Bango vs RevMan
Bango
bango.boncode.netRevMan
cochrane.orgSide by side
| Figure | Bango | RevMan |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | £6.67/mo |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | Yes |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | — | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | Yes |
| macOS | Yes | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 1 | 11 |
| Spec score · Systematic Review Software | 8.0 (#10) | 8.7 (#3) |
| Purpose | Bango automates abstract screening for systematic literature reviews by evaluating articles against user-defined criteria with AI. | RevMan is Cochrane’s software for producing transparent systematic reviews, guiding authors from structured data entry and analysis through result visualization. |
| Security | The maker says API keys are encrypted locally with AES-256-GCM using a machine-derived key, and project backups omit credentials. | Cochrane states that RevMan Web is GDPR compliant, hosted on AWS with SOC 2 Type 2 controls, uses 256-bit SSL, encryption at rest, OIDC single sign-on, permission separation, monitoring and daily backups. |
| Support | The README asks users to report issues on GitHub and says responses depend on availability. | Cochrane directs users to its Support Team and provides how-to articles, screencasts and release notes. |
Plans
RevMan
- Cochrane author accessFree
- Cochrane author accessFree
- Practice reviewFree
- Individual student annual subscription£80 a year
- Student£80 a year
- Academic£100 a year
- Individual academic annual subscription£100 a year
- Individual standard annual subscription£130 a year
- Standard rate£130 a year
- OrganizationPriced on request
In their own words
Bango
Bango automates abstract screening for systematic literature reviews by assessing articles against criteria users define. Its AI screening returns decisions along with reasoning, matched rules, suggested tags, and confidence scores. Projects can import RIS and BibTeX files or Zotero collections, with up to 10,000 articles supported per project. Bibliometric analysis includes co-authorship networks, citation graphs, keyword maps, publication timelines, author rankings, and co-citation analysis. Bango can produce PRISMA 2020 flow diagrams from record counts and export them as SVG or PNG. It also supports Zotero import and export and can generate Boolean search strings for several research indexes and libraries. The maker says project data stays on the user's computer, with no cloud uploads, login, or account required. The README describes locally encrypted API keys and backups that omit credentials. AI connections include hosted providers such as OpenAI, Anthropic, Google Gemini, Mistral AI, and z.ai, as well as local and other OpenAI-compatible endpoints. Bango runs on Linux, macOS, and Windows, though macOS builds support Apple Silicon only. The Free plan is free, with no subscription, paywall, or limits.
RevMan
RevMan is Cochrane’s software for building systematic reviews, from structured data entry and analysis to presenting results. It supports diagnostic test accuracy, intervention, methodology, overview, prognosis, qualitative, and flexible review types. Authors can edit separate parts of a review at the same time and see who else is working on it. Analysis options include pairwise meta-analyses, sensitivity and subgroup analyses, and fixed-effects, random-effects, Mantel-Haenszel, and inverse-variance models. Built-in outputs include forest, SROC, and funnel plots, risk-of-bias assessments, and PRISMA flow diagrams. Authors can work from ready-made or custom templates and structured headings with Cochrane methodological guidance. RevMan imports study data and references from Covidence, and RIS reference imports can draw on Crossref, PubMed, or CRS. A free practice review is deleted after 30 days and permits one person, with no data export. Free access is also available to authors working on Cochrane Reviews. Individual annual plans are £80 a year for eligible students, £100 a year for eligible academics, and £130 a year for standard subscriptions; VAT applies in the EU and UK.