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10 Best Free Bug Tracking Software In 2023

Best Free Bug Tracking Software Shortlist

Here’s the shortlist of the best bug tracking tools that I’ll cover in this article, with detailed summaries below.

  1. 1. Backlog — Best for creating and organizing customized workflows
  2. 2. Asana — Best for cross-functional work tracking
  3. 3. Caspio — Best no-code free bug tracking software
  4. 4. Instabug — Best bug tracking software for mobile apps
  5. 5. GoodDay — Best for a distributed workforce
  6. 6. CaseCamp — Best for effective time management
  7. 7. YouTrack — Best for streamlining tasks and creating configurable bug reports
  8. 8. MantisBT — Best for collaborating with team members
  9. 9. Bugzilla — Best for scheduling reports and presenting bug lists in multiple formats
  10. 10. Mattermost — Best for fostering collaboration among technical teams

Bug tracking tools help you log and monitor errors or defects during software testing so you can effectively get rid of bugs and deliver high-quality products to your customers. When considering adopting a defect tracking tool, it’s advisable to go for free bug management software. My goal is to help you pick the best free tool for your team. To that effect, I’ve curated the 10 best free bug tracking software available today.

What Is Free Bug Tracking Software?

Free bug tracking software is a defect management solution that offers a free plan. While you’re mandated to pay a subscription fee before you can have access to the features of non-free tools, free bug tracking solutions allow you access to bug tracking features for free. 

Overviews Of The 10 Best Free Bug Tracking Software

Here is my list of the best free bug tracking software, including a few bonus options.

1

Backlog

Best for creating and organizing customized workflows

Backlog provides project management, code management, and bug tracking capabilities. Trusted by over 18,000 companies across the globe, this tool comes with bug and issue tracking features that enable you to track and resolve bugs seamlessly.

Why I picked Backlog: Backlog makes managing bugs easy by allowing you to create and customize your workflows. It lets you organize tasks in ways that are easy to keep track of. For instance, you can nest subtasks under parent tasks, making it easy to get things done with minimal confusion and errors. 

Backlog allows you to create custom fields that fit your team’s needs and preferences. With the versions and milestones tracking capability, you can arrange and keep track of every release and update.

Backlog Standout Features and Integrations

Standout features: Backlog provides issue templates, which help you standardize issue creation and the bug tracking process. You can use automation to get things done faster. The tool allows you to add issues through email and set up automatic issue creation using an email address. There is also a good notification capability that lets you keep team members and stakeholders in the loop.

Integrations include Jira, Redmine Importer, Typetalk, Cacoo, Slack, Jenkins, Webhook, Microsoft Teams, Google Chat, and LambdaTest.

This is an aggregated rating for this tool including ratings from Crozdesk users and ratings from other sites.
4.5 162

30-day free trial

From $30/month

Pros

  • You can automate issue creation
  • Good notifications
  • Customizable

Cons

  • UI needs improvement
  • Customer support response is slow at times
2

Asana

Best for cross-functional work tracking

Asana provides everything you need to track your debugging tasks and keep your team organized and focused on the major goal. The tool is great for companies with remote and distributed teams; it provides task management and collaboration capabilities that help teams work together effectively.

Why I picked Asana: I’m recommending Asana as one of the best defect tracking tools because it’s designed to help you manage complex bug tracking tasks easily. It features a list view, which lets you organize and assign tasks. With lists, each team knows exactly the tasks to accomplish, what is expected of them, and when to complete tasks. Asana streamlines everything and provides the clarity needed to keep track of your debugging activities.

Asana Standout Features and Integrations

Standout features: Asana allows you to streamline your reports and get real-time insights into what your teams are doing. Asana Boards make things a lot easier by helping you focus on tasks currently in the pipeline. Boards help you get a detailed overview of what’s going on and let you know where there are frictions in your workflow.

Asana stands out with its workflow automation capabilities. You can put routine activities like assigning tasks and setting due dates on autopilot, which provides the space you need to focus on other important tasks.

Integrations include Salesforce, Gmail, OneDrive, Zapier, Tableau, Sharepoint, Outlook, Office 365, Box, and Instagantt.

This is an aggregated rating for this tool including ratings from Crozdesk users and ratings from other sites.
4.3 8327

Free plan available

From $10.99/user/month

Pros

  • Great reporting
  • Automation capabilities
  • Easy to use

Cons

  • More workflow customization needed
  • More guides for new users are required
3

Caspio

Best no-code free bug tracking software

Caspio gives you access to drag-and-drop features you can rely on to manage and track your QA processes with ease. It allows you to build forms, reports, dashboards, and other things to track defects and deliver high-performance products.

Why I picked Caspio: It’s great for users that need a scalable tool that facilitates collaboration. Caspio allows users to collaborate on tasks effectively. It allows you to build interactive reports, which makes keeping tabs on your debugging tasks a lot easier. You can customize your bug reports to suit your requirements and present data in ways that are convenient for your team.

Caspio Standout Features and Integrations

Standout features that set Caspio apart include advanced charts and dashboards and workflow automation. There is an extensive chart library that enables you to create beautiful charts for visualizing data. Caspio’s dashboards come with user-driven filtering and drill-down features that empower you to make decisions based on real-time insights.

With Caspio, assigning tasks and tracking progress is a lot faster. This is due to its workflow automation capabilities. The tool lets you streamline operations by automating routine tasks.

Integrations: Caspio allows you to integrate with a wide range of tools, including Google Drive, Zapier, Microsoft 365, Box, Sogolytics, Twilio, Stova, FastField, LeadMaster, and APIANT.

This is an aggregated rating for this tool including ratings from Crozdesk users and ratings from other sites.
4.3 106

Free plan available

From $140/month

Pros

  • Flexible and customizable
  • Free training
  • 24/7 support and expert services

Cons

  • More tutorials needed
  • A bit difficult for new users
4

Instabug

Best bug tracking software for mobile apps

Instabug is a bug management solution that empowers you to monitor, prioritize, and resolve bugs throughout the entire product development phase. It provides detailed bug reports with the important information you need to fix the issues.

Why I picked Instabug: It offers a mobile app bug tracking solution that lets you receive bug reports and feedback from testers and your users. The software allows you to get reports from testers during development; this helps you to get rid of defects that can impact your product after launch. Instabug takes the game to the next level by letting you receive performance feedback from users when your app is live.

Instabug Standout Features and Integrations

Standout features: Instabug has an in-app bug reporting feature that allows testers and users to seamlessly send feedback or report bugs by simply shaking their devices. From the app, they can send annotated screenshots, screen recordings, or voice notes to explain their experience with your app.

You can reply to users and automate your workflow with third-party integrations. Through in-app chats, you can communicate effectively with customers — request more information from users or inform them that an issue has been resolved.

Integrations include GitHub, Jira, Slack, Asana, Zendesk, Pivotal, Trello, Freshdesk, Basecamp, Zapier, and FrontApp. 

This is an aggregated rating for this tool including ratings from Crozdesk users and ratings from other sites.
4.3 195

Free plan available

From $124/month

Pros

  • Comprehensive bug reporting
  • Seamless in-app communication
  • Get detailed logs and metadata

Cons

  • More customizations needed
  • Customer support response time needs to be improved
5

GoodDay

Best for a distributed workforce

GoodDay is a modern work management platform. It provides a range of work management capabilities that let you stay in control of your defect tracking processes. Its key capabilities include process management, team collaboration, task management, time tracking, analytics, and data management.

Why I picked GoodDay: I added this tool to the list because it makes the remote work model easier to implement. It comes with collaboration capabilities that remote workers need to work together as one productive team. With GoodDay, you can plan and collaborate on one platform.

GoodDay offers task management features that help you manage your bug tracking tasks effectively. You can assign tasks, share task attachments, add custom fields, organize tasks with tags, and track the progress of your tasks. In a nutshell, the tool provides everything you need to track bugs and ensure issues are resolved properly with no confusion.

GoodDay Standout Features and Integrations

Standout features include time management, data management, and advanced reporting and analytics. It offers a range of data management features to help you make good use of the information you gather in the course of QA. You can do bulk editing, create copies of existing items, drag and drop work items, filter information, and sort data according to your needs.

With the time management capability, you can easily keep track of time spent on your work items. The key time management features include a task timer, work schedules, daily timesheets, weekly timesheets, and project time reports.

Integrations include Google Drive, Dropbox, Google Calendar, Slack, Gmail, GitHub, Kanban Tool, Google Docs, and Google Workspace. 

This is an aggregated rating for this tool including ratings from Crozdesk users and ratings from other sites.
4.3 43

Free version available

From $6/user/month

Pros

  • Good support
  • Flexible workflow
  • Seamless integrations

Cons

  • Some processes or settings are complicated
  • UI needs more colorful updates
6

CaseCamp

Best for effective time management

CaseCamp is a project management software tool that features a range of capabilities, including resource management, budgeting, employee tracking, project roadmaps, time tracking, reporting functionalities, location tracking, and collaboration features. Its tracking feature helps you organize your workflow and keep track of the product debugging processes.

Why I picked CaseCamp: This software helps you organize people and keep them on the same page. It provides the tooling you need to track everyone as they perform their role and ensure your testers are working toward the common goal. CaseCamp makes communication and exchanging information with teams and stakeholders very easy and trackable.

Another thing I like about this tool is the time tracking feature. With this capability, you can set time limits for tasks and track your workers to ensure tasks are completed quickly and correctly. 

CaseCamp Standout Features and Integrations

Standout features include Gantt Chart analysis, employee tracking, document management, iOS app tracking, Android app tracking, and live chat for collaboration.

The employee tracking feature helps you keep track of remote workers during software testing. You can track the location of remote staff and the amount of time spent on projects. The tool allows you to monitor all your debugging tasks from a dashboard. The reporting and analytics features give you insight into the QA activities.

Integrations: CaseCamp allows you to integrate with third-party tools, including GitHub and SVN. 

30-day free trial

From $25/month

Pros

  • Effortless bug tracking
  • Great customer support
  • Good user interface

Cons

  • Tutorials needed for beginners
  • Its many features might overwhelm new users
7

YouTrack

Best for streamlining tasks and creating configurable bug reports

YouTrack provides an all-in-one solution that allows you to track your debugging tasks, manage your team, and collaborate to deliver the best product possible. This tool enables you to streamline work and increase the productivity of your team.

Why I picked YouTrack: It has bug management features, enabling you to know where the problem lies, create bug reports, and track feature requests on time. In addition to building bug reports, YouTrack allows you to set their priority and assign them to team members. You can link issues to test cases by integrating with tools such as TestLink, TestRail, and TestLodge.

It also makes managing feature requests very easy. YouTrack lets you keep tabs on upcoming feature requests, prioritize feature rollouts, and use communication features to keep stakeholders in the loop.

YouTrack Standout Features and Integrations

Standout features include agile boards, a knowledge base, a Gantt chart, advanced reporting, and time tracking. YouTrack comes with up to 20 configurable reports to enable you to monitor, manage, and be in control of what your team is doing. 

It provides Scrum and Kanban board presets. You can also build boards to suit the bug tracking process your team has in place. With the interactive Gantt charts, you can schedule and prioritize tasks, set expectations, and keep an eye on everything with maximum precision.

Integrations include Slack, GitHub, Jira, Zendesk Suite, Confluence, IntelliJ IDEA, Bitbucket, GitLab, Cisco Jabber, and Albato.

Free plan available

From $3.67/user/month (billed annually)

Pros

  • Easy to use
  • Very customizable
  • It has a lot of features

Cons

  • UI can be confusing and clunky for beginners
  • There are not many YouTrack tutorials
8

MantisBT

Best for collaborating with team members

MantisBT is an open-source bug tracking tool. It supports Linux, Windows, and MacOS on the server side. MantisBT is also compatible with popular browsers.

Why I picked MantisBT: This web-based, open-source tool helps you streamline your QA process by making it very easy and fast to collaborate with team members and other stakeholders. I like MantisBt because it’s simple yet powerful. You can get started with the tool in minutes so you don’t have to spend hours trying to figure out how to set things up. The tool lets you manage debugging projects effectively.

MantisBT Standout Features and Integrations

Standout features: MantisBT offers email notifications, which help you keep your team and clients in the know about issue updates, resolutions, or comments. The tool is highly customizable. You have the flexibility to customize your workflow, notifications, and issue fields.

Integrations include GitHub, Toggl Track, LambdaTest, TestRail, Cerberus, iceScrum, Testsigma, HackerOne, QF-Test, and Meliora Testlab.

Free demo available

Pricing available upon request

Pros

  • Good for collaboration
  • Compatible with major operating systems and browsers
  • Easy to set up

Cons

  • Difficult configurations
  • Additional training on features needed
9

Bugzilla

Best for scheduling reports and presenting bug lists in multiple formats

Bugzilla, a secure and scalable free bug tracking software, is designed to help you plan, organize, and track your QA activities. It lets you categorize bugs, track the issues, and keep tabs on your team throughout the defect management process.

Why I picked Bugzilla: Bugzilla is a leading defect tracking system that provides the tooling you need to keep track of outstanding bugs and other issues that are impacting your product. It offers custom fields and custom workflow, which empower you to customize the bug tracking process to suit what your team has in place.

In addition to the basic HTML layout, Bugzilla presents bug lists in multiple formats, including Atom and iCalendar. You can schedule reports by email, and the tool has a feature you can configure to send out reports to anyone daily, weekly, hourly, etc.

Bugzilla Standout Features and Integrations

Standout features include advanced search capabilities, automatic duplicate bug detection, and time tracking. There is an advanced bug search system that allows you to create any search you want, such as time-based searches, and other forms of specific queries.

With the time tracking feature, you can make an estimate of how long a bug will take to be resolved and then keep track of what your team does in between to ensure time expectations are met. You can also take it a step farther to set a deadline for completing tasks.

Integrations: Integrations are available with Testsigma, Panaya, Bugsnag, QF-Test, Ranorex Studio, Deepinfo, TestComplete, PWSLab, and Test Collab.

Free to use

Pros

  • Customizable workflows
  • It’s secure
  • Good documentation

Cons

  • UI could be upgraded
  • More responsive support needed
10

Mattermost

Best for fostering collaboration among technical teams

This tool helps your team collaborate securely and effectively. Mattermost is designed to help technical teams with stringent security and privacy requirements to get things done with a suite of secure, workflow-centric collaboration tools.

Why I picked Mattermost: I added Mattermost to my list due to its advanced collaboration features. It allows your team to work together effectively with real-time communication, file sharing, code snippet sharing, and in-line code syntax highlighting. You can easily switch from chat to audio calls and screenshare on the same tool.

Mattermost enables you to catch bugs before you launch your software by improving visibility across dev and ops during the QA process. It has advanced security features that enable you to stay compliant with full data control.

Mattermost Standout Features and Integrations

Standout features: Mattermost comes with purpose-built workflow automation, which empowers you to get things done faster with few resources. Its seamless custom integrations with popular tools improve the workflow automation potential of this software and give you the flexibility to connect to your favorite tools.

In addition, the tools help you save costs by providing the tracking capabilities you need to avoid costly outages and downtime.

Integrations: Mattermost is extensible and customizable with tool integrations. Key integrations include GitHub, ServiceNow, GitLab, Bitbucket, Jira, CircleCI, Confluence, Opsgenie, ToDO, and Zendesk App. 

Free plan available

From $10/user/month

Pros

  • Very secure
  • Highly extensible
  • Full control over your data

Cons

  • Some glitches in the mobile app
  • Notifications should be improved

The 10 Best Free Bug Tracking Software Summary

Tool Free Option Price
1
Backlog

Best for creating and organizing customized workflows

30-day free trial

From $30/month Visit Website
2
Asana

Best for cross-functional work tracking

Free plan available

From $10.99/user/month Visit Website
3
Caspio

Best no-code free bug tracking software

Free plan available

From $140/month Visit Website
4
Instabug

Best bug tracking software for mobile apps

Free plan available

From $124/month Visit Website
5
GoodDay

Best for a distributed workforce

Free version available

From $6/user/month Visit Website
6
CaseCamp

Best for effective time management

30-day free trial

From $25/month Visit Website
7
YouTrack

Best for streamlining tasks and creating configurable bug reports

Free plan available

From $3.67/user/month (billed annually) Visit Website
8
MantisBT

Best for collaborating with team members

Free demo available

Pricing available upon request Visit Website
9
Bugzilla

Best for scheduling reports and presenting bug lists in multiple formats

Not available

Free to use Visit Website
10
Mattermost

Best for fostering collaboration among technical teams

Free plan available

From $10/user/month Visit Website

Other Options

Here is an additional list of free bug tracking software to check out:

  1. Shortcut

    Best for tracking issues with Kanban boards

  2. Rollbar

    Best for proactively discovering and resolving errors in real time

  3. New Relic

    Best bug tracking tool for providing data for engineers to monitor and fix bugs in their entire stack

  4. LambdaTest

    Best issue tracking system for mobile software development teams

  5. Zoho BugTracker

    Best issue tracker for getting instant notifications and informative bug reports

  6. Bugasura

    Best AI-powered issue tracking software

  7. BugHerd

    Best for anyone involved in the website development process and QA

  8. Zoho Sprints

    Best issue tracking tool for remote software teams

  9. Jira

    Best bug tracking system for agile development teams

  10. LogRocket

    Best for tracking bugs with the aid of machine learning

Selection Criteria For Free Bug Tracking Software 

Here’s a short summary of the main selection and evaluation criteria I used to develop my list of the best free bug tracking software for this article:

Core Functionality

Here are the basic functionalities I considered when I was evaluating defect tracking tools for this article:

  • Automatic detection of bugs
  • Automated workflow
  • Issue management
  • Customizable workflow

Key Features

I picked tools that come with the following key features:

  • Collaboration: A capability that enables team members to work together and share resources in real time. This feature is beneficial for remote teams because it empowers them to work together effortlessly without losing track of tasks.
  • Reporting: This feature enables you to keep a record of resolved and unresolved bugs in ways that are easy to keep track of.
  • Interactive dashboards: Interactive dashboards present data in easy-to-understand formats. Your team members and stakeholders can interact with dashboards and draw insights from the debugging data.
  • Time tracking: With this feature, you can keep track of how long it takes workers to accomplish tasks assigned to them.

Usability

No matter how powerful a tool is, it won’t be very helpful if users are struggling to apply the features. I picked free bug tracking tools that are user friendly. As a result, all the tools on the list are simple to use. You don’t need weeks of tutorials to get started. It’s easy to figure out how the solutions work and get started with your defect management projects.

Software Integrations

Integrating other tools with your major software development program enables you to have access to your toolset from a unified workflow. It gets rid of the need to move from one tool to another when tracking bugs. Consequently, I looked out for tools that can be integrated with a wide range of software development, QA, and productivity tools.

Pricing

When it comes to pricing, I considered three important factors: affordability, flexibility, and transparency. As you go through my list of the best free bug tracking software, you are sure to find tools that suit your QA or development projects.

People Also Ask

Some important questions people are asking about free defect tracking software:

Other Testing Software

If you want to learn more about software development and testing, check out the following articles.

Final Thoughts

Bug tracking tools help you build a successful product by enabling you to ensure your software is devoid of bugs and user experience problems. Carefully evaluate my recommendations and select the software that suits your project. No matter what your needs are, there is free bug tracking software that can meet them.

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By Anyalebechi Elisha

I’m Anyalebechi Elisha, a tech blogger and cybersecurity expert. For more than 3 years, I’ve been researching and writing short-form and long-form articles across many tech niches – with major focus on cybersecuty.

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