Sprout Social has been around for a while now and, as a result, has become one of the go-to software options for anyone needing the best social media management or SEO tools. 

The package, spread across several paid tiers, comprises a heady blend of social tools and marries those to a potent analytics edge, which produces a great all-round package for small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs).

Anyone looking to take on social media channels for the first time, or to beef up their levels of participation, will find Sprout Social offers plenty. There’s a neat dashboard-style management setup, allowing for easy co-ordination, while the ability to lets multiple users access it means there’s appeal for larger organisations too.

• Sign up for a Sprout Social plan

While Sprout Social comes with a potent yet user-friendly array of social media management tools, the company has worked to still offer an affordable and good value option. Perhaps unsurprisingly then, Sprout therefore continues to be a hit with many business owners, who might not necessarily warm to a competitor like Hootsuite or Buffer. 

Let's dive into our Sprout Social social media management review. 

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Sprout Social: Plans and Pricing

You can try Sprout Social for free using a 30-day trial, without the need for any credit card details, which is a great way to get to know the software. 

Following on from that, Sprout Social comes in three different packages, starting with the Standard edition, which currently costs $249 per user/per month, and is billed annually. Alternatively, you can choose to pay for the Standard package on a $199 month-to-month basis.

Stepping up to the next package, the Professional edition is Sprout Social's most popular plan, currently available for $399 per user/per month and, again, billed annually. There is also the option to pay $299 month-to-month with this one, too.

Meanwhile, an Advanced edition costs $499 per user/per month, again, billed annually. This has the option to pay $399 on a month-to-month basis if preferred. If you’re concerned about whether or not there will be enough benefits from the higher-end packages, requesting a demo is also possible, where a member of the Sprout Social team can talk you through the various features and functions.

Finally, there's an Enterprise tier, which is available for large organisations upon request. Sprout Social will tailor the app to your needs, and there is 24/5 support, plus a range of other features we'll get into below. 

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Sprout Social: Basic features

As you’d expect from a Standard package, the entry-level edition is more of a slimline edition of the software. Nevertheless, it does come with a decent array of tools aimed at users with lesser social media management needs than bigger businesses. 

Starting off, the Standard edition bundles in five social profiles, an all-in-one social inbox, the ability to publish, schedule, draft, and queue posts, and a social content calendar, to keep everyone on the same page. 

Users can also carry out review management, monitor profiles, keywords, and locations, as well as deploying social CRM tools. Reporting offers up group, profile, and post-level options, plus there’s the ability to deliver paid promotion tools to boost Facebook posts. 

Sprout also offers handy iOS and Android apps for working on the go. 

Sprout Social: Professional features

You’ll really want to invest in Sprout Social's popular Professional edition to benefit from more power tools. While this does involve additional costs, the set of features covers an awful lot of bases. Look out for unlimited social profiles, plus everything that comes packed into Standard. 

On top of that there is competitive reporting for Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, incoming and outgoing message content tagging, as well as custom workflows for multiple approvers. More advantageously, there’s scheduling for optimal send times and the benefit of response rate and time analysis reports. 

Crucially, Pro users get trend analysis for Twitter keywords and hashtags, and the benefit of paid social reporting for Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Also useful for larger concerns is the helpdesk, CRM, and Social Commerce integration capabilities.

For most companies, Professional offers the perfect blend of features and price, and compares favourably to its rivals across the market. 

Sprout Social: Advanced features

Finally, larger business frequently have the need for even more power tools, which can often be a needless requirement for smaller companies. 

Social Sprout’s Advanced package features add a lot more muscle to the software, especially for companies with a major push going on with their social media management needs. The Advanced package comes with everything in the Professional edition, and then adds on the likes of Message Spike Alerts for increased message activity email and push notification alerts when traffic is high.

There’s a digital asset and content library, and chatbots with automation tools. Advanced users can also work with saved and suggested replies, make use of an inbox rule builder for automated actions, and enjoy automated link tracking. Twitter surveys to define CSAT or NPS come bundled good measure.

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Sprout Social: Analytics and reporting

By the same token, the reporting aspect of Sprout Social is as impressive as ever. 

Users can create detailed insights into social media campaigns, get a handle on what works and what doesn’t, as well as producing shareable information that should work a treat in the board room. Naturally, it’s easy to export reports in popular file formats, including CSV and PDF.

Sprout Social has always been handy with its chunky analytics tools and this is an aspect that has become stronger in recent years. The higher-end bundles pack in lots of advanced features for helping combine analytics with lead generation and suchlike, adding value. 

In fact, sales and marketing teams should find it invaluable, while a feature like the Chatbot tool should help improve efficiency too by allowing administrators to build an assistant to help customer needs.

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Sprout Social: User Interface

Sprout Social has been in existence for quite a while now and has therefore evolved into a great on-the-go tool for anyone needing to manage their social media out in the field. 

Sprout Social offers iOS and Android mobile apps, both of which have been nicely produced and include more than enough functionality for most needs, even on the Basic edition. Considering its impressive feature set, Sprout Social is still fairly straightforward to setup and configure.

Even in its desktop incarnation, you’ll find Sport Social to be fairly logical with its layout, especially considering all of the tools that come contained within. There are quick access menu options to commonly used tools like Messages, Tasks, Feeds, and Publishing, helping to improve the overall workflow. 

Similarly, you can get to those vital reporting tools with relative ease too. There are practical considerations too, with a settings area that lets you configure language settings and suchlike for users in other geographical territories.

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Sprout Social: Support

Anyone getting to grips with Sprout Social for the first time will find a whole host of great content at the online help center, including tips, tricks, and tutorials covering every aspect of the software, along with more advanced tools for helping to get the best from Sprout Social. 

If you need to get in touch there is a phone support number, the option to submit a request online or you can simply reach out via social media. The enterprise tier also includes 24/5 dedicated support, for any enquiries or help. 

While some rivals do go a little further when it comes to support, Sprout Social offers most of the things needed to make sense of the software and get the most out of your online social media presence. 

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Sprout Social: The competition

Social media management tools are reasonably plentiful and, if you’re working to a tight or non-existent budget, some of them can be had for free. 

Small business owners might struggle to justify the cost implications of the beefier editions of Sprout Social. With that in mind, heading for something like the basic edition of Hootsuite might make more sense, but there’s also the likes of Buffer, HubSpot, Zoho Social, and Circleboom to ponder over too.

All of the different services have their own pros and cons – especially depending on your specific social media needs – and checking out a variety of cheaper (or free) tiers, plus free trials, is likely the best way to definitively find the best. 

• Read more on how we test, rate, and review products on TechRadar.

Sprout Social: Final verdict

If your organisation has advanced social media management needs then Sprout Social offers plenty of appeal, including the ability to ramp up your efforts even more than that with the additional premium solutions. However, all of those extra features and functions add to the price tag, which for smaller businesses can soon make a Professional package seem like a sizeable investment.

Nevertheless, if you’ve got any kind of serious inclination to boost your standing in social media circles, and enjoy the data produced by Sprout Social, you’ll find this is a package that rarely disappoints. Even the Standard edition offers up a surprisingly potent dashboard of delights, via an interface that’s a joy to use, especially if you’re making full use of the iOS and Android apps. 

As we've said throughout the review, Sprout Social is far from an upstart in the space and so you can trust the company to maintain its product, offer quality support, and generally provide one of the best social media management tools in 2024. 

• Sign up to Sprout Social.

Hootsuite is one of the best-known names in the world of social media, and one of the best social media management tools full stop. If you’ve got any kind need for tracking and analytics using SEO tools then Hootsuite is one of the best options, plus it’s been around since 2008, so has been nicely honed over the years.

The current incarnation lets you manage multiple social media accounts, all from within one interface that allows quick and easy administration. On top of that, Hootsuite can schedule content for the likes of Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest, plus LinkedIn and YouTube, while lining up tweets on Twitter (sorry, X) is simple. 

• Sign up for a Hootsuite plan

There’s a limited free plan that’ll help you get started and explore its potential, but the real power of Hootsuite lies in its paid-for plans, which are outlined in detail throughout this review. 

As companies move into the social media era, getting the right tools makes all the difference. We've spent hours testing various social media managers like Circleboom, Buffer, and HubSpot to find the absolute best and take your online content to the next level. 

Let's dive into our Hootsuite social media manager review. 

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Hootsuite: Plans and Pricing

Hootsuite has something to offer all sorts of social media managers and in any kind of business environment. There’s a free plan available for those with simple needs or anyone with little or no social media budget to play with. 

However, if you’re looking to boost your social media activities you’ll be wise to head in the direction of a Professional plan, with prices that start from $49 per month.

Going deeper, a Team plan costs $129 per month, while the beefy Enterprise package costs $739 per month but delivers hefty performance. Those with more specific needs should also investigate the Enterprise custom edition of Hootsuite. 

Meanwhile, get started with a 30-trial if you just want to see what’s on offer on any of the plans. (Interestingly, Hootsuite is currently running a promotion of 20% off for those that skip the trial completely.) 

Compared to its rivals, these pricing plans are very competitive and the range of features on offer, as we'll get into over the next sections, makes Hootsuite hard to beat, especially for organisations at large scales. 

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Hoosuite: Basic features

As is the case with any software program, the free edition of Hootsuite will offer much less in the way of features and functions compared to the paid-for plans. So while you’ll get a limited array of social media management tools, you’ll really want to head in the direction of one of the paid-for plans outlined above to see what Hootsuite can really do for your business fortunes.

The Professional plan offers unlimited post scheduling, timing recommendations, Canva integrations, and a hashtag generator, plus a variety of other features. The limitations are that you can only have one user and 10 social accounts. 

While many people enthuse about Hootsuite, a frequent bone of contention for some is the way the Hootsuite interface looks, feels, and behaves. It’s been improved over the years and the latest edition is perhaps the best to date, but it can be an acquired taste, especially compared to upstart rivals that focus on UI. 

Nevertheless, setting up a Hootsuite account is easy using an email and password combination to get going. Once you're into the interface, adding social networks is a slick procedure and these can be managed via a central dashboard. 

Hootsuite also offers up a full range of tools for monitoring and managing each social network. A real benefit is the ability to integrate any one of over 150 apps into your workspace, which further boosts the appeal.

Hoosuite: Professional features

We just spoke about the Professional plan, but a beefier option is the Team package, which offers three users, 20 social accounts, and the ability to schedule unlimited posts, along with the option to access message in one inbox. 

Team is a really well-featured offering and will cater to most organisations. Hoosuite lists it as the Most Popular and for good reason, as it strikes a balance between letting you get on with work but not costing a ton. 

Those with more muscular social media requirements will prefer the Business edition, which comes with a five user capacity, 35 social accounts, the same team options as above, plus extended functionality thanks to an array of premium apps.

Hoosuite also adds on extra "social listening" analytics, employee advocacy, an advanced inbox, and review management. Take a look at Hootsuite's plans website to check which plan has your must-have feature. 

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Hootsuite: Analytics and Reporting

There’s a whole area within Hootsuite that will let you tackle analytics, especially if you’ve gone for a beefier package. Depending on your tier, Hootsuite offers options for taking a deep dive into your social media stats, all of which can subsequently be compiled and readied for detailed reporting.

Hootsuite helps "prove" a social media ROI, especially useful in e-commerce businesses or those that sell products online, which can be combined with its best timing tools to pick out the perfect moment to make a post. The service also offers ways to boost your engagement via its tools. 

If you’re looking for data to report back to bosses with then Hootsuite is great, especially via its graphics. Pro users will really appreciate the quality and power of the reporting potential in the higher-end editions. You’ll struggle to get that same impressive reporting in the cheap and cheerful editions, though. 

On top of these features, Hootsuite offers specific tools for monitoring social media, including getting customer feedback and protecting a brand from negative publicity. By putting all social media data in one place, keeping track becomes much easier. 

There's a reason that brands as big as Ikea, Allianz, and Domino's use Hootsuite. 

Hootsuite: User Interface

Having that central dashboard at your disposal makes Hootsuite a breeze to administer, even when working with multiple accounts. There are some quirks, which may not suite everyone’s taste, but the platform feels stable on the whole. 

The Enterprise plan is a good one to chose if you have staff members who might feel the benefit of the 24/7 priority support that comes as part of the package. (Hootsuite also publishes online documentation and guides for many of its features.) 

There's a lot more to the interface than initially meets the eye, too, including some great integrations with Dropbox, Google Drive, and others, which offer a more seamless experience for busy social media executives. The software can also be used in conjunction with many of the Microsoft business apps, adding additional appeal especially to corporate users.

While the UI might not be as flashy as some of its rivals, Hootsuite gets the job done and we had very few problems finding our way around the online website or apps. 

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Hoosuite: Support

As mentioned above, you'll really want to invest in the Team or Enterprise plans if you think either yourself or your staff using the system will need the benefit of 24/7 support. That may mean more of an outlay, but to keep staff going if they get stuck along the way is often worth a little more expenditure. 

Hootsuite also has a dedicated help center that makes a good place to start if you’re looking for assistance with the package. Unsurprisingly, some of the best ways to contact support involve using social media companies like Facebook and Twitter.

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Hootsuite: The competition

Not everyone will want all of the extra functionality provided by a business-focused edition of Hootsuite. There are plenty of alternatives in the social media arena however, with the likes of Sprout Social, Buffer, Sendible, Loomly, and Zoho Social all being perfectly decent competitors worth considering.

There's not enough space to go into loads of detail about all of these offerings, so we recommend checking out Hootsuite's feature list, seeing if what you need is there, and then checking out its rivals should that feature be absent. 

One thing we would say is that lots of Hootsuite's rivals don't offer the full range of services, especially in the Enterprise plan, and so it can be seen as something of a Swiss army knife. 

Hootsuite: Final verdict

Hootsuite continues to have plenty of appeal to all levels of social media managers, though anyone at the lower end of the business spectrum will find it’s basic edition a little too spartan. 

You’ll get more joy with the beefier plans though, with an Enterprise edition packing in everything needed to take care of social media requirements for companies of all shapes and sizes. There's a reason that Hootsuite has endured for so long, and it's definitely here to stay. 

• Sign up to Hootsuite

Hootsuite has been building its reputation as one of the best social media management tools since 2008. If you need social media management or analytics, it's one of the oldest options available in the market. However, it's worth noting that recent concerns about its contracts with the US Department of Homeland Security and ICE, which include its social listening features, have caused a stir in the industry.

Hootsuite's current incarnation lets you manage multiple social media accounts, all from within one interface that allows quick and easy administration. On top of that, Hootsuite can schedule content for later publishing on Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn, YouTube, and X.

• Sign up for a Hootsuite plan

There’s a limited free trial that’ll help you get started and explore its potential, but paid-for plans are the only way to keep using the platform long-term, which you'll find outlined in detail throughout this review.

We've spent hours testing social media management platforms like Circleboom, Buffer, and HubSpot. Each of them is promising, but offers something different in terms of core usability.

Let's dive into our Hootsuite social media manager review now.

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Hootsuite: Plans and pricing

Hootsuite has something to offer all sorts of social media managers and in any kind of business environment. There’s even a 30-day trial available for those who want to dip their toes into social media management tools.

But if you’re looking to use it long-term, Hootsuite's paid plans start at $199/month per user for teams that require up to 10 accounts.

Going deeper, the Advanced plan costs $399 per month per user, while the beefy Enterprise package requires contacting sales for a quote but delivers hefty performance and high-end customization.

Interestingly, Hootsuite is currently running a promotion that gives you 10% off if you skip the trial completely. But compared to its rivals, Hootsuite's plans are more on the moderate-to-expensive side, suitable for growing organizations and enterprises only.

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Hoosuite: Basic features

As is the case with any software program, the Standard edition of Hootsuite will offer much less in the way of features and functions compared to the Advanced or Enterprise plans.

The Starter plan offers unlimited post scheduling, timing recommendations, Canva integrations, and a hashtag generator, plus a variety of other features. The limitations are that you can only work with 10 social accounts. If you want to add more, you'll need to upgrade to the $399/month plan for unlimited social accounts.

While many people enthuse about Hootsuite, a frequent bone of contention for some is the way the Hootsuite interface looks, feels, and behaves. It’s been improved over the years and the latest edition is perhaps the best to date, but it can be an acquired taste, especially compared to upstart rivals that focus on UI.

Nevertheless, setting up a Hootsuite account is easy using an email and password combination to get going. Once you're into the interface, adding social networks is a slick procedure and these can be managed via a central dashboard.

Hootsuite also offers up a full range of tools for monitoring and managing each social network. A real benefit is the ability to integrate any one of over 150 apps into your workspace, which further boosts the appeal.

Hoosuite: Professional features and AI

Hootsuite's entry-level Standard plan lets you plug into 10 social media accounts, with the ability to schedule unlimited posts and to access all communications in one inbox.

Those with more muscular social media requirements will prefer the Advanced edition, which comes with the ability to integrate with unlimited social accounts, plus extended functionality like custom reporting and approval workflows.

Hoosuite also adds on extra "social listening" analytics, employee advocacy, an advanced inbox, and review management. Take a look at Hootsuite's website to check which plans it has available now.

• Best of the best: TechRadar's definitive buying guides

Hootsuite has significantly enhanced its platform with AI through OwlyWriter and the newly launched OwlyGPT in 2025. You'll find these tools integrated throughout the platform, designed to speed up content creation and eliminate writer's block.

OwlyWriter AI helps you generate social media captions in seconds. You can create posts from scratch by providing a simple prompt, or paste a URL and let it summarize articles into engaging social content. The "Get Inspired" feature generates endless post ideas based on keywords you provide, perfect for filling your content calendar. OwlyWriter can also identify your top-performing posts and suggest fresh ways to repurpose them.

OwlyGPT takes things further with new capabilities introduced in 2025. It can now generate original images to accompany your posts (currently in beta). Just describe what you need and it creates graphics automatically. The tool also personalizes output by analyzing your past posts and mimicking your brand voice, ensuring consistency even when multiple team members create content. OwlyGPT uses Talkwalker's social listening technology to incorporate real-time insights from live social feeds, making your content more relevant and timely.

The platform provides various copywriting formulas like HOOK, AMP, WIIFM, and AIDA to boost engagement and conversions. You get 300 AI tokens that renew monthly on paid plans, with each caption creation using one token. This gives you plenty of capacity for regular content generation without running out.

All Hootsuite plans include OwlyWriter AI at no extra cost. The AI integrates seamlessly with Hootsuite's scheduling, approval workflows, and compliance tools, so you maintain control over what gets published.

Hootsuite: Analytics and reporting

There’s a whole area within Hootsuite that will let you tackle analytics, especially if you’ve gone for a beefier package. Depending on your tier, Hootsuite offers options for taking a deep dive into your social media stats, all of which can subsequently be compiled and readied for detailed reporting.

Hootsuite helps "prove" your social media ROI, useful in e-commerce or with cash-strapped startups and scale-ups. The service also offers ways to boost your engagement by tracking engagement across time.

If you’re looking for visual data to take back to your bosses, Hootsuite is great with graphic reporting. Advanced plan users will really appreciate the quality and power of the reporting potential in the higher-end editions. You’ll struggle to get that same impressive reporting in cheaper editions, though.

On top of these features, Hootsuite offers specific tools for monitoring social media, including getting customer feedback and protecting a brand from negative publicity. By putting all social media data in one place, keeping track becomes much easier.

Hootsuite: User interface

Having that central dashboard at your disposal makes Hootsuite a breeze to the administrator, even when working with multiple accounts. There are some quirks, which may not suite everyone’s taste, but the platform feels stable on the whole.

The Enterprise plan is a good one to chose if you have staff members who might feel the benefit of the 24/7 priority support that comes as part of the package. (Hootsuite also publishes online documentation and guides for many of its features.)

There's a lot more to the interface than initially meets the eye, too, including some great integrations with Dropbox, Google Drive, and others, which offer a more seamless experience for busy social media executives. The software can also be used in conjunction with many of the Microsoft business apps, adding additional appeal especially to corporate users.

While the UI might not be as flashy as some of its rivals, Hootsuite gets the job done and we had very few problems finding our way around the online website or apps.

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Hoosuite: Support

You'll really want to invest in the Enterprise plans if you think your staff will need the benefit of 24/7 support. That may mean more of an outlay, but to keep staff going if they get stuck along the way is often worth a little more expense.

Hootsuite also has a dedicated help center that makes a good place to start if you’re looking for assistance with the package. Yet unsurprisingly, some of the best ways to contact support involve using social media companies like Facebook and Twitter.

• Best content marketing tool of 2024

Hootsuite: The competition

Not everyone will want all of the extra functionality provided by a business-focused edition of Hootsuite. There are plenty of alternatives in the social media arena however, with the likes of Sprout Social, Buffer, Sendible, Loomly, and Zoho Social all being perfectly decent competitors worth considering.

There's not enough space to go into loads of detail about all of these offerings, so we recommend checking out Hootsuite's feature list, seeing if what you need is there, and then checking out its rivals should that feature be absent.

One thing we would say is that lots of Hootsuite's rivals don't offer the full range of services, especially in the Enterprise plan, and so it can be seen as something of a Swiss army knife.

Hootsuite: Final verdict

Hootsuite continues to have plenty of appeal to all levels of social media managers, though anyone at the lower end of the business spectrum will find it a bit on the costlier side.

You’ll get more done with the beefier plans too ($399+) and the Enterprise edition packs in everything needed to handle social media for a global organization. We appreciate the depth of features on offer here, but feel conflicted about the removal of the free and more budget-friendly plans that were available before.

• Sign up to Hootsuite

Adobe Premiere Pro arguably sets the Hollywood gold standard for the best video editing software. And while you now find countless of the best alternatives to Adobe Premiere Pro, in our experience, it remains a top choice for anyone serious about video editing. 

Its extensive toolkit, firmly focused on videography, has made it a popular choice across Tinsel-town and well beyond - from ad agencies and marketing departments to social media influencers and YouTubers. Add in full integration with the likes of Audition and After Effects, our pick for best VFX software, and you’re suddenly working with a comprehensive, professional post-production suite.

The non-linear video editor is available on Windows and Mac with a Creative Cloud subscription (bad news for those looking for the best free video editing software - although we’ve covered how to download Adobe Premiere Pro on a free trial). 

In our tests, we found Adobe Premiere Pro to be a powerful video editor packed with industry-standard features and effects - and, of course, complete integration with Creative Cloud apps. 

For a simpler editing experience, Adobe also has the beginner-friendly Premiere Elements and Premiere Rush, one of the best video editing apps on mobile. We’ve also rounded up the best video editing software for beginners.  

• See how the video editor compares to alternatives in Adobe Premiere Pro vs Apple Final Cut Pro and Adobe Premiere Pro vs Lightworks.

New import focus

The latest version of Premiere Pro has a focus on your media. This is apparent from the very start, with a redesigned import window that showcases your clips above all else. 

Locate them, select the ones you wish to work with, and click on Import. A new project will be created for you. Those clips will be added to your sequence. No need to fiddle with settings, or anything like that.

Of course, nothing stops you from altering your Sequence Settings after the fact, which is crucial if you need to create a project for a specific social media format. 

But more often than not, just getting right down to working with your clips in their native format will be what people choose to do. This removal of potentially unnecessarily complex tweaking is most welcome.

Transcription tools 

One stellar new feature is Speech to Text. The simple name belies a range of truly fantastic speech-to-text tools, including the useful automatic transcription. Premiere Pro currently supports 14 different languages.

How it works is so simple: go to the Captions and Graphics workspace, then click on ‘Transcribe Sequence’. You have a series of fine tuning options, such as selecting the language (an important one, that), or even giving Premiere Pro the ability to recognise different voices, marking that in the transcript itself.

Now, of course, it’s not perfect, but it’s pretty great. And it’s easy to make alterations and fixes to the transcript, even replacing all the errors at once, if it couldn’t quite get someone’s name right, for instance.

Coupled with that is a link to a spellcheck. So, if you made a typo, you’ll be informed of that with the usual little red squiggly line under the problem word.

But that’s not all. As you play your sequence, you’ll be able to track the progress on the transcript itself. 

This means Premiere Pro knows where the spoken words are located on the sequence. Why is that important? Because there’s a handy search field at the top. Search for a word or a phrase, and you’ll be taken straight there in the recording. 

From now on, if you remember that someone mentioned something in an interview, you’ll be able to find it in seconds, rather than desperately play sections until you hope you bump into the right bit, usually by accident.

But it gets even better, as with the click of a button, you can create automatic captions for your videos based on that transcript. Now, you can make movies that are even more accessible to audiences. 

That’s a really important step up for creators, and we’re delighted at how well the feature actually works.

New titling options 

Speaking of text, Premiere Pro also has interesting new styling tools. For instance, you’re now able to add multiple shadows to your text layers, creating more unique and distinctive styles.

The spell checker and replace options mentioned above are present anywhere text is used in your project. This applies to multiple languages, too. Prior to this current version, working in multiple languages was a serious pain, as you had to take a trip to the Settings each time you needed to switch languages. 

In the latest version of Premiere Pro, just type in the other tongue, and the tool will understand and conform. Left to right or right to left settings are set straight from the Essential Graphics panel. 

Even better, you’re able to apply different scripts within the same graphic elements. This is bound to be a boon for multi-linguist movie-makers.

AI tools

Premiere Pro, like most of Adobe's creative software suite, is packed with AI tools that work incredibly well.

One of these is Remix. This is a tool designed to retime songs so your chosen tune fits the video perfectly. Usually this is a painstaking process, involving a lot of cuts, fades, and trial and error to make it work.

We tested this with an original song, to remove any possibility that the AI was basing its knowledge on some well known track, and we were mightily impressed. 

The process took a few seconds to perform (this undoubtedly depends on your CPU’s prowess), but the end result was excellent.

Adobe is constantly adding new artificial intelligence tools to the program, too. One of the newest here is what Adobe dubs an "AI-powered media intelligence and search panel". Currently in beta, this will let editors find the right video clip when working with large file libraries, speeding up the workflow.

Announced ahead of Sundance 2025, there's also a new caption translation tool that will automatically - you guessed it - translate captions so videos have greater global appeal. We were already impressed with Adobe's AI work in this area, so it's great to see extra work going into this.

Native Apple Silicon support

Great news for Mac creatives: Premiere Pro offers native support for Apple’s proprietary silicon chip. According to Adobe’s own internal tests, “thanks to new hardware acceleration, 4k, and 8K ProRes are now up to 5x faster on M1 Pro and M1 Max MacBook Pros.”

This also includes impressive hardware acceleration when working with the hi-res HEVC file format. Adobe says exports in HEVC “are faster with macOS 12 on M1 Macs. Hardware encoding is now enabled for DCI 4K and 8K HEVC exports, resulting in significantly faster performance.”

It’s always good when the big players back a new silicon endeavor. It's one of the reasons why the Macbook tops our round-up of the best video editing laptops.

Final verdict

It’s not hard to see why Adobe Premiere Pro is one of the most popular editors on the market. It’s a stable video editing powerhouse with a huge list of features designed to help you intuitively build professional-grade projects. 

There’s a natural learning curve to mastering the software. But the juice is worth the squeeze. Especially with some of the fantastic new tools - with transcription features a real stand-out among the pack. 

If you’re serious about video editing, you should really take a long hard look at Adobe Premiere Pro. 

• Power up Premiere Pro on the best video editing computers

One of the biggest problems affecting Windows users is how third-party software accesses and appends the system registry. If everything is working well, you can be reasonably confident that the registry – an index of software and settings – is more or less “clean.”

But when your PC begins to experience unexplained hangs and shutdowns and the dreaded blue screen of death, one of your first steps will be to clean the registry. Various PC maintenance tools for Windows 11 are available, including Wise Registry Cleaner.

Developed by Lespeed Technology Co. Ltd, under the name “WiseCleaner,” Wise Registry Cleaner was first released in 2005, and focuses on freeware and shareware distribution. A whole library of “Wise” utilities is available, with data recovery, uninstaller, and video converter tools also available.

We’ve assessed the software based on price, features, how it compares to the competition, and some other factors to help you decide if this is the best option to optimize your PC’s performance.

Wise registry cleaner: Plans and pricing

Wise Registry Cleaner is available with a free version and an upgraded “Pro” version. Wise Registry Cleaner Pro is available for $19.95, with payment by credit card, PayPal, or Google Pay (other payment methods are available, depending on territory). Note that this is an introductory price.

Billing recurs every 12 months, with automatic renewals costing $29.95. 

There are a few differences between the two versions, with the Pro version mainly intended to clean multiple Windows profiles, rather than just the one accessible with the free version.

Note that there is a box in the bottom-right corner of the software promoting other tools from WiseCleaner.

Wise registry cleaner: Features

Wise Registry Cleaner features several tools to help you optimize your PC’s performance. These are grouped into registry cleaner, system tuneup, and registry defrag tools.

Registry Cleaner

The core component of this software, the tool covers all sorts of registry entries, from firewall settings and DLLs to uninstaller leftovers, startup programs, and more. If there are items in the Windows Start menu that should no longer be there, these can be discarded with the registry cleaner, as can ActiveX/COM components.

Clean-up is via a single button press; scans and clean-ups can be scheduled to run at your convenience. You can make a backup or set a Windows Restore Point before running the cleaner.

System Tuneup

Intended primarily for optimizing your PC, the System Tuneup tool tidies up boot and shutdown procedures ensures improved system stability and speeds things up.

Each of these is achieved with a collection of tiny fixes (e.g. removing the word “shortcut” from shortcut icons), all initiated by checking a box to select and hitting the Optimize button.

Registry Defrag

A bloated registry will slow down your PC. Wise Registry Cleaner includes a tool to tidy and compress the Windows system registry. This feature can boost the launch speed of games and applications and takes just a few moments to complete.

Additional features

As well as supporting multiple languages, Wise Registry Cleaner also offers light and dark modes and command line access. It also includes a tool to create a portable version for use on a USB stick.

The software also has a clear user interface, with the key tools intuitively arranged across the top of the app window. As such, it is easy to use, it feels modern, and this helps to build trust.

System requirements

Wise Registry Cleaner is for Windows 11, but will also run on Windows XP through to Windows 10. It has 32-bit and 64-bit versions available.

If you have a Windows 11 PC, the software should run without issue. Older systems need at least a Pentium 1GHz CPU, 4GB of RAM, and 20MB of disk space.

Wise registry cleaner: Interface and in use

We found it quite effortless to download, install, and use Wise Registry Cleaner. You can download the setup file at any time from WiseCleaner’s official website. Afterwards, run the setup file, and installation begins. Ours took about a minute to finish installing, and we immediately launched the app.

Upon launching Wise Registry Cleaner, you should notice its neat, uncluttered user interface. All the app’s features fit into just three menus, so there’s no stress finding anyone. Any PC user can easily understand it. 

However, one drawback in the user interface is that WiseCleaner advertises its other software tools within the app. These ads feel intrusive.

Wise registry cleaner: Support

The Wise Registry Cleaner portion of the Wise Cleaner website has a heavy focus on software support.

Here, you’ll find links to a video guide explaining how to use the software, online help documentation, and a user forum. There are also instructions on uninstalling software and a list of changes made to the utility over the past two years. The support tools can be accessed via the Wise Registry Cleaner’s menu, as well as by visiting the website.

The support center provides various FAQs, solutions to license issues, and a contact form. You can expect a response within 1 working day should you need to contact Wise Cleaner. 

Customer response to Wise Cleaner’s support is positive. On Trustpilot, it has a score of 4.4.

Wise registry cleaner: Competition

If you’re considering a registry cleaning tool to boost your PC’s performance, Wise Registry Cleaner probably isn’t the only option on your list. Key competition comes from AVG Tuneup, Ashampoo WinOptimizer, and CCleaner.

All of these tools offer free versions or free trials, with Wise Registry Cleaner the second cheapest option of the tools we’ve looked at (behind Ashampoo WinOptimizer at just $14).

Unlike other aspects of the PC optimization market, registry cleaners are almost identical in performance, for the core purpose at least. When choosing a registry cleaner, ensure it meets your minimum requirements, then look at the extra features and whether these match what you expect from the price.

As it is, unless you require tech support, the free version or another tool should be all you need to clean the Windows registry.

Wise registry cleaner: Final verdict

Cleaning the registry is going to improve performance on Windows, whichever tool you use. Wise Registry Cleaner is a strong option that does exactly what the name implies and is easy to get to grips with.

It is not, however, perfect. The presence of adverts for other WiseCleaner products is tawdry, and hiding the developer behind the WiseCleaner name on the website (I found it by checking the Windows Store) doesn’t instill the level of trust we expect from tools that can potentially break your PC.

If you need the paid version of Wise Registry Cleaner, you may find that alternative tools offer much the same level of licensing and support. But if you just need a free registry cleaner for your own PC, Wise Registry Cleaner is a good alternative to CCleaner.

• Keep your PC running smoothly with one of the best registry cleaners

WinZip Driver Updater is a driver updater tool from WinZip Computing LLC, a leading Canadian software company. Since 2006, it has been a subsidiary of the Corel Corporation, one of Canada’s biggest homegrown software companies. 

Driver Updater is one of many system optimization and security software products developed by WinZip. The company released the first version of the software over a decade ago. Since then, it has dropped many more updated versions, including the latest in February 2022. 

WinZip also creates a number of solutions. It is best known for its file compression software that gives the company its name, but it also manufactures a PDF editor and an entire suite of tools that can be used for file transfers. 

In this review, however, we're focusing specifically on WinZip Driver Updater, helping you decide whether it's the right tool for you or not. We’ll assess the software based on various criteria, including features, ease of use, pricing, customer support, and more. 

WinZip Driver Updater review: Plans and pricing

WinZip Driver Updater is a piece of freemium software that has both a free and a premium version. Anyone can download and use the free version, but it has limited functionality. On the other hand, the premium version unlocks all the features.

The premium version costs $32 for a yearly subscription. You can pay for it directly on WinZip’s official website through PayPal or a credit/debit card. The price includes a one-year license for a single computer, which gives you free product updates and upgrades, as well as 24/7 premium support. WinZip also offers a 30-day money-back guarantee for every purchase, which allows you to cancel your subscription before you've committed yourself financially. 

Features

WinZip Driver Updater’s core feature is exactly as its name suggests. It runs an extensive PC scan to pick out outdated or corrupt drivers. Afterwards, it lets you update the outdated ones or download new versions of the corrupt ones.

The app includes a prominent “Start Scan Now” button. Clicking it starts a scan of your computer that shows results in a relatively short time. WinZip checks your PC’s drivers against a database of over 4 million drivers during its scan. Usually, the first time you install the software, it automatically runs this scan for you without clicking a button.

In our tests, the scan took less than a minute. The software found 21 outdated drivers and listed them in a tabular format. You can update them individually or collectively with the click of a button. The ability to update all at once is reserved for premium users. 

You can set schedules for WinZip’s Driver Updater to scan your PC’s drivers automatically. It could be daily, weekly, monthly, or anytime your computer boots up afresh. This way, you ensure that you continually update your drivers without opening the app every time.

WinZip’s Driver Updater also lets you backup drivers and restore them later. This feature is helpful because some driver updates could make your PC malfunction. If you fall into that category, you can simply restore the previous driver settings to make your PC function as usual. The ability to restore your PC to its old drivers lets you roll back the clock in a similar way to the versioning that you see with some cloud storage programs. 

The Driver Updater also shows you detailed information about your PC. It’s similar to the in-built “System Information” app included with every Windows PC.

Interface and in use

We found WinZip Driver Updater easy to download, install, and use. We downloaded the setup file from the official website, and installation took less than a minute. Afterwards, we began using the app. 

Driver Updater has a neat, uncluttered interface. Its features fit into just three menu bars, so they’re easily accessible. You'll find five options at the top of the screen: Home, PC Scan, Backup, Options, and Register. Beneath this, there's a list of the number of outdated drivers that were found during your last scan, as well as when this took place. 

It's also easy to download all the relevant drivers in one go or apply updates manually. Finally, drive details can be reviewed before you commit to a download and you can exclude drivers from future scans.

The software is also multilingual, supporting various languages, including English, French, Korean, Turkish, German, Italian, and many more. 

Support

WinZip provides customer support through email only. It also provides a detailed FAQ page and user guide for WinZip Driver Updater. Some of the questions listed include how to register the driver updater and general troubleshooting tips.

There's also a very clear guide on how the process of updating your drivers works. It takes users from the very beginning, starting with how to download WinZip Driver Updater. It then talks you through the program's automatic launch, scanning and other features.  

The fact that WinZip Driver Updater only comes with email support is something of a shame when compared to competitors, however. Many competing tools offer live chat and telephone support. 

The competition

Standard alternatives to WinZip’s Driver Updater include Auslogics Driver Updater, DriverFix, and IObit Driver Booster. They offer similar features, but WinZip’s Driver Updater is the most expensive in the cohort. 

On the other hand, WinZip Driver Updater comes with a well-known name in the industry and a reputation built over many years. There's also the option of accessing other tools from the same vendor like you see with some other providers of driver updater solutions, such as Fortect.

Final verdict

WinZip’s Driver Updater is a proper tool to ensure you never have outdated or corrupt drivers for a significant time. It effectively prevents any problems caused by faulty drivers. It’s a valuable tool for every computer user who values speed and performance. 

While the support options could be better and the pricing could be lower, this is still a very respectable driver updater. The fact that the program sources drivers from original equipment manufacturers only should also be reassuring to users.

• Ensure you're running all of the latest drivers on your Windows PC with the best driver update software

Expert Software Application (Exswap), a Romanian software company, launched  Mindomo in 2006, aiming for it to be one of the best mind-map software tools based on the (now discontinued) Adobe Flash platform. It released a web app in 2007 and a native desktop app in 2008.

In 2010, Exswap added real-time collaboration to Mindomo, which has become the software’s most defining feature. In 2012, the company released native Mindomo mobile apps for iOS and Android. 

Mindomo is very popular with educators. Over 1,000 schools worldwide use it to help teachers effectively interact and collaborate with students. 

We tested Mindomo extensively to give you an exhaustive, unbiased review. Our review is based on specific criteria, including pricing, features, compatibility, customer support, and ease of use.

Mindomo:Plans and pricing

Available as a desktop app with a browser-based cloud version, Mindomo can be installed on Windows, macOS (Intel), and Linux (as an AppImage). The free option is desktop-only, whereas the subscription option gives you cloud and mobile access.

The Free plan supports 8 import formats, 11 export formats, sharing, and is limited to 40 diagrams. Anyone can sign up to the Free plan to try Mindomo for free.

Mindomo’s Subscription plan is $5.50 per month, with an annual subscription. This can be used on 2 computers, in a browser, and on a mobile device, with unlimited syncing between them. As well as the Free plan features, it adds unlimited diagram topics, unlimited searches, and unlimited cloud diagrams. You also get support and software updates.

The Desktop Premium option offers some extra features to the Free plan. It is $69 for a lifetime license, with 1 year of support and update, use on 2 computers, unlimited diagram topics, and a year of unlimited searches. If you like Mindomo and need the updates beyond a year, you can extend it for $36 each year.

Volume licenses (10 or more) are available for enterprise use, with quotes available on request. Mindomo subscriptions can be paid using PayPal, wire transfer or credit card. Mindomo provides a 30-day money-back guarantee for every purchase. 

Mindomo:Features

Mindomo’s core feature is building and presenting mind maps. Mind maps are diagrams that visually organize information. It's hierarchical and shows relationships between pieces of information. It's a practical technique of visualizing your thoughts and ideas and sharing them with others.  

Mindomo provides built-in templates to create various mind maps and convert them into presentations. You can stylize these mind maps to make them as visually appealing as possible. The app lets you build mind maps solo or with your colleagues within a school or workplace.

To make your mind maps as detailed as possible. Mindomo lets you add a range of objects. You can add hyperlink resources to link specific parts of your mind maps to external URLs. You can also attach files on the mind map by uploading them from your computer.  Notes add more detailed text bodies to the topics in your mind maps, and you can upload videos from your PC or embed directly from YouTube and Vimeo.

You can search for photos directly from the web and insert them into your mind maps, and Mindomo even lets you import files from your computer, Dropbox, Google Drive, or OneDrive accounts and convert them into mind maps. 

When you’re done, mind maps and other creations can be exported in a wide variety of file formats. You can import mind maps you created with other tools into Mindomo. Likewise, you can export mind maps you create on Mindomo into similar platforms like MindManager, SimpleMind, and iThoughts. 

The Presenter Mode feature turns any mind map into a slide-by-slide presentation. Should you need to take your projects with you, the tools supports downloading all your mind maps in one single ZIP file.

For complex mind maps, Mindomo’s search feature helps you easily find any information you want. The app also enables you to organize your mind maps into folders to declutter them and make information easily accessible. 

When using the web-based interface, you can continue editing your mind maps even if you’re disconnected from the net, and your changes will automatically sync once the connection restores.  

Mindomo: Ease of Use

We found it pretty easy to use Mindomo. The first step is to subscribe through the official website, either for the free or premium version. If you choose the premium version, you must pay before use. You have to provide basic data like your name and email for a subscription. Google login is supported, as is Facebook, Apple, Office 365, and various others.

After subscribing, Mindomo sends an activation link to the email you provided. Click on this link, and you’re good to go. 

A simple and clean user interface makes Mindomo easy to use. The design window is doesn’t rely on sidebars, preferring context menus to add elements, change layout, and alter design style.

Template selection is good, which means it might take you a while to find what you are looking for. However, with the free account, templates cannot be heavily edited – new topics and subtopics are a premium feature. Creating a mind map or similar diagram from scratch doesn’t have this restriction, however.

Mindomo: Customer support

If you encounter any difficulty using Mindomo, a detailed help resource is available at help.mindomo.com. This is searchable, so you should find the solution you need with the right search term.

Mindomo provides customer support through email, live chat, or telephone. There are also video tutorials and a customer support forum available in English, French, Spanish, and Italian.  

Mindomo: The competition

Common alternatives to Mindomo include Freemind, XMind, and SimpleMind. They offer similar features and are comparably priced.

Mindomo’s large design workspace helps it to stand out, and the free version is also a bonus. 

Mindomo: Final verdict

With many alternative mind-mapping tools available, Mindomo’s free version should be enough to entice you to try it out. That should be enough to tell you if this is the right choice. 

Mindomo is an ideal tool for visualizing your thoughts and ideas in the form of mind maps and sharing them with others. It’s valuable to individuals and professionals, mainly educators interacting with students.

If you’re looking for a mind-mapping and diagramming solution that is available on a range of desktop and mobile platforms, Mindomo should be top of your list.

We've listed the best flowchart software.

Too many apps on your computer? Frustrated by pre-installed software? Windows’ standard uninstall tool is good, but at times it is not good enough. The solution is a third-party utility designed to uninstall software and ensure that all related data is extracted from your computer.

Various uninstaller tools are available. Wise Program Uninstaller is published by WiseCleaner, founded in 2005 by a trio of programmers to produce free or affordable system utilities for Windows.

If you’re looking for an uninstaller, Wise Program Uninstaller may be a name that comes up in your search. To explore whether this is a good option, we’ve taken an in-depth look at the software, comparing pricing, features, usage, how it compares to the competition, and other factors

Wise Program Uninstaller: Plans and pricing

Various apps and tools are available from WiseCleaner, some of which are paid. Others, like Wise Program Uninstaller, are free. This is confirmed on the download page: “Wise Program Uninstaller is a completely free removal tool.”

This is clearly a major advantage; paying for software that you will typically only use once or twice can be tough to justify.

There is no path from free trial to paid software, no annual subscription, and no limit on the number of PCs that Wise Program Uninstaller can be installed on. You simply download it for free and use the software. Better still, Wise Program Uninstaller is not ad-supported, either.

Wise Program Uninstaller: Features

Wise Program Uninstaller has a very clear and open user interface, which blends in with the current design and feel of Windows. This makes it easy to use and intuitive. It includes some key features to assist with program removal.

Remove desktop apps

All types of desktop applications, games, and utilities can be removed with Wise Program Uninstaller. Software is grouped by type – desktop, Metro/Windows Store apps, and system components – with details on size and installation date for each. Uninstalling is a simple matter of checking the boxes (batch uninstall is supported) and clicking the Uninstall button. This prompts the official uninstall procedures for the selected apps and follows it with a user-prompted clean-up of the registry and orphaned files.

Note that the Store app removal feature includes those apps that come pre-installed on Windows 11.

Restore point creation

Making changes to Windows can result in problems later on if they’re not correctly planned. Wise Program Uninstaller can create a restore point if required, ready to be wound back if the uninstall doesn’t go as planned.

Custom uninstall tool

Software that won’t uninstall and leaves considerable residual data behind can be deleted with the Custom Uninstall button. A file browsing tool is provided to find the folder with the left-behind data and delete everything related to it.

Clean-up browser extensions

In addition to desktop software removal, this utility will also handle browser extensions. We tested it on Mozilla Firefox and Microsoft Edge, and it removed unwanted extensions in seconds.

Regular updates

Wise Program Uninstaller receives updates, with an update-checking button in the menu. Remember: this is free software, so it’s particularly impressive that it is maintained in this way.

System requirements

Wise Program Uninstaller is for recent Windows versions, particularly Windows 11. If your PC runs Windows 11, then it will have no problem with this software. 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows are supported.

It can also be installed on older systems, but the installer doesn’t work on Windows XP. For this, you will need to use the portable version of Wise Program Uninstaller, which can be created within the app.

On older PCs, the software needs a Pentium 1GHz CPU or higher, 4GB of RAM, and at least 40MB of disk space.

Wise Program Uninstaller: Interface and in-use

Wise Program Uninstaller is easy to download, install, and use. It’s free, so it takes just one click to download the setup file from the official website. After that, run the setup file, and installation takes barely a minute. You’re now prepared to use the app. 

The user interface is a list of all installed programs on your PC and the ability to select them individually or in batches and uninstall them. There are no confusing menus or features hidden deep within specific menus. The software has just one core function: uninstall apps, so this interface is simple to understand and navigate. 

Wise Program Uninstaller: Support

On the WiseCleaner website, you will find a comprehensive support portal, built around FAQs for each of its products. Wise Program Uninstaller has three FAQs, as well as a digital user manual. Other support tools relevant to this software include the ability to contact the WiseCleaner team for help via an online form.

In addition, if you want to find out what other users think of the software and any issues and related solutions they’ve uncovered, you can check the WiseCleaner Community Forum. This has dedicated boards for its paid software, and separate boards for the free tools like Wise Program Uninstaller.

Support can also be accessed from within the software by clicking the Support Center menu option. This opens an interface for reporting problems or suggestions.

WiseCleaner has built an excellent reputation for customer support and has garnered a Trustpilot score of 4.4.

Wise Program Uninstaller: The competition

If you’re looking at uninstaller tools then you already know that there are several tools in this portion of the PC optimizer market. Wise Program Uninstaller already has an advantage over many of them thanks to being free.

The paid competition includes Iobit Uninstaller and Ashampoo Uninstaller, and both are good, affordable alternatives. But Wise Program Uninstaller has strong competition from Geek Uninstaller and Bulk Crap Uninstaller, both Windows software uninstaller tools that can be used completely free.

While Geek Uninstaller can be exchanged for the PRO version and extra features and elevated support, Wise Program Uninstaller doesn’t offer that option. Your decision will depend on whether you want support from a tool like this, or if removing some annoying apps is all you need.

Wise Program Uninstaller: Final verdict

We really liked the presentation of Wise Program Uninstaller, especially compared to some of the alternatives. It feels modern and sits alongside native Windows software without looking like a relic from the past.

It is also easy to use, with everything you need to remove applications and games from your computer. Unlike some alternatives (like Bulk Crap Uninstaller) the Wise Program Uninstaller doesn’t give you the ability to drill down into specific data; similarly, it is focused purely on uninstalling unwanted software.

The product support and customer information for the utility is impressive. In fact, it compares favorably against various paid and subscription product uninstaller solutions. 

As for the price, it’s pretty unbeatable, and we think this is one of the best Windows software uninstaller utilities around.

We've also highlighted the best free software uninstallers

OnlyOffice was created by Ascensio System SIA, a software enterprise headquartered in Latvia. It was initially introduced in 2009 under the moniker TeamLab, before being rebranded to OnlyOffice in 2014. Concurrently, Ascensio also released an open-source variant of OnlyOffice in the same year.

OnlyOffice may be accessed either as a cloud-based tool or deployed on-premise servers. The cloud-based option is charged on a per-user basis, while the on-premise option is charged on a per-server basis.

This review of OnlyOffice aims to assist in determining whether it represents a suitable productivity software suite for your organization. Our evaluation is founded upon specific criteria, encompassing features, pricing, customer support, ease of use, and other relevant considerations. 

OnlyOffice: Plans and pricing

OnlyOffice offers distinct pricing structures tailored to the specific deployment options it provides. In the context of cloud computing, OnlyOffice adopts a subscription-based pricing model, allowing users to access its services on a recurring basis. Conversely, for on-premise deployments, the pricing is determined based on the number of servers procured. 

Cloud Pricing

This version introduces three tiers: Startup, Business, and Enterprise. The Startup tier, while free of charge, offers limited functionality, with only 2 GB of file storage. The Business tier, starting at $20 per month, includes additional features and increases storage capacity to 250 GB. The Enterprise on-site deployment requires direct contact with the organization to determine the cost per server for lifetime installation, which is $6550.

There is also a Docs Enterprise tier, which starts at $8 per user per month for the cloud version, or an on premise install starting at $1500 for the 1 year license that supports 50 users. 

On-prem

The on-premise version has three tiers; Enterprise, Enterprise Plus, and Enterprise Premium. Unlike the cloud-based version, you pay for a lifetime license rather than a subscription. 

Enterprise costs $1900 per server, Enterprise Plus costs $3000 per server, and Enterprise Premium costs $4150 per server. Each plan is capped at 50 users per server. If your enterprise surpasses that number, you can pay the same amount for another 50-user license.  

OnlyOffice: Features

OnlyOffice, a comprehensive productivity suite, offers various applications, one of which is OnlyOffice Docs. Similar to Microsoft Office, it combines the functionality of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint into a single package.

OnlyOffice Docs consists of four primary components:

1. Document Editor: Allows users to create, view, and edit text documents.

2. Spreadsheet Editor: Provides spreadsheet functionality for creating and managing data.

3. Presentation Editor: Facilitates the creation and delivery of presentations.

4. Form Creator: Enables the creation of customizable forms for data collection

Document Editor

Introducing the Document Editor – a robust word processing tool that empowers you to create, format, and edit text documents with ease. It supports a wide range of file formats including DOC, DOCX, ODT, TXT, PDF, and HTML, ensuring compatibility with various systems and platforms.

The Document Editor is packed with features that you would expect from professional word processing software. You can control fonts and styles, format text, adjust paragraph and line spacing, customize page layout, insert headers and footers, and more. Additionally, you can enrich your documents with images, tables, charts, shapes, and more. All the added objects can be effortlessly repositioned, resized, or aligned to suit your preferences.

For detailed analysis, the Document Editor offers insights into word count, paragraphs, and characters, and provides a version history feature that allows you to restore previous versions of your document.

The Document Editor integrates seamlessly with various third-party add-ons to extend its functionality. These add-ons allow you to insert YouTube videos, translate words and sentences, and edit images directly within the editor, saving you the hassle of switching between multiple applications.

Lastly, collaboration is made easy with real-time document editing. Team members can collaborate simultaneously, leaving comments or engaging in discussions through the built-in chat tool within the editor, ensuring seamless coordination and efficient teamwork.

Presentation Editor 

With OnlyDocs' Presentation Editor, you can create eye-catching presentations much like you would with Microsoft PowerPoint. You can create and save your presentations in various formats, including PDF, PNG, JPG, PPTX, PPT, and ODP.

There are numerous ways to design an appealing presentation with OnlyDocs. For instance, you can add customizable charts, tables, and equations to present statistics effectively. You can also enhance your presentations with videos, clip art elements, and special symbols using third-party add-ons.

OnlyDocs features a convenient "Presenter View" mode. In this mode, you can add notes to emphasize crucial parts of your presentation. You can also smoothly navigate to any slide with a single click. Additionally, you can collaborate with your colleagues on presentations in real time.

Form Creator

With the Form Creator, users can generate detailed forms and extract information after they've been completed. Users can create a form from scratch or use a provided template and host it online for designated respondents to fill out. The forms can include text areas, drop-down lists, checkboxes, and combo boxes.

OnlyOffice offers an email management tool for enterprises, allowing them to create corporate emails for team members by adding a mail server to their domain name. Custom corporate emails give organizations a more professional image compared to generic ones, highlighting the importance of this feature.

OnlyOffice Mail provides standard features expected in an email platform, such as sorting email into folders, automatic mail sorting with filters, attachment capabilities, signature creation and management, and more. It's a formidable competitor to popular corporate email management tools like Google Workspace and Zoho Mail. 

OnlyOffice CRM

Essential for every business, OnlyOffice CRM is a comprehensive customer relationship management (CRM) system that facilitates the monitoring and management of all communications and interactions with customers. OnlyOffice CRM enables you to establish a comprehensive customer database and closely track interactions with each individual. Additionally, you can craft forms to gather sales data or generate and transmit invoices directly from within the application. 

With OnlyOffice CRM's seamless integration with Twilio, a widely-used cloud communications platform, users gain the ability to directly answer customer calls from within the CRM interface, enhancing communication management and customer service capabilities.

OnlyOffice Projects

OnlyOffice Projects serves as a comprehensive  project management software solution. It enables users to establish tasks and subtasks, assign responsibilities to specific individuals, and subsequently monitor the progress of such tasks. Additionally, it incorporates time-tracking capabilities to evaluate performance and generate reports in an automated manner. This all contributes to making OnlyOffice Projects an ideal tool to monitor small or medium-sized projects within an organization. 

OnlyOffice Calendar

With OnlyOffice Calendar, you can establish and label calendars for effective organization within your team. It allows you to add upcoming events to calendar dates, ensuring all team members are informed and updated. Additionally, you can create personalized timetables and calendars and selectively share them with specific individuals. Finally, there are also integrations with other OnlyOffice tools like Mail and Projects. 

OnlyOffice: Interface and use

Subscribing to and using OnlyOffice turned out to be quite straightforward. The first step involves creating an account on their official website. Upon doing so, you will be provided with a subdomain under the “onlyoffice.eu” URL extension. This subdomain effectively becomes your dedicated online office workspace. 

When opting for the on-premise version, the OnlyOffice workspace is hosted on your servers, complete with a dedicated IP address, instead of being located on an OnlyOffice domain.

Interface

The web interface of this software is pleasingly neat and uncluttered. Additionally, OnlyOffice offers mobile apps for iOS and Android, making it a great choice for those who frequently work on the go.

OnlyOffice: Support

Enterprise users of OnlyOffice enjoy customer support through both email and telephone, whereas home users are limited to using only the forum for support. The platform offers a single email address for support, but telephone support lines vary based on the user's country of residence. 

OnlyOffice: The competition

Among OnlyOffice's primary competitors are Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace, and Zoho. While OnlyOffice offers comparable features to Zoho, Microsoft Office 365 and Google Workspace boast greater versatility and a wider range of tools.

A key advantage of OnlyOffice compared to its competitors, such as Zoho, Google Workspace, or Microsoft Office 365, is the ability to deploy the software on in-house servers. This provides users with maximum control over security, ensuring that their data remains secure and within their organization's control.

OnlyOffice: Final verdict

OnlyOffice presents itself as a compelling office productivity software suite. It serves as a comprehensive platform designed to facilitate effective communication and collaboration within an organizational setting. Nonetheless, our evaluation revealed certain limitations, notably its relatively high cost and the initial challenges associated with its implementation. 

We've featured the best document editing and management software.

• Update - April 2025: Since we last reviewed signNow, the company has updated its paid plans
• The service allows unlimited users across all paid plans.
• Businesses will only pay for the number of documents sent for signature.
• After 100 invites in a year, additional fees will apply

With all this hybrid working across a global workplace, companies to fast shifting to secure digital document solutions. We’ve seen a massive rise in the best cloud storage and PDF editors to keep files accessible but safe.

When it comes to signing documents without printing them, the best eSign software is ideal, letting you create digital signatures, work together, and share and track files. And signNow from airSlate is tailored-made for the task.

signNow: Pricing & plans

• A eSign service for businesses with subscription tiers adding additional features and security tools - but a 7-day free trial is available

As signNow is an online service, it’s unsurprisingly subscription-based. You’re presented with 4 different tiers, with a yearly commitment saving you up to 60% compared to paying monthly. There's also a 7-day free trial to see if it works like you need it to.

Interestingly, signNow will now let unlimited users on paid plans, with businesses only paying for the number of documents sent for signature (additional fees apply after 100 invites in a year is reached).

The Business plan is cheapest. With it, you’re able to send a document to be signed to other parties. You’ll find tools to fill in forms, you’re allowed to create as many templates as you need, connect to other online storage services such as OneDrive, Google Drive, and Box. There’s access to a mobile app, so you can keep track of your documents on the go. This will cost you $20 a month or $96 a year.

Business Premium adds a few extra features for $30 a month or $180 a year. This includes reminders, sending documents in bulk, and adding your custom logo design (it’s easy to make one using the best logo maker). You can find a ‘kiosk mode’ for the mobile app, letting you grab someone’s signature in person, which is useful.

In addition to this, Enterprise subscribers gain the ability to request payment when a person signs a document. You’ll also benefit from better security, being able to attach additional documents when signing, and introduce fillable fields to your templates. This plan is priced at $50 a month or $360 a year.

Finally the Business Cloud subscription introduces multiple users to the same account, CRM/ERP integration, HIPAA and 21CFR Part 11 compliance. The price is based on the number of users, with a minimum of 5 per account, starting at $50 per month per user or $600 per year per user.

• Pricing & plans: 4/5

signNow: Setting digital signatures

• Creating an e-signature is an easy process that’s as hands-on as you need it to be

The sign-up process is actually as simple as it can be. All you need to start is your email address and password. A click on an email they send you to verify your address is genuine, and you’re good to go.

Once in, you type in your name and signNow will offer you a generic signature and initials, based on a cursive font. If you’re fine with that, click on Next. You can change it later if you wish, or right now by clicking on Change Signature or Change Initials.

Doing this gives you multiple options, which are the same for either your signature or initials. You’re able to rewrite your name, change the font that’s used (there are 8 on offer), draw your signature using your mouse or trackpad, which is always fun. Alternatively, you can upload an image of your signature.

During the setting process, you’ll be encouraged to add the email address of some of your colleagues, to make it easier further down the road to share your documents with them. As with your signature, if you don’t want or need to do that right now, you can skip this process and return to it at any time later on. You’re now ready to start working with PDF documents.

• Setting digital signatures: 4.5/5

signNow: Preparing documents

• Add various types of editable fields to a file quickly and easily

When working with documents, the first thing you need to do is tell signNow who it will need to be sent to. You’ll also find a list of recent recipients to make it easier to send work to people you collaborate with often. If you have to fill it in yourself, just click on the Add Myself button.

‘Save and Continue’ gets you to the working interface proper, which is similar in layout to others we’ve seen before. To the left is a sidebar with all the tools available to you, from your signature, to text boxes, radio buttons, drop-down menus, formulas and more. You can add any of these to your document, a large preview of which takes up most of the interface, to that sidebar’s right. The right sidebar offers a thumbnail preview of all the document’s pages.

signNow is designed to set up which recipient is allowed to fill in specific elements, and this is clear from the very start: just above the tools in the left sidebar is a list of people who will be allowed to edit the document you’re currently working on. You can even modify that list right from that section.

Each one of your colleagues sports a different color, with each one applied to the elements added to a document. We felt this made it very simple to see at a glance who is allowed to modify different sections of a document.

To add an element, click on it, then move the cursor over to your document (no need to drag). You’ll see your cursor has that element attached to it. Position your cursor over the correct location and click to add the element.

Don’t worry if its position is not exactly right, you can now drag it and also resize it, until you’re happy with it. You’re also able to change which recipient gets to alter that element thanks to a pulldown menu above it.

Click again on your document to add the same element elsewhere. This makes it easy to quickly populate your file with editable text fields for instance, without having to go back to the sidebar each time. You’ll find that setting up a document with all relevant fields can be done very efficiently with this method.

• Preparing documents: 4/5

signNow: Completing documents

• Fill in just the sections you need, but the lack of formatting options is disappointing

Once your document is prepared, signNow brings you to the Send Invite section, which is where you set up how you’re going to notify the people who need to fill in the document. One recent feature is the ability to contact people via SMS as opposed to email. You get to customise your message for each, and when ready, click on ‘Send Invite’.

It’s a little odd to have to send an invite to yourself in order to begin filling in the fields you’ve added, and signing a document, but that’s how signNow works - treating you the same as all the other members of the team.

Once you’re in that stage, click on each field to enter the appropriate information. As you do, they will turn green, helping you see at a glance what you still need to do. You have no apparent ability to alter the font or perform any other formatting. This limits your options but also makes it easy to input the necessary data quickly.

Click on Finish, top right, when you’re done. Although if you’ve missed a field somewhere, signNow will inform you of that and even allow you to see where they’re located (most useful when working with multi-page docs. Selecting Close saves your work so you can get back to it later, and ‘Decline’, is pretty self-explanatory.

signNow’s main dashboard lets you see at a glance which documents have been done, which are incomplete, who hasn’t yet signed it, etc. You even have a way to resend invites to specific colleagues to nudge them gently. This is also where you can archive documents, print, download and delete them.

• Completing documents: 3.5/5

signNow: Scorecard

Should I buy...?

Buy it if...

You need to frequently work with others, and have to manage and monitor a list of colleagues who regularly fill in and sign documents.

Don't buy it if...

You’re less involved in working with and managing others, compared to filling in your own documents or you prefer using software over working online.