Compare Gantt Chart Maker & Timeline Project Planner vs. Runn

Gantt Chart Maker (Timeline Task Planner) is a native Windows Excel-based app that transforms Microsoft Excel into an offline project scheduling engine. Built for engineers, developers, and technical project leads who require deterministic schedule calculations without sending sensitive project data to third-party web servers, the software executes entirely within the local desktop environment. Instead of relying on fragile grid formulas or web wrappers, the add-in hooks directly into Excel’s native architecture. It processes task lists into dynamic Gantt charts with automated dependency cascading across four standard link types: Finish-to-Start (FS), Start-to-Start (SS), Finish-to-Finish (FF), and Start-to-Finish (SF). An internal calculation module accounts for custom working schedules, non-working days, and corporate holiday lists to compute accurate net durations across complex task networks. Key technical capabilities include baseline locking for schedule variance analysis, multi-scale timeline grids (Daily to Yearly with ISO week numbering), and high-density vector PDF rendering via Excel’s native print engine. Data persistence relies strictly on standard .xlsx workbooks and local or network-mapped Microsoft Access (.accdb) databases, ensuring zero network transport of confidential project metadata. Available via the Microsoft Store and the Microsoft Marketplace, Gantt Chart Maker provides a lightweight, and enterprise-deployable scheduling tool for Windows 10 and 11 environments.

Runn is a real-time resource management platform with integrated time tracking and powerful forecasting capabilities. Intuitively plan projects and schedule resources with allocations, project phases, milestones, and time off. Flick between monthly, quarterly and half-yearly views to plan for the short and long term. Get a dynamic bird’s-eye view of your entire organization to manage capacity, workload and availability changes as you create your plans. Runn makes resource management dynamic and visual from a single, shared view. Drill into different roles, teams and tags to compare trends and understand which groups are overbooked. Plan out tentative projects to see how plans might change if work gets confirmed. Track projects, view forecasts, and get relevant metrics within Runn. Get insights like utilization, project variance, and overall financial performance. Use Runn’s built-in timesheets to monitor project progress. Runn integrates with Harvest, WorkflowMax, and Clockify. With the API, build your own integrations to connect Runn with your favorite tools.