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TeamRetro vs Parabol vs Retrium: which should your team pick?
Three credible retrospective tools, three different bets. Pricing, features and fit, plus the situation each one wins.
The short answer: all three run a solid online retrospective, and they differ most on pricing model, health checks and security. Parabol is open source, has a free tier and bills per active user. Retrium is retro-only, bills per room, and has no AI in its paid plans (a separate free AI rebuild, Retrium Next, is in open beta). TeamRetro is built around health checks you can trend over time and, on Enterprise, across teams, action follow-through and security on every plan: SOC 2 Type 2 and SAML SSO, at per-team pricing.
We’re one of the three, so a note on method: every claim on this page comes from each vendor’s public pricing and feature pages, checked in September 2026, with Parabol rechecked in October 2026.
The three tools at a glance
From each vendor’s public pricing and feature pages. Pricing examples assume three teams of about eight people.
| Features | TeamRetro | Parabol | Retrium |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free option | Not supported 30-day trial, no credit card | Supported Free tier: 2 teams, 10 meetings/month, 30-day history | Not supported 30-day trial |
| Pricing model | Per team, no per-user fees, from $25/month | Per active user, from $8/user/month | Per team room, unlimited members, from $39/month |
| Cost for 3 teams of 8 | $50/month (annual Small Organization plan) | ~$192/month | ~$117/month |
| Retro templates | Supported Customizable, as many as you need | Supported 40+ | Supported 10+ (plus custom) |
| Health checks | Supported First-class: custom models, radars, trends; cross-team reporting on Enterprise | Partial or limited Recurring check, 5 Likert questions per check across 5 fixed categories, five-check trend line; paid plans only | Partial or limited Team Radar with custom spokes |
| AI features | Supported Grouping, summaries, suggested actions, sentiment | Supported Grouping, summaries, discussion prompts, insights | Partial or limited None in the paid product; AI co-facilitator in the separate Retrium Next beta |
| In-meeting AI assistant | Supported trAI, in the meeting side panel | Not supported Not offered | Partial or limited Only in the Retrium Next beta |
| Action follow-through | Supported Action dashboard, carryover, propose-and-agree actions | Supported Kanban task board, carryover, backlog write-back | Supported Team-room action plan, carries forward |
| Planning poker | Supported Included, plus a free standalone tool | Supported Included (Sprint Poker) | Not supported Not offered |
| Integrations | Supported Jira, Azure DevOps, GitHub, Linear, Trello, Confluence, Slack, Teams and more | Supported Jira, GitHub, GitLab, Azure DevOps, Linear, Slack, Teams | Partial or limited Jira Cloud; Slack (beta) |
| SAML SSO | Supported Every plan | Partial or limited Enterprise tier only | Partial or limited Business and Enterprise plans |
| SOC 2 | Supported Type 2, held directly | Supported Yes | Supported Yes |
| Self-hosting | Not supported No | Supported Yes, open source (AGPL-3.0) | Not supported No |
Updated:
References: Parabol pricing · Parabol integrations · Parabol Team Health · Parabol security FAQ · Parabol GitHub (open source, AGPL-3.0) · Retrium pricing · Retrium integrations · Retrium security · Retrium Next (AI beta)
How the three differ
Parabol
The only one of the three with an ongoing free tier, and the only one you can self-host, because it’s open source under AGPL-3.0. It writes back to Jira, GitHub, GitLab, Azure DevOps and Linear, and offers AI summaries and grouping. Sprint Poker and async standups round out the ceremony stack.
Team Health, generally available since September 2026, is a recurring check built on five research-backed categories, with 10 question packs including Gallup Q12 and the Spotify squad model, and findings sync to the backlog as tasks.
The trade-offs: each check asks five Likert questions across the same five categories, it is English only, and organization-wide reporting is still listed as coming soon. Team Health is also paid-plans-only, so it is not part of the free tier. SAML SSO and SCIM sit on the Enterprise tier only, and per-user pricing grows with every person you add.
Retrium
A library of retro techniques with an opinionated five-phase flow, built around the facilitator. Team Radar is its health check, with customizable spokes including psychological safety. Per-room pricing means unlimited users on every plan, and the persistent action plan carries between retros. Retrium Next, a free open beta, is its AI rebuild, separate from the paid product.
The trade-offs: no free tier, no AI in its paid plans, and integrations stop at Jira Cloud plus a beta Slack app. It’s retro-only, with no planning poker or estimation, and its release notes stop at 2024.
TeamRetro
Health checks are a first-class module: pick from 45+ models or build your own, then read the results as a radar, a trend line per dimension and, on Enterprise, a cross-team rollup. Actions get a dashboard, carryover and propose-and-agree flow so follow-through is visible. SOC 2 Type 2 and SAML SSO come on every plan, with audit logs and US/EU hosting. Customizable templates, AI grouping and summaries, planning poker and async daily standups included.
The trade-offs: no free tier, just a 30-day trial and then a paid plan. No self-hosted option, and SCIM plus the full account-level API are Enterprise-only.
Which should your team pick?
Parabol is the only one of the three with a free tier and a self-hosted option. It bills per active user, so the cost grows with headcount, SAML SSO and SCIM sit on the Enterprise tier, and team health is paid-plans-only. See the deeper two-way look at TeamRetro vs Parabol.
Retrium is retro-only, with per-room pricing and no free tier. Its paid plans have no AI and no estimation, its integrations stop at Jira Cloud plus a beta Slack app, and its release notes stop at 2024. See the deeper two-way look at TeamRetro vs Retrium.
Choose TeamRetro if retrospectives are part of a wider improvement practice. If you’re tracking team health over time, need action items to actually get done between sprints, or have a security review to pass (SOC 2 Type 2, SAML SSO on every plan, audit logs) TeamRetro covers all three in one per-team price with no per-user fees. Plans start at $25/month per team, with a 30-day trial and no credit card required.
Browse more templates
A few of the ready-to-run formats your team can start from and customize: classic columns, illustrated and themed boards, and dark mode for late-day retros.
Agile retrospective
Scrum values retrospective
Psychological safety retrospective
Rollercoaster retrospective
Energy levels in dark mode
Enterprise-grade security, compliance, and control
TeamRetro holds a SOC 2 Type 2 report. An independent auditor examined the controls across our policies, product, platform and infrastructure under AICPA attestation standards. Explore TeamRetro for Enterprise.
GDPR compliance and regional hosting (US & EU)
Single Sign-On (SSO) via SAML
SCIM for scalable user provisioning
Audit logs available on request
We maintain 99.99% uptime, with fast-response SLAs to ensure your teams stay productive and supported.Explore enterprise
Frequently asked questions
Is there a free plan in TeamRetro, Parabol or Retrium?
Which of the three is cheapest for multiple teams?
Which tool is best for enterprise security and compliance?
Can you run team health checks in all three tools?
Do all three support anonymous retrospectives?
Can I migrate from Parabol or Retrium to TeamRetro?
What TeamRetro users say
The interface is clean and super intuitive and the flow was easy to navigate. I love the different options for retro types and the sticky note and dot voting experience was great. And finally, the ability to create actions was a fantastic finish. Your team should be SO PROUD.
In software development and consultancy, human factors can be the difference between ‘okay’ and ‘awesome.’ That’s why we hold weekly check-ins, and TeamRetro lets team members share their thoughts before meetings.
TeamRetro is a product where every detail is considered – simple usage, and good design. different flows for different needs, highly customizable, real-time features. It allows you to enter a retrospective or health check meeting comfortably and be ready for the meeting as a team leader.
It is intuitive, easy to use, and helps the team tremendously to perform a constructive retrospective. Also, the health check fully meets our requirements.
I love TeamRetro because it allows my team and me to focus on our topics without worrying about security or the tools we use, thanks to its amazing UI/UX. I started using it for retrospectives and health checks at my previous company, and now I also use it for planning poker.
TeamRetro’s Team Health Check feature allowed us to run quick surveys, providing a pulse on how our teams felt about aspects like communication and workload.
Probably one of the best applications we’ve used to conduct a retrospective. Seeing everyone interact with the board and share their opinions was awesome! The integrations with our Jira board is great. Allows us to track our goals and ensure they’re owned. Thank You, thumbs up from me👍
TeamRetro helped our teams effectively manage retrospective meetings, even in a remote setup, saving time and increasing productivity.
With the step-by-step framework TeamRetro provides, it enables small teams to hold regular retrospectives with alternating team members in the facilitating role.
Excellent, it’s exactly what we expected and even more, we liked very much the idea of incorporating in the report not only the current retro actions but also the pending ones from earlier retros.
