--- title: CrafterCMS Reviews meta_title: 'CrafterCMS Reviews 2026: Details, Pricing, & Features | G2' meta_description: Filter 18 reviews by the users' company size, role or industry to find out how CrafterCMS works for a business like yours. aggregate_rating: rating_value: 4.5 review_count: 18 scale: '5' date_modified: '2026-08-07' parent_category: name: Content Management url: https://www.g2.com/categories/content-management --- # CrafterCMS Reviews **Vendor:** Crafter Software **Category:** [Web Content Management Software](https://www.g2.com/categories/web-content-management) **Average Rating:** 4.5/5.0 **Total Reviews:** 18 ## About CrafterCMS CrafterCMS is the AI-native, Java-based headless CMS built for modern enterprise digital experiences such as global websites, e-commerce experiences, employee intranets, customer portals, mobile apps, OTT video apps, conversational AI experiences, and more. It replaces the limitations of traditional, monolithic content management with a developer-first, API-driven architecture designed for speed, scale, and long-term platform evolution. Built on Java and Spring, CrafterCMS integrates natively with modern AI technologies—including Spring AI, OpenSearch vector database, and CrafterQ AI agents—to power intelligent, governed, and brand-safe content experiences. Its true headless design delivers clean APIs for React, Next.js, Vue, Angular, mobile apps, and conversational AI interfaces, without locking teams into proprietary front-end stacks. CrafterCMS treats content as code. With a Git-based content repository, XML content models, Groovy scripting, and FreeMarker templating, it enables modern DevContentOps workflows and makes content, configuration, and UI artifacts fully accessible to AI coding tools such as Github Copilot, Cursor and Claude Code. Developers gain full control and extensibility, while content teams benefit from visual authoring, omnichannel delivery, and AI-assisted productivity without sacrificing governance or accuracy. Enterprises can deploy CrafterCMS to match their operational and security requirements, with options including self-hosted/self-managed with enterprise support, fully managed private SaaS, and community-supported open source. Learn more at craftercms.com. ## CrafterCMS Reviews ### 1. The author experience is good. The developer experience can use some work. **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Higher Education | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** February 01, 2023 **What do you like best about CrafterCMS?** The authoring experience is pretty good. I like that Crafter puts a lot of thought into content management and makes developers and authors focus on how that content is managed within the system. I have seen other CMS systems where the CMS turns into a swamp of content. **What do you dislike about CrafterCMS?** While I like that Crafter handles everything via Git repositories, sometimes the underlying Crafter repository seeps its way into my developer's processes -- the Crafter repository is a leaky abstraction. The code forward/content back model proposed by Crafter is good in theory. But dealing with DEV/STAGE/PROD release cycles can get messy very fast because the content is getting created at all three levels, DEV/STAGE for testing and PROD for the real content. Then if you have to change the configuration files in one of the upstream environments (STAGE or PROD) -- a hotfix config change -- that makes merging your code from DEV messy. I would like to see more effort put into improving this developer experience. I don't like the fact that groovy is the only programming choice for most things in Crafter. We should also have the option to use Typescript/Javascript throughout. **What problems is CrafterCMS solving and how is that benefiting you?** Crafter allows our content creators to create and publish changes outside our normal product release cycles. Once the developers have enabled the in-content editing, there are now large parts of the application developers don't even concern themselves with. This allows our developers to focus on our sites' more dynamic, data-oriented features without worrying about managing large blocks of static content. Our developers are also recommending new content areas that authors can manage, which means they are starting to understand the benefits of content modeling. **Official Response from Mike Vertal:** > Thanks for the feedback! We do put a lot of thought into management of content and the authoring UX, especially as content size grows, so we're glad you're seeing the benefits. We're working on both more documentation and more tooling for the Code Forward/Content Back processes to better help with the setup and management of it, especially when use case complexity increases. I think it's fair to say that managing content across environments is a real business need and is technically challenging (even more so when you are working with a traditional CMS built around a database). Our Git-based content repo makes many processes and tasks easier and more efficient. Git branching also makes larger site updates, site redesigns, and segregation of highly secure content easy. But there's more we can do to make things easier and more efficient. We'll keep working on it! In all cases, it's important to use a branching strategy and flow that keeps environment-specific content in that environment. It's also worth noting that CrafterCMS has a Javascript SDK which you can find here: https://www.npmjs.com/search?q=craftercms You can use our native Javascript bindings on the content delivery system for any site/app development (e.g., using Nodejs, Nextjs, Nuxtjs). Our authoring UI, Crafter Studio, is also Typescript/React-based so any authoring UI development is also Javascript. The only type of development where Groovy is the "only" programming language option is server-side programming within Crafter Studio. ### 2. Does the job! **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Entertainment | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** March 19, 2020 **What do you like best about CrafterCMS?** Prompt customer service. Easy to send in tickets with issues. Can handle a large database without being slow. Love the new publishing options for the new system update. **What do you dislike about CrafterCMS?** System updates take months. And some fixes mysteriously can't be addressed until a system update patch comes through, which means I'm stuck with a bad UI for months. New Crafter update has some streamlined improvements, but doing away with scrolling menus makes using the sidebar soooo slow and clunky. Bring back scrolling for sifting through large databases! Clicking to "next 10" for a database with hundreds of entries is maddening. **What problems is CrafterCMS solving and how is that benefiting you?** Helped to turn a massive database of content into an easily manageable website. **Official Response from Russ Danner:** > Thank you for the review! Here are a couple of tips on CrafterCMS v4's Studio user interface: Based on your comment, you may not have noticed the new filtering feature within the sidebar. This is handy when navigating a large volume of content. Take a look at this documentation: https://docs.craftercms.org/en/4.0/content-authors/content-authors-pages.html#adding-a-page In the figure, you will see a little magnifying glass. Click this to search for your content rather than paging through a ton of other content to find it. Another cool feature in CrafterCMS v4 Studio UI is that it's totally configurable, and there are alternatives for the various widgets. If you don't like how the current widgets work, there's a good chance they can be replaced with a different widget or reconfigured to function in a way that is better for you. For more information, check out this link or feel free to reach out to me, and I'll help: https://docs.craftercms.org/en/4.0/site-administrators/studio-configuration.html ### 3. Industrial strength and open standards-based **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Online Media | Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** January 26, 2023 **What do you like best about CrafterCMS?** I like that the delivery (website in our case) is separate from the authoring environment, which means we can deploy releases at any time without impacting the end user. **What do you dislike about CrafterCMS?** The version that we currently use requires an instance of Elastic that is outside of the Crafter environment and our internal security policy makes that difficult to maintain. **What problems is CrafterCMS solving and how is that benefiting you?** We are using CrafterCMS to store and maintain content related to a public website. The information served on the site is a combination of video-on-demand, live-streaming video and articles. A consolidated platform to maintain access to this content is beneficial. **Official Response from Mike Vertal:** > Thanks for the review! Our truly decoupled architecture (separate authoring and delivery systems) has many advantages, including the ability to deploy new releases without impacting end users as you have indicated. Also note, CrafterCMS has always supported an out-of-the box installation of Elasticsearch. Please contact our customer success team if you would like help switching to the built-in Elasticsearch service. ### 4. Crafter CMS from Ops Perspective **Rating:** 3.5/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Verified User in Information Technology and Services | Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.) **Reviewed Date:** January 26, 2023 **What do you like best about CrafterCMS?** Crafter CMS has a great support team that is very helpful during challenging times. Logging options are very flexible which helps to quickly diagnose problems. Updating content, deploying the changes across the cluster are very simple tasks. From a development & deployment perspective, Crafter is a dream. **What do you dislike about CrafterCMS?** My biggest dislike is the way Crafter syncs data between repos. I suppose Git is a better than the old option of Alfresco, but Git working across clusters has been prone to conflicts which are sometimes a mess to work through. There's got to be a better way. **What problems is CrafterCMS solving and how is that benefiting you?** Crafter continues to upgrade their products to be more user-friendly. That allows me to spend less time troubleshooting Crafter servers which is very helpful. ### 5. The best experience and software to improve the company. **Rating:** 4.0/5.0 stars **Reviewed by:** Joan V. | Enterprise (> 1000 emp.) **Reviewed Date:** July 30, 2020 **What do you like best about CrafterCMS?** Its tools allow for better organization and content management for our WEB portal. Likewise, an optimal development for your brand is achieved since it will allow the employee to create content more easily. The structure stage system allows you to freely edit the designs you want since it is possible to use C + or java languages in order to offer the best ease of creating and improving, very efficient and I like it. **What do you dislike about CrafterCMS?** I have no complaints, although on some occasions we have been forced to consult with CMS experts since our virtual platform was outdated, which can be frustrating waiting for some help is a negative point for the system, however the tools comply, needs optimization. **Recommendations to others considering CrafterCMS:** You will be able to build or rebuild your website effectively since the tools are perfect to do it quickly, achieving the best results. For this reason and for the success achieved thanks to the help of Crafter CMS I have no doubts that we will continue to work together. **What problems is CrafterCMS solving and how is that benefiting you?** We achieved growth on our WEB page and clients are very happy, they enjoy being able to observe our content since it is very organized and attractive. In addition, it supports us more and more to find data that our clients are fascinated by in order to create attractive entries and generate more traffic, they are definitely useful tools. ## CrafterCMS Discussions - [What is Crafter delivery?](https://www.g2.com/discussions/what-is-crafter-delivery) - 1 comment - [How Crafter CMS works?](https://www.g2.com/discussions/how-crafter-cms-works) - 1 comment - [View CrafterCMS pricing details and edition comparison](https://www.g2.com/products/craftercms/reviews?filters%5Bnps_score%5D%5B%5D=4§ion=pricing&secure%5Bexpires_at%5D=2026-08-12+11%3A15%3A33+-0500&secure%5Bsession_id%5D=10f790e7-fad7-4367-8c2f-0a7f80b50a6c&secure%5Btoken%5D=f3bff8b4f9ef4b16ab889542d55ee83255a83f781a64262d40dcf3b9f8e268cf&format=llm_user) ## CrafterCMS Integrations - [Angular](https://www.g2.com/products/angular/reviews) - [AWS and Cloud Services](https://www.g2.com/products/aws-and-cloud-services/reviews) - [AWS Bedrock](https://www.g2.com/products/aws-bedrock/reviews) - [AWS CodePipeline for CI/CD Automation](https://www.g2.com/products/aws-codepipeline-for-ci-cd-automation/reviews) - [Bootstrap](https://www.g2.com/products/bootstrap/reviews) - [ChatGPT](https://www.g2.com/products/openai-chatgpt/reviews) - [Claude](https://www.g2.com/products/claude-2025-12-11/reviews) - [Docker](https://www.g2.com/products/docker-inc-docker/reviews) - [GitHub](https://www.g2.com/products/github/reviews) - [GitLab](https://www.g2.com/products/gitlab/reviews) - [Groovy](https://www.g2.com/products/groovy/reviews) - [HubSpot Content Hub](https://www.g2.com/products/hubspot-content-hub/reviews) - [OpenSearch](https://www.g2.com/products/opensearch/reviews) - [Reactjs Development](https://www.g2.com/products/reactjs-development/reviews) - [Salesforce Headless 360 Platform (formerly Salesforce Platform)](https://www.g2.com/products/agentforce-360-platform-formerly-salesforce-platform/reviews) - [Spring](https://www.g2.com/products/spring-spring/reviews) - [Vue.js](https://www.g2.com/products/vue-js/reviews) ## CrafterCMS Features **Additional Functionality** - Metadata Management - Version Control - Collaboration Tools - Rapid Creation - Video Tagging - Social Promotion - Filtering - Commenting/Notes - Privacy Options - Multi-Channel Marketing - Mobile Screen Support - Video Editing - Live Streaming - Inside the Video Search - Brand Overlay - Customizable Branding - Presentation Streaming - Alerts/Notifications - Multimedia Support - Real-Time Analytics - Video Creation - Content Library - Screen Recording - Closed Captions - Image Library - Website Analytics - Video Archiving - Video Support - Customizable Templates - Visual Analytics - Drag & Drop - Multi-Channel Distribution - Workflow Management - Access Controls/Permissions - Engagement Tracking - Multiple Format Support - Labeling - Social Media Integration - API - Single Sign On - File Management - Template Management - Social Sharing - Communication Management - Tagging - Search/Filter - Generative AI - SSL Security - Video Streaming - Reporting & Statistics - Content Management - AI Copilot - Video Looping - Video Management - Activity Dashboard - Reporting/Analytics - Third-Party Integrations - Bulk Uploading **Content** - Content Authoring - Rich Text Editor - Versioning - Plug-ins/Widgets/Apps - Approval Process - Content Scheduling - Asset Management - Internal Search - Content Repository - SEO Management - eCommerce Management - Forms Management - Campaign Management - Media Management - Drag & Drop Editor - Audio Editor **Analytics** - Web Analytics - Campaign Tracking - Audience Insights - Reports & Dashboards - Personalization - Marketing Automation - Activity Tracking - Reporting/Analytics **Publishing** - Automated Publishing - Multi-language - AR/VR Capability **Content Type** - Video Streaming - Audio-Only Streaming **Design** - Breadth of Pre-Built Templates - Mobile - Branding/Themes - Customization **Content Management** - Customizable Templated Workflows - Asset Management - Portals and Sites - SEO Management - Campaign Management - Metadata Management - Calendar Management - Audio File Management - Asset Lifecycle Management - Content Management - Brand Management - Document Management - Template Management **Development** - Image Management - Reuseable Content - Unlimited Environments - Form Builder - Web Forms - Customizable Forms - User Management - Workflow Management - Template Management - Compliance Management - Asset Lifecycle Management - Website Management - Document Management - SEO Management - Content Management - Multi-Channel Management - Integrated Development Environment - File Management **CDN Type** - Built-In Content Delivery Network (CDN) - Content Delivery Network (CDN) Integrations **Platform** - User Community - SEO - Flexible Navigation Structures - User, Role, and Access Management - Enterprise Scalability - Internationalization - Dashboards and Reports - API **Design & Development** - No-Code App Development - Low-Code App Development **Analytics** - Personalization - Interactive Content **Monetization** - Subscription Video-On-Demand (SVOD) - Advertising Video-On-Demand (AVOD) - Transactional Video-On-Demand (TVOD) **Content Delivery** - Multi-Device Delivery - Multilanguage Support - Website Hosting - Application Development **Agentic AI - Web Content Management** - Cross-system Integration - Natural Language Interaction - Social Media Integration **Agentic AI - Headless CMS** - Cross-system Integration - Third-Party Integrations **Agentic AI - Digital Experience Platforms** - Autonomous Task Execution - Cross-system Integration - Adaptive Learning - Proactive Assistance - Decision Making - Third-Party Integration **Additional Functionality** - AI/Machine Learning - Reporting/Analytics - Collaboration Tools - Image Editing - Website Publishing Options - Chatbot - Content Publishing Options - Text Editing - Access Control - Website Accessibility Tools - Content Delivery - Content Personalization - Configurable Workflow - Generative AI - Alerts/Notifications - Video Editing - AI Copilot - Performance Testing - Activity Monitoring - Multi-Channel Distribution **Additional Functionality** - Search/Filter - AI Copilot - Commenting/Notes - Content Publishing Options - Reporting & Statistics - Content Library - Document Classification - Drag & Drop - API - Multi-Channel Distribution - Customizable Templates - Customizable Forms - Alerts/Notifications - A/B Testing - Generative AI **Additional Functionality** - A/B Testing - Full Text Search - Two-Factor Authentication - SDKs - Content Publishing Options - Multi-Channel Marketing - Image Editing - API - Content Library - Mobile Access - Reporting/Analytics - AI Copilot - De-Coupled Front & Back Ends - Collaboration Tools - Activity Dashboard - Generative AI - Customizable Templates - Text Editing - Drag & Drop - Rich Text Editor - Scheduling - Tagging - Single Sign On - Configurable Workflow - Categorization/Grouping - Preview Functionality - Multi-Channel Distribution - For Marketers - Version Control - Approval Process Control - Filtering - For Developers - Website Analytics - Role-Based Permissions - Historical Reporting - Access Controls/Permissions - Email Marketing - Loyalty Program - Customer Touchpoints - Customer Segmentation - Web/Mobile App Development - Product Catalog - Inventory Optimization - Multi-Location - Data Synchronization - Inventory Tracking - Customer Database - Activity Tracking - Multi-Currency - Shopping Cart - Reporting & Statistics - Customer Accounts - Conversion Tracking - CRM - Search/Filter - Barcode/Ticket Scanning - SSL Security - Alerts/Notifications - Secure Login - Document Review - Content Delivery - Customizable Branding - Secure Data Storage - Document Storage - Mobile Capture - Offline Access - Templates - File Sharing - Data Capture and Transfer **Generative AI** - AI Image-to-Text - AI Text-to-Video - AI Text-to-Music - AI Text-to-3D **Agentic AI - OTT Platforms** - Multi-step Planning - Cross-system Integration ## Top CrafterCMS Alternatives - [Contentful](https://www.g2.com/products/contentful/reviews) - 4.3/5.0 (312 reviews) - [Craft CMS](https://www.g2.com/products/craft-cms/reviews) - 4.2/5.0 (48 reviews) - [Adobe Experience Manager](https://www.g2.com/products/adobe-experience-manager/reviews) - 4.2/5.0 (663 reviews)