Verdict
A self-hosted, single-container photo indexer under AGPL/commercial licensing, for people who want a private on-hardware archive without Google-Photos-level AI tagging or mobile app polish.
An image and video CDN with an API-first asset library, built for fast developer integration, billed on flat monthly tiers with per-GB overage once bandwidth or storage limits are exceeded.
An enterprise DAM module within Adobe Experience Manager, for large organizations managing thousands to millions of brand assets across marketing channels.
An open-licence, self-hosted DAM for teams with in-house server admin capability, trading a free licence for the time to run upgrades, tune dependencies and troubleshoot it themselves.
Price published
Yes
Yes
No
No
Billed on
Subscription per edition, billed annually
Bandwidth, storage and user seats, with published per-unit rates above the limits
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.
Self-hosted: no licence fee. Hosted: a user ceiling per tier
Deployment
On-premise, Cloud
Cloud
Cloud, On-premise
Cloud, On-premise
Free plan
Yes
Yes
No
Yes
Free trial
No
Yes
No
No
Transparency index
100%
70%
Not checked
60%
Most common complaint
The gap between the free edition and the first paid one is wide: €200 a month
Several units are metered at once: bandwidth, storage, video units and seats
Not checked
The free route is genuinely free of licence fees but moves hosting, upgrades and support onto you