PicaJet
Search Build shortlist

Piwigo, Brandworkz, NetX, HyperCMS

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.

Piwigo

Yes

Brandworkz

No

NetX

Yes

HyperCMS

Yes

Everything else

Piwigo
Brandworkz
NetX
HyperCMS
Verdict
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.
A brand-guidelines and asset portal for mid-market marketing teams, with a genuine free tier that covers a branded guidelines page but not the full asset library or workflow tools.
A digital asset management platform for enterprises, agencies, museums, and nonprofits, paired with in-house consulting and data-migration services.
An open-source DAM, CMS, and PIM platform combining asset, content, and product management for mid-to-large enterprises in banking, insurance, and retail.
Price published
Yes
No
No
No
Billed on
Flat price per account by storage; users are unlimited
Number of users and the tier selected
Not disclosed publicly. Plans are differentiated by number of admin users, storage (TB), and number of portals (e.g. Essential: 5 admin users/1TB; Signature: 20 admin users/2TB/3 portals; Premium: 50 admin users/5TB/5 portals); exact per-unit or per-tier prices are not published, visitors must request a consult.
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.
Deployment
On-premise, Cloud
Cloud
Cloud, On-premise, Hybrid
Cloud, On-premise
Free plan
Yes
Yes
No
No
Free trial
Yes
No
No
No
Transparency index
100%
40%
Not checked
Not checked
Most common complaint
A ten per cent price rise is announced for 1 September 2026
The free tier is named while the cost of the next step is not
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.

Piwigo A ten per cent price rise is announced for 1 September 2026 — ask them to answer this in writing before the trial.
Brandworkz The free tier is named while the cost of the next step is not — ask them to answer this in writing before the trial.

No email required — the page prints as it stands.