardHive does none of this, and it is not trying to. Once the client is onboarded, OnboardHive hands off. Teamwork picks up.

Security

Teamwork offers advanced security features on its Enterprise plan, including Single Sign-On, and serves large organizations. OnboardHive uses passwordless access and offers encrypted hosted storage or Google Drive links. OnboardHive does not list public enterprise compliance certificates such as SOC 2, so if you need documented certs, confirm directly with each vendor.

Scalability

Teamwork scales up the org chart. As your team and project count grow, its tiers add automation, planning, and financial controls, all the way to Enterprise. The per-user model means cost scales with headcount.

OnboardHive scales across clients, not seats. Its flat pricing means adding team members does not raise the bill, and Scale removes onboarding limits. It is built to onboard many clients cleanly, not to run a 200-person delivery org.

Agency use cases

• New client intake is slow and messy. OnboardHive. One link takes the client from proposal to signed to fully onboarded.
• You lose deals in the gap after "yes." OnboardHive. Read analytics and stall radar keep momentum.
• Projects run over budget and you cannot see why. Teamwork. Time tracking and profitability reports expose the leak.
• You juggle capacity across many client projects. Teamwork. Resource and capacity planning balance the load.
• You want both. Onboard in OnboardHive, then push the client into Teamwork for delivery.

Enterprise and larger-team use cases

Larger service firms with many billable staff, formal resource planning, and finance reporting needs will get more from Teamwork's Optimize and Enterprise tiers. Those add SSO, role-based scheduling, financial insights, and priority support. OnboardHive fits inside such an org as the onboarding front end, not as the system of record for delivery.

Migration difficulty

Moving to OnboardHive is light. You rebuild a proposal template and your onboarding steps, then start sending links. There is little historical data to carry over because it is a front-end tool.

Moving to Teamwork is heavier, as with any full project system. You import projects, set up templates, connect time tracking and budgets, and train the team on views and permissions. Plan for a real onboarding period of your own.

Pros and cons

OnboardHive pros

• Proposal to onboarding in one passwordless link
• Native proposal and section-level read analytics
• AI kickoff briefs from intake answers
• Flat pricing and a real free plan
• Fast to set up

OnboardHive cons

• No time tracking, Gantt, or budgets
• Client messaging is async, not live chat
• No native mobile app (responsive web only)
• API and Zapier not listed today
• No public enterprise compliance certs listed

Teamwork.com pros

• Deep delivery suite: Gantt, time, capacity, budgets, profitability
• 150+ integrations, plus API and Zapier
• Native iOS and Android apps
• Free client users for collaboration
• Scales to enterprise

Teamwork.com cons

• No interactive sales proposals or read analytics
• No e-signatures (Proofs is for approvals)
• No passwordless client access
• Per-user pricing grows with your team
• More to learn before you are productive

When Teamwork.com wins

Choose Teamwork when your bottleneck is delivery. If you need to plan timelines, track billable hours, manage capacity across projects, watch budgets, and prove profitability, Teamwork is built for exactly that. It is also the better pick if you want native mobile apps, a large integration list, and a platform that scales to a big delivery team.

When OnboardHive wins

Choose OnboardHive when your bottleneck is the start. If deals stall after "yes," if onboarding is a mess of emails and lost files, or if you want to know whether a prospect actually read your proposal, OnboardHive is built for that moment. It is also the better pick if you want passwordless client access, flat pricing, and a setup you can finish today.

Who should choose which

Final verdict

These two tools are more like teammates than rivals. OnboardHive is the front end: it wins the client and gets them onboarded on one passwordless link, with read analytics and AI briefs that agencies love. Teamwork.com is the back end: it plans, tracks, delivers, and bills the work with a depth OnboardHive does not try to match.

If you can only fix one thing this quarter, ask where the pain is. A rough client start points to OnboardHive. A rough delivery and profit picture points to Teamwork. And if both hurt, the smartest agencies use OnboardHive to onboard and Teamwork to deliver.

FAQs

Is OnboardHive a Teamwork.com competitor? Only partly. They overlap on intake forms, tasks, progress tracking, file sharing, and client collaboration. But OnboardHive is built for winning and onboarding clients, while Teamwork is built for delivering and billing projects. Many agencies use both.

Does Teamwork.com have interactive proposals? No. Teamwork does not offer interactive sales proposals or proposal read analytics. Its Optimize plan adds "quotes" for billing, but that is a different tool from a trackable pitch. OnboardHive is built around interactive proposals.

Does Teamwork.com offer e-signatures? No. Teamwork uses a feature called Proofs to collect approvals on creative work. It does not provide legal e-signatures for agreements. OnboardHive includes e-signatures in its onboarding flow.

How much does Teamwork.com cost in 2026? Teamwork has a free plan for up to 5 users. Paid plans start at $9.99 per user per month on Basics (annual), then $24.99 per user per month on Accelerate. Optimize and Enterprise are custom priced. There is a 30-day free trial.

How much does OnboardHive cost? OnboardHive has a free plan forever. Pro is $15.83 per month (or $190 per year), and Scale is $40.83 per month (or $490 per year). A Founding Lifetime deal is $149.89 one time as a limited offer. Pricing is flat, not per user.

Which is cheaper for a small agency? It depends on team size and needs. OnboardHive's flat price stays the same as you add people. Teamwork's per-user price grows with headcount. For onboarding-focused needs, OnboardHive is usually cheaper. For full delivery, Teamwork's features justify its cost.

Does Teamwork.com have a client portal? Sort of. Teamwork uses free "client users" who log in to the app with limited access to up to 5 projects. It is a collaboration space, not a branded onboarding portal. OnboardHive gives clients a branded portal through a passwordless magic link.

Do clients need a login for OnboardHive? No. OnboardHive uses a passwordless magic link. Clients click a tokenized URL and reach their portal with no account and no password. Teamwork client users log in with standard credentials.

Does Teamwork.com have time tracking? Yes. Native time tracking is a core Teamwork feature, and it ties directly to budgets and profitability reports. OnboardHive does not include time tracking.

Does OnboardHive do project delivery like Gantt charts and budgets? No. OnboardHive stops after onboarding. It does not offer Gantt timelines, capacity planning, budgets, or profitability tracking. Teamwork is the right tool for those.

Does Teamwork.com have AI? Yes. TeamworkAI surfaces insights on at-risk projects, bottlenecks, and workload, and suggests task changes. It is included on paid plans during an introductory period, with usage-based credits launching in September 2026. Confirm current terms before buying.

Does OnboardHive have AI? Yes. OnboardHive's AI drafts kickoff briefs from intake answers and runs a stall "radar" that flags stuck clients and sends auto-reminders on Pro and higher.

Does Teamwork.com have a mobile app? Yes. Teamwork has native iOS and Android apps. OnboardHive is a responsive web app with no native mobile app today.

Does Teamwork.com integrate with other tools? Yes. Teamwork lists 150+ integrations, including Slack, Google Workspace, Microsoft Teams, Dropbox, QuickBooks, HubSpot, and Salesforce, plus a developer API and Zapier. OnboardHive integrates with Google Drive, Notion, Slack, and Dodo Payments.

Does OnboardHive have an API or Zapier app? Not that is publicly listed today. A public REST API and a native Zapier app are not listed on the OnboardHive site. Confirm directly with OnboardHive if you need them. Teamwork has both.

Can I use OnboardHive and Teamwork.com together? Yes, and many agencies should. Use OnboardHive to win and onboard the client on one link, then push the onboarded client into Teamwork to plan, deliver, and bill the project.

Which tool is better for agencies? Neither is simply "better." OnboardHive is better for the sales and onboarding step. Teamwork is better for delivery and profitability. The best choice depends on which part of your client journey needs the most help.

Does Teamwork.com have intake forms? Yes. Teamwork offers forms for work intake, with smart forms on higher tiers. OnboardHive also offers intake forms, plus AI that turns the answers into a kickoff brief.

Is there a free version of each tool? Yes. Teamwork has a free plan for up to 5 users and up to 5 projects. OnboardHive has a free plan forever with 10 tracked proposals per month and 3 completed onboardings total.

How hard is it to switch to each tool? OnboardHive is light to adopt because it is a front-end tool with little history to migrate. Teamwork is heavier, like any full project system, and needs project imports, setup, and team training.

Does Teamwork.com track profitability? Yes. Teamwork ties time and budgets to profitability and financial reporting, so you can see if a project made money. This is one of its core strengths and something OnboardHive does not do.

Sources: onboardhive.com, teamwork.com/pricing, teamwork.com product and support pages, teamwork.com/ai-info, G2, Capterra. Verified July 2026.