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Design

Balsamiq

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Panel rating · 6 judges · How to read the stars

Category median

Sovereignty: not determined

0–5 in half steps. 5 means the rubric's top anchor is met on the evidence.

by Balsamiq Studios, LLC · balsamiq.com

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Balsamiq: AI-assisted analysis on whats-best.ai Balsamiq: AI-assisted analysis on whats-best.ai (dark)

Add ?theme=dark to the image address for dark backgrounds. The badge shows the category and the month of the latest evaluation, and EU-Made where that is the product’s provenance. It never shows a score.

Balsamiq at a glance

Vendor
Balsamiq Studios, LLC
Headquarters
Not stated on the vendor’s pages as of 3 Nov 2026
Data hosting
Not stated on the vendor’s pages as of 3 Nov 2026
Free plan
Not stated on the vendor’s pages as of 3 Nov 2026
Panel verdict
The AI panel rates Balsamiq 2.5/5, the mean of 6 judges. Balsamiq is an AI-powered wireframing and prototyping tool for product and IT teams, and the scoring follows that shape. how scores are made
As of
Vendor pages captured 3 Nov 2026; evaluated by the panel 4 Nov 2026. all sources

Balsamiq alternatives, European ones first →

Read this page as one judge. Each weighs the same scores by what they care about.

The Brand Marketer

Weighted verdict

Keeps the brand consistent across twelve sales offices that make their own flyers. Wants locked templates non-designers can use, guidelines inside the tool, licence and expiry dates on every stock image, and a clear answer on whether a generated image may go on a trade-fair stand.

Same scores as the panel view — this lens weights them the way this judge cares.

Scored by The Brand Marketer

Panel median The Brand Marketer This judge’s scores over the panel median. Each label opens its reasoning below.
Scores per criterion, in stars out of 5
Criterion Panel median The Brand Marketer
Design, prototyping & design systems 2 of 5 2 of 5
Collaboration, review & developer handoff 3 of 5 3 of 5
Files, formats & portability 3 of 5 3 of 5
AI features & rights to the work 3 of 5 2.5 of 5
European sovereignty 2.5 of 5 3 of 5

Design, prototyping & design systems

How this is scored

The making itself: vector and layout tools, interactive prototypes, and the shared components, styles and tokens that keep a company's products and materials consistent — judged on what the feature and help pages document, not on showcase images.

0 — Not a design tool: a file viewer, a stock library or a single-purpose converter in which nothing is laid out or drawn.

3 — A canvas or editor with templates, shapes, text and images; reusable components, shared styles and prototyping are basic or not described.

5 — Reusable components or styles shared across files, responsive or auto layout, and clickable prototypes or presentations linking screens.

8 — A design system managed in the tool: team libraries that update where they are used, variables or tokens for colour, type and spacing with modes or themes, component variants and properties, prototypes with transitions and conditional logic, and library changes published with versions.

10 — The design system is a governed product: library releases versioned and reviewable, token export in a documented format for development, usage analytics per component, and accessibility checks such as contrast built into the editor.

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The Brand Marketer

The captured pages document a working canvas with interactive, clickable prototypes — buttons respond, screens link, and you can regenerate and refine the prototype — plus AI-generated editable wireframes and screenshot-to-wireframe conversion. We found no public information on shared components, team libraries, tokens or component variants, so as a maker of consistent company materials it stays a canvas-plus-prototype tool rather than a managed design system. 3 10

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Collaboration, review & developer handoff

How this is scored

Working on the same files with colleagues, clients and developers: comments and review, permissions for internal and external people, and the handoff that gives engineering measurements, assets and code rather than screenshots.

0 — A single-user tool: files are worked on alone and passed on as exports.

3 — Files shared by link with comments or real-time co-editing; guest access, permissions and a developer view are basic or not described.

5 — Real-time co-editing, comments with mentions, sharing with view or edit rights per file or project, and an inspect or developer view with measurements and asset export.

8 — Guests and reviewers who comment without a paid seat, version history with restore, branching or review of changes before they reach the main file, a developer mode that links components to code, a documented API and plugins, and named integrations with issue trackers and code tools.

10 — Handoff is a contract between design and code: component properties mapped to code components, token and asset export automated through the API, an audit log of access and sharing, and external access governed by domain, expiry and admin policy.

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The Brand Marketer

Six permission roles with free staff and guest reviewers who view and comment without a paid seat, real-time co-editing, and owner-gated public review links sit comfortably at the mid level, and handoff goes further through the MCP server that generates user stories and production code plus prototypes dropped into Notion, Jira or Linear. We found no public information on version history with restore, branching, or an inspect view with measurements. 5 6 3

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Brand assets & governance

How this is scored

Keeping a brand usable and correct across a company: a central library for logos, images and templates, brand guidelines people can find, locked templates that let non-designers produce material, and rights and expiry metadata on every licensed asset.

0 — No shared assets of any kind; the product has no library, kit or template that a team uses together.

3 — A shared folder, brand kit or template set with logos, colours and fonts; locking, guidelines and asset metadata are basic or not described.

5 — A central brand kit or library with logos, colours and fonts, team templates that non-designers can fill, and the ability to lock brand elements or restrict who edits templates.

8 — Brand guidelines published in the tool, tagging and search across assets, approval workflows for new assets and template output, version control on assets, rights, usage and expiry metadata with warnings on expiry, and access per team, market or partner.

10 — Brand governance is auditable: every asset carries its licence, owner and permitted use, usage of each asset is tracked across files and channels, distribution to external partners is logged, and the whole library with metadata is exportable in a documented format.

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The Brand Marketer not rated — no public information

We found no public information on a central customer brand kit, locked templates that non-designers can fill, brand guidelines inside the tool, or licence and expiry metadata on assets. The brand page we read covers only Balsamiq's own logos, colours and wordmarks with usage rules for the vendor's own name. 7 6

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Files, formats & portability

How this is scored

Whether the work can leave: open or documented file formats, export that keeps layers, vectors and components, offline or self-hosted options, and what happens to files after a downgrade, a removed seat or a cancelled contract.

0 — Work cannot leave the product: no export or download of designs is offered.

3 — Export of designs as images or PDF per page or frame; export of whole files with structure and access after cancellation are basic or not described.

5 — Export to PNG, PDF and SVG with vectors and text kept, whole files downloadable to a local copy, and files of a downgraded or cancelled account addressed in the help centre or terms.

8 — An open or publicly documented file format, import from and export to other named tools documented, bulk export of a team’s files, an API that reads full file structure, files of removed users transferred to the organisation by policy, and a stated retention and deletion timeline after the contract ends.

10 — Portability is built in: an open-source or openly specified format, self-hosting or a local-first option, round-trip export without loss of components and prototypes, and the customer’s ownership of all files and their export rights written into the terms.

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The Brand Marketer

Whole project files export alongside PDF, PNG and raw HTML, the desktop app stores files locally on the device with a perpetual licence (sales ending December 31, 2026, support December 31, 2027), and the terms state a 30-day export window after a Space closes, deletion within 60 days and backups persisting up to 90. We found no public information on an open documented file format, bulk export of a team's files, or an API that reads file structure. 8 9 2 3

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AI features & rights to the work

How this is scored

What the vendor's AI does with the customer's files and what the customer may do with the AI's output: training on customer content and the opt-out, the models and where they run, commercial use of generated images, stock licences and indemnity.

0 — The terms state that customer files train the vendor’s models with no opt-out, or that generated output may not be used commercially.

3 — AI features described on an AI or help page with a general statement on responsible use or data handling; training on customer files, admin controls and output rights are basic or not described.

5 — A statement on whether customer content trains the models (excluded, or with a documented opt-out), AI features that an admin can switch off for the organisation, and commercial use of generated output addressed in the terms or AI page.

8 — Training excluded by default for business plans, model providers and the processing location of AI features stated, generated content labelled or carrying content credentials, stock and template licences stated per asset type, and an IP indemnity for generated output on a named plan.

10 — AI is governed in writing: a per-feature list of models, providers and locations, admin controls per team and feature, a log of AI use, training exclusion and output ownership in the contract terms, and indemnity and licence limits published in full.

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The Brand Marketer

The pages state plainly that Customer Data is never used to train the partner models, name Google Gemini as the provider, and make AI opt-in per interaction, with credits included on every plan and purchasable top-ups. What I could not find anywhere is the answer my trade-fair team needs: we found no public information on commercial use rights for generated output, an organisation-wide admin off-switch, or an IP indemnity. 2 10

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European sovereignty

How this is scored

Who the contracting entity is, where design files, brand assets and AI prompts are stored and processed, and which subprocessors touch them. Independently sourced by the sovereignty pipeline.

0 — Proven non-EU on every dimension the evidence covers: non-EU contracting entity and non-EU hosting, with no EU option stated.

3 — One European element proven: an EU contracting entity or EU representative, EU data residency (even if only on an enterprise plan), or a published DPA, with the rest of the chain unstated.

5 — EU hosting stated for files as standard or selectable and an EU contracting entity or EU representative, with a DPA offered; the subprocessor chain (AI, rendering, support) is unstated or partly non-EU.

8 — EU contracting entity, files, assets and backups stored in the EU on named infrastructure, subprocessor list published with locations and purposes, and the processing location of AI features stated.

10 — Sovereign end to end and evidenced: European ownership, EU entity, every hosting, AI and support subprocessor European or optional, self-hosting or a European cloud offered, and certifications published.

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The Brand Marketer

An Italian parent holding and a Bologna R&D entity sit alongside the US sales entity, a DPA is published, EU Standard Contractual Clauses apply where the Data Privacy Framework does not, Enterprise customers may choose EU or US data residency, and a subprocessor list is published including the purpose and location of each provider. Outside that Enterprise choice the pages say data may be processed in the US, EU or other locations, and where the Gemini-powered AI processing runs is not stated. 2

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Pricing transparency not rated — the vendor publishes no price

How this is scored

Whether a buyer can compute the annual cost for their team from public pages alone — which seat types exist and what each may do, how viewers and guests are billed, how seats are added and trued up, AI credits, and the plan where SSO, admin controls and brand features begin.

0 — No public prices at all; every plan is a sales conversation.

3 — A public "from" price or one priced plan, per seat or flat.

5 — Per-seat prices public for the main plans with the billing period stated and the main features per plan listed.

8 — Every plan and seat type priced, free viewers and guests stated with their limits, how and when added seats are billed explained, AI credits and storage priced or included explicitly, the plan that unlocks SSO and admin controls named, and VAT treatment stated.

10 — Complete cost computability: annual cost derivable for a given mix of editors, viewers and guests, true-up and auto-upgrade rules published, every add-on priced publicly, and contract term, renewal and downgrade conditions stated.

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The Brand Marketer

The seat mechanics are clearly documented — editors consume a paid seat, staff and guest reviewers are free, guest editors consume a seat, AI credits are included on every plan with purchasable top-ups, and SAML begins at Enterprise — but we found no price figures on the captured pages, so an annual cost for a given team cannot be computed from what we read. 6 10

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European sovereignty — proven facts

0 of 6 dimensions proven

Built only from facts shown on the vendor's own pages. A dimension we could not prove is left open, not scored as zero.

Hosting location Not determined — uncited Report an error
Hosting options Not determined ⚠ unverified — uncited Report an error
Open source Not determined — uncited Report an error
Data processing agreement Not determined ⚠ unverified — uncited Report an error
Transfer impact assessment Not determined — uncited Report an error

Questions about Balsamiq

Is Balsamiq European?

Not determined: the vendor’s pages as captured do not say where Balsamiq is based.

Where does Balsamiq store data?

Not stated on the vendor’s pages as of 3 Nov 2026.

Does Balsamiq have a free plan?

Not stated on the vendor’s pages as of 3 Nov 2026.

What are the best alternatives to Balsamiq?

As of 4 Nov 2026, the panel rates Penpot (3.5/5), Sketch (3/5) and Collaboard (3/5) highest among the other 21 Design products evaluated. Ratings that look equal are rounded to half stars; the order uses the unrounded rating, then the name. The highest-rated European alternative is Penpot (EU-Made). Ratings are the AI panel’s opinion, formed from public evidence: how scores are made. The full list, with European products first: Balsamiq alternatives.

Where this could be wrong

What we left out

A claim that does not survive our checks costs us the claim, not the page. This is what was taken off this one.

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Sources (10)

The pages every claim on this page was read from — each one checked, dated, and kept verifiable.

  1. 1 Vendor page balsamiq.com Checked 3 Nov 2026 Details →
  2. 2 Legal notice — found from the homepage balsamiq.com Checked 3 Nov 2026 Details →
  3. 3 Design, prototyping & design systems — found from sitemap balsamiq.com Checked 3 Nov 2026 Details →
  4. 4 Design, prototyping & design systems — found from sitemap balsamiq.com Checked 3 Nov 2026 Details →
  5. 5 Collaboration, review & developer handoff — found from sitemap balsamiq.com Checked 3 Nov 2026 Details →
  6. 6 Collaboration, review & developer handoff — found from sitemap balsamiq.com Checked 3 Nov 2026 Details →
  7. 7 Brand assets & governance — found from sitemap balsamiq.com Checked 3 Nov 2026 Details →
  8. 8 Files, formats & portability — found from sitemap balsamiq.com Checked 3 Nov 2026 Details →
  9. 9 Files, formats & portability — found from sitemap balsamiq.com Checked 3 Nov 2026 Details →
  10. 10 AI features & rights to the work — found from sitemap balsamiq.com Checked 3 Nov 2026 Details →