Monday License Optimization: How to Stop Paying for What You Don't Use

Introduction

Across growing organizations, Monday.com quickly becomes an essential part of everyday operations, powering project tracking, automation, and collaboration. Yet beneath that efficiency lies a quiet cost spiral. IT admins and SaaS managers frequently find that license counts keep increasing, even when user activity doesn't. Teams change, projects close, and contractors leave, but licenses often remain assigned, silently draining budgets.

Unlike typical per-seat SaaS models, Monday.com's license cost scales with workspace complexity, including the number of paid users, automation limits, and app integrations. The lack of unified visibility across departments often results in underused or misallocated licenses. A marketing team may have 20 users, but only 12 log in monthly; operations might overprovision Pro licenses when most tasks could run on Standard plans. This operational blind spot means many enterprises pay 10–35% more than they should for the same capabilities.

License optimization ensures that every user, automation, and integration aligns with business value. For IT and finance leaders, this isn't just cost-cutting, it's governance. Effective optimization prevents waste, improves utilization, and strengthens accountability across departments.

CloudNuro helps organizations uncover exactly where license waste hides in Monday.com and other SaaS platforms. Recognized twice in Gartner's SaaS Management Platforms Magic Quadrant and named a Leader in the Info Tech SoftwareReviews Data Quadrant, CloudNuro provides the analytics and automation needed to optimize Monday licenses, reclaim unused accounts, and forecast renewals with confidence.

Book your 15-minute SaaS Optimization Assessment →

Step-by-Step Best Practices for Optimizing Monday Licenses

Step 1: Conduct a Full License Inventory and Usage Audit

Start with visibility. The first step in optimization is understanding how many licenses are purchased versus how many are actively used. Monday.com provides an Admin > Users dashboard that lists user status (active, invited, pending, or deactivated) and last login date.

Step, by, step process:

1. Navigate to Admin → Users and export your complete user list.
2. Track fields such as "Last Login," "Plan Type," and "Role."
3. Use analytics tools or a SaaS management platform like CloudNuro to visualize dormant users and inactive boards.
4. Flag any users who have been inactive for 30 or 60 days.
5. Identify "Invited" accounts that never accepted invitations; these consume licenses until they are removed.

Example:
An IT admin for a media firm found that out of 1,800 total licenses, only 1,520 users logged in within the last 90 days. That's nearly 280 underused or inactive accounts, totaling $8,400/month in avoidable costs.

Tool Tip: Monday's export reports only show user activity. CloudNuro integrates these data points with HR and SSO systems to automatically flag users who left the company or changed roles.

Step 2: Reallocate Licenses Across Departments Based on Real Usage

Not all teams need full access. Marketing or design departments often require automation, heavy Pro licenses, while HR or finance may only need view or comment access.

Step, by, step process:

1. Collect department-level activity reports (boards accessed, automations used).
2. Categorize users into three tiers:
   1. Power Users: Frequent automation usage, admin rights.
   2. Standard Users: Daily activity without advanced automation.
   3. Occasional Users: Viewers, approvers, or occasional collaborators.
3. Reassign Standard or Pro licenses only to Power Users.
4. Convert occasional users into free viewers when possible.

Example:
A retail organization identified 320 "Viewer" profiles using only dashboards and comments. By downgrading them from Standard to Viewer roles, they saved $42,000 annually.

Tool Tip: Monday's Permission Management Panel helps visualize active usage per department. Combine it with CloudNuro's cross-department mapping for granular chargeback visibility.

Step 3: Analyze Automation and Integration Consumption

Monday's automation recipes (e.g., "When task status changes → notify team") are charged by monthly action limits. Overprovisioning or overlapping recipes can rapidly exhaust quotas, leading to unnecessary plan upgrades.

Step, by, step process:

1. Go to Admin → Usage → Automations and Integrations.
2. Identify the top 10 boards with the most actions.
3. Merge redundant automations (e.g., multiple notifications for the same trigger).
4. Deactivate automations tied to archived or inactive boards.
5. Reassess whether Pro or Enterprise tiers are justified by real usage.

Example:
An engineering team discovered they used only 40% of their automation quota. Downgrading from Enterprise to Pro saved $6,600/month with zero workflow impact.

Step 4: Implement Departmental Chargeback Reporting

A chargeback in Monday.com means assigning license costs to departments based on their usage. While Monday lacks native chargeback features, platforms like CloudNuro automate this by mapping user activity and license ownership to departments or cost centers.

Benefits of chargeback:

• Encourages accountability across teams.
• Reduces license hoarding.
• Enables precise budgeting for renewals.

Step, by, step process:

1. Assign each license to a department or project code.
2. Generate monthly usage reports (via CloudNuro).
3. Allocate costs proportionally (e.g., $12 per active seat/month).
4. Share reports with department heads to promote ownership.

Example:
A global consulting firm using Monday adopted chargeback and cut waste by 27% within one quarter by having departments self-regulate unused seats.

Step 5: Automate User Lifecycle Management

Manual provisioning and deprovisioning are error-prone. Connect Monday.com to your Identity Provider (IdP) (e.g., Okta, Azure AD, Google Workspace) for automated lifecycle governance.

Step, by, step process:

1. Enable SCIM provisioning in Monday's Admin settings.
2. Configure automatic deactivation for offboarded employees.
3. Create approval workflows for new user requests.
4. Periodically sync HR data with SaaS provisioning tools.

Example:
A logistics company using Azure AD auto-deprovisioning reclaimed over 80 unused licenses within a month, worth $9,600 annually, without manual intervention.

Step 6: Schedule Quarterly License Reviews and Renewal Forecasting

Optimization is not one-time. Quarterly reviews ensure sustainability and prepare you for renewal negotiations.

Step, by, step process:

1. Review "Seats Used vs. Purchased."
2. Check license utilization trends over the last quarter.
3. Use CloudNuro dashboards to simulate upcoming renewal costs based on usage patterns.
4. Negotiate renewals using real data rather than vendor estimates.

Example:
A professional services firm projected that its license usage would drop by 15% after the project closed. By adjusting renewal counts before invoicing, they saved $22,000 instantly.

CloudNuro makes Monday license optimization continuous, not reactive. By combining usage analytics, chargeback automation, and renewal forecasting, CloudNuro gives IT admins and SaaS managers a single view to optimize Monday licenses in real time.

Request your 15-minute SaaS Optimization Demo →

Case Study: Hidden License Waste in a U.S. Design Firm

Scenario:
A design and media agency with 1,500 Monday users across marketing, design, and operations teams.

Findings:

• 155 total inactive or orphaned licenses = $2,325/month waste.
• 60 Viewer roles were wrongly billed as Standard.
• Automations consumed only 50% of the quota.

Solution:

• Reassigned inactive seats using CloudNuro's license insights.
• Downgraded 60 Viewer roles.
• Consolidated redundant automations.

Outcome:
Annual savings: $31,500 with improved governance transparency.

Line Graph Narrative (visual description):
The line graph showed total licenses (1,500) vs. active usage (1,330) over six months. After implementing governance, the active usage line rose to 1,460 while total licenses dropped to 1,420, visually demonstrating better efficiency and alignment.

Common License Management Mistakes

1. Overassigning Full Licenses to Occasional Users
   Assigning Pro or Standard licenses to dashboard viewers or clients inflates costs. Instead, use Viewer roles or shared boards.
2. Neglecting Role Changes or Employee Offboarding
   Employees move roles frequently. Without automated provisioning, inactive users remain licensed indefinitely.
3. Ignoring Automation Quotas and Integrations
   Overlooking unused automations can keep your plan at a higher tier than required.
4. Failing to Track Guest Access
   Guest users may be converted to billable users depending on permissions. Regular audits prevent unwanted charges.
5. No Departmental Ownership of Licenses
   Without cost accountability, teams over-request licenses. Chargeback reporting prevents hoarding and promotes transparency.

CloudNuro prevents all five of these pitfalls by combining user lifecycle automation, license visibility, and department-level accountability. It ensures that every Monday seat is justified, used, and billed fairly.

Start your no-cost SaaS Optimization Review →

Quick, Reference Checklist

FAQs

1. How can I quickly identify unused Monday.com licenses?
Use Monday's Admin reports for last login and role type. For enterprise-level oversight, CloudNuro provides automated inactivity detection integrated with HR and SSO data.

2. Can I downgrade a license tier mid-term?
Yes, Monday supports downgrades at renewal or mid-term via admin request. CloudNuro models the financial impact of tier changes before execution.

3. What's the easiest way to optimize Monday licenses across multiple workspaces?
Consolidate under one enterprise plan and use CloudNuro for centralized license visibility and department-based reporting.

4. Does Monday offer native chargeback functionality?
Not natively. However, CloudNuro automates Monday chargeback using usage data, mapping license cost to each department or project.

5. How does CloudNuro help optimize Monday licenses?
CloudNuro provides continuous monitoring, automatic deprovisioning, and usage-based recommendations, helping IT teams ensure they only pay for what's actively used.

Conclusion: Turning License Optimization into Continuous Value

Optimizing Monday licenses is less about cutting costs and more about building visibility, fairness, and accountability. The best IT admins know that license waste compounds silently, and eliminating it strengthens governance, reduces renewals, and aligns IT spending with real business needs.

With real-time data, automation, and chargeback, CloudNuro transforms Monday license management into a measurable, ongoing discipline. Enterprises gain 360° visibility into usage, ensuring every seat is justified and every dollar accounted for.

CloudNuro

CloudNuro is trusted by enterprises such as Konica Minolta and Federal Signal to deliver measurable SaaS savings and governance.

Recognized twice by Gartner and named a Leader in Info Tech's SoftwareReviews, CloudNuro brings AI-powered optimization, renewal forecasting, and proper Monday license governance to IT and SaaS leaders.

See how CloudNuro helps you stop paying for what you don't use →