OpenConf vs OpenSession

OpenConf is a system for managing peer review, conferences and abstracts. Organizers can build submission forms from built-in fields or add their own, then assign reviews manually or match submissions and reviewers by topic or bids. Its workflow includes scoring, acceptance decisions, notifications and committee discussion. Accepted submissions can be scheduled into a web program or print booklet, and proceedings can be published online. OpenConf can be installed on a customer's server or used through a hosting service administered by the maker. Authentication options include passkeys, magic links and single sign-on using OIDC and SAML. Privacy tools include policy links, cookie banners, consent checkboxes, personal-information review and administrator-managed data deletion. Professional Edition lists IEEE eCopyright, ACM copyright export and ORCID reviewer credit features. OpenConf 8 requires an HTTP server with TLS/SSL, PHP 7.3 or later and MySQL 8.0.4 or later. Support is included for hosting account and license contacts; Community Edition users receive no support. Community Edition has no listed price and is limited to three or fewer events and journals per calendar year.

OpenSession is a free, MIT-licensed platform for managing conference programs from proposal intake through speaker onboarding and agenda publication. Organizers create call-for-papers forms with MDX, conditional logic, multiple speakers, and file uploads; each speaker may submit up to three talks per event. Reviewers can vote, comment, and view aggregate scores without administrator access. The agenda builder assigns accepted sessions to rooms and time slots while flagging room and speaker conflicts. Schedule changes automatically update RFC 5545 ICS invitations. Accepted speakers receive a self-service portal for profiles, submissions, onboarding tasks, and files. Organizers can publish embeddable agendas and speaker galleries, plus JSON and ICS feeds. The software can be self-hosted on Cloudflare Workers, using D1 for its database and R2 for files. The listed plan is free, billed free forever. Cloudflare’s listed free-tier limits are 100,000 requests daily, 5 GB of D1 storage, and 10 GB of R2 storage. It does not cover CRM, marketing pages, or payment processing.