Verdict
An enterprise brand-asset DAM built for controlled distribution to many consumers of assets, that needs a permanently staffed administrator and slows down on large files.
A self-hosted, permission-based photo/video catalog with album hierarchies, tagging and a large plugin ecosystem, for archives and small orgs willing to maintain their own server as the library grows.
An enterprise DAM module within Adobe Experience Manager, for large organizations managing thousands to millions of brand assets across marketing channels.
An open-source PHP/Symfony platform unifying PIM, DAM, CMS and MDM on one codebase, for teams with in-house developers or an integrator partner rather than a marketing team wanting to self-serve.
Price published
No
Yes
No
Yes
Billed on
Modular packages, quoted per customer
Flat price per account by storage; users are unlimited
No public price list; sales quote required for both packages (Prime and Ultimate). Adobe's own on-premise product description sheet lists separate license metrics per component — AEM Assets itself is licensed 'Per Instance', 'Users' are licensed 'Per User', Brand Portal is licensed 'Per Brand Portal User', and Dynamic Media/Personalized Media are licensed by 'Page Views per month' — so billing is multi-metric and only available via custom quote, not a single flat per-user or per-GB rate.
Annual licence per edition, not per user
Deployment
Cloud
On-premise, Cloud
Cloud, On-premise
On-premise, Cloud
Free plan
No
Yes
No
Yes
Free trial
No
Yes
No
No
Transparency index
0%
100%
Not checked
100%
Most common complaint
No figure anywhere on the pricing page, so the order of magnitude is unknowable before a call
A ten per cent price rise is announced for 1 September 2026
Not checked
It is a broader platform than a DAM — some capability has to be built rather than switched on