Paperguide vs SciSummary (2026): which should you pick?
As of Nov 12, 2026, Paperguide grades higher than SciSummary: 2.6 against 2.2 out of 4.0.
Checked Oct 5, 2026 and Nov 12, 2026 · graded Oct 10, 2026 and Nov 12, 2026 by ToolGPA
Paperguide grades higher on features. They get the same grade on value for money, the free plan, ease of use and platforms.
Price, platforms and features side by side. The table says where each price was read and when.
Paperguide
AI research platform for literature and systematic reviews
SciSummary
AI summaries, figure explanations and chat for scientific papers
Which one is for you
Pick Paperguide if
- Fits if your team runs systematic reviews and needs every screening decision documented
- Works for students and academics, who get 30% off with a university email
Look elsewhere if
- Tight if you're staying free, with 20 AI searches and 2,000 credits a month, and no systematic reviews or shared workspaces
- Pricey if you need dual-reviewer screening, which sits on Evidence at $89 a seat a month billed annually
- Watch out: every AI feature draws on one monthly credit pool, 12,500 on Plus and 50,000 on Pro
- Skip it if you were counting on image and table extraction, as that's still marked coming soon
- Not for you if you want a phone or desktop app, as only a web app and browser extension are listed
Pick SciSummary if
- Fits if you read scientific papers and want the figures explained
- Works for someone who searches PubMed and arXiv and wants one library
Look elsewhere if
- Skip it if you want a free plan, as only a 7-day capped trial exists
- Pricey if you read the vendor's own pages: they disagree between $12.50 and $4 a month
- Watch out: the trial caps summaries at 30,000 words, 5 figures and 100 chat messages
- Watch out: uploads are capped at 200 MB, and there's no desktop or mobile app
How we grade them
| 2.6GPAPaperguideGood | 2.2GPASciSummaryFair | |
|---|---|---|
| Value for money | CPlus is $12 a seat a month billed annually, or $19 monthly, which is the middle of this category exactly. It does carry systematic reviews of up to 1,000 papers, unlimited AI searches and 12,500 credits a month, and a university email takes 30% off. Dual-reviewer screening is another matter: Evidence, at $89. | C$12.50 a month billed yearly or $15 monthly, at the upper end of a category whose middle is $10. The homepage and the site's llms.txt file list different prices ($4 and $7), so the figure is unclear. |
| Free plan and trial | CFree gives you 2,000 AI credits and 20 AI searches a month, 500 MB of reference storage and extraction tables of up to 10 papers and 5 columns. Enough to learn the tool, not to run a project on: there are no systematic reviews and no shared workspaces. | CNo free plan. A 7-day trial is capped at 30,000 words of summaries, 5 figures and 100 chat messages, and non-AI features are free with no card. |
| Features | ATwo parts rivals like Elicit and Consensus don't list: screening that ends in a PRISMA diagram with dual-reviewer checking, and a full reference manager with 1,000-plus citation styles. Then AI search across 200 million papers, extraction tables, an agent and a writer. | CSummaries, figure analysis, chat, a library with folders and tags, and an API. Uploads are capped at 200 MB per file, and larger files may fail. |
| Ease of use | CNo store rating on record, and the work is front-loaded: a protocol to define for screening, columns to set up for extraction, and one monthly credit pool that every AI feature draws on. It does import a Zotero or Mendeley library, so your references don't start from nothing. | CNo store rating on record. There's a library with folders and tags to organize before it earns its keep. |
| Platforms and integrations | BA web app with a browser extension, plus a Search API at 10 requests a month on Free and 500 on Pro. It imports from Zotero and Mendeley and connects to Claude and ChatGPT. No phone or desktop app is listed, so that API is what earns the B. | BWeb only, with PubMed, arXiv and ChatGPT, plus API and agent access. |
| Best for | search, references and reviews in one workspace | summaries and figure explanations of scientific papers |
The GPA is the average of the five grades: an A is 4 points, an F is none. The full reasons are on each tool's page: Paperguide and SciSummary. How we grade
Price against what you get
Paperguide starts at $12 a month for each person and scores 3.0 out of 4 on features, ease of use and platforms. SciSummary starts at $12.50 a month and scores 2.3.
Paperguide scores higher and starts $0.50 a month lower. Of the other AI research tools on the chart, none scores higher than Paperguide for less, and 16 score higher than SciSummary for less.
Features, ease of use and platforms, averaged
What paid plans start at, a month (each step along is roughly double) →
- The best score at each price
- Has a free plan
- No free plan
Where they differ
- Paperguide also covers AI search, AI agents and long-form writing.
At a glance
| Paperguide | SciSummary | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free plan | Free trial |
| Starts at | $12 per seat / month, billed annually ($8 with the academic discount) | $12.50 per month, billed yearly ($15 billed monthly) |
| Free plan | 2,000 AI credits and 20 AI searches a month, 500 MB of reference storage, extraction tables of up to 10 papers and 5 columns, and 10 Search API requests a month. | None |
| Free trial | None listed | 7-day free trial of the AI tools, limited to 30,000 words of summaries, 5 analyzed figures and 100 chat messages. |
| Web | ||
| Browser extension | ||
| Made by | Paperguide | Ariso |
| Price read from | paperguide.ai | scisummary.com |
| Checked | Oct 5, 2026 | Nov 12, 2026 |
Worth knowing
Paperguide
- The Free plan has no systematic reviews or shared workspaces and is limited to 20 AI searches and 2,000 AI credits a month.
- AI features draw on a monthly credit pool: 12,500 on Plus, 50,000 on Pro and 150,000 on Evidence.
- Dual-reviewer screening for systematic reviews needs the Evidence plan, at $89 per seat / month billed annually.
- Image and table extraction is marked as coming soon on the pricing page.
SciSummary
- The homepage shows $12.50 a month billed yearly and $15 billed monthly, but the site's llms.txt file lists $4 and $7 a month, so the vendor's own pages disagree.
- The 7-day trial caps summaries at 30,000 words, 5 figures and 100 chat messages; non-AI features are free without a card.
- Only a web version is described, with no desktop or mobile app.
- Uploads are capped at 200 MB per file, and the FAQ says larger files may fail.
Key features
Paperguide
- AI Search
- Ask a research question in plain language and get a synthesized answer drawn from more than 200 million papers, with each claim linked to its source.
- Systematic reviews
- Screens papers against a predefined protocol with cited evidence for each criterion, then produces verified extraction tables, a report and a PRISMA diagram. Dual-reviewer screening is on the Evidence plan.
- Reference manager
- Imports from Zotero or Mendeley, or by DOI, URL, PDF, BibTeX or RIS, fetches metadata and open-access PDFs, and formats citations in more than 1,000 styles.
- Extract Data
- You define the columns and the AI fills them across the selected papers, with every value linked to the statement it came from. Tables export to CSV or Excel.
- Research Agent
- Investigates a topic across the paper database and your library, answers questions about one or several PDFs, and can generate a literature review of up to 50 papers.
- AI Writer
- Drafts and edits documents with citations from your library and the paper database, and exports them as Word, PDF or LaTeX files.
SciSummary
- Structured summaries
- Breaks a paper into labeled sections and can summarize several papers into one combined summary, or compare papers with AI.
- Figure analysis
- Explains figures, tables and charts, including statistics such as p-values, confidence intervals and effect sizes.
- Chat with papers
- Ask questions of one paper, or of the whole library through semantic search and chat.
- Library with folders and tags
- Papers can be organized into folders and tags, and imported from a PDF, DOI, PubMed ID, arXiv ID or URL.
- API and agent access
- A REST API for bulk summarization, an MCP server and a command-line tool are described on the site's developer pages.
Plans
Paperguide
Free$0
2,000 AI credits and 20 AI searches a month, 500 MB of reference storage, and extraction tables of up to 10 papers and 5 columns.
Plus$12
per seat / month, billed annually ($144); $19 billed monthly
12,500 AI credits a month, systematic reviews of up to 1,000 papers, unlimited AI searches and reference storage, and shared workspaces.
Pro$29
per seat / month, billed annually ($348); $49 billed monthly
50,000 AI credits a month, systematic reviews of up to 5,000 papers and 500 Search API requests a month.
Evidence$89
per seat / month, billed annually ($1,068); $149 billed monthly
150,000 AI credits a month, PRISMA-grade dual-reviewer screening, a dedicated support channel and 1,500 Search API requests a month.
EnterpriseCustom
Custom AI credits, systematic reviews of up to 20,000 papers, dual-reviewer screening and a dedicated support channel.
SciSummary
Pro Plan$12.50
per month, billed yearly ($15 billed monthly)
Unlimited summaries, figure analysis, chat messages and article searches, and semantic search over 1,000 indexed documents. Yearly billing is $150 a year.
Ways to pay less
Paperguide
- Annual discount
Save up to 41% with yearly billing
Billed yearly, Plus is $12 a seat per month against $19 billed monthly, Pro is $29 against $49 and Evidence is $89 against $149. The pricing page labels the saving as 41%.
- Education
30% academic discount with a university email
Verifying a university email takes 30% off: Plus becomes $8, Pro $20 and Evidence $62 per seat / month billed yearly, or $13, $34 and $104 billed monthly.
SciSummary
- Annual discount
Yearly billing at $150
The homepage shows the Pro Plan at $12.50 a month billed as $150 a year, labeled Save $30 a year against $15 a month billed monthly.
Common questions
Which is cheaper, Paperguide or SciSummary?
As of Nov 12, 2026, Paperguide starts at $12 per seat / month, billed annually ($8 with the academic discount), and SciSummary starts at $12.50 per month, billed yearly ($15 billed monthly). One is priced for each person and the other is not, so which costs less depends on how many of you use it.
Which has a free plan, Paperguide or SciSummary?
As of Nov 12, 2026, only Paperguide has a free plan. SciSummary does not, though it has a free trial.
Which platforms do Paperguide and SciSummary run on?
As of Nov 12, 2026, only Paperguide lists a browser extension. Both list a web app. A platform missing from a listing is one its maker's pages did not mention.
More comparisons
How this page was made
- The verdict at the top follows a fixed rule. When both tools are in the same category and either is in our top three for it, the verdict follows that ranking: the higher-placed tool is our pick. The top three weigh who each tool suits as well as its grades, so a pick can go against the GPA. Otherwise the page does not pick one and says which grades higher: the higher GPA first; on a tie, the one with a free plan, then the one that starts cheaper in dollars a month, counted the same way for both; if they are still level, what the choice depends on.
- The grades are our own, from each tool’s review or report card. The GPA is their average.
- Prices, plans and platforms come from each tool’s listing. The table above says where each price was read and when.
- The differences and the answers to the questions are worked out from those listings.