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Search Build shortlist

Frontify, Acquia DAM, HyperCMS, Islandora

Side by side on what we have verified on each vendor’s own pages. Where a fact was not checked, the table says so rather than leaving a blank that reads as “no”.

What decides it · Runs on your own servers

If the files genuinely cannot leave your infrastructure, this is not a close race — the platforms marked No below should not be on the call at all.

Frontify

No

Acquia DAM

No

HyperCMS

Yes

Islandora

Yes

Everything else

Frontify
Acquia DAM
HyperCMS
Islandora
Verdict
A brand-management platform built around a single, always-current source of truth for guidelines, logos and templates, aimed at brand teams working with internal staff and external agencies.
A quote-only enterprise DAM (formerly Widen) built on configurable metadata and external sharing portals, for organisations already standardised on the Acquia stack.
An open-source DAM, CMS, and PIM platform combining asset, content, and product management for mid-to-large enterprises in banking, insurance, and retail.
An open-source, community-governed digital repository platform on Drupal, for libraries, archives, and museums to manage digital collections.
Price published
No
No
No
No
Billed on
Monthly active users
Organisation size, user count, storage volume and feature set
Cloud service: billed by storage capacity (GB) plus which optional modules you select; user accounts are unlimited/uncapped. No public price list — pricing is obtained via a configurator/calculator or by requesting a quote. On-premise/hosted deployments use Free, Standard, and Enterprise license editions (feature-gated), also quote-only. A non-commercial Free Edition exists with no disclosed price.
No published price on islandora.ca — the core software is free open source ("free to use and always will be"). Paid options are hosting/installation/migration/support/training contracts sold by independent third-party service providers listed on islandora.ca/service-providers (e.g. Born-Digital, discoverygarden); islandora.ca itself does not publish their rates or billing units.
Deployment
Cloud
Cloud
Cloud, On-premise
On-premise, Cloud
Free plan
No
No
No
No
Free trial
No
Yes
No
No
Transparency index
30%
20%
Not checked
Not checked
Most common complaint
The MAU model favours occasional users, but there is no figure to verify that with
Cost depends on four variables at once, none of them priced publicly
Not checked
Not checked

“Not checked” means exactly that: we have not verified it, not that the platform lacks it. Every other value was read off the vendor’s own pages on the date shown on each platform page.

What to ask on the demo

One question per platform, drawn from what actually goes wrong with it — not a generic checklist. Vendors run the demo; this hands the agenda back to you.

Frontify The MAU model favours occasional users, but there is no figure to verify that with — ask them to answer this in writing before the trial.
Acquia DAM Cost depends on four variables at once, none of them priced publicly — ask them to answer this in writing before the trial.

No email required — the page prints as it stands.