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28 Best Timeline Software for Every Kind of Project (2023)

A comprehensive list of tools to help you make the perfect timeline

By Matt Mazur · Last updated October 25, 2023

When it comes to creating a timeline, there is no shortage of timeline makers to choose from. To make choosing a tool easier for you, we’ve searched the internet and compiled a complete list of all 28 timeline software available that you might want to consider.

How to Choose the Right Timeline Maker

With so many tools to choose from, how should you decide which to use?

To start, ask yourself these 4 questions:

  1. What features are non-negotiable? For example, depending on the tool, you may or may not get collaboration, images, drag and drop, events with durations, BC dates, etc.
  2. What platforms does the tool support? Some tools are web-based and can be used from any device whereas some only work on Windows or Macs.
  3. What style do I prefer? Every tool creates a different style of timeline. A cartoon-looking timelines might be fine if you're working on a homework assignment but may not work well if you'll be presenting the timeline to a board of directors.
  4. What can I afford? Most tools, including ours (Preceden), provide a free plan or trial which may be more than enough for your timeline. If you need a paid plan (which will typically unlock additional features) you'll want to make sure to choose a tool in your budget, which may be drastically different depending on whether the tool is for students or a project managers at Fortune 100 companies.

In addition to the differing features, pricing, and styles, be sure to check out other aspects of each offering. Some may have been neglected for years and have poor support (you can send an email to their support team to see how quickly they respond). If several tools will get the job done, the strength of their support docs and quality of their support response could be a deciding factor.

Top 10 Rated Tools for Creating Timelines in 2023

If you're short on time, here are the top tools you should check out:

  1. Preceden
  2. ChronoFlo
  3. Timeline Maker Pro
  4. Time.Graphics
  5. Tiki-Toki
  6. Aeon Timeline
  7. TimeToast
  8. Timeline 3D
  9. Timeline JS
  10. Kronoli

And if you have some more time, check out the our complete list of 28 timeline makers below. You can use the following filter to drill down based on your requirements:

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Showing all 28 tools:

1. Preceden

Tags:
Professional Use Personal Use Educational Use Web App

Preceden is an easy-to-use timeline maker and roadmapping tool that helps you quickly create professional timelines. With its intuitive web-based editor for creating interactive timelines, timeline templates, and numerous export options you'll be able to build and share your timeline in no time at all.

Sure, this may be a bit biased, but we believe Preceden is the best timeline software on the net regardless of whether you're using it for project management, historical timelines, or even genealogy research.

Since it's completely web-based, Preceden is compatible with both Mac and PC computers – moreover, no download is required to use this tool.

Preceden is free to try with paid plans starting at $12/month.

  • Website: https://www.preceden.com

  • It was launched in 2009 by Matt Mazur

  • It supports showing images on the timeline
  • It supports date ranges
  • It allows drag and drop
  • You can download your timeline as a PNG, CSV, Excel or PDF

What customers are saying about Preceden:

“ I tested several interactive timeline maker tools and chose Preceden because of its aesthetic and ease of use. Other tools were clunky and didn't really have the features that I needed such as layers or templates. With Preceden, I was able to customize my timeline and create a timeline that I can insert in a presentation or have a beautiful printout to share. ”
—

Galina Madjaroff Rietz

2. ChronoFlo

Tags:
Personal Use Educational Use Web App

ChronoFlo is an online timeline maker created by the Alex Kearns, who also created TikiToki. It lets you create interactive timelines with multiple ways to embed media (images, videos, etc) onto the timeline.

ChronoFlo has a free plan that lets you create 1 timeline with up to 50 events. There's also a Bronze plan ($10/month) that supports 5 timelines with up to 500 events, and a Silver plan ($29.50/month) that supports up to 25 timelines and up to 1,000 events per timeline.

What customers are saying about ChronoFlo:

“ You get a tremendous amount of customization. You can change the accent color, whether it's above or below the timeline, they style of the card and more. ”
—

Patrick Cauley

3. Timeline Maker Pro

Tags:
Professional Use Personal Use Educational Use Windows App

Timeline Maker Pro is Windows-based timeline maker software that lets you create clear, impressive scheduling charts in minutes. The program's interface is professional and welcoming, starting with some helpful tutorials and moving on to an intuitive layout at every turn. The program feels like operating a calendar system, like the one found on Microsoft Outlook, but its results look very different. After entering in event information like start and stop times, you see a clear timeline of your event.

One-time purchases ranging from $49 for students to $535 for enterprise teams.

What customers are saying about Timeline Maker Pro:

“ I manage the IT organization and a lot of our work is project driven so I leverage the tool to allow people to visualize all the projects that may be going on at once. Everyone who has seen me use the tool talks about how it is a nice application. ”
—

Ingra C

4. Time.Graphics

Tags:
Personal Use Educational Use Web App

Time.Graphics is a free online timeline maker that supports a wide variety of options for embedding content in your timeline.

Free public timelines up to 18 events. Premium plans from $4.90/day to $97.90/year.

What customers are saying about Time.Graphics:

“ Time.Graphics has a good service providing all the timeline tools I have been looking for such as being able to add specific date entities, time periods, and customise the look of them as I desire. ”
—

vald0506

5. Tiki-Toki

Tags:
Professional Use Personal Use Educational Use Web App Mac App Chromebook

Tiki-Toki is a online timeline maker that makes it dead easy for people to create stunning timelines in their browsers.

Images, text and even videos (YouTube, Vimeo, and MP4s) can be embedded in Tiki-Toki timelines.

Thanks to this timeline maker's ability to add images, videos, and more, it's probably the best timeline software for historians.

Whether you want to add historic paintings, battlefield diagrams, or informational videos, this timeline maker can do it all.

Tiki-Toki's free plan is limited to 1 timeline with paid plans starting at $9.50/month that support multiple timelines and additional features.

What customers are saying about Tiki-Toki:

“ Can create gorgeous timelines with lots of media and different views. ”
—

grangerts

6. Aeon Timeline

Tags:
Professional Use Personal Use Windows App Mac App

Aeon Timeline is a flexible timeline maker software tool meant for writers and other creative thinkers.

Free 14-day trial, then a one-time purchase of $64.99.

What customers are saying about Aeon Timeline:

“ I found Aeon while looking for a program to compile a complex legal timeline. Aeon was just what I needed. It allows the user to create a timeline using absolute times and dates, or to create one where everything is relative. ”
—

Glenn Jones

7. TimeToast

Tags:
Personal Use Web App

Timetoast is an application that makes it possible for users to design and build their own interactive timelines. These timelines can then be shared on the internet by embedding them into any site. It’s possible for anyone to join Timetoast and they can start making their very own timelines straight away. It’s free and the only thing you need is an email address.

Timetoast has a free plan that lets you create unlimited public timelines, with paid plans starting at $5.99/month that add premium features.

What customers are saying about TimeToast:

“ I love to use this not only to create timelines, but also to help students organize their thoughts in advance of a presentation or writing activity, and I have students who use this resources to help keep citations organized for their research papers, and speeches, and many who collaborate on one Timetoast to uses as a basis for a group presentation. ”
—

Michelle P

8. Timeline 3D

Tags:
Professional Use Personal Use Mac App

Timeline 3D is timeline maker software for Mac that makes it easy to create your own timelines for any subject, whether it is family photos, a historical timeline, or even to remind you of a series of meetings and work related events. Timeline 3D makes the process very easy by enabling you to create interactive timelines that you can view on your Mac and even mobile devices such as iPhone, iPad, and Android phones.

Timeline 3D is free to use.

What customers are saying about Timeline 3D:

“ I have found this app to be useful for a variety of presentations both professional and personal. It’s easy to create a nice flow of information that’s not boring to look at. Timeline can be saved out in several formats but the actual movie timeline is really nice and my preference. ”
—

Notso Fast

9. Timeline JS

Tags:
Professional Use Personal Use Programmers Use Web App

Timeline JS is an open source timeline software tool that allows publishers to quickly and easily create interactive, media-rich timelines using nothing more than a Google Spreadsheet.

Hundreds of thousands of news organizations around the world have used TimelineJS to tell the world’s most intriguing and important stories — from the story of a murdered Austrian boy to the French presidential race to the Pulitzer Prize-winning story of the Aurora theater shooting.

TimelineJS is free to use.

What customers are saying about Timeline JS:

“ I love how I can easily add contents to my website through a timeline. It is very interactive and at the same time informative. The output is visually rich in features and I love how I can easily edit the layout. ”
—

Sarah N

10. Kronoli

Tags:
Personal Use Educational Use Web App

Kronoli is an online timeline creation software that can be shared and mixed with other timelines.

Kronoli is a free service.

  • Website: https://kronoli.com/

  • It was launched in 2020 by Andy Lee

  • It supports showing images on the timeline
  • It does not support date ranges
  • It does not allow drag and drop
  • See also: Kronoli Alternatives
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