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Alfresco vs SharePoint comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 4, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Alfresco
Ranking in Enterprise Content Management
9th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
Document Management Software (3rd)
SharePoint
Ranking in Enterprise Content Management
1st
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
160
Ranking in other categories
Web Content Management (1st), Corporate Portals (Enterprise Information Portals) (1st), Enterprise Intranet (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Enterprise Content Management category, the mindshare of Alfresco is 7.6%, up from 7.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SharePoint is 16.4%, down from 20.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Enterprise Content Management
 

Q&A Highlights

AS
Apr 04, 2023
 

Featured Reviews

Karthi Keyan - PeerSpot reviewer
Streamlining document management with enhanced digitalization features needed
We used Alfresco as a document management system for automating and digitizing manual forms. Those were the main use cases The digitalization of workflow, forms, operations, and business processes has improved our organization. The most valuable features of Alfresco include its integration with…
Sanil Paul - PeerSpot reviewer
Streamlined collaboration through seamless integration and customization
I have been an administrator for SharePoint and have used it as an end-user for document storage. Predominantly, I've been involved in administration SharePoint helps a lot since we've moved from using it directly to using it as a backend for Teams, which makes collaboration easier. It supports…

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The most valuable features of Alfresco include its integration with the scanning solution, the ability to search, and the capability to store and index to capture metadata."
"The digitalization of workflow, forms, operations, and business processes is also significant."
"The most valuable feature is the flexibility of the searching elements of the metadata."
"Alfresco's technical support is very fast and professional."
"You can meet your users' expected features without having Alfresco's involvement."
"Alfresco allows broad searches with many index fields that you can search on, although the created fields and their values may not be intuitive."
"The product allows engineering teams and developers to introduce new things in a seamless and easy way."
"I like the ease of use, sections, and calendar."
"It has an easy to distribute administration capability, and can also scale to meet a large number of future needs."
"SharePoint has made things easier with the increased functionality for building the portals, microsites, and total integration with Microsoft categories."
"It is well supported by Microsoft."
"It has good integration with other MS products."
"What I like about SharePoint is that they keep up with a lot of updates, and they bring out new features. I also like that the system is integrated with the Microsoft 365 suite of apps."
"The stability of SharePoint is high."
"OneDrive and SharePoint provide a secure, fully auditable way of storing information."
"Document flows, storage, and numbering take off the actions for checking and assigning the numbering and running around with approvals and pre-approvals."
 

Cons

"I think the presentation layer could be improved - currently, it's too complex, and there are too many features cluttered all over the screen."
"Alfresco has a very steep learning curve, and unfortunately, during the learning process, it's very easy to make errors, which often are unforgiving."
"The configuration of Alfresco is a big challenge."
"If you don't have proper governance, things can go wrong. You have to make rules, such as one folder should not have more than 5,000 subfolders or children."
"The setup process for Alfresco was complex."
"Currently, documents in Alfresco are stored on a file server, which, while good for performance, is a security risk."
"Alfresco could improve workflow digitalization and enhance artificial intelligence capabilities."
"Metadata, auto class, disposition log, and legal hold."
"Annoyingly, many new Office 365 apps always end up being only US locale for the first year of their life. Microsoft needs to realise that most of their customers are not in the USA."
"It does not integrate despite being part of the Microsoft family."
"During uptime under our network, it is hard to find info when content is hefty."
"The product could be improved in a lot of way. It is so frustrating to get things to work as advertised."
"Document management and the ability to easily integrate single sign-on (SSO) are areas for improvement in SharePoint."
"You still need a bit of expertise to add branding."
"​Improve the user-friendliness."
"The technical support process should be more streamlined as it usually involves contacting vendors and arranging calls for resolution."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is cheaper compared to head-to-head competitors."
"The license for Alfresco is expensive - not the maximum, but close. There are also extra costs once you start building integrations, as implementation seems to be very costly."
"There are costs for any upgrade or additional functions."
"If you buy Alfresco through a partner, there is usually a OEM licensing option."
"The solution's pricing is relatively expensive because it's bundled with other products."
"The cost is expensive, but worthwhile."
"They are about an eight in comparison to other similar products."
"The pricing is competitive."
"The product is reasonably priced."
"Licensing can be by server or by seat."
"The data classification and search elements are cheap."
"The pricing works for us."
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Comparison Review

it_user8925 - PeerSpot reviewer
Aug 23, 2013
Jive vs Sharepoint vs Drupal Commons
At Mediacurrent we often get requests to compare Drupal to other platforms used for intranet sites and social business platforms (like https://dev.twitter.com/ for example). This is often referred to as “Social Business Software”, which has grown in popularity in recent years. I decided to do a…
 

Answers from the Community

AS
Apr 4, 2023
Apr 4, 2023
Alfresco scores are high on all features of an ECM solution and tools. Back office processing, rated as 3.36 good. Business Process Application 3.55 Good to excellent. Document Management 4.12 Excellent. Records Management 3.81 Good to Excellent. Team Productivity 3.66 Good. Compared with Sharepoint the ratings are as below. Back office Operations 3.29. Business Process Application 3...
2 out of 8 answers
Aug 4, 2014
Hi, Sorry but I am not familiar with Alfresco. We have experience with the followings: WebSphere CMS, Sharepoint and Drupal. Thank you, Jacob (Kobi) Welber CTO
it_user71736 - PeerSpot reviewer
Aug 4, 2014
www.springcm.com routinely solves this problem and there now is an "easy button" on ECM and we have lots of clients to prove it, plus it includes some pre-configured apps that are very quick to deploy and derive value from. ok, commercial over... two quick questions: 1- do you need to integrate with salesforce.com? 2- what is the primary challenge with sharepoint?
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
16%
Government
14%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Government
13%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Alfresco?
The pricing of Alfresco starts at $100,000, which can be expensive for small projects. There is often a transition from the community version to the licensed version, which incurs migration costs. ...
What needs improvement with Alfresco?
Currently, the challenge is the general availability to users. Initially, they had poor documentation, but over the years, their documentation has highly improved. Initially, we had challenges find...
What is your primary use case for Alfresco?
This is mainly for unstructured document management systems with workflow and data classification.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SharePoint?
As SharePoint is part of the Microsoft 365 suite, the pricing is acceptable.
What needs improvement with SharePoint?
The web parts in SharePoint could be more intuitive for end users. Many do not fully understand these features, and improving user awareness could foster better data relations. The learning curve o...
 

Also Known As

No data available
SharePoint 2007, SharePoint 2010
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Over 1,300 companies from 180 different countries. Including EuroStar, Saks Fifth Avenue, NASA Langley Research Center, and KLM.
Toyota, Aeroports de Paris, ASBBank Ltd., Barking, Havering and Redbridge University Hospitals, CambridgeshireConstabulary, D&M Group, NPL Construction Company, and The Regional Municipality of Niagara.
Find out what your peers are saying about Alfresco vs. SharePoint and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.
859,957 professionals have used our research since 2012.