Rayyan vs Silvi
Rayyan scores 6.0 to Silvi's 3.6 among the systematic review platforms we rate, and is the better pick for 5 of the 5 kinds of buyer below.
Rayyan wins, 6.0 to 3.6
A mobile app and an institutional library licence route set Rayyan apart from Silvi, which offers neither. Silvi counters with a browser extension that Rayyan does not have, though Silvi holds AI assisted screening back until its Rapid tier while Rayyan offers AI powered screening suggestions you accept or delete. Rayyan's cheapest paid plan is $8.33 a month, billed quarterly; Silvi's cheapest paid plan, Rapid, is 40 euros a month.
Pick Rayyan if you want AI assisted screening from the entry plan.
Pick Silvi if you want a browser extension over a mobile app.
Best for
Who each one suits, decided on the criteria that matter to that buyer and the checked facts where the two differ.
- Answers a research question from the literature: Rayyan yes, Silvi no
- Ask questions of a paper: Rayyan yes, Silvi no
- AI help with screening: Rayyan yes, Silvi no
- Monthly price, cheapest paid plan: $8.33 against $43.2
- University or library licence: Rayyan yes, Silvi no
- API: Rayyan yes, Silvi no
- Mobile app: Rayyan yes, Silvi no
- But Silvi leads on browser extension: Silvi yes, Rayyan no
How they score
Both are scored the same way, against the other systematic review platforms we rate, from facts on each vendor's own pages. Rayyan leads on 5 of 6 criteria.
Where they differ
Every point where the two vendors' published facts disagree, with a link to where each fact was read. "Not published" means the vendor does not say either way.
Published by only one of them
Where they match (16)
Pricing, plan by plan
Every plan each vendor publishes, monthly and yearly where both are offered.
Rayyan
Silvi
Pros and cons
From each tool's full review, written from the same checked facts.
Rayyan
- The Systematic Auto-Resolver deduplicates references quickly using a configurable protocol, solving one of the most tedious parts of multi-database systematic reviews.
- ResearchPilot AI provides zero-shot relevance ratings, meaning it can score reference relevance without requiring training examples from the user.
- Auto-generated PRISMA flow diagrams save researchers hours of manual charting work.
- The AI Reviewer feature allows users to interactively query their reference set, enabling more dynamic literature exploration.
- Auto-extract data function pulls structured information from included studies, which is especially valuable in later-stage reviews.
- Over one million researchers at more than 30,000 institutions use it, reflecting genuine adoption rather than inflated free-signup numbers.
- Programmable hot keys and data sampling tools for randomized subsets help speed up screening and distribute workloads across teams.
- A free tier is available that provides meaningful functionality, including access to the deduplication feature.
- Rayyan is not listed on G2 or Capterra, making it harder to find aggregated, verified user reviews for independent evaluation.
- The tool does not perform its own database searches — users must import references manually from external sources like PubMed or Embase in RIS or BibTeX format.
- The AI-driven features are built around a proprietary system called ResearchPilot, which limits transparency into how relevance scoring and extraction decisions are made.
- It is designed for a very specific use case — systematic review screening — and is not a general-purpose research or literature discovery tool.
- Academic forum coverage is the primary source of user feedback, suggesting limited mainstream visibility and potentially slower support or feature communication.
Silvi
- Built specifically for systematic literature reviews, covering the full review pipeline from search to data extraction and synthesis.
- Database imports from PubMed, OpenAlex, and ERIC are supported, though search happens on each database's own site before importing into Silvi; Zotero import is also supported.
- PDF highlighting system automatically stores both extracted data and source location, providing full traceability essential for rigorous systematic reviews.
- AI screening and data extraction tools operate in a human-in-the-loop model, letting researchers validate and correct suggestions rather than being locked into automated decisions.
- Collaboration features include task assignment, blinding, and conflict resolution between reviewers — methodologically meaningful, not just surface-level.
- Positioned as a more affordable alternative to Covidence while covering comparable systematic review workflow stages.
- Web-based interface is clean and modern, avoiding the dated UX associated with older academic research tools.
- No mobile app, limiting flexibility for researchers whose workflow moves across devices or contexts.
- Relatively niche tool with limited user feedback and community discussion, making it harder to assess real-world reliability at scale.
- Database coverage, while solid, does not include every source academic researchers may need for comprehensive systematic reviews.
- As a smaller Copenhagen-based tool, long-term support, development roadmap, and enterprise reliability are less proven than established competitors.
- Limited public user reviews make it difficult to verify how well AI screening accuracy holds up across different research domains.
- The tool's niche focus means it is not suitable for general AI research, note-taking, or broader literature management tasks.
Rayyan vs Silvi: common questions
Which is better, Rayyan or Silvi?
Rayyan scores 6.0 and Silvi 3.6 out of 10 among the systematic review platforms we rate. Rayyan is ahead on finding papers, reading and analysing papers, systematic reviews, pricing and access, teams and privacy. Silvi is ahead on citing and writing.
Is Rayyan or Silvi cheaper?
Rayyan's cheapest paid plan is $8.33/mo (billed quarterly; no monthly plan exists) and Silvi's is €40/mo (billed monthly; €19/mo billed annually). Compare what each plan includes below before going on price alone.
What can Rayyan do that Silvi cannot?
On the facts both vendors publish: answers a research question from the literature, ask questions of a paper, aI help with screening, university or library licence, aPI, mobile app and works in languages other than English.
What can Silvi do that Rayyan cannot?
On the facts both vendors publish: browser extension.
