As of 28 Oct 2026, the panel rates inFlow Inventory 2.5/5 and Katana 3/5 in Supply Chain & Logistics. Weighted by what each judge cares about, 2 of the 6 judges pick inFlow Inventory and 4 pick Katana. inFlow Inventory scores higher on 3 of 7 criteria (Pricing transparency, Warehouse operations: receiving, picking & packing and Multi-carrier shipping & returns). Katana scores higher on 3 of 7 criteria (European sovereignty, Freight & transport management and Integrations, automation & exit). Provenance — inFlow Inventory: Rest of world; Katana: EU-Made. Ratings are the AI panel’s opinion, formed from public evidence: how scores are made.
The benches split rather than settle. inFlow Inventory is ahead on pricing transparency (6.3 vs 4.7, six judges leaning inFlow), warehouse operations (6.2 vs 5.8) and shipping and returns (4.5 vs 4.2). Katana is ahead on sovereignty (5.8 vs 3.5, six judges leaning Katana) and marginally on integration and automation (6.5 vs 6.3) and freight and transport (1.2 vs 1.0). Inventory control sits level at 7.5 apiece, with two judges leaning each way and two ties. Weighted totals favor Katana for four judges and inFlow Inventory for two. Sovereignty attributes as they stand: Katana lists data residency EU only and legal entity jurisdiction Estonia; inFlow Inventory lists data residency US default and legal entity jurisdiction unknown; both list US Cloud Act subprocessor exposure. The captured pages give different statements on where Katana's data lives.
Choose inFlow Inventory if
You need published prices before you commit: pricing transparency leaned to inFlow Inventory with six judges (6.3 vs 4.7), and the four tiers are published at Lite 79, Core 229, Pro 389 and Max 539 EUR/mo billed annually.
Your team runs stock across multiple locations and sublocations with reorder points set per location: warehouse operations leaned to inFlow Inventory (6.2 vs 5.8, two judges leaning its way, four ties).
You print parcel labels through EasyPost or ShipStation on your own carrier accounts and handle returns on the sales order: shipping and returns leaned to inFlow Inventory (4.5 vs 4.2).
You weigh the warehouse manager's and fulfilment provider's views of the panel: those two judges scored inFlow Inventory higher in weighted totals (6.4 vs 5.3 and 5.7 vs 5.4).
Choose Katana if
You need EU data residency: Katana's data residency attribute is EU only, and six judges leaned Katana on sovereignty (5.8 vs 3.5) — noting that the captured pages give different statements on where Katana's data lives.
Your team manufactures: Katana's verdict covers production management and reorder quantities computed from stock, forecast demand, safety stock and MOQ, with inventory control level at 7.5.
You sell on WooCommerce, BigCommerce or eBay: those connectors appear in Katana's integration verdict, and integration and automation leaned Katana (6.5 vs 6.3, two judges leaning its way).
You require a known EU legal entity: Katana's legal entity jurisdiction is Estonia, while inFlow Inventory's is listed as unknown.
You weigh the ecommerce operations lead, transport planner, integration lead and skeptic views of the panel: four judges scored Katana higher in weighted totals.
Read this comparison as one judge. Each weighs the same scores by what they care about.
The Fulfilment Provider
Runs a 3PL warehouse with twenty-two client brands, each on a different shop system. Wants one WMS that keeps every client's stock and orders apart, connects to whatever shop the next client brings, ships on the client's own carrier contracts or the house rates, and turns picks, storage and packaging into a client invoice.
inFlow Inventory
This judge's pick
Katana
Criterion by criterion
Inventory & stock control
inFlow Inventory
Stock lives per location with bin and aisle positions, full inventory counts, and end-to-end lot, serial and expiry traceability including FEFO and FIFO suggestions; reorder points run per product and per location, purchase orders are tracked, and fulfilled sales push updated levels back to the connected storefronts. That is close to a proper stock ledger, though we found no public information on movements being booked with a reason and a named user, a stated valuation method, or demand forecasting. For a 3PL like mine we also found no public information on keeping several client brands' stock apart as separate entities.
Katana
Stock movements are tracked in real time with adjustments recorded in the item's history, batches are shown in FIFO order with expired batches blocked at the picking step, serial numbers are booked with recorded adjustments, bins and multiple locations are supported, kits resolve through bills of materials, and reorder quantities are calculated from forecast demand, safety stock and MOQ. I found no public information on stocktaking or cycle counts or on a stated inventory valuation method, and for a house like mine the native 3PL link with stock levels and inbound shipments is itself listed as coming soon, with nothing on keeping many client brands' stock apart as separate entities.
The floor work is genuinely covered: goods receipt against purchase orders with lot assignment, pick lists sorted along an efficient sublocation path, automatic allocations that stop two pickers taking the same units, several sublocation picking strategies, and a rugged Android scanner alongside DYMO and Zebra label printers. We found no public information on batch, wave or multi-order picking, putaway suggestions, packing verification, or pick and error rates per user and shift. The multi-client operation with client billing that my warehouse runs on also has no public information behind it.
Katana
The warehouse app covers receiving against purchase orders, picking and packing tasks driven from the sales order, QR or barcode scanning from any device with a camera, automatic task assignment, operator attribution on each packed order, storage bins, and batch discipline with manager pre-assignment and partial fulfillments split into separate tasks. I found no public information on batch, wave or trolley picking strategies, putaway suggestions, named handheld scanner support, or pick, pack and error rates per user and shift, which are the numbers I would run the shift by.
Multi-carrier shipping & returns
inFlow Inventory
Labels are bought through EasyPost and ShipStation on the client's own carrier accounts, billed directly by the carrier, with rate comparison across FedEx, USPS, UPS and others, saved parcel sizes, and customer shipment emails when the parcel is picked up; returns are processed with refund or credit and restock-or-discard. We found no public information on automatic carrier-selection rules, customs documents, a self-service returns portal, bulk label runs, or tracking numbers written back to the shop.
Katana
Label work is evidenced through named partners ShipStation, Shippo and 2Ship rather than in the product itself, the shipping overview notes that e-commerce orders often ship through the platform's own options, and tracking numbers are stored on the sales order to monitor delivery. Returns are handled internally and credibly, linked to the original sales order with item-level reasons, selective restocking, Shopify return sync and automatic credit notes in QuickBooks Online, but I found no public information on shipping rules choosing carriers, customs documents, branded tracking pages, pickup points, own carrier contracts, or a customer-facing returns portal.
Freight & transport management
inFlow Inventory
The documented shipping is parcel-only, through EasyPost and ShipStation; the single mention of freight is a field recording shipping cost on a sales order. We found no public information on pallet or groupage booking, CMR or digital delivery documents, freight invoice checking against agreed prices, or CO2 per shipment.
Katana
The only freight-adjacent material I found is an integration to a third-party shipping platform, 2Ship, and the ability to store shipping addresses and tracking information on B2B and EDI sales orders. I found no public information on pallet, groupage or truckload booking, freight quotes or tenders, transport documents such as CMR, freight cost audit, or CO2 emissions per shipment.
Integrations, automation & exit
inFlow Inventory
There are connectors to Shopify, WooCommerce, Amazon, Squarespace and Square, accounting through QuickBooks Online and Xero, Zapier and Extensiv, plus a documented REST/JSON read-write API with MCP support and CSV export of most record types on exit. The API requires an add-on on select plans, support routes API questions to the developers, and export leaves manufacture orders, attachments and settings behind. We found no public information on webhooks, EDI, an order-routing rule engine, API rate limits, or DATEV-class accounting exports.
Katana
The connector list covers Shopify, BigCommerce, WooCommerce, Amazon and eBay with automatic stock updates, QuickBooks and Xero sync for invoices and bills, an open API with manageable keys and webhooks, Zapier, community-built apps, and AI-assistant access via an MCP server; custom integrations including EDI and 3PL links are built by the vendor's engineers on the top plan. For my mix of client shops the gaps matter: I found no public information on ERP connectors, documented API rate limits and versioning, or a documented export of orders, stock and shipment history when a contract ends.
European sovereignty
inFlow Inventory
The contracting entity is Archon Systems Inc., an Ontario corporation, order and recipient data are hosted on Microsoft Azure in North Central US (Illinois), and processors are described as primarily US-based with a subprocessor list referenced but not shown. Annual SOC 2 audits, EU model clauses and breach notification are stated, which is more than a bare privacy policy. Still, for my European clients' recipient data we found no EU hosting option on the pages read.
Katana
The contracting entity is an Estonian company, the privacy policy states the service and its databases are hosted in the EU, an Article 28 processing contract sits in the terms, SOC 2 Type II is published, and deletion timelines for closed accounts are stated. Set against that, the terms also say the services may be provided from systems in the United States and other jurisdictions, hosting is on AWS with no region named, the subprocessor list is available only on request, and Google Analytics runs on the public site, so the processing chain is only partly proven.
Pricing transparency
inFlow Inventory
Tier prices are public — Lite at 79 EUR/mo., Core at 229 EUR/mo., Pro at 389 EUR/mo. and Max at 539 EUR/mo., billed annually, with team sizes from 2 to 20 members, unlimited products, sales, purchases and integrations on every plan, a required 399 EUR one-time onboarding, optional packages at 799 EUR and 2299 EUR, extra training at 169 EUR/hour, and labels billed directly by the carrier on the client's own accounts. We found no public information on the API add-on's price, hardware pricing, monthly billing figures or VAT treatment; on cancellation the backup arrives within 30 business days once outstanding fees are settled.
Katana
The structure is unusually open: a $0 plan with all features up to 30 SKUs, the Core plan starting at $299 per month, unlimited users and SKUs, and the fee mechanics stated as a base fee plus per-sales-order usage fees on an exponential decay model plus a per-location fee, with monthly to annual billing commitments, tax-exclusive fees and auto-renewal all published. What I cannot compute from the captured pages is the real annual cost: the actual per-order and per-location rates are not shown there, the ladder between Core and the custom-priced Advantage plan is unpriced, and value packs and special services are only named, not priced.
Sovereignty, side by side
Dimension
inFlow Inventory
Katana
Legal entity
Not determined
Not determined
Ownership
Not determined
Not determined
Data residency
US by default
Not determined
Subprocessors
US CLOUD Act reach
US CLOUD Act reach
Facts, side by side
Only facts both products carry under the same definition — anything else would not be a fair row.
As of 28 Oct 2026, the panel rates Katana higher: 3/5 against 2.5/5. Weighted by what each judge cares about, 2 of the 6 judges pick inFlow Inventory and 4 pick Katana. Which one fits depends on the criteria that matter to you; the table on this page shows both side by side, and each judge’s reading has its own page. Both were scored by the same AI bench under the same rubric, from public evidence only, as the methodology describes.
Is inFlow Inventory or Katana European?
inFlow Inventory is not European by provenance (Rest of world). Katana is European (EU-Made). Provenance is read from each company’s own legal pages: who builds it and who owns it.
Where do inFlow Inventory and Katana store customer data?
Per the vendors’ own pages as captured — inFlow Inventory: In the US by default. Katana: its pages as captured do not say.
Do inFlow Inventory and Katana have a free plan?
As of 28 Oct 2026, Katana’s own pages state a free plan; inFlow Inventory’s pages as captured do not. Each product page links the pricing page it was read from.