Excise vs RedactLaw
Excise
github.com
RedactLaw
redactlaw.comSide by side
| Figure | Excise | RedactLaw |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | $39/mo |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | Yes |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | — | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | — |
| macOS | Yes | — |
| Linux | Yes | — |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| Self-hosted | — | Yes |
| Plans published | 1 | 5 |
| Spec score · Document Redaction Software | 8.8 (#3) | 8.5 (#6) |
| Integrations | The project documents OCR using the system Tesseract and lists mutool and pdftotext as independent tools used to check redaction results. | Clio, MyCase, PracticePanther, iManage, NetDocuments, Dropbox, OneDrive, Box and generic cloud storage are marked coming soon; REST API is marked available now. |
| OCR | Yes | Built-in OCR processes scanned PDFs and image files, including JPEG, PNG and TIFF inputs. |
| What it does | Excise is a cross-platform PDF editor that removes redacted content from the PDF itself rather than covering it with a black box. | RedactLaw is a SaaS platform that uses AI to detect and permanently remove sensitive information from legal documents. |
Plans
RedactLaw
- FreeFree
- Starter$39 a month
- Pro$79 a month
- Firm$149 a month
- EnterprisePriced on request
In their own words
Excise
Excise is a free, open-source PDF editor for Windows, macOS, and Linux. Its central feature is permanent redaction: it removes text, images, and vector graphics from PDF content rather than placing a visible cover over them. By default, the cleanup also removes metadata, attachments, JavaScript, thumbnails, and hidden layers, and reports those removals. The app handles search, text selection and copying, annotations, page organization, Bates numbering, file-size reduction, and AcroForm filling, flattening, and creation. Its command-line tools support batch work and stable JSON output; `unredact` checks for leaked redacted text, while `audit` looks for text beneath opaque overlays. Excise reads and writes AES-128 and AES-256 encryption and inspects digital signatures against the operating system trust store. Signature inspection does not check revocation or evaluate timestamp and long-term validation material. Dynamic XFA layouts are experimental and cannot be filled. Downloads include packages for Apple Silicon macOS, Windows 10/11 x64, Ubuntu/Debian, and x64 or ARM64 Linux; builds are unsigned, not notarized, and lack auto-update.
RedactLaw
RedactLaw is an AI-powered document redaction platform made for law firms. It detects personal information and HIPAA identifiers, applies context-aware recognition, and assigns confidence scores to help users review proposed redactions. Reviewers can compare a detection with the original, approve or reject items individually, or handle flagged items in bulk. The product says it removes underlying data permanently and clears metadata and hidden layers from redacted files. It accepts PDF, DOCX, XLSX, JPEG, PNG, and TIFF files, including scanned documents through OCR, and produces redacted PDFs. Templates cover medical records, court filings, FOIA responses, financial discovery, employment records, and immigration files. Redaction decisions, users, and timestamps appear in an audit trail, with PDF and CSV exports. RedactLaw is available on the web, by API, and as self-hosted software. The free plan allows five documents a month, up to ten pages each, for one user; paid plans start at $39 a month.