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Alfresco vs DocStar ECM comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 4, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Alfresco
Ranking in Enterprise Content Management
4th
Ranking in Document Management Software
1st
Average Rating
7.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.1
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
DocStar ECM
Ranking in Enterprise Content Management
25th
Ranking in Document Management Software
11th
Average Rating
9.6
Number of Reviews
7
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of November 2026, in the Enterprise Content Management category, the mindshare of Alfresco is 5.7%, down from 8.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of DocStar ECM is 1.4%, up from 0.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Enterprise Content Management Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Alfresco5.7%
DocStar ECM1.4%
Other92.9%
Enterprise Content Management
 

Featured Reviews

Albano Garcia - PeerSpot reviewer
Director at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Centralized document management has boosted search efficiency and supports secure collaboration
The best features Alfresco offers in my experience include the intelligent search, because sometimes you need to find a document, and this solution provides a full-text search across different document types and formats, which is perhaps the most remarkable feature, along with version control. The solution tracks all the changes of the documents and prevents accidental overrides or other issues. The intelligent search has made my work easier because you can just put a word. Perhaps you are thinking of finding something related to a client or a specific MSA agreement, and with one or two words, the intelligent search proposes all the documents that include this word, facilitating finding the information very easily and very quickly. This is the most important feature for us.
it_user255402 - PeerSpot reviewer
President/Owner with 51-200 employees
It has the flexibility to span across multiple departments, improving, for example, accounts-payable automation and contract management.
Ease of use Flexibility to span across multiple departments A/P Automation H/R On boarding Client/Vendor File Management Contract Management Not designed well for high-volume batch capture Does not display the images during the scanning process, so QC is always a post process Over 13…

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Alfresco is the most widely used open source ECM in the world and it has characteristics that I really like such as a Java based platform, lots of integration points, many protocols for accessing it, advanced workflow support, scripting, easily customizable user interface, a concept of a group/team based working area called site."
"Alfresco's technical support is very fast and professional."
"Document repository."
"The features which are most valuable to us are rapid deployment, ease of installation, ease of use, and Linux platform support."
"Alfresco is a very good product that has very good inbuilt features, and at the same time, it is customizable and we can customize this product the way we want."
"We are happy with Alfresco, believing it to be a very good and competitive solution in price as a great content management solution."
"The product allows engineering teams and developers to introduce new things in a seamless and easy way."
"Alfresco positively impacted my organization by enabling the ability to store hundreds of thousands of documents, helping my team save time and reduce errors, enabling users to find exactly what documents they were looking for in a timely fashion, as well as to export to patients and healthcare members what they needed to do for Medicaid, Medicare, or any other secondary insurance, including the documents they needed to fill out as well as prescriptions."
"We have some very compelling case studies with a very positive ROI."
 

Cons

"If you don't have proper governance, things can go wrong. You have to make rules, such as one folder should not have more than 5,000 subfolders or children."
"I have not seen a return on investment, as at the time it was not saving them money at Evernorth and Cigna, which is why they moved out of it."
"I would like them to consider document capture functionality. Currently, for document capture functionality (ocr, read document metadata automatically, automatic document classification), Alfresco needs to be integrated with document capture such as: Kofax, Ephesoft, etc., while other Alfresco competitors already make document capture functionality as their default functionality."
"We did encounter some stability issues when there were many simultaneous requests on the server."
"Metadata, auto class, disposition log, and legal hold."
"Alfresco can be improved as the roadmap went a little stagnant for the past few years, so there had not been any new development, and coming out with a new roadmap with new features and executing and delivering on those new features would be an improvement."
"I think the presentation layer could be improved - currently, it's too complex, and there are too many features cluttered all over the screen."
"There is need to improve features such as the record management and case management in the product."
"Not designed well for high-volume batch capture Does not display the images during the scanning process, so QC is always a post process"
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"If you buy Alfresco through a partner, there is usually a OEM licensing option."
"It is cheaper compared to head-to-head competitors."
"The license for Alfresco is expensive - not the maximum, but close. There are also extra costs once you start building integrations, as implementation seems to be very costly."
"There are costs for any upgrade or additional functions."
Information not available
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Comms Service Provider
11%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
15%
Construction Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Comms Service Provider
9%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business19
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise13
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise3
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Alfresco?
Pricing, setup costs, and licensing are interesting aspects of Alfresco for our organization. We do not rely solely on licensing as it is based on a billing model rather than just licensing. Since ...
What needs improvement with Alfresco?
Alfresco could be improved in terms of maintenance and could have a simpler architecture regarding search functionality. If I change the metadata, I have to perform re-indexing of all the content f...
What is your primary use case for Alfresco?
My main use case for Alfresco is as a content management system at an enterprise level. A specific example of how I use Alfresco as an enterprise level content management system is for sharing docu...
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Also Known As

No data available
docSTAR eclipse
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Over 1,300 companies from 180 different countries. Including EuroStar, Saks Fifth Avenue, NASA Langley Research Center, and KLM.
Gillette Pepsi CompaniesUnited Way of KnoxvilleUniversity of MichiganMohawk PaperCleveland IndiansThe City of CamdenPenn Foster Career SchoolCapital Cardiology AssociatesCollier Restaurant Group
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft, IBM, Adobe and others in Enterprise Content Management. Updated: October 2026.
920,769 professionals have used our research since 2012.