13 Best FREE Microsoft Visio Alternatives & Competitors (2023) (2024)

Microsoft Visio is a diagramming tool that allows you to create simple as well as complex diagrams according to your business needs. Visio also enables you to make detailed organization charts, floor plans, pivot diagrams, etc.

However, Microsoft Visio has some limitations like it does not work on mobile phones and mac operating system. Furthermore, this tool does not support a collaborative environment.

Here is a curated list of top tools that are capable of replacing Visio. The list contains both open source(free) and commercial(paid) software.

Top Microsoft Visio Alternatives Online Software

#1) Miro

Miro is a collaborative online whiteboard with over 1,000 templates, including mind maps, Kanban boards, Gantt charts, product wireframes, research boards, and flowcharts.

Miro is a versatile tool catering to Agile Workflows, Strategy & Planning, Brainstorming & Ideation, and Mapping & diagramming. It facilitates seamless communication with built-in comments, video, chat, and @mentions. Supporting 300 simultaneous editors and unlimited team workspaces, it enables effortless collaboration.

Miro Integrates with popular platforms like Slack, Asana, Salesforce, Jira, and Microsoft Teams, and provides templates for meetings, brainstorming, research, and strategy. Additional features include product management, centralized communication, screen sharing, and an infinite canvas. Supporting multiple file formats and offering options for creating Flowcharts, BPMN, UML, and Network diagrams, Miro excels in real-time collaborative drawing, with easy sharing via links.

Features:

• It provides real-time collaborative drawing
• Built-in comments, video, chat, and @mentions for seamless communication.
• Unlimited team workspaces with granular permissions, privacy & sharing controls
• It provides customer support via Email and Contact form
• Supported platforms: iOS and Android
• Price: Plans start at $10 a month. 20% Discount on Yearly Payments.
• Free Trial: Lifetime Free Basic Plan

Visit Miro >>

Life Time Free Basic Plan

#2) LucidChart

Lucidchart is a web-based tool that helps you to start diagramming. This tool is a strong competitor of Visio. It allows you to create a simple flowchart to complex technical diagrams.

Lucid is a collaborative diagramming tool that supports team collaboration on any device and across various platforms. It allows live data connections and data imports for automatic organization chart creation. Lucidchart increases security and easy user account management and follows GDPR guidelines.

This tool can integrate with platforms such as Slack, Zapier, AWS, Salesforce, Azure and ServiceNow. You can also export diagrams in several formats like PNG, JPEG, CSV, PDF, VSDX, SVG, and VDX. Lucid offers real-time collaboration, imports from Visio, Omnigraffle, and, Gliffy, automated diagramming, and advanced security features. It also has templates for Brainstorming, Flowcharts, UI/Layout Design, Education, Fun, and Taskboards.

Features:

• Works with your team on any device across various platforms
• Helps you to increase security and easily manage user accounts
• Lucidchart follows GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) for data security.
• It provides customer support via Contact form
• Supported platforms: Windows, macOS, and Linux
• Price: Plans start at $7.95 a month.
• Free Trial: Lifetime Free Basic Plan

Visit LucidChart >>

Life Time Free Basic Plan

#3) Edraw Max

Edraw Max is a versatile collaborative platform that helps in sharing designs anytime, anywhere. It has numerous features like change management, charting, collaboration tools, customization, and data visualization.

The tool supports various types of diagrams such as ER, mind maps, Gantt charts, flowcharts, org charts, and UML. It allows you to export in multiple formats like VSDX, VSD, PDF, HTML, SVG, and JPG. Edraw Max offers templates for daily life activities like education, work, events, and even reading notes. Moreover, it integrates with Google Drive and Dropbox Business to increase productivity and convenience for you.

Features:

• It provides a user-friendly interface similar to MS Word.
• Edraw Max helps you to share designs anytime, anywhere.
• This tool provides 280+ latest diagram solutions.
• It provides customer support via Email, Chat, and Contact form
• Supported platforms: Windows, macOS, and Linux
• Free Trial: Free to Download

Visit Edraw Max >>

Free Download

#4) Creately

Creately is a diagramming software that combines the power of an intuitive online whiteboard with many advanced data-linking features. Its visual platform enables smart diagramming and allows visual collaboration, knowledge management, etc., under a single platform.

Creately is a versatile visual collaboration tool that allows easy creation and organization of various structures. It includes a built-in agile project management tool for efficient workflow management. The platform supports enterprise needs like SSO and SCIM. Custom databases can be created to store diverse information, from HR records to law firm documentation.

With about 1000+ specially designed shapes and 50+ standard diagrams and connectors, diagramming is quick and efficient. It provides features like multi-perspective analysis and planning. Creately integrates with Confluence, JIRA, Google Workspace, Microsoft Teams, and Slack. It supports multiple formats for export, such as SVG, PNG, JPEG, BMP, GIF, and ICO.

Templates for Marketing, Operations, Strategy, IT & Networking, HR, and Education are available, along with options for UML, ER, Use Case, Activity, and Block diagrams. The tool offers a drag-and-drop editor, no-code capabilities, offline access, Infinite visual canvas, real-time collaboration, project and task management, enterprise scalability, custom databases, data-driven docs, and powerful visual modeling.

Features:

• You can easily create and organize any structure you wish.
• It provides a built-in agile project management tooling to keep workflow.
• Allows you to create data-driven documents
• Provides features like multi-perspective analysis and planning.
• It provides customer support via Contact form and Chat
• Supported platforms: Windows, macOS, and Linux
• Price: Plans start at $8 a month. 40% Discount on Yearly Payments.
• Free Trial: Lifetime Free Basic Plan

Visit Creately >>

Life Time Free Basic Plan

#5) MyDraw

MyDraw is diagramming software for Windows and Mac OS X. It allows you to create flowcharts, network diagrams, mind maps, tree diagrams, etc.

MyDraw is a user-friendly diagramming tool available in various languages, including English, German, Chinese, and Russian. It simplifies diagram arrangement and provides online tutorials for easy drawing. Seamlessly integrating with Microsoft Visio, MyDraw ensures smooth workflow. You can also share diagrams via links, and the tool supports multiple file formats like BMP, PNG, JPG, TIF, SVG, EMF, and DXF.

It has a comprehensive set of features, including a user interface, Vector drawings, shapes and connectors, rich text and tables, barcodes, automatic layouts, image generation, visio compatibility, and diagram automation. It also provides templates for various diagram types, including BPMN, cause and effect, cross-functional flowchart, data flow diagram, chain of command, education, charts and tables, and biology.

Features:

• You do not require the internet to work with this tool.
• It provides shapes to cover various diagrammatic scenarios.
• This app contains more than a hundred templates.
• MyDraw helps you to arrange the diagram with ease.
• It provides customer support via Email and Phone
• Supported platforms: Windows and macOS
• Free Trial: Free Download

Visit MyDraw >>

Free Download

#6) Moqups

Moqups is an online tool that enables you to make flowcharts and UML diagrams with minimal effort. It allows you to drag and drop shapes to visualize any flow.

Moqups is a collaborative tool that offers an array of shapes and drawing arrows for easy diagram creation. It allows resizing, rotating, and moving shapes to customize designs. Seamlessly integrating with Box, Jira, Slack, Google Drive, and Dropbox enhances workflow efficiency.

The tool provides templates for wireframes and mockups, diagrams and flowcharts, mind maps, process flowcharts, site maps, charts and graphs, and business strategies. It offers UML, flowcharts, use cases, and network diagrams with unlimited objects, feedback, real-time editing and comments, quick wireframe creation, prototype interactions, and flow diagramming capabilities.

Features:

• You can collaborate easily with other people.
• Includes numerous shapes and drawing arrows.
• You can resize, rotate, and move shapes.
• It provides customer support via Email and Contact form
• Supported platforms: Windows and macOS
• Free Trial: Free Download

Link: https://moqups.com/

#7) Gliffy

Gliffy is a free website app for drawing diagrams and a solid replacement for Visio. It helps you to make UML diagrams, network diagrams, entity-relationship diagrams, and more.

Gliffy is a powerful tool that enables teams to quickly grasp new business processes using flowcharts. It supports business process modeling and Notation (BPMN) diagrams, offering a free alternative to Visio for easy diagram creation. With seamless integration with Confluence, Slack, Trello, Basecamp, and Jira, collaboration is enhanced.

It provides various diagram types like flowcharts, UML, mind maps, Venn, and network diagrams. Its drag-and-drop editor and offline access add to the user-friendly experience. The tool offers visual project management, increased collaboration, process modeling, standard operating procedures, risk assessment procedures, and centralized security features.

Features:

• It enables your team to quickly understand a new business process using flow chart.
• This free alternative to Visio allows you to draw a diagram with ease.
• Seamlessly integrates with Confluence, Slack, Trello, Basecamp, and Jira
• It provides customer support via Email and Contact form
• Supported platforms: Windows and macOS
• Free Trial: Free Download

Link: https://www.gliffy.com/solutions/diagrams-for-businesses

#8) Yed

Yed is an alternative of Visio for generating high-quality diagrams. You can use this tool to make diagrams manually or by exporting external data.

Yed is a user-friendly tool that excels in arranging large datasets with a single mouse click. It seamlessly integrates with Atlassian and Confluence for smooth collaboration. This tool’s offerings, like BPMN, semantic networks, family trees, flowchart, social networks, and UML class diagrams, caters to diverse diagramming needs.

It provides a drag-and-drop editor, offline access, and intuitive features like clearly displayed data, an intuitive user interface, automatic layout, and keyboard shortcuts. With templates for Vue.js, SVG, and String, it allows easy sharing of diagrams via link. Yed Graph Editor simplifies diagram creation with its easy-to-use UI, while its automatic arrangement feature streamlines diagram organization.

Features:

• Yed Graph Editor enables you to create diagrams using easy-to-use UI.
• This tool automatically arranges elements of diagrams.
• It offers a vast variety of layouts to visualize your drawings.
• It provides customer support via Email, Phone, and Contact form
• Supported platforms: Windows, macOS, and Linux
• Free Trial: Free Download

Link: https://www.yworks.com/products/yed

#9) Google Drawings

Google Drawings is a free, cloud-based diagramming application. It enables users to collaborate and work together in real time to create numerous charts.

Google Drawings is a free Visio alternative that allows easy insertion of pre-designed diagrams. It offers a gradient background feature for the working area and provides numerous shortcuts to streamline tasks. Users can create titles using word art. Seamlessly integrating with Google Drive, Google Workspace, and Bit.ai, it supports various file formats like JPEG, SVG, PNG, and PDF.

With features for laying out drawings, snapping to a grid, auto-distribution, and object manipulation like moving, resizing, and rotating, it enables precise diagram creation. Google Drawings is a versatile tool, catering to flowcharts, organizational charts, website wireframes, mind maps, and concept maps while also offering image editing options like cropping, applying masks, and adding borders.

Features:

• This free Visio alternative helps you to insert pre-designed diagrams.
• You can easily add a gradient background to the working area.
• Google Drawings provides numerous shortcuts to make your task easy.
• It provides customer support via Community support
• Supported platforms: Windows, macOS, iOS, Android, and Linux
• Free Trial: Free

Link: https://docs.google.com/drawings/

#10) Smartdraw

SmartDraw is a tool for making and organizing flowcharts, mind maps, project charts, and other business visuals. This tool is used by organizations and companies to document processes and manage plan strategies as well as projects.

SmartDraw is a user-friendly tool, surpassing the standard drawing tools in G Suite and Microsoft Office. It allows REST API integration and offers chart-based and schematic diagrams. With a wide range of templates for agile workflow, AWS diagrams, brainstorming, healthcare, infographics, Decision Trees, education, emergency planning, and engineering, it caters to diverse needs.

SmartDraw provides intelligent formatting, professional results, breadth of content, and engineering power. Supporting various diagram types like flowcharts, Gantt charts, network, organization charts, mind maps, and project chart diagrams, it seamlessly integrates with Microsoft Teams, Confluence, Jira, Trello, Dropbox, and Box, enhancing collaboration and productivity.

Features:

• SmartDraw is easier to use than the standard drawing tools included in G Suite and Microsoft Office.
• You can connect SmartDraw with REST (Representational state transfer) API.
• The software lets you create chart-based and schematic diagrams.
• It automatically generates a decision tree.
• It provides customer support via Chat, Phone, and Contact form
• Supported platforms: Windows and macOS
• Free Trial: Free Download

Link: https://www.smartdraw.com/

#11) Draw.io

Draw.io is an open-source platform where you can efficiently create and share diagrams. You can use this free Microsoft Visio alternative tool to create flowcharts, network diagrams, and UML diagrams.

Draw.io is a versatile tool with a library of numerous shapes. It works on mobile iOS, Android devices, and desktop PCs. Data is not stored on the server for enhanced security. The tool provides templates for Gitflow diagrams, application mockups, cabinet diagrams, Veaam infrastructure diagrams, and Arista rack diagrams.

With support for UML, org charts, mind maps, concept maps, flowcharts, Swimlane, and BPMN diagrams, Draw.io offers real-time collaboration with shared cursors and easy-to-use advanced tools. It seamlessly integrates with Google Drive, Google Workspace, Trello, Dropbox Business, GitHub, Jira, OneDrive, and Confluence, making it a secure and efficient diagramming solution. Users can also share diagrams via links and social media platforms.

Features:

• It has a library containing numerous shapes.
• It does not store data on the server for security concerns.
• Compatible with Firefox, Chrome, and more.
• It provides customer support via Chat, Email, and Contact form
• Supported platforms: Windows, iOS, macOS, Linux, and Android
• Free Trial: Free Download

Link: https://app.diagrams.net/

#12) Xmind

Xmind is an integrated platform for brainstorming and mind mapping apps. It is designed to generate ideas and inspire creativity. This software supports tree diagrams, fishbone diagrams, spreadsheets, etc.

Xmind is a user-friendly tool with an easy-to-use GUI that allows access to graphics anytime and anywhere. It features a theme editor for quick style editing of diagrams, making it versatile for creating various visuals. The tool seamlessly integrates with ConceptDraw MINDMAP and MarginNote, enhancing productivity.

Users can share diagrams via links and social media platforms. Xmind provides offline access and offers a range of features like Pitch, Outliner, ZEN Mode, Smart Color Theme, Hand-drawn Style, Custom Themes, Align Floating Topic and Merge Xmind Files. It includes templates for projects, master plan design, web design, and business plans, and it also provides 1 GB of free storage.

Features:

• It provides easy-to-use GUI.
• Xmind allows you to access graphics anytime and anywhere.
• It has a theme editor to quickly edit the style of diagrams.
• You can make any graphic you want.
• It provides customer support via Email, Phone, and Contact form
• Supported platforms: Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, iPadOS, and Android
• Free Trial: Free Download

Link: https://www.xmind.net/

#13) ASCIIflow

ASCIIflow is a tool to create ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange) diagrams. It enables you to save your designs to Google Drive.

ASCIIFlow is a user-friendly Visio software alternative that allows the creation of drawings using text. It simplifies drawing arrows, lines, boxes, and other elements. The tool integrates with Flamory and supports sharing diagrams via links.

It supports multiple formats like TXT and HTML and also offers infinite diagrams, and ability to save to Google Drive, and features for resizing and freeform drawing.

Features:

• This Visio software alternative has a user-friendly UI.
• ASCIIflow helps you to create drawings made up of text.
• You can easily draw arrows, lines, boxes, etc.
• Supported platforms: Windows
• Free Trial: Free

Link: http://asciiflow.com/

#14) UMLet

UMLet is a Java-based UML product. It enables you to export diagrams to PDF, SVG, JPG, etc. This tool can work on Windows, Linux, and OS X. UMLet can be used to build a diagram from plain text.

UMLet is an efficient tool for UML diagram creation with a simple double-click element addition and copy-to-clipboard functionality. Modified elements can serve as templates, and custom UML elements are easily created. It supports shortcuts for quick access and seamlessly integrates with Eclipse.

This tool offers an easy-to-use interface, free user access, and sharing diagrams via links. UMlet includes Use case, sequence, state, deployment, and activity diagrams, along with features like an elements browser, diagram zoom, and multiple tab view for a hassle-free diagramming experience.

Features:

• You can add elements to a UML diagram with a double click.
• It enables you to copy a diagram to the system clipboard.
• Modified elements can be used as templates.
• It helps you to create diagrams quickly with no hassle.
• It provides customer support via Email
• Supported platforms: Windows, macOS, and Linux
• Free Trial: Free Download

Link: https://www.umlet.com/

FAQs

Best FREE Microsoft Visio Alternatives