Verified on 2026-10-13. Prices, plans and AI features change. Check each vendor's own page before you buy. “Not verified” means we did not see a clear statement on the official page we read; it does not mean the feature does not exist.
The short version
- If your institution already licenses NVivo, MAXQDA or ATLAS.ti, and your work needs team projects, Windows, or importing an existing project, stay with it. Liminon is a single-user Mac app and cannot import those projects yet.
- If your protocol says recordings must not leave your machine, or you want a one-time price, Liminon is built for that. The other three now describe cloud AI as the default; MAXQDA's Premium tier also offers a local-model option.
Side by side
| Liminon | NVivo | MAXQDA | ATLAS.ti | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| License model | One-time: $129 early-bird, $179 standard, $79 student; free during the beta (our pricing page) | Prices not shown on the product page we read: not verified. Its AI is described as a separate, cloud-based subscription product | Pricing page lists customer types (academia, non-profit, business, students) and annual, 3-year and 5-year terms. Amounts not readable: not verified. AI Assist add-on is subscription-only | Home page says licenses give “all features on all platforms for one flat fee”. Amounts not shown: not verified |
| Where the AI runs | On your Mac, through a local model in Ollama (optional) | NVivo AI Cloud runs on Microsoft Azure, hosted in five regions; the page says data is not used to train models and is not retained after each task | MAXQDA's cloud by default (needs internet and a MAXQDA Account). Premium can use a model on your own computer or your organization's server, without signing in | The page says it pairs with OpenAI, and offers a choice of processing in the US or Europe |
| Platforms | macOS 14+, Apple Silicon only | Not verified | Not verified | Windows and Mac desktop apps, plus a web version |
| Transcription | On-device; the first run downloads the models once | Not verified | Not verified | Lists “AI Auto Transcription” for Desktop; where it runs: not verified |
| Import another tool's project | Not yet. REFI-QDA (QDPX) import is on the roadmap, not in this build | Not verified | Not verified | Not verified |
Liminon facts come from our own pricing, beta and support pages (version 1.18.1).
What this means in practice
- Where the AI runs is now a real choice, not a given. A year ago the honest summary was “cloud or no AI”. MAXQDA's Premium tier now lets AI Assist use a model on your own computer or server. We have not tested its quality, and it is a paid subscription tier.
- Liminon's trade-off is breadth. It is one person on one Mac, with English-language interviews working best. It does not do team projects, Windows, or project import.
- Check the price on the vendor's own page. We could not read amounts for the other three, so we do not quote them here. Our older NVivo alternatives article quotes prices collected in July 2026 and flags that they have not been re-verified.
Sources
- NVivo: lumivero.com/products/nvivo (read 2026-10-13).
- MAXQDA: What is AI Assist?, What AI models are used? and pricing (read 2026-10-13). The models page lists Anthropic's Claude and Google's Gemini models and says they may change.
- ATLAS.ti: atlasti.com (read 2026-10-13).
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