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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
7th
Average Rating
7.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
14
Ranking in other categories
Document Management Software (1st)
SharePoint
Ranking in Enterprise Content Management
1st
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
162
Ranking in other categories
Web Content Management (1st), Corporate Portals (Enterprise Information Portals) (1st), Enterprise Intranet (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the Enterprise Content Management category, the mindshare of Alfresco is 8.6%, up from 7.3% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of SharePoint is 15.1%, down from 19.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Enterprise Content Management Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
SharePoint15.1%
Alfresco8.6%
Other76.3%
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…
Madhur D'silva - PeerSpot reviewer
Collaborative work benefits while user-friendliness challenges persist
The most valuable feature of SharePoint is its user interface, which is very easy to use. I do not have to be very technical to use it. Its rights management capabilities and ability to restrict access to certain people are also very useful. Furthermore, I can access SharePoint from any device, whether it is a phone or laptop, which is very convenient.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I like the ease of use, sections, and calendar."
"The most valuable feature is the flexibility of the searching elements of the metadata."
"Alfresco's technical support is very fast and professional."
"Document repository."
"You can meet your users' expected features without having Alfresco's involvement."
"The digitalization of workflow, forms, operations, and business processes is also significant."
"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 do like the collaboration around documents. The versioning history has proven useful in some instances as well."
"It has good integration with other MS products."
"​Combined reports and data with timeline tracking."
"Ability to store files of any type."
"The search feature is valuable."
"Its most valuable feature is the document library."
"SharePoint is smooth and easy to use for editing, updating, and uploading files."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is file sharing or information sharing."
 

Cons

"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."
"Currently, documents in Alfresco are stored on a file server, which, while good for performance, is a security risk."
"Metadata, auto class, disposition log, and legal hold."
"I would like them to consider document capture functionality."
"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."
"Alfresco could improve workflow digitalization and enhance artificial intelligence capabilities."
"The product must provide more automation."
"It would be nice if the editing and setting up of SharePoint were more user-friendly, so I do not have to have an expert to deal with it."
"Microsoft support could be better, especially for enterprise troubleshooting. They require a lot of logs and often rely on online support, which does not meet customer expectations."
"When you are trying to migrate from a different platform to SharePoint for file storage, the upload utility should be more flexible, taking more files and then updating you on the upload status of the files you are trying to transfer into SharePoint."
"Search can be improved a lot because we are always trying to compare it with Google Search. Beyond that, it would be helpful to tag the documents."
"Emails stored now do not display metadata in native format."
"During uptime under our network, it is hard to find info when content is hefty."
"Needs improvement on the user interface."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It is cheaper compared to head-to-head competitors."
"If you buy Alfresco through a partner, there is usually a OEM licensing option."
"There are costs for any upgrade or additional functions."
"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."
"The pricing is competitive."
"It is very expensive.​"
"It is pretty reasonable. It is $5 per month per user. We have 12 users now, so it is about $60 per month."
"The cost is expensive, but worthwhile."
"The replacement costs for it are cheaper if you use only SharePoint."
"We have purchased add-ons to handle multiple site collections, form creation, and design."
"The solution's pricing is relatively expensive because it's bundled with other products."
"The pricing works for us."
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Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Enterprise Content Management solutions are best for your needs.
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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
12%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
5%
Government
13%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business15
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise3
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business79
Midsize Enterprise37
Large Enterprise80
 

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?
Not with SharePoint specifically, but overall with the software or tools from Microsoft, I think there are areas that need improvement. It's very difficult to understand the objective. There are so...
 

Comparisons

 

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: September 2025.
867,445 professionals have used our research since 2012.