BORIS vs CVAT

BORIS is free and open-source software for coding video and audio and recording live observations. Media tools include frame-by-frame navigation, playback speeds from 0.1× to 100×, and synchronized playback of up to eight files. Users can define unlimited behaviors, subjects, modifiers, and independent variables, with behaviors recorded as state or point events. Analysis options include Cohen’s Kappa inter-rater reliability, transition matrices, flow diagrams, time-budget analysis, and graphical views of coded data. Coded events can be exported in formats including TSV, CSV, HTML, ODS, XLSX, SQL, Pandas and R dataframes, SDIS, Praat TextGrid, and JWatcher formats. BORIS also imports JWatcher Global Definition Files and Noldus The Observer XT templates. Live event logging is available in the desktop program and Android app. The Android app is version 0.13 and marked beta for testing only. Data is stored in JSON; download files are GPG-signed, with a public key available for integrity checks. The project warns that backward compatibility of project files is not guaranteed and recommends regular backups.

CVAT turns images, video, 3D data and audio into labeled datasets for AI workflows. Its annotation tools include boxes, masks, polygons, keypoints, skeletons and object tracks, with additional listed types such as cuboids, ellipses and tags. Teams can review jobs through validation and acceptance stages and assess quality using ground truth, honeypots and consensus workflows. Storage connections include Amazon S3, Azure Blob Storage, Google Cloud Storage, compatible buckets and self-hosted storage. CVAT names SAM 2, SAM 3, Ultralytics, Hugging Face and custom models as labeling aids. It exports to more than 20 formats, including COCO, YOLO, KITTI, Cityscapes and Pascal VOC, and offers API, SDK and CLI automation. Deployment can be managed in the cloud or self-hosted, including on-premises and air-gapped options. Free plans are available; online paid plans start at $23/user/mo billed annually. CVAT lists security controls but says it does not hold ISO 27001 or SOC 2 certifications.