---
name: Kanban board
slug: kanban-board
category: layout
status: published
created: 2026-08-21T00:00:00.000Z
modified: 2026-08-21T00:00:00.000Z
definition: A row of vertical columns, each one a stage, holding cards that move
  sideways as work progresses.
aliases:
  - name: board layout
    source: community
  - name: column board
    source: community
  - name: swimlane board
    source: community
  - name: trello layout
    source: community
tags:
  - dragging
relations:
  contrastWith:
    - card-grid
    - content-shelf
  variantOf: []
  partOf: []
  seeAlso:
    - drag-to-reorder
implementations: []
sources: []
demo: inline
exhibit: false
useWhen: items that belong to exactly one stage at a time
---

Kanban is Japanese for signboard, and the original was literally that: a card on a
physical board in a Toyota plant, moved from one column to the next as a part was
worked on, so anyone walking past could see how much was in progress without
asking. The software version keeps the shape and most of the point. Columns are
stages, a card sits in exactly one of them, and the card's position is its status
rather than a field inside it.

That exclusivity is what separates the board from a table grouped by a column,
which is the thing it most resembles. In a grouped table an item can be regrouped
by any dimension and the grouping is a view. On a board the one dimension is
baked into the layout, which is a real cost: a board cannot show you status and
owner at the same time, and every team that has tried to solve that by adding a
second row of columns has discovered why swimlanes are usually a mistake.

The column header count is not decoration. Making queue length visible is the
original purpose of the board, and a work in progress limit (a column that says
three and turns amber at four) is the mechanism the method actually cares about.
A board with unlabelled columns and no counts is the aesthetic of kanban without
the part that changed anything.

Two practical constraints follow from the shape. It needs horizontal room, so on a
phone the columns become a swipeable set or a single stage at a time behind a
picker, and stacking them defeats the comparison the layout exists for. And
dragging cannot be the only way to move a card: a board where status changes
require a sustained pointer gesture is unusable by keyboard, so the card needs a
menu that names the destination columns as well.