ganttown.com

What It Is

GanttOWN is a desktop Gantt chart project planning tool built around a “buy once, use forever” model. It does not use a SaaS subscription model and does not depend on the cloud. Once installed, it can run fully offline, with projects saved as .gantt files on a local machine, network drive, SharePoint, or OneDrive. The current copy indicates that the Mac version is already available, while the Windows version is still in development.

Core Features and Collaboration

Feature-wise, it covers the key parts of project scheduling: drag-and-drop task adjustment, automatic cascading for dependencies, critical path highlighting, milestones, baselines and variance tracking, work calendars, status dashboards, and PDF/Excel export. The Team and Business editions add PM/member roles, separate passwords, member inboxes, date change requests and approvals, PM messages, project logs, and full audit logs. Its collaboration model is not cloud-based real-time multi-user editing, but shared files plus file locking—better suited to teams that need localized data storage and controlled workflows.

Pricing

Pricing is straightforward: Solo is a one-time payment of $49, supports up to 5 users, and is suitable for individual PMs or small teams, but does not include roles or approvals; Team is a one-time payment of $149, supports up to 20 users, and unlocks the full collaboration suite; Business is a one-time payment of $299, supports up to 150 users, and is aimed at department-level deployment. Solo includes 12 months of updates, while Team/Business include future feature updates. Payment is handled through Lemon Squeezy, with instant download after purchase.

Pros and Cons

The advantages are its low one-off cost, no monthly per-seat fees, offline usability, controllable local files, and practical project management features such as critical path, baselines, approvals, and audit logs. The drawbacks are also clear: at present, only Mac is officially available; there is no web/mobile app, cloud sync, real-time collaboration, API, or broader third-party integrations. On the security and compliance side, only password protection, local storage, and audit logs are mentioned, with no disclosure of common enterprise certifications.

Who It’s For and Access from China

It is suitable for teams in construction, IT/software, marketing, operations, and similar fields that need shared scheduling but do not want to buy a heavyweight enterprise project management system. It is especially relevant for budget-sensitive use cases or teams that prefer offline file-based management. The available text does not provide details on access from China. Payment and downloads rely on overseas sites and Lemon Squeezy, so real-world availability needs to be tested. Alternatives include Microsoft Project, ProjectLibre, GanttProject, as well as China-based tools such as 飞书项目 and TAPD.