--- title: Apache FreeMarker Reviews meta_title: 'Apache FreeMarker Reviews 2026: Details, Pricing, & Features | G2' meta_description: Filter 20 reviews by the users' company size, role or industry to find out how Apache FreeMarker works for a business like yours. aggregate_rating: rating_value: 4.0 review_count: 20 scale: '5' date_modified: '2026-05-17' parent_category: name: Collaboration & Productivity url: https://www.g2.com/categories/collaboration-productivity --- # Apache FreeMarker Reviews **Vendor:** The Apache Software Foundation **Category:** [Document Generation Software](https://www.g2.com/categories/document-generation) **Average Rating:** 4.0/5.0 **Total Reviews:** 20 ## About Apache FreeMarker Apache FreeMarker is a template engine and a Java library to generate text output (HTML web pages, e-mails, configuration files, source code, etc.) based on templates and changing data. ## Apache FreeMarker Reviews ### 1. It is very good template engine for dynamic web pages. **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Krishantha C. | Technical Specialist, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** December 07, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Really easy to use. This is great when we have so many web templates and it's giving the flexibility to adjust them accordingly. And of cause, it's Open Source and well documented and therefore we don't need to hard search to get something done. **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** Freemarker had almost everything I need. And also it's well documented. Therefore I had no issues with it while working on my requirements. So I don't have anything at this moment. But if I found something will inform them because it is a great and simple tool, and we need to improve that to sustain it in the market. **Recommendations to others considering Apache FreeMarker:** It is a great tool and easy to use. I did not want to contact them because I was able to find everything I want. So if you have an idea to use Freemarker or looking for a dynamic template engine I can guarantee that the Freemarker is a good choice. If you still have an issue with it, there are a lot of people out there to support you. **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** I had to generate multiple templates with the same set of backend data a long time ago. At that time it gave me huge flexibility to complete the requirement. And also with the tight deadline, I was able to complete it because of the good documentation and ease to use. And performance-wise also I do not need to worry about it because it is a lightweight tool. After that, I used it to generate complex dynamic web pages in a simple manner. ### 2. There's no better and easier data transformation tool out there **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Surya U. | Software Development Engineer II, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 29, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Freemarker has the least learning curve of all the transformation technologies. When compared with Xquery, Jsonpath, xpath etc. Freemarker is might weight and faster processing than the others. Combined with great built in functions and macros support and support for all the data structures of Java, I can't think of any other technology that comes even close to freemarker in this domain. **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** Though the documentation is pretty good, finding a function that does exactly what you need is a bit challenging. Also, the dateTime formatting libraries and their documentation could be improved. There's no good IDE support. Very few plugins in eclipse and IntelliJ offer support for freemarker linting. **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** I've used freemarker as a data transformation tool for JSON to XML and JSON to JSON transformations. Handling some complex transformations are where freemarker shows its elegance. It's easy to write and debug transformations using freemarker. Benefits are: 1) Support for all Java structures like map, set, lists etc 2) Very fast and light weight 3) Fast learning curve ### 3. Freemarker is best for message generation in desired format and Runtime UI components **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Banking | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** December 21, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Apache Freemarker is best for generating mesaage in any format eg xml,json,swift,fix and ISO messages. And also best for Runtime UI components. I have mainly used for generating message with different formats to other systems and also for converting one format to others Actually for conversion its best when compares to others **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** I used in most of the place i didn't see any cons over there **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** Easy to use and configure, Takes less time to integerate with the application ### 4. Powerful templates engine **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Waqas A. | Technical Lead, Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 25, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Apache free marker template have very powerful engine for processing ftl files with backing java Classes. Using free-marker you can design a framework that could be cross platform and have one json response across different platform i.e Android Ios **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** Sometimes its hard to get the error when ftl engine process the ftl and came across some error. Error description messages can be more well defined **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** Write and design a UI framework that is cross platform for Android and IOS. Same Libraries could be developed for cross platform mobile devices ### 5. Easy way for building dynamic email templates **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Computer Software | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** August 24, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Easily build the dynamic templates and connect them with blackened with MVC framework. It provides loops and conditional statements which makes it more easy to build those. **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** Need of variable declaration fot every backend values which kind of hectic one. So it will be great if we can use backend values directly in the code without need of variable. **Recommendations to others considering Apache FreeMarker:** Great tool for templates desi Add on features to make your templates compatible with different screens. **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** We are creating email templates using freemarker which helps us to notify our end user with different email design for different subjects. Which ofcourse makes good impression on user as they are not seeing any repeated mails again and again. ### 6. Free marker for web design **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Hari K. | Associate, Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** December 14, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** I had to generate multiple templates with the same set of backend data a long time ago. Great flexibility for web design **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** Solutions available in web were not enough to solve some issues **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** Quick development ### 7. Used number of templating languages in the past but without a doubt Freemarker is the easiest one **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Leisure, Travel & Tourism | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 28, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Simple and easy to read code, everything looks very natural and easy to understand. **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** Some syntax is harder to remember but I am glad they have an outstanding resources available online which is really helpful **Recommendations to others considering Apache FreeMarker:** I would highly recommend anyone who's looking a great backend templating language Freemarker is the great choice available **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** We were looking for a good templating language solution which could work perfectly with our CMS Alfresco and Freemarker was the perfect match made in heaven :) ### 8. Simple to use, help in reducing redundant code **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Publishing | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** December 06, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Mechanism to embed Code inside templates, exhaustive logical code construct support , simple syntax, easy to understand **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** Debugging mechanism was weak on eclipse, not sure if there is any other way to debug apart from traces **Recommendations to others considering Apache FreeMarker:** worth trying the product, it may help reducing lots of complex code **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** we have generated XML based configuration, based on JSON input through UI ### 9. Apache freemaker a great template engine which useful in generating text output **Rating:** 4.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Asanka S. | Technologist, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** September 01, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Open-source Flexibility of usage Good documentation **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** It has a considerable learning curve before usage **Recommendations to others considering Apache FreeMarker:** It is a great template engine to have a go **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** Generating dynamic contents for sending emails It provides nice templates and once configured it is much easier to use in the long run ### 10. Freemarker Review **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Information Technology and Services | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** December 05, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Powerful template language Multipurpose and lightweight Internationalization/localization-aware XML processing capabilities Versatile data-model **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** Error description can be improved also there is no good IDE support **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** designing a UI framework for that works efficiently on every platform ### 11. I used to generate web pages and email **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Information Technology and Services | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** August 31, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** We used this with Spring MVC as well before Thymeleaf arrives. A really good template engine does well with loops, lists, conditional statements. **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** FreeMarker is really good, but I would go with Thymeleaf if using with Spring **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** Geanarate dynamic web pages, email templates. ### 12. Excellent for XML generation **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Information Technology and Services | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** July 28, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Easy to use Java API Great Performance. Templates saves a lot of time by bypassing complete XML generation code. **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** Documentation can be improved. Developers need more samples so that they can easily start using Freemarker. Need more examples on JSON structures with nested arrays and one to many relationships. **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** Avoided the need to use Standard XML APIs for XML generation. Saves lot of time and effort. All I need is an XML template that can be populated by freemarker. ### 13. Lightweight but powerful **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Online Media | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** October 30, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Highly configurable and easy to use, great locale awareness **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** Looping over objects can be verbose and long winded **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** Multiple reports of similar format ### 14. Server side template engine **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Information Services | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** September 01, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** We were using free market template along with jquerh Ajax. And we found it easy to use. Data binding is easy. **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** Documentation part has a scope to be improved. Other than that I don't see any cons as of now. **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** It's a lightweight, fast and easy to use. ### 15. My review **Rating:** 2.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Financial Services | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** July 23, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Using Freemarker to create ticket templates ant data collection files. Ease access to the Java methods, variables and operate them. **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** A little bit confused language syntax, need more time to understand other peoples written code. **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** Creating templates for POS financial tickets. ### 16. Used in struts2 **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Computer Software | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** August 14, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Great Performance and the way it handles some things (like whitespace), comparing to other template engines **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** The documentation was not so good at that time **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** Creating a custom struts2 theme ### 17. Perfect way to develope content templates **Rating:** 5.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Human Resources | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** August 31, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Easy to integrate to our webcms liferay. **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** New classes and functions would be really nice **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** Different user approaches. ### 18. Good for building simple templates , there is better template builder from Spring **Rating:** 3.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Internet | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** August 13, 2020 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** Good for building simple templates,simple to use **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** there is better template builder from Spring **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** building template for emails ### 19. Apache Freemarker template review **Rating:** 3.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Information Technology and Services | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** March 01, 2019 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** The way it provides a way to parse JSON objects in HTML code **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** I wish it had more functionalities and parsing backwards with .. doesn't look good with nested objects. Wish it had a better way. **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** Templating JSON objects in HTML ### 20. A novice IT user..LOL **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Christina A. | Secretary, Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** May 15, 2018 **What do you like best about Apache FreeMarker?** That it was not overly to hard for someone with limited IT experience to use. **What do you dislike about Apache FreeMarker?** some areas were confusing.. had to go back a couple times and restart but we have just started using this program. **What problems is Apache FreeMarker solving and how is that benefiting you?** It makes it nice when it comes to putting sales documents together and the branding of them. ## Apache FreeMarker Discussions - [What is Apache FreeMarker used for?](https://www.g2.com/discussions/what-is-apache-freemarker-used-for) - [View Apache FreeMarker pricing details and edition comparison](https://www.g2.com/products/apache-freemarker/reviews?section=pricing&secure%5Bexpires_at%5D=2026-07-01+00%3A35%3A47+-0500&secure%5Bsession_id%5D=9641d14c-fb42-4800-baea-10b10b27f6e1&secure%5Btoken%5D=cc09870c9e9de7b3e08c185bf4cf4d97a0e52d413881ba9b07c5596b343f05b5&format=llm_user) ## Apache FreeMarker Features **Data Sources** - Software - Spreadsheets - Documents **Generation** - Templates - Automation - Branding **Delivery** - Workflow - Schedule - Batch **Generative AI** - AI Text Generation - AI Text Summarization - AI Text-to-Image - AI Image-to-Text **Agentic AI - Document Generation** - Autonomous Task Execution ## Top Apache FreeMarker Alternatives - [Conga Composer](https://www.g2.com/products/conga-composer/reviews) - 4.4/5.0 (834 reviews) - [Adobe Acrobat](https://www.g2.com/products/adobe-acrobat/reviews) - 4.5/5.0 (4,578 reviews) - [Wondershare PDFelement](https://www.g2.com/products/wondershare-wondershare-pdfelement/reviews) - 4.5/5.0 (1,028 reviews)