PicaJet
Search Build shortlist

PhotoShelter Brands, Portfolio, Canto, Air

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 Brands

No

Portfolio

Yes

Canto

No

Air

No

Everything else

PhotoShelter Brands
Portfolio
Canto
Air
Verdict
A DAM platform for brand and marketing teams, built for real-time camera-to-cloud photo and video distribution during live events.
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.
A DAM built around search and tagging for mid-market teams, with unlimited free view-only accounts but per-seat pricing for editors that only appears after a sales quote.
A visually organized, board-based DAM for photo/image-heavy creative and marketing teams, with a genuinely usable free tier and a history of shifting, steep paid-tier pricing.
Price published
No
No
No
No
Billed on
Plan tiers differ by number of Library (admin) seats and storage (TB); unlimited invited/contributor users on every tier. No dollar figures published — all tiers show a "Get Pricing" CTA leading to a sales/demo form.
Quoted per customer; the licensing model was preserved through the change of owner
Team size and storage volume
Credits; users are not billed
Deployment
Cloud
On-premise
Cloud
Cloud
Free plan
No
No
No
Yes
Free trial
No
No
Yes
Yes
Transparency index
Not checked
25%
20%
60%
Most common complaint
Not checked
It changed hands in March 2026, so anything written before that date describes it as an Extensis product
The tiers are named and described but cannot be compared on cost
The free tier is described in detail while the paid tiers are named only

“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.

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.
Canto The tiers are named and described but cannot be compared on cost — ask them to answer this in writing before the trial.
Air The free tier is described in detail while the paid tiers are named only — ask them to answer this in writing before the trial.

No email required — the page prints as it stands.