Yamdu alternatives for 2026

Why look beyond Yamdu at all?

Yamdu has clear strengths — anyone switching should know what they are giving up:

• Department-level workflows for larger crews
• Strong scheduling for multi-week productions
• Established in European TV and film production

Where teams hit limits

The search for an alternative almost always starts at one of these points:

• The department structure is overhead on a two-day commercial
• Setup effort assumes a production office that maintains it

1. TillyBoard — the Yamdu alternative that starts from the brief

TillyBoard is built for the brief-to-shoot-ready path of commercials and branded content rather than long-form department administration.

A fit for commercials, brand films, corporate and social work — wherever a brief lands and has to become a plan a crew can shoot from, quickly. Free to start, no credit card.

Yamdu vs TillyBoard: feature comparison

The table only records what each vendor documents on its own site — "Not stated" means we could not evidence it there, not that it is missing.

As of October 2026. Source: yamdu.com · TillyBoard: tillyboard.com

Yamdu pricing compared

Yamdu shows its prices for Germany excluding VAT; the annual discount on Studio is advertised as 33%.

TillyBoard bills per workspace, not per person: the Studio plan covers up to 25 members, and crew and clients confirm and comment via link without an account. All TillyBoard prices exclude VAT.

As of October 2026. Prices change — the vendor's pricing page is authoritative: yamdu.com/en/pricing

Is Yamdu free? Free plan and trial

There is no permanent free plan. Yamdu offers a trial with up to 3 users that needs no payment details and does not convert into a charge; its length is not stated. Students can ask for a sponsored plan.

TillyBoard has a free-forever plan with no credit card: one own project, 1 GB of storage, Tilly AI on the standard quota and 10 AI images a month. That is enough to plan one real job end to end, from brief to call sheet, before deciding on a paid plan.

Try TillyBoard free

Who Yamdu is the better pick for

Put honestly — here Yamdu is the stronger choice:

• Long-form productions — feature, series, documentary — that need breakdown, budget, time cards and DOOD in one system
• Productions that import Final Draft scripts or Movie Magic schedules and work with Showbiz Budgeting
• Teams that want CO2e calculators and crew recruitment alongside planning

Who TillyBoard is the better pick for

And here TillyBoard is the stronger choice:

• Short jobs and small teams: a free plan, and a flat workspace price instead of per-project fees
• Briefs without a screenplay — Tilly AI turns the concept into a shot list
• Visual planning with an AI preview frame for every shot and a moodboard canvas

Other Yamdu alternatives

Depending on your bottleneck, these are worth a look — each with a different centre of gravity:

• StudioBinder: Agencies and production companies that want a single system of record for the whole crew.
• Assemble: Agency-side teams coordinating several productions at once.
• Setkeeper: Production offices that live in call sheets and distribution lists.
• Sesame: Teams looking for lightweight coordination without a full studio suite.
• Scenechronize: Large scripted productions with heavy paperwork distribution.
• Croogloo: Production offices on longer-form projects.

Yamdu in practice: what to weigh

Not a star rating, but the points that follow from Yamdu's design, pricing model and documentation and that make the difference on real jobs:

• Flex is priced per project: one is included, each further one costs €39 — fine for one feature, costly across many short jobs.
• Studio gets cheaper per head as the team grows: ten users included, €9 for each additional one.
• Imports from Final Draft, Fountain, PDF and Celtx scripts and from Movie Magic schedules make it easy to move into Yamdu.
• Yamdu's AI is text-based — tagging suggestions, synopses, revision comparisons — and produces no images.

Switching from Yamdu to TillyBoard

TillyBoard has no direct import from Yamdu. The switch runs through an export and a fresh plan — ideally between two jobs, not mid-production:

1. Export the shooting schedule and call sheet from Yamdu as PDF, and the shot list as CSV or Excel.
2. Create a free TillyBoard account (no card) and start the next job there rather than moving a live production.
3. Rebuild the shot list from the export or let Tilly AI draft it from the brief; budget about a minute per shot for retyping.
4. Add talent and locations once, then arrange the shoot days by drag and drop.