PicaJet
Search Build shortlist

PhotoShelter, CELUM, Frontify, Portfolio

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.

PhotoShelter

No

CELUM

No

Frontify

No

Portfolio

Yes

Everything else

PhotoShelter
CELUM
Frontify
Portfolio
Verdict
A cloud portfolio and image-storage platform for individual photographers, with client galleries and built-in print/licensing sales.
An enterprise DAM bundled with workflow and creative-review tools, aimed at mid-to-large manufacturing and consumer brands needing deep Adobe/PIM/CMS/e-shop integration and partner-led setup.
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.
An on-premise DAM known for deep metadata and search, for existing Portfolio users who size and maintain their own server, now under Axle AI ownership after a March 2026 acquisition.
Price published
No
No
No
No
Billed on
Quote-only. Priced per named "Library Seat" (2-5 seats depending on tier, custom for Enterprise) plus a storage allotment per tier (1TB-5TB, custom for Enterprise) and a cap on "Advanced Integrations" (0 to unlimited). Unlimited invited/contributor users and unlimited Social Content Publisher seats included on all/most tiers. Annual or monthly billing toggle shown on the pricing page, but no dollar amounts are published — all tiers show a "Get Pricing" CTA to a demo/sales call.
Quoted per customer
Monthly active users
Quoted per customer; the licensing model was preserved through the change of owner
Deployment
Cloud
Cloud
Cloud
On-premise
Free plan
No
No
No
No
Free trial
No
No
No
No
Transparency index
Not checked
0%
30%
25%
Most common complaint
Not checked
The pricing page contains neither tiers nor figures
The MAU model favours occasional users, but there is no figure to verify that with
It changed hands in March 2026, so anything written before that date describes it as an Extensis product

“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.

CELUM The pricing page contains neither tiers nor figures — ask them to answer this in writing before the trial.
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.
Portfolio It changed hands in March 2026, so anything written before that date describes it as an Extensis product — ask them to answer this in writing before the trial.

No email required — the page prints as it stands.