The story behind Obeya
A project management platform rooted in a decades-old Japanese philosophy — built for how modern teams actually work.
The Obeya Philosophy
“Obeya” (大部屋) is a Japanese word meaning “big room”. In lean manufacturing — pioneered by Toyota in the 1990s — the obeya is a dedicated physical space where cross-functional teams come together to visualize work, make decisions, and solve problems collaboratively.
The walls of a traditional obeya are covered with charts, timelines, status boards, and key metrics — creating a shared visual language that everyone in the room can understand at a glance. No status meetings needed. No “let me check the spreadsheet.” The information is always there, always visible, always current.
Obeya Cloud brings this philosophy into the digital age. We believe the best project management tools should feel like walking into a well-organized big room — where everything is visible, nothing is hidden, and your team can focus on the work that matters.
Our Mission
To build the most flexible, fast, and beautiful project management platform — and make it accessible to every team, everywhere.
We believe project management tools should adapt to your team — not the other way around. Too many tools force rigid workflows, lock features behind expensive tiers, or require weeks of training before anyone can be productive.
Obeya Cloud is different. With 25+ custom field types, five interchangeable views, built-in automations, and an API-first architecture, it shapes itself to match exactly how your team works. And because it's open source, you're never locked in.
Beautiful by default
We obsess over design details so your team gets a tool that's genuinely enjoyable to use every day.
Accessible everywhere
Cloud-hosted or self-hosted. Desktop or mobile. Obeya works wherever your team works.
Built for teams
Real-time collaboration, role-based access, and shared visual boards — because great work is never solo.
Open Source Commitment
Obeya Cloud is open source from day one. We believe the tools teams depend on every day should be transparent, auditable, and community-driven.
Our open source commitment means:
- Full transparency — Every line of code is public. You can inspect, audit, and verify exactly what the software does with your data.
- No vendor lock-in — Self-host on your own infrastructure whenever you want. Your data is always yours.
- Community-driven — Feature requests, bug reports, and pull requests from the community shape the product roadmap alongside our team.
- Extensible by design — API-first architecture, webhooks, and a plugin system make it easy to build custom integrations.
We sustain development through our cloud-hosted plans (Free, Starter, Pro, Enterprise), which include managed hosting, priority support, and advanced features. The core product will always remain open source and free to self-host.