*The term "total cost of ownership" usually applies to traditional on-premise software and includes not only the cost of purchase but all aspects in the further use and maintenance of the equipment, device, or system considered. Total cost of ownership includes the costs of training support personnel and the users of the system, costs associated with failure or outage (planned and unplanned), diminished performance incidents (i.e. if users are kept waiting), costs of security breaches (in loss of reputation and recovery costs), development expenses, testing infrastructure and expenses, quality assurance, boot image control, decommissioning, e-waste handling, and more. That is why it could be hard to estimate your total expenses, when you purchase a software product.

In case you purchase a subscription to a web-based project management solution you pay only the price that is given to you at the beginning. Usually web-based software vendors include all the support and software updates costs into this price. You don’t have to spend money on training, installation and maintenance.