When selling digital items, you want to find a seamless platform for your customers. There are numerous options available, but two of the most notable ones are SendOwl and Fileflare Digital Downloads (Downloadable Digital Assets). While SendOwl is the most popular option, that doesn’t always translate to product effectiveness. Below, we will let you know how the two Shopify apps compare when selling digital files on Shopify.
What is Fileflare?
Fileflare doesn’t have the same clout as SendOwl, but it does have many of the same features. It also automatically delivers digital downloads to your customers, associating them with customer accounts.
Fileflare is owned by Massive Monkey Limited, a Shopify app development company. The company produces solid Shopify apps but doesn’t have the same clout for seed funding.
Despite this, it has made an incredibly robust app regarding price.
What is SendOwl?
SendOwl is a digital sales and delivery platform that offers instant and automatic delivery of your products. The company works with the Shopify POS and integrates with known platforms like DropBox for greater use.
Pricing – SendOwl vs. Fileflare
If you are looking for flexible pricing options, Fileflare wins. Much of this win comes from the possibility of using the free version; something SendOwl doesn’t offer.
Regardless, both offer free trials for the premium option. SendOwl has the more robust free trial option, with the 30-day option instead of the 7-day option available through Fileflare.
Regarding pricing, here’s what you can expect:
SendOwl’s Cost
SendOwl breaks itself into 3 different plans. These plans have limitations on the number of products you can list.
| Plan | Cost | Features |
| Standard | 5% per order | 30 products, PDF Stamping, 3GB of storage, attach personalized products |
| Premium | $15 /mo + $0.33 per order fee | 100 products, Video streaming, 5GB |
| Business | $39 /mo + $0.17 per order fee | 250 products, Multiple users with varying permission levels, 15GB of storage |
One pain you’ll notice with SendOwl is the steep product limitations. Those who sell a wide range of digital items will find themselves unable to use this digital download management tool.
SendOwl also offers custom pricing, something made available for those who need more than what’s available. In these cases, you can expect discounts based on volume, but the pricing will depend on your need.
Fileflare Digital Downloads Costs
Fileflare is the only one to offer unlimited products. Those who have a large number of small products might not even need to leave the free version. You’ll also find the pricing to be cheaper overall.
| Plan | Cost | Features |
| Free | Free | Unlimited Products, 1GB of storage, bandwidth limits, one attachment per product |
| Basic | $9 per month | 1GB of storage, PDF stamping, download stats, personalized products attached, unlimited assets per product, thank you pages. |
| Growth | $19 /mo | 15GB of storage, attach unlimited assets per product, fraud protection, customizable email templates, email tracking. |
| Premium | $29 /mo | 1TB of storage, unlimited assets per product, user account access, IP download limits. |
You’ll notice that Fileflare limits the free version by steep storage requirements and limiting to only one attachment per product. However, unless you are selling more than 1GB of products per month, you might still be able to avoid paying for it.
The “Pro levels” do include all of the significant features. Check out their pricing page for more details.
SendOwl Pros and Cons
SendOwl’s list of reasons for and against buying it:
Pros
- Easy-to-use dashboard
- Great customer support
- PDF stamping for easy protection
- URL-based product storage features
- Offers help with an API
- Offers excellent security through time limit download links, video & audio streaming, and two-factor authentication
- It offers three different checkout templates
- Integrates with affiliate marketing tools
- Included analytics package
- Automatically distributes license keys
- Business is trusted and has solid funding
Cons
- It doesn’t integrate well with external scripts
- Unsuitable for subscription sites
- It doesn’t allow multiple file downloads
- Initial setup takes some time and effort
Fileflare Pros and Cons
Simply put, Fileflare Digital Downloads has a more positive customer experience rating than SendOwl. At a steller five stars, you can expect a pretty solid experience. Here are some pros and cons:
Pros
- No product-based limitations
- Better scalability for those with large numbers of small products
- Offers fraud protection that integrates with Shopify
- Easy-to-use interface with no complicated setup
- Integrates easily with subscription apps
- Excellent customer service ratings
- Provides the ability to attach multiple files to a single product
- Easy and automated PDF stamping
- Offers email templates and allows links on the Shopify ‘Thank you’ page
- It is a full-service analytics service to see your email and product download performance
Cons
- Bandwidth limitations can be tight if you have large files
- No seed funding (that we know of)
- No available API
Which Is The Best Digital Downloads Experience?
Comparing the two digital download tools, finding the best experience depends on your need.
Overall, Fileflare Digital Downloads is much more flexible and easy to use. Its interface is a solid improvement compared to SendOwl, mainly because they offer an excellent download platform.
SendOwl offers more features. However, it still struggles with subscription platforms, so it isn’t ultimately perfect. Its significant bonuses come from the complete platform, but in trying to be the “everything,” it manages to integrate poorly with Shopify’s ecosystem.
I recommend you try both of them out, as the best digital download platform will depend on your needs. However, if you are on a tight budget, stick with Downloadable Digital Assets, it has a free version, and its first upgrade is about $5, much cheaper than SendOwl’s.
