Same six-judge panel, same rubric — and the benches split by criterion. softgarden takes sovereignty 7.3 to 3.2 and applicant data governance 5.5 to 2.0, with six judges leaning softgarden on each, plus AI screening control 3.0 to 1.7 with five leans and one tie. d.vinci takes integrations and handover 2.8 to 1.7 with six leaning d.vinci, and job distribution 5.0 to 4.2 with five leaning d.vinci. Pricing transparency favors d.vinci at 5.2 to 4.5, with three leans d.vinci and three ties; candidate pipeline splits too: 3.7 to 3.3 for d.vinci, but two judges lean d.vinci, one softgarden, three tie. Weighted totals favor softgarden with five of six judges; employer branding sits level at 4.4 to 4.4. Both are DE-jurisdiction with EU-only data residency; d.vinci's ownership is founder-held and its subprocessor exposure US Cloud Act, softgarden's ownership unknown and subprocessor exposure EU-only.
Choose d.vinci if
You need integrations and handover — six judges lean d.vinci there, 2.8 to 1.7, the strongest lean of d.vinci's bench
Your team posts broadly and needs distribution reach — five judges lean d.vinci on job distribution, 5.0 to 4.2, with multiposting to over 500 job boards, Google for Jobs optimization and a career page the vendor calls "100% barrierefrei"
You want module prices you can read before a sales call — three judges lean d.vinci on pricing transparency, 5.2 to 4.5, with applicant management "ab 785 € pro Monat", career pages "ab 399 € pro Monat" and onboarding "ab 1020 € pro Monat"
Founder-held ownership is a requirement — d.vinci's sovereignty attributes list founder-held ownership, while softgarden's list ownership as unknown
Choose softgarden if
You need documented applicant-data governance — six judges lean softgarden, 5.5 to 2.0, on German data-centre hosting at named providers WIIT AG (formerly myLoc) and Equinix Germany GmbH in Frankfurt and Düsseldorf, a downloadable processing agreement and ISO 27001/27017/27018 certification
Sovereignty leads your shortlist — six judges lean softgarden, 7.3 to 3.2; its subprocessor exposure is listed as EU-only while d.vinci's is listed as US Cloud Act
AI screening control is a gate in your evaluation — five judges lean softgarden, 3.0 to 1.7 with one tie; the d.vinci verdict found no public information on what its career-page AI agent does, which provider runs it or whether it can be switched off
Your data protection officer or works council signs off on the purchase — their weighted totals are 4.6 to 2.8 and 4.1 to 2.5 for softgarden
Read this comparison as one judge. Each weighs the same scores by what they care about.
The Skeptic
Has read "DSGVO-konform" and "AI-powered matching" on every page in this category. Reads instead for the deletion deadline that is actually configured, the AI feature that can actually be turned off, and what the invoice does when a job goes out to three paid boards.
d.vinci
softgarden
This judge's pick
Criterion by criterion
Applicant management & hiring workflow
d.vinci
Configurable workflows with roles and rights, management of multiple legal entities, and unlimited users are stated, but we found no public information on pipeline stages per job, structured scorecards, interview scheduling, templated candidate communication, or any record of who moved a candidate and why. A decision here is made, not documented, on the evidence captured.
softgarden
The captured pages show an application overview with team communication, a dashboard with recruiting KPIs like time-to-hire, and a system history that logs access attempts and changes to records — more than a bare inbox. But we found no public information on configurable pipeline stages per job, hiring-manager access limited to their own vacancies, structured scorecards, or interview scheduling; the module list names a KI screening and interview assistant without saying how any decision is documented.
Multiposting, career page & candidate experience
d.vinci
Multiposting to more than 500 job boards, Google for Jobs optimisation, application via XING, LinkedIn or upload, and career pages stated as "100% barrierefrei" with one-click translations are all claimed — but not a single German board is named in the captures. We found no public information on booking or budget tracking per board, source attribution per applicant, or candidates seeing their own status and withdrawing themselves.
softgarden
Multiposting to more than 1,200 jobboards plus social media and Google Ads is stated, alongside a hosted career page, SEO-optimised ads, and per-ad analysis of conversion rates and entry channels — that is real measurement, not just broadcast. We found no public information on which German boards are covered, Google-for-Jobs markup, mobile application without an account, application-form configurability, or accessibility.
Retention, deletion & talent-pool consent
d.vinci
The privacy policy states a purpose- and statute-limited retention principle and double opt-in for the newsletter, but it reads as the vendor's website policy: we found no public information on a configurable deletion deadline after rejection, talent-pool consent with expiry, a documented way to answer an access or erasure request, or any access and export log. This is the criterion the employer is liable for, and the captured pages are effectively silent on the product side of it.
softgarden
This one is documented rather than merely promised: automatic deletion of applicant data configurable by the responsible party, a recommended six-month retention period, a four-week deadline for answering data-subject requests, a downloadable processing agreement, and a system history logging access attempts and changes to records. What holds it back: we found no public information on talent-pool consent or its expiry, candidate self-service, per-country retention rules, or how deletion propagates to backups and to the job boards the system posts to.
AI screening transparency & control
d.vinci
An "integrierter AI-Agent" is marketed as a career-page feature with no statement of what it does, which model or provider runs it, or whether a customer can turn it off; the one-click translations sit next to it with the same opacity. We found no public information on per-feature switches, EU processing for AI, protected-attribute handling, or the vendor's EU AI Act position.
softgarden
AI is used for job-ad texts, communication, candidate matching and process structuring, marketed as "Transparent und ohne Blackbox", with named KI Screening Assistant and KI Interview Assistant modules — a benefit claim with a general assurance, not documentation. We found no public information on the inputs the matching evaluates, a per-feature switch, whether a rejection can occur without a human action, candidate notification, or the model provider behind these features; the published subcontractor list names Textkernel and Cronofy without tying either to the matching.
HR handover, integrations & API
d.vinci
Interfaces "für die Anbindung diverser Partner" exist for both the applicant-management and onboarding products, and a Microsoft Teams integration covers video interviews — but no partner is named, no API is documented, and no handover to a German HR or payroll system appears in the captures. We found no public information on SSO, SCIM, e-signature or webhooks.
softgarden
An onboarding module and multi-client capability are described as softgarden's own offering, and the subcontractor list names Cronofy, but the captured pages never say what Cronofy is used for. We found no public information on an API, SSO, e-signature, webhooks, or handover to a named HR system such as Personio or DATEV-connected systems — so the hire's path into payroll stays invisible to a buyer.
European sovereignty
d.vinci
The contracting entity is solidly European — d.vinci HR-Systems GmbH, Amtsgericht Hamburg, HRB 93221 — but the subprocessors the privacy policy names (Dovetail in Australia, Figma on US AWS, Google, Zendesk with a Frankfurt data centre) serve the vendor's own website and support, and we found no public information on where the SaaS hosts applicant data or which subprocessors sit in the product chain. Hosting, the CV and application data location, and the AI agent's processing location are all unstated on the captured pages.
softgarden
The captured pages show a German contracting entity in Berlin, hosting in German data centres on named providers (WIIT and Equinix in Frankfurt and Düsseldorf), a published subcontractor list, a statement that no third-country transfer of applicant data occurs, a downloadable processing agreement, and ISO 27001/27017/27018 certification. Three things keep it below the top band: ownership is not evidenced, the provider behind the AI matching is not named, and the support chain includes Intercom — engaged via its Irish entity and argued to act as controller with only business email addresses shared, but the US Cloud Act exposure remains.
Pricing transparency
d.vinci
Starting prices are public for all three modules — applicant management "ab 785 € pro Monat", career pages "ab 399 € pro Monat", onboarding "ab 1020 € pro Monat" — with the basis named as employee count, unlimited users, postings and onboardings, support included, and implementation workshops charged separately. But we found no public information on the price table for a given employee count, job-board posting costs, the minimum term, or VAT treatment, so the real annual invoice is not computable from these pages.
softgarden
The Core package is public at "ab 199 € / Monat" with its basis and limits stated — five included jobs, unlimited users — and the VAT treatment is given ("Alle Preise zzgl. MwSt."), plus a brochure claiming to contain all packages, functions and prices. But the All-in-One tier is "Individuelle Preisgestaltung", and we found no public information on job-board posting costs for the multiposting module, prices for the AI assistants, or the minimum term — so the invoice for a larger hiring volume is not computable from public pages.
Sovereignty, side by side
Dimension
d.vinci
softgarden
Legal entity
Incorporated in DE
Incorporated in DE
Ownership
Founder-held
Not determined
Data residency
Not determined
EU only
Subprocessors
US CLOUD Act reach
Not determined
Facts, side by side
Only facts both products carry under the same definition — anything else would not be a fair row.