Common Grant Application vs OpenWater
Common Grant Application
commongrantapplication.com
OpenWater
openwater.comSide by side
| Figure | Common Grant Application | OpenWater |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | $175/mo | — |
| Free plan | — | — |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | Yes | Yes |
| iOS | — | Yes |
| Android | — | Yes |
| Plans published | 3 | 1 |
| Spec score · Scholarship Management Software | 7.6 (#6) | 7.1 (#16) |
| Founded | 2007 | 2012 |
| Headquarters | Santa Monica, California, United States | Alexandria, Virginia, United States |
| Integrations | The maker says there is no DocuSign integration or general online payment mechanism; it offers a Bill.com integration to generate an invoice for online payment. | OpenWater says it integrates with more than 65 AMS, CRM, directory, and payment gateway solutions, including iMIS, Salesforce, Higher Logic, Stripe, and PayPal. |
| Purpose | The product is a customizable online system for managing grant and scholarship lifecycles, including online and paper-based applications. | OpenWater manages application and review processes for abstracts, awards, scholarships, fellowships, and grants. |
| Security and privacy | The maker says it generally adheres to GDPR and CCPA, does not sell user information, stores data in the United States, and uses secure communications and password-protected accounts. | Listed security features include SSO, app encryption, two-factor authentication, CAPTCHA, and password strength requirements; the platform also supports GDPR-related consent and data deletion options. |
| Support | The maker lists setup help, ongoing support, online help, and email and phone support; its pricing page says setup, ongoing support and training have no additional charge. | OpenWater reports an average support response time of 10 minutes and says it guarantees an answer within one business day. |
Plans
Common Grant Application
- Low Complexity$175 a month
- Medium Complexity$250 a month
- High Complexity$450 a month
In their own words
Common Grant Application
Common Grant Application is a customizable web system for managing grant and scholarship lifecycles, including online and paper-based applications. Grantmakers can create reusable forms for applications, recommendations and reports with text, document and media fields. Review workflows support evaluation steps, reviewer groups, scoring or ranking, notes and controls over evaluation visibility. Grantmakers can manage agreements, reports and payment amounts, then export payment information to a spreadsheet. Each application can contain up to two grant agreements and eight grant reports. Applicants pay nothing; grantmakers pay a monthly subscription starting at $175 a month. The Low Complexity plan covers one to two administrative users and 1–50 applications annually. Medium Complexity costs 250.00 USD monthly, and High Complexity costs 450.00 USD monthly. The browser-based service requires no installation and supports Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Safari. Setup, support and training are included.
OpenWater
OpenWater manages application and review workflows for abstracts, awards, scholarships, fellowships, and grants. Organizations can create submission forms with conditional logic and accept attachments in nearly any type, size, or format. Submissions can be routed to multiple reviewers, with scores collected in a dashboard and optional double-blind judging. Rubrics and reviewer collaboration support scoring, while an applicant portal and workflow automation cover other stages of the process. Users can configure dashboards and export reports in multiple file formats, and the platform can collect payments. OpenWater lists Android, iOS, and web access; mobile-responsive submission pages and its mobile app support applicants and team administrators. Security options include SSO, encryption, two-factor authentication, CAPTCHA, and password requirements, with GDPR-related consent and deletion options. It integrates with more than 65 AMS, CRM, directory, and payment systems, including iMIS, Salesforce, Higher Logic, Stripe, and PayPal. The paid subscription uses a custom quote based on usage needs, functionality, and backend user count. OpenWater does not support recommendation requests directly within the platform.