Best Online Whiteboard Tools for Remote Collaboration
Miro, Figma or Google Jamboard?
Back in the day when people were still spending a lot of time commuting into a physical office, physical whiteboards were the hype. Markers, chalk and an overload of sticky notes were everywhere. It was more hyped up than NFTs, trust me. Unless we have a major breakthrough in robotics though, those physical tools will not be necessarily useful in the age of remote work.
Below we present some of the best online whiteboard and collaboration tools we have tested that are currently on the market. Not only they can make you and your team more productive but also boost the creativity of online meetings and act as a virtual office for those who are remote.
1. flat.social: great for remote teams, retrospectives and real-time brainstorming
It's a fun online meeting, an online whiteboard and a collaborative always-open meeting room all in one. With flat.social, every meeting is embedded within an interactive space that sports features like sticky notes, drawing and adding images. It's perfect for meetings that require creativity, new ideas and brainstorming like an Agile Retrospective or a Creative Workshop.
Click here to see flat.social
2. Google Jamboard: free & fastest to step up for quick light sketches.
If you have a google account there are high chances that you can already use Google Jamboard with your team
It's the simplest and most quick way to replicate a whiteboard if you're running a meeting that requires a bit of collaborative visual action.
While it's simple, it is also incredibly useful because it sports all the basic necessary features that you might need when brainstorming something online. And most importantly - it's free!
Check it out at jamboard.google.com
3. Limnu: perfect educational tool
Limnu is a well-priced whiteboard tool primarily used in education. It's perfect for teaching mathematics or other subjects that require a lot of pen and paper thinking and a minimalistic, clean approach to presenting your ideas.
A great thing about Limnu is that your virtual students will not have to go through a long signup process to join the whiteboard so you don't have to worry about some people dropping out because of additional friction.Check it out at limnu.com
4. Figma: more advances tool for designs and sketching out ideas.
Figma is a more complicated and feature rich tool that is mostly used for sketching out complex ideas, full designs and workflows. It started mostly as a tool for designers but quickly expanded to the market of whiteboard online meetings. If you're building something more complicated, figma might be the tool for you. Check it out at figma.com
5. Miro: great tool for remote work
Good for productivity.
Miro is yet another real-time and collaborative whiteboard application that is flexible, simple enough to understand and sports all the necessary features to keep your team productive. It can also act as a video conferencing tool on top of the whiteboard.
Miro also sports a number of templates and feature that users can acquire via Miro marketplace like voting plugins and integrations.
Check it out at miro.com
6. Canva Whiteboards: Offers beautiful collab-ready templates
If your team always needs ready-to-use whiteboard templates, then Canva Whiteboards is your best bet. Apart from the usual online whiteboard features like infinite canvas and unlimited sticky notes, Canva Whiteboards has free templates for just about any virtual brainstorming or planning session. You have idea boards, flowcharts, decision trees, SWOT analysis boards, concept maps, and so much more. A bonus: it has a built-in timer to keep your meetings productive.
Check it out at canva.com
What makes a great online whiteboard app?
Infinite Canvas
While a physical whiteboard has a limited space (unless you're a graffiti artist), online whiteboards are not subject to the same constraints. Being able to increase your collaboration space without limitations boost the creativity of participants and allows them to connect ideas much faster, without jumping between different whiteboards.
Collaboration
An online whiteboard becomes much more useful when everyone can work on it at the same time. It's not just one person presenting some but an online collaborative experience which is necessary for many types of meetings like workshops or agile retrospectives.
Ability to add images, draw and notes
Sticky notes were invented in 1962 by Spencer Silver, an engineer at 3M. What started as a simple idea quickly became one of the most versatile tools that we have to sketch ideas quickly and efficiently. Sticky notes are also a perfect companion in the digital world as well - almost every online collaborative whiteboard application.
Ability to share and present
What would an online whiteboard be if you wouldn't be able to share it and use it in sync with other people? A boring whiteboard. Ability to share a whiteboard is a must requirement for any app that wants to be in this space. In some, like flat.social the collaborative whiteboard is so much ingrained into the core experience it unifies with the meeting seamlessly.
