GanttProject is a desktop project scheduling tool built around the Gantt chart. It is used to plan tasks and durations, link dependencies, assign people to work, track progress against a saved baseline, and export a timeline that stakeholders can review.
GanttProject is a desktop application for building and maintaining project schedules as visual Gantt charts. You start in a spreadsheet-style task table, typing names, dates, and durations while the timeline draws each task as a bar. Linking tasks with dependencies turns that list into a real schedule: move one bar and everything downstream reschedules itself. From there you can indent work into summary phases, add milestones for key dates, and assign team members to their work. Everything is saved in a local project file, so a plan can be built and adjusted without an internet connection, and progress can be measured against a saved baseline. The value is a schedule that stays honest when reality shifts.
GanttProject suits schedules that are handed to real people: contractors, site crews, studio teams, or a supervisor who just wants to know whether the deadline still holds. Because the project file lives on your own machine, project data stays local instead of sitting on a third-party server, and a plan can be edited offline. Sharing is manual by design, so you either export the chart or hand over the project file itself. When revised timelines need explaining, the accompanying email is often written in Outlook for Windows, with the exported PDF attached. For a heavier project office, the optional cloud service adds co-editing so several planners can work on the same schedule instead of emailing copies back and forth.
The first benefit of GanttProject is that scheduling becomes arithmetic instead of guesswork. Durations, dependencies, and working-day calendars combine so that any change ripples through the plan automatically, which means fewer spreadsheets with stale dates and fewer arguments about whose version is current. Summary tasks give managers a one-bar view of a phase, while milestones pin the dates everyone actually cares about. The resources chart answers the question that sinks most plans, who is double-booked next month, before the crunch arrives rather than after. Saving a baseline preserves the original promise of the project, so progress reports can say whether work is ahead, on track, or slipping with evidence behind the claim. Exports keep people without the software in the loop, and the critical-path highlight shows where a single day of slippage would move the finish line. For small and medium projects, that is a lot of discipline for a tool you can learn in an afternoon.
Key capabilities and highlights.
GanttProject gives every task a start date and a duration, and lets you drag between bars to link work in sequence. When a task moves, everything downstream recalculates, so the plan stays internally consistent instead of quietly contradicting itself after the first delay.
Indent related work beneath a parent to create a summary task that spans the dates of its children, then collapse the phase for a one-line executive view. Milestones mark zero-duration dates as diamonds, separating genuine decision points from ordinary work.
Define the people, crews, or equipment that constrain the plan, then assign them to tasks. The resources chart lays each commitment out over time and flags overload, so you can move a task, extend it, or reassign it before a double-booking turns into a missed deadline.
In GanttProject, save a baseline to freeze the plan as it was agreed, then compare it with actual progress as the weeks pass. It is the difference between reporting that a phase feels behind and showing precisely how far the schedule has drifted from the original commitment.
Turn on the critical-path highlight and the chain of tasks that determines the finish date lights up, showing where a single day of slippage would push the whole project. Timescales can be switched between days, weeks, months, and quarters, and zoomed until the plan fits the screen.
Render the current view as a PDF or PNG for a status report or slide, or publish the schedule as HTML, with colours, dependencies, and milestone diamonds kept intact. Task data can also leave as structured spreadsheet-friendly output when another system needs the dates rather than the picture.
Existing task lists and plans from other project tools can be brought in as a starting point, giving you names, dates, and durations without retyping. After importing, add the dependencies, milestones, and resource assignments that turn a flat list into a working schedule.
Projects are stored as a local file you control, so the plan works offline and can be archived or backed up like any other document. Sharing that file keeps a small team in sync, and an optional cloud service adds simultaneous co-editing when several planners need to work on one schedule at once.
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Common questions about GanttProject.
It is used to plan and track projects visually: entering tasks with durations, linking them in order, assigning the people responsible, and watching the timeline update as dates change. Teams use it for construction, engineering, production, and similar work where a clear schedule matters more than a large feature set.
Yes. Tasks are connected by dependencies, so moving or extending one task recalculates the start dates of everything that follows it. That keeps the plan consistent without manual date editing, which is the main practical difference between a Gantt chart and a spreadsheet timeline.
Yes, using baselines. Save a baseline when the plan is agreed, then compare current dates and progress against it later. GanttProject keeps the original values, so a status report can be backed by exact differences rather than a general impression.
Export the chart as a PDF or image and send it, or publish it as HTML that opens in any browser. The export keeps colours, dependency arrows, and milestones, so the shared version stays readable without any explanation of how it was produced.
A small group can share the project file through ordinary file storage, taking turns to edit it. GanttProject also offers an optional cloud service that adds simultaneous co-editing, which suits teams that would otherwise keep emailing copies of the plan back and forth.
Yes. Resources are defined once and then assigned to as many tasks as needed, with the resources chart showing each person's commitments across the timeline. Where the assignments stack up too heavily, an overload is flagged so you can move, shorten, or reassign work before the crunch.
GanttProject is a desktop project scheduling tool built around the Gantt chart. It is used to plan tasks and durations, link dependencies, assign people to work, track progress against a saved baseline, and export a timeline that stakeholders can review.
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