Microsoft Whiteboard alternatives: where to go before the app retires
What stops in 2026, five destinations in detail, and a seven-step export plan.
The short answer: Excalidraw if you used Whiteboard on a personal account to sketch diagrams, for free and without signing up. Miro if your team runs workshops and wants ready-made templates and 250+ integrations. Mural if you facilitate meetings with lots of guests. Collaboard if your data has to stay in Europe. FigJam if your team already lives in Figma. One thing to know before you pick: Whiteboard only exports an image. Your sticky notes, ink and links will not arrive editable anywhere. We compared the five destinations in this guide and checked their prices and limits in 2026.
Some links are affiliate links. They never change the order or the opinions on this page. The ranking is editorial: a sponsored spot is always labeled on its card, and no affiliate link changes a score.
Why so many people are leaving Whiteboard in 2026
Whiteboard has one real strength: it ships with eligible Microsoft 365 plans and turns itself on, Teams included. Nobody pays for it, so nobody really chose it. This year's exits have a new trigger, the retirement Microsoft announced, stacked on top of older complaints. Here are the six that come up most, and what each one means for you.
Personal accounts lose editing
On a personal Microsoft account (Outlook.com, Hotmail, a family account) you can no longer create or edit boards. You can still view and export them until they are deleted. Microsoft offers no replacement for consumers, so picking a new home and exporting first is on you.
The standalone apps are going away
The Whiteboard apps for Windows, iOS and Android retire in 2026 for every account type, work and school included. Once retired, the installed app just shows a retirement screen. Work accounts keep Whiteboard in the browser and inside Teams, but the habit of opening it as an app on a pen tablet is over.
Older boards can be deleted for good
The oldest boards were stored by Microsoft on Azure rather than in OneDrive. Any that were never migrated to OneDrive get permanently deleted, and Microsoft states there will be no recovery or migration option afterwards. If your account goes back a few years, some of your boards may be in that bucket.
No file you own, only an image export
On a personal account, a board is not a file you can drop in a folder. It lives in Microsoft's cloud and opens from the board picker. Export gives you an image: PNG on Windows and iOS, SVG on the web. It looks right, but everything is flattened. A sticky note becomes pixels, not an object you can move.
Laggy ink and slow loading
One computer science teacher described ink taking up to two seconds to appear, only three pen colors at a time, an eraser that wiped whole objects, and dropped connections on a good network. Some of that was fixed later, but slow loading keeps coming back, including after Windows 11 updates. If you write with a pen in front of a class, a one-second lag breaks the flow.
Three entry points, few facilitation tools
Whiteboard opens from Teams, from the app and from the browser, and it overlaps with OneNote for handwriting. A consultant who uses it daily put it bluntly: too many steps, too many decisions. Compared with Miro or Mural, it also lacks workshop tools like voting, timers and breakouts, and guests from outside your company are less at home in it.
You're leaving because… go to…
The right Microsoft Whiteboard alternative depends on how you used it. Usually one line fits you. Each card jumps to the detailed profile below.
Free with no time limit, no sign-up, and your drawings save to a file you actually own.
Your team runs workshops and wants templatesMiroReady-made workshop templates and 250+ integrations, from $8 per member per month.
You facilitate Teams meetings with outside guestsMuralUnlimited members on the free plan, and the Teams integration is one of its core integrations.
Your data has to stay hosted in EuropeCollaboardSwiss vendor, hosting in the Netherlands, with Switzerland or Germany (extra cost) on the Advanced plan.
Your product team already works in FigmaFigJamFigma's whiteboard, with a $3 per month Collab seat on the Professional plan.
You have a work account and Whiteboard in Teams is fineStay, but check OneDriveWork and school accounts keep Whiteboard on the web and in Teams. Make sure your old boards made it to OneDrive.
Microsoft Whiteboard alternatives, tool by tool
For each tool: why move to it, who it fits, its catch, how to bring your Whiteboard boards over, and what it costs. One thing they all share: none of them imports a Whiteboard board with its objects intact. Everywhere, you arrive with an image, which you lock as a background and rebuild on top of.
Miro: the default pick for teams that run workshops
Most completeWhy move to Miro. It covers the most ground in one place: brainstorms, retros, journey maps, project plans. It connects to more than 250 apps, and its template library saves you from rebuilding your workshop formats by hand. If you're replacing Whiteboard for a whole team, it's the destination that will annoy the fewest people.
Two habits help on the free plan: keep one board per recurring meeting instead of piling everything into one canvas, and archive finished boards as images so they don't eat your 3 free slots.
Who it fits. Teams from 3 people to a few dozen who regularly run sessions together, in the room or remote.
Who it doesn't fit. Someone who sketched the occasional diagram: the free plan is too tight and the paid plans are more than that use needs.
The catch. The Free plan keeps only 3 editable boards, always the 3 most recent, so opening a fourth freezes your oldest. There are no private boards, exports are low resolution, and you get 10 AI credits a month. Starter is $8 per member per month billed annually, Business $20, and costs climb fast because every member counts. Annual billing saves 20%.
How to migrate. Miro has no Whiteboard import, and its community confirms it: export the board as an image, then upload that image to Miro. It lands as a background you can't edit. Lock it, then recreate the sticky notes you still want to move. Our full Miro review breaks down every plan.
- Free
- 3 editable boards
- Paid
- Starter $8/member/mo, annual
- Best for
- teams running regular workshops
- Catch
- price scales with every member
Mural: for facilitating meetings with lots of guests
Most guest-friendlyWhy move to Mural. Its free plan allows unlimited members, which matters a lot if your sessions mix colleagues, clients and partners. Core integrations are open on the free plan too: Microsoft Teams, Webex, Zoom, Jira Cloud, Google Workspace and Slack. So Teams stays your meeting room, and Mural only replaces the board.
Practical tip: because members are unlimited on the free plan, you can invite a whole client team to a pilot session before anyone pays, then upgrade only the facilitators to Team+.
Who it fits. Workshop facilitators, consulting and training teams, and any department that regularly brings outsiders into the room.
Who it doesn't fit. Anyone who wants dozens of live boards without paying: the free plan allows only 3 editable murals at a time, in a single workspace.
The catch. Team+ is $9.99 per member per month billed annually, or $12 month to month. Business is $17.99 annually, and that's the first tier where you can connect single sign-on through Azure AD or Okta. If your IT team wants access managed from your Microsoft directory, budget for Business.
How to migrate. Same method as everywhere: export each Whiteboard board as an image, ideally as SVG from the web version, drop it into a mural, and rebuild what needs to stay live. Use the switch to replace improvised boards with clean workshop templates.
- Free
- unlimited members, 3 editable murals
- Paid
- Team+ $9.99/member/mo, annual
- Best for
- guest-heavy meetings in Teams
- Catch
- Azure AD sign-on only on Business
Collaboard: for keeping your boards hosted in Europe
EU data hostingWhy move to Collaboard. This Swiss vendor sells on where your data lives. Boards are stored on Azure in the Netherlands on the Free and Basic plans, and on Advanced you choose between the Netherlands, Switzerland and Germany (Germany at extra cost). Enterprise goes further with self-hosting or an on-premises install. The Teams integration is included on every plan, free included.
Who it fits. Public bodies, schools, healthcare organizations, and any company whose legal team asks where data sits before approving a tool. Also US teams with European clients who ask the same question.
Who it doesn't fit. A large team that wants its board wired to dozens of other tools: with 250+ integrations, Miro is better equipped.
The catch. The free plan stops at 3 boards, 5 participants per board and 15 MB files. Watch out for guests: on the free plan they can look but can't edit or add content. Basic is $6 per user per month billed annually, Advanced $11.50, and annual billing saves 17%.
How to migrate. Collaboard documents the most detailed path on this list. You can place the Whiteboard image as a background, or import a PDF that Collaboard converts into objects. The vendor is upfront that it's not a 1:1 import: check each board after conversion, especially the text.
- Free
- 3 boards, 5 participants each
- Paid
- Basic $6/user/mo, annual
- Best for
- data hosted in Europe
- Catch
- fewer integrations than Miro
FigJam: for teams already working in Figma
Cheapest for product teamsWhy move to FigJam. If your designers and product managers already have Figma accounts, FigJam is the whiteboard that sits right next to their mockups. You go from a workshop to a designed screen without switching tools or logins. A Collab seat is $3 per month on the Professional plan, the cheapest paid option in this guide.
Practical tip: on an Organization or Enterprise plan, check whether people only need FigJam before buying full Figma seats; the Collab seat at $5 covers board work.
Who it fits. Product, design and engineering teams, and agencies that already share Figma files with clients.
Who it doesn't fit. A team with no tie to Figma: you add one more tool, and the Figma world can confuse people coming from a simple Microsoft board.
The catch. The Collab seat goes to $5 per month on the Organization and Enterprise plans, billed annually. The pricing page doesn't spell out free plan limits, so check them in your account before planning to dump your whole archive there.
How to migrate. Drop your Whiteboard exports as images into a FigJam file, one per topic, and recreate the useful notes with the built-in templates. If you ever leave Figma too, our guide to switching from Figma covers what comes next.
- Free
- yes, limits not listed by Figma
- Paid
- Collab seat $3/mo (Professional)
- Best for
- teams already on Figma
- Catch
- one more tool outside product teams
Excalidraw: the free way out for personal accounts
Free and open sourceWhy move to Excalidraw. It's the simplest answer if Whiteboard was where you sketched diagrams, prepped a lesson or thought things through alone. Excalidraw is free with no time limit and open source. Above all, it fixes the problem that pushed you out: your drawings save to a .excalidraw file (readable JSON) that you keep wherever you like, and export as PNG or SVG.
Who it fits. Consumers pushed off Whiteboard by the personal account change, teachers, developers, and anyone who wants their files on their own drive.
Who it doesn't fit. A team running workshops with votes, timers and dozens of participants. That's not what it's built for.
The catch. The hand-drawn look isn't for every client-facing document. PDF and PowerPoint export of frames needs Excalidraw+, at $6 per user per month, with a 14-day trial and 14% off on annual billing.
How to migrate. Export your boards from Whiteboard in the browser, as SVG: the vector format stays sharp at any zoom. Drag each image into Excalidraw as a reference, then redraw on top the diagrams you still update. Save the .excalidraw file to your folder: this time, it's really yours.
- Free
- yes, no time limit
- Paid
- Excalidraw+ $6/user/mo
- Best for
- solo diagrams, local files
- Catch
- no facilitation tools
The 5 alternatives side by side
Our default pick: Excalidraw for a personal account, Miro for a team that runs workshops. The rest depends on your constraints: outside guests (Mural), European hosting (Collaboard), product teams (FigJam). For a sense of scale, a 10-person team pays $960 a year on Miro Starter billed annually, and $360 a year on FigJam Professional Collab seats.
| Free plan | First paid tier and migration | |
|---|---|---|
| Microsoft WhiteboardWhere you start | Included in Microsoft 365; personal accounts can't create or edit | No standalone price; PNG or SVG export, one board at a time |
| MiroTeams and workshops | 3 editable boards (most recent), low-res export | Starter $8/member/mo annual; image upload as background |
| MuralLots of guests | Unlimited members, 3 editable murals, Teams integration | Team+ $9.99/member/mo annual; image upload as background |
| CollaboardData in Europe | 3 boards, 5 participants per board, guests view-only | Basic $6/user/mo annual; image background or PDF turned into objects |
| FigJamTeams on Figma | Yes, limits not listed on the pricing page | Collab seat $3/mo (Professional); image dropped into a file |
| ExcalidrawPersonal accounts | Free with no time limit, local .excalidraw file | Excalidraw+ $6/user/mo; SVG placed as reference |
Entry prices before tax, in the vendor's currency, subject to change. Annual billing is cheaper than monthly on Miro, Mural, Collaboard and Excalidraw+.
Leave Whiteboard in seven steps
Order matters, because time works against you: a board that isn't exported before it's deleted is gone. The first steps save your archive; the last ones set up the new tool.
Figure out which account holds your boards
FirstEverything hinges on this. On a personal Microsoft account, you've lost create and edit, so your job is to export before deletion. On a work or school account, Whiteboard carries on in the browser, in the Teams app, in Teams meetings and tabs. Only the standalone app goes away.
If you have both, open the board picker with each account. A lot of people find forgotten boards on their personal address at this point.
- Personal account
- view and export only
- Work account
- web and Teams stay
List your boards and triage them
TriagePut every board in a simple sheet: name, topic, whether it's still in use, and what you'll do with it. Three options only: archive as an image, rebuild in the new tool, or delete.
Triage saves real time, because Microsoft offers no bulk export: each board exports one at a time. Fewer boards to export means a faster exit.
- Bulk export
- none, one board at a time
- Risk if rushed
- a board forgotten, then deleted
Work accounts: check your old boards made it to OneDrive
Work accountsOn a work account, recent boards are .whiteboard files in the Whiteboards folder of your OneDrive. The oldest ones were stored separately, on Azure. If they weren't migrated to OneDrive, they get permanently deleted, with no way to recover them.
Open your Whiteboards folder and compare it with your inventory. If boards you still see in the app are missing, message your Microsoft 365 admin right away and export them as images while you wait.
- Where to look
- OneDrive, Whiteboards folder
- If missing
- ask your admin
Export every board, as SVG if you can
BackupOpen the board, hit the "..." menu, then export as an image. On Windows and iOS you get a PNG; on the web, an SVG. Go with the web: SVG is vector, so lines stay crisp when you zoom, and it drops cleanly into Excalidraw or another diagram tool.
Save the files in a folder named after your inventory. Don't count on a PDF export: Microsoft's documentation only lists image exports.
- Windows and iOS
- PNG
- Browser
- SVG (vector)
Copy the text and links that matter
The trapThe image keeps how the board looks, not what's in it. An exported sticky note is no longer text you can copy, and a link is no longer clickable. For each board you'll rebuild, paste long text, voted idea lists and link URLs into a document.
That document becomes your source for the rebuild: you paste text into the new tool instead of retyping it from a picture.
- What the image loses
- editable text, links, objects
- Fix
- one text doc per board
Lock the image as a background and rebuild on top
RebuildIn the new tool, drop in the exported image, stretch it to the board size, and lock it so it stops moving. Then rebuild on top the notes, arrows and areas you still want to move around. That's the method recommended on Miro's community forum and in Collaboard's guide.
In Collaboard, you can also import a PDF that gets turned into objects. It won't match the original exactly: reread the text and fix anything that shifted.
- Method
- locked image, rebuilt objects
- Variant
- PDF conversion in Collaboard
Swap recurring formats for templates
Time saverYour retros, brainstorms and prioritization grids don't need converting. Pick the matching template in the new tool, adjust the columns, and keep the old board as an image for reference.
This is also when you set access rules: who can create boards, who can invite outsiders, and on which plan. On a 3-board free plan, decide which boards stay live before you invite the team.
- To convert
- nothing recurring
- To decide
- access and guests
Is your tool missing from this page? Email us: hello@hackceleration.com
What makes a Whiteboard exit go wrong
The mistakes that show up on forums aren't technical. They're oversights and assumptions, and on Whiteboard they're expensive, because a deleted board doesn't come back.
Waiting for the announced date
Microsoft has already moved this retirement schedule several times in 2026. Don't aim for the last week: export everything you want to keep now. An early export costs nothing; a late one doesn't exist.
Assuming the export keeps objects
You export a picture, not a board. People who learn this afterwards end up rereading every note off a screenshot to retype it. Copy your text before you close Whiteboard, not after.
Forgetting boards on another account
An old personal account, a school account, a work account from a previous job: each one has its own board picker. And on the work side, older boards left on Azure disappear without recovery if they weren't migrated.
Picking a free plan that's too small
Miro, Mural and Collaboard all cap their free plan at 3 editable boards. On Miro it's always the 3 most recent, so importing your archive freezes your active boards. Keep the archive as images in a folder, and import only what's still alive.
Forgetting outside guests
If clients or partners worked on your boards, count them before choosing. Collaboard's free plan stops at 5 participants per board and guests can't edit, while Mural allows unlimited members. That one detail can decide between two tools.
Ignoring where your data goes
Leaving Microsoft also means changing who hosts your data. If your organization approved Microsoft 365 for compliance reasons, get the new tool approved before putting client data in it. Collaboard lists its hosting countries plan by plan.
- Account identified: personal, work or school
- Board inventory, with a decision for each
- OneDrive Whiteboards folder checked against the inventory (work accounts)
- Every useful board exported, as SVG from the browser when possible
- Important text and links copied into a document
- Images placed as locked backgrounds in the new tool
- Recurring formats rebuilt with native templates
- Access, guests and plan settled before inviting the team
Microsoft Whiteboard alternatives: common questions
Is Microsoft Whiteboard being discontinued?
Not for everyone. The standalone Windows, iOS and Android apps retire in 2026 for all accounts. Personal accounts lose create and edit, and their boards are then deleted. Microsoft says plainly that Whiteboard is not retiring for work or school accounts: it stays in the browser and in Teams.
What replaces Microsoft Whiteboard for personal accounts?
Microsoft doesn't offer a replacement, so you choose. For solo sketching, Excalidraw is the closest fit: free, no account needed, and your work saves to a file you keep. If you collaborated with friends or a small group, Miro's free plan works as long as you stay within 3 editable boards.
Can I import my Whiteboard boards into Miro?
Not directly. Miro has no Whiteboard importer: you export the board as an image, then upload it, and it arrives as a background you can't edit. Tip: on Miro's free plan, don't upload your whole archive, because only the 3 most recent boards stay editable.
Can I export a Whiteboard board as a PDF?
Microsoft's documentation only lists image exports: PNG on Windows and iOS, SVG in the browser. Some guides mention PDF, but don't rely on it. If you need a PDF for archiving, export as SVG and convert it afterwards; Collaboard can even turn that PDF into editable objects.
What's the best free whiteboard that works with Microsoft Teams?
Mural opens its Teams integration on the free plan, with unlimited members but 3 editable murals. Collaboard includes Teams on every plan, free included, with 3 boards and 5 participants per board. And on a work account, Whiteboard itself stays inside Teams. If you're leaving Teams too, see our guide to switching from Microsoft Teams.
I write with a pen on a Windows tablet. What should I use?
Look at Xournal++ or OpenBoard. Both were suggested on Microsoft's own forum to people asking for local saves: they work offline, on files stored on your device. If your handwritten notes also lived in OneNote, our guide to switching from OneNote fills in the rest.
Is there an open-source Microsoft Whiteboard alternative?
Yes, a few. Excalidraw is the simplest, with a readable .excalidraw file you keep. draw.io tops alternative directories, and tldraw and AFFiNE come up often too. For more formal diagrams, our guide to switching from Lucidchart compares diagram tools.
Do I have to pay for Microsoft Whiteboard?
No. Whiteboard has no price of its own: it comes with eligible Microsoft 365 plans and turns on automatically, Teams included. That's why any paid alternative is competing against zero. If your use fits inside Teams on a work account, staying may be enough.
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