Brainstorming software that takes a company from ideas to decisions

An admin opens a challenge with the question, a description and a deadline. Before anyone writes, AI can suggest starter ideas so the team is not facing an empty page. For bigger strategic questions, the AI workshop looks at the problem from six perspectives, Optimist, Skeptic, Customer, Engineer, Marketer and Visionary, and the results can be sent into the challenge as ideas.

Members then add their own ideas, including people who could not attend a live meeting. A two sentence idea is enough, because AI expands it into a problem, a solution, a first step and a success measure. Members vote on the ideas they support.

As the list grows, AI detects similar ideas and merges them while keeping every author and vote, and groups the rest into themes. If you use structured methods in your sessions, see how the six thinking hats tool and idea clustering fit in.

Each idea gets scores for impact, cost, risk and strategic fit from 1 to 10, with a written rationale. On Business and Enterprise, the total is weighted by the strategic goals your company set, so the ranking reflects your priorities rather than a generic formula.

The ideas then move through a pipeline: submitted, in review, shortlisted, approved, in progress, implemented or rejected. Every move is recorded with who, when and a note. When the challenge closes, the board report summarizes the ranking, themes, stage counts and a recommendation, ready to print to PDF, download as Markdown or export as CSV.

This is the step that turns brainstorming into results. Facilitators who run regular sessions may also like our innovation workshop tool page.

Whiteboard tools are excellent for live, visual work: sketching a customer journey, mapping a process, arranging notes during a workshop. If your team only needs a canvas for a meeting and the outcome is decided in the room, a whiteboard tool may be all you need.

Brainstormer is the better fit when ideas must be compared, when people across teams or locations contribute over days rather than one hour, and when someone has to explain the decision to leadership later. Many teams use both: a canvas for the live meeting and Brainstormer for the challenge, the scoring and the record.

See the facilitation tools page for session formats, then compare the plans on the pricing page.

Once a company needs more than a canvas, the shortlist turns into idea management vendors. They differ less in features than in how you buy them. Some publish plans you can pay for by card this week, others quote an annual contract after demos and a procurement review. The table shows how each vendor prices and links to our side by side page for it, which also says when the other vendor is the better pick.

Prices come from each vendor's own pricing page or, where nothing is published, from what the vendor says about quoting. They change, so confirm the current figures before you sign. If two enterprise suites are already on your list, start with IdeaScale vs Brightidea. If you want the program running before the next planning cycle, run the demo challenge on the homepage and compare the three plans on the idea management software pricing page.