10 Best Product Requirements Tool Shortlist
Here's my pick of the 10 best software from the 20 tools reviewed.
Our one-on-one guidance will help you find the perfect fit.
There are so many different product requirements tools that selecting the best one for you can be tricky. You want to define, organize, and manage the specifications and features that a product should have, and maintain a clear and organized set of requirements throughout the product lifecycle, but need the right tool for it. I've got you covered! In this post, I review the best product requirements software and use my personal experience managing hundreds of products and using many different requirements platforms with large teams in my analysis.
What are product requirements software?
Product requirements software are tools that help teams document, analyze, prioritize, and agree on product requirements. They enable product development teams to store all their product requirements documents in one place, create links between documents and other items, while also keeping track of changes and allowing team members to communicate throughout the development process.
Key features of product requirements software include requirement documentation, version control, collaboration tools, traceability, and integration with other project management or development tools. These features help product teams maintain a clear and organized set of requirements throughout the product lifecycle.
Overviews Of The 10 Best Product Requirements Software Solutions
Here’s a brief description of each product requirements app to showcase each tool’s best use case, some noteworthy features, and screenshots to give a snapshot of the user interface.
Show the links between regulations, requirements, and tests with a diagram
Jama Software is a product requirements management software used by organizations to help them design, develop, and deliver better products. It provides a collaborative platform that allows you to work together with your team on product development projects, including collecting and managing customer requirements, setting up reviews and approvals, tracking progress, and ensuring compliance with regulations.
Jama Software's requirements authoring feature is an efficient, user-friendly tool for product requirements management. It allows you to quickly and easily build, store, review, and collaborate on all product requirement documents in one place. The built-in library of templates makes it easy to create custom document types tailored to the product's needs, while powerful search capabilities ensure that relevant information is instantly available.
Additionally, real-time data analysis capabilities provide insights into how requirements change throughout the development process—streamlining the amendment process and allowing for effective communication between stakeholders.
Another great feature is live traceability. By proactively monitoring changes over time, you can quickly identify when a product diverges from its roadmap or specification, allowing for potential adjustments to be identified before issues arise. With full audit trails on all artifacts associated with products and project versions, stakeholders are always up to date on the most updated version.
Jama Software integrates with other applications through Jama Connect. This connector lets you sync traceable information without replacing the current tools in your tech stack. Integrations include MathWorks, Jira, TFS, Windchill, Jenkins, Bugzilla, Excel, and GitHub.
Pricing for this tool is available upon request, and a 30-day free trial is available upon registration through the website.
Craft.io is an end-to-end product management platform with best practices built-in for everything product managers need. It provides product professionals with an all-in-one solution to effectively manage the entire lifecycle of their digital products, from strategy, feedback collection and feature definition to prioritization, capacity planning, road mapping, and portfolio management.
The feedback collection feature for this product lets you collect, tag, and track comments from internal and external stakeholders. Then, you can grab these items and connect them to feature items so you continue developing with the client's needs in mind.
The software also enables product managers to define the product's goals and objectives and user persona cards so your team does not lose focus on who the product is for and how it should work. The Guru layer infuses industry-leading best practices into every step of the product process. The templates from the Guru layer, called Guru views, will help you see the information in the right context. Whether a table or board, these views help with your capacity planning, product tracking, planning, and item prioritization using frameworks like Rice, WSJF, and Now/Next/Later.
Craft.io integrates with Jira, Azure DevOps, GitLab, GitHub, Targetprocess, Figma, Adobe XD, Okta, Google Workspace, Active Directory, SAML, Lucidchart, Confluence, Miro, and PingIdentity. You can also connect to over 1,000 additional applications via Zapier.
Simplify your searches with color-coded databases and tags
ProductPlan is a flexible product management tool that can help teams build better products. The software successfully doubles as requirements management software and its color-coded interface makes it easy to create documentation hierarchies or links between different requirements.
One of the nice things about ProductPlan is that you can add tags to everything you do, so you can get relevant results every time you search for something. Every item you create can hold an incredible amount of details, which can help your team collaborate.
You can link wireframes and templates to your PRDs, explain how your changes would affect the target audience via comments, and add all sorts of items that might help your team create better products.
ProductPlan costs from $49/user/month. You can access a free 14-day trial.
ProductBoard is a project management solution with good requirements management capabilities. The software creates a centralized location for all your documentation, and it allows your team to collaborate and understand why some features are being prioritized.
This tool has a nice-looking interface and comes with built-in communication tools. You can share your screen to validate ideas with your team or show off your progress to stakeholders as you work.
ProductBoard displays information in real-time. You can set up custom alarms to receive notifications when your name or certain keywords are mentioned, making it easy to stay on top of what’s happening with your project.
One of the things that make ProductBoard stand out is its ability to collect user stories and feedback, organize them into problems, and build roadmaps based on them.
ProductBoard costs from $20/user/month. You can get a free 15-day trial.
Aha
Create the perfect work environment with a customizable product requirements solution
Aha! is one of the most popular software development solutions available. The software doubles as a requirements management tool, and enables engineering teams to release great products with the help of requirements gathering, new feature prioritization, customer feedback, product requirements document templates, and progress tracking.
The solution has a nice-looking interface and an intuitive build, so you can navigate it with ease. You can create a strategy for every project, and connect your goals and initiatives to the work your team delivers. One of the great things about Aha! is that it enables you to customize almost everything.
This helps you create a work environment that matches your team’s workflow, terminology, and preferences. Aha! costs from $59/user/month.
The solution offers a free 30-day trial and you can also schedule a live demo.
Roadmunk is a project management platform and road-mapping tool that helps you organize your work. The software enables you to communicate your strategy in a visual manner, by placing it on a timeline roadmap, so your team knows what to prioritize next.
This solution offers built-in product management frameworks, so you can save time when starting a new project.
You use Roadmunk to collect insights from your users, team members, or stakeholders, and link the insights to product ideas in your backlog. You can then organize your ideas and schedule them into your roadmap, plan sprints, etc.
Roadmunk costs from $19/month (3 users). You can access a free 14-day trial.
R4J is a native requirements management add-on you can use in Jira. The solution enables your staff to collaborate and communicate throughout the product development lifecycle. This software is easy to use, and Jira administrators can configure it to their liking.
With R4J, you can create a hierarchical structure for your documentation, track the evolution of your requirements, and ensure traceability.
R4J can help you reduce time to market by allowing you to reuse requirements from other projects. You can import and export requirements to different formats, and the software integrates with Microsoft Excel, so your team can edit .csv files.
R4J pricing starts from $10/10 users/year. The solution offers a free 30-day trial.
DevSpec is a product requirements management software that enables engineering teams to create and organize requirements, collaborate, and track everything they do. The solution also allows your product team to make marketing requirement documents (MRDs), so it helps multiple departments prepare for product launch.
This solution helps you understand what your team is doing. You can customize your dashboard to keep track of the important aspects of your project, view requirement relationships, and see how your changes will impact other features or functionalities.
With DevSpec, you can set up real-time notifications to stay up to date with the latest changes and log all your team’s activities for audit purposes. Team members can open chat sessions and leave notes to one another to keep each other in the loop.
DevSpec integrates with MS Word, and you can import/export your docs and create PRD templates.
DevSpec costs from $20/user/month. The software offers a 30-day free trial.
Aras is a requirements management tool that helps you create relationships between product requirements documents. The software offers good traceability capabilities, and it allows you to perform detailed requirements analysis.
This solution has a simple, low-code build that’s similar to that of a word processor. When you create a document hierarchy, related requirements show up as chapters you can edit. This helps you eliminate confusion and implement a structured requirements creation process for all your projects.
The software automatically maintains traceability, and you can set up different rules depending on your project or necessities.
Aras offers custom pricing upon request. You can also access a demo.
Improve your time to market with AI
IBM’s DOORS Next is a scalable requirements management solution that helps teams manage product features, versions, and iterations. The solution creates a centralized, shared location for all your requirements, so every department can access the document-style database.
This software enables you to share dashboards across your organization’s departments, highlight potential issues, and ensure traceability. It also enables you to assess the impact of any changes you make by linking the change requests to requirements, so you can easily trace different effects to their root cause.
DOORS Next can help improve your time to market with the help of AI. The software’s Quality Assistant analyses your requirements and offers recommendations based on INCOSE Guidelines, so it can help you optimize your resources when developing requirements.
DOORS Next offers customized pricing upon request. You can access a free trial.
The Best Product Requirements Software Solutions Summary
Tools | Price | |
---|---|---|
Jama Software | Pricing Upon Request | Website |
Craft.io | From $19/editor/month | Website |
ProductPlan | From $49/user/month | Website |
Productboard | From $25/user/month | Website |
Aha | From $59/user/month | Website |
Roadmunk | From $19/month, paid annually | Website |
R4J Requirements Management for Jira | From $10/10 users/year | Website |
DevSpec | From $20/user/month | Website |
Aras | Pricing Upon Request | Website |
IBM Engineering Requirements Management DOORS Next | Pricing Upon Request | Website |
Compare Software Specs Side by Side
Use our comparison chart to review and evaluate software specs side-by-side.
Compare SoftwareOther Tools
These didn’t make the top list but they are still worth checking out.
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Perforce Helix RM
Reuse requirements to shorten your time to market
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Wrike
Write, review, & approve product requirement documents with a team
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monday.com
Customizable project management app with requirements management capabilities
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Process Street
Free requirements management for recurring checklists and procedures (1 user, 1 workflow)
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Cradle
Agile tool for loading, creating, inter-linking and publishing requirements information
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aqua ALM
Application lifecycle management tool with product requirements solutions built in
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Doc Sheets
Enterprise requirements and lifecycle management software with traceability features
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QVscribe
Analyze requirements documents for errors and vulnerabilities
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RequirementsHub
Tools to gather, evaluate, and produce IT, software, or services requirements
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Innoslate
Model-based systems engineering and requirements management
Comparison Criteria
What do I look for when I select the best product requirements system? Here’s a summary of my evaluation criteria:
- User Interface (UI): I look for tools that offer a clean interface. Your team members shouldn’t waste your time trying to find the functionalities or information they need.
- Usability: I look for software anyone can use. Your staff should learn how to use most of the tool’s functionalities after going over the documentation or through a brief training period.
- Integrations: I look for solutions that integrate with the tools you’re already using, such as word processing software, communication solutions, analytics tools, project management platforms, customer support solutions, etc.
- Value for $: I look for software that gives you all the features you need to take your product from ideation to validation and ultimately to product release, so you get the most out of your investment.
Product Requirements Solution: Key Features
- Simple product requirements document creation: The software should help you create product requirement documents (PRDs) with ease, even if you rely on the Agile methodology and add the requirements to your backlog after sprints.
- Flexible requirement types: The solution should enable you to define multiple requirement types, so you can create hierarchical structures that are tailored to each product.
- Multiple reading views: You should be able to change your reading views, so you can switch to role-specific views or visualize the requirements in document format when necessary.
- Requirements management: The solution should allow you to create and manage requirement dependencies, link requirements to one another, and prioritize certain features.
- Requirements traceability: You should be able to track tasks, test cases and other items to requirements, so you can have an accurate picture of how the development process is going.
- Reporting: The solution should interpret data and generate reports, so you can present your success metrics to product managers, stakeholders, or clients.
- Notification and collaboration: The solution should enable your team members to communicate, collaborate, and receive notifications when project requirements have been updated.
Related: Product Analytics Dashboards For Product Management
Improve Your Releases With Product Requirements Software
Product requirements software can help you launch competitive products. As Ravi Goyal or Sureline Systems said,
“The tech world is one of the most dynamic markets. That means even if a solution was perfect for one project, it might not be fresh enough for the other. You have to get creative and innovative with every new project's roadmap in order for it to correspond with the requirements of that individual project.”
By keeping your data organized and creating links between customer feedback and product requirements, the software makes it easier to launch something your users would love.
You can learn more about the different aspects of product lifecycle management on our blog. Subscribe to the Product Manager newsletter if you want to receive tips on product management from top thinkers in the industry directly in your inbox.
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