How We Compare Software

ChooseSaaS publishes comparisons and buying guides for small businesses choosing software. This page explains exactly how we reach our conclusions — and, just as important, what we do not claim to do.

The short version

Our reviews are analysis-based. We study product documentation, verify published pricing directly on vendor pricing pages, and compare published product specifications. We do not run laboratory benchmarks, and we do not pretend to. When a claim in our guides comes from a third party, we say so.

What we actually do

Every guide on this site follows the same four-step process:

1. Feature & spec analysis. We read the vendor's own documentation, feature lists, and changelogs to establish what each product actually does — as opposed to what its marketing page implies.
2. Pricing. We publish the vendor's listed prices as they appear on the vendor's own pricing page when a guide is written, and we note billing tiers, minimum seats, and hidden costs (onboarding fees, add-ons, price-per-feature traps). Prices move constantly, so treat every figure as indicative and confirm it with the vendor before you buy.
3. Documented limits and trade-offs. We read the vendor's own documentation, stated limits and changelog history, and we quote published independent lab results where the category has them, naming the lab and the test period. We do not scrape or aggregate G2, Capterra or TrustRadius scores, and we do not run hands-on lab tests ourselves. Where a guide quotes a third party, it says so.
4. Category comparison. Finally, we line the finalists up side by side — features, real costs, user sentiment, and fit for specific team sizes — and explain who each tool is right for, not just which one is "best."

Our scoring dimensions

When a guide includes scores, they are weighted as follows:

Dimension	Weight	What we look at
Core features	25%	Depth of must-have capabilities for the category, not the length of the feature list
Pricing transparency	20%	Public pricing, fair free tiers, predictable scaling costs, hidden fees
Ease of use	15%	Onboarding time, UI consistency, and what users say about day-to-day use
User satisfaction	15%	Vendor-published case studies and publicly documented product limitations
Integrations & scalability	15%	API quality, native integrations, and behavior as teams grow
Support & reliability	10%	Support channels by tier, SLAs, and public status-page history

Where our data comes from

• Vendor documentation, pricing pages, and changelogs
• Published documentation
• Vendor status pages and security disclosures
• Public benchmarks and lab results, when available — always attributed to the lab that produced them

What we don't do

• We don't run lab benchmarks or instrumented performance tests. When performance matters (e.g., VPNs, video tools), we cite independent labs that do.
• We don't collect our own user reviews. We do not publish user-satisfaction scores, because we have no first-party survey data to base them on.
• We don't accept paid placements or "review fees" from vendors. No vendor sees a review before it publishes.

How affiliate links interact with our ratings

Some links on this site are affiliate links: if you buy through one, the vendor pays us a commission at no extra cost to you. Commission rates never influence scores or rankings — our full affiliate disclosure explains the details, including how we handle products we have no financial relationship with.

Updates & corrections

Pricing and features change constantly. We re-check every guide at least quarterly, and sooner when a vendor ships a major release or price change. If you spot an error, email corrections@choosesaas.com — verified corrections are published within five business days, with a note.