Conferencer
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Conferencer vs Sessionize.

Sessionize is call for papers, schedule and speaker management. Conferencer is free, open-source software for the same job — the call, the review, the decisions, the onboarding, the agenda and the public site — that you run yourself.

Open the live demoSessionize pricing page

What it costs

Sessionize: $499 / event. Conferencer: $0.

Sessionize
$499 / event
A Professional event is $499 plus tax, valid for one event occurrence, with a fully functional test mode and no credit card required. Community events with no participation fee use it free — but the free licence is not valid for internal, private, promotional, marketing, profit or commercial events. Five or more events a year is a custom bulk conversation.

Conferencer

$0, always

MIT licensed and self-hosted: no plan, no per-event fee, no limit on submissions, no share of your revenue. Your only bill is the box it runs on, and a $5 VPS covers it.

What Sessionize is

Call for papers, schedule and speaker management.

Sessionize is a hosted call-for-papers and speaker-management tool built around a large public speaker directory: speakers keep a profile on Sessionize and reuse it to submit to any event on the platform. It also builds the schedule and ships a mobile and web app for attendees.

Who it is for: Community and professional tech conferences, and agencies running many events.

Side by side

The same job, line by line.

The Sessionize column states only what their own public pages state; the sources are linked at the foot of the page. The Conferencer column is checkable in the repository.

Published price

Conferencer$0 — MIT licensed, no plans, no per-event fee

Sessionize$499 + tax per event occurrence; free for eligible community events

Free for commercial events

ConferencerYes — any event, any size

SessionizeNo — the free tier excludes commercial, private and internal events

Self-hosted

ConferencerYes — one container, one SQLite file, Node 22+

SessionizeNo — hosted only

Call for speakers

Conferencer14 field types, show-when logic, saved drafts, per-person limits, close dates

SessionizeCustomizable submission page, session and speaker tagging

Committee review

ConferencerMulti-round plans, anonymized rounds, 8 scorecard types, conflict-of-interest recusal, auto-distribution with caps

SessionizeSubmission evaluation tools for the content team

Speaker onboarding

ConferencerOnboarding tasks, versioned file requests, a deliverables matrix, a speaker portal

SessionizeA smart task list and unlimited mailings to accepted speakers

Agenda

ConferencerRooms grid with drag-and-drop, blocked room clashes, speaker-clash warnings, publish diff

SessionizeDrag-and-drop schedule builder with session coloring

Public site

ConferencerA full public site — sessions, speakers, agenda, itinerary, gallery, personal .ics schedule — no login

SessionizeAn event web and mobile app, plus a copy-paste embed

Speaker network

ConferencerYour own CRM across your own events

SessionizeA public directory of speakers across all Sessionize events

Getting started

ConferencerClone, npm run seed, and click around a real demo conference

SessionizeLog in and try every feature in test mode

Where Sessionize is genuinely better

The speaker network
Speakers already have Sessionize profiles and can submit with a click, and the public directory helps you discover speakers you did not know. Conferencer has no cross-event public network.
A real free tier
For free community events Sessionize genuinely costs nothing, and it is hosted for you. If your event qualifies, it is a good deal.
An attendee app
The published schedule ships as a mobile and web app for attendees. Conferencer publishes a website and .ics feeds, not an app.
Zero setup
Nothing to run: log in and every feature is there to test. Conferencer asks you to run one container.

Where Conferencer differs

Free means free for everyone
Commercial, private and internal events included — the licence does not ask what kind of event you are running.
The work continues after the decision
Accepting a talk opens the speaker's portal and assigns their onboarding tasks — bio, headshot, slides — with versioned deliverables you can chase in one matrix.
Your speaker data is yours
A CRM across your own events, in your own database — not profiles on someone else's platform.

Sources for every claim about Sessionize on this page, read on 12 August 2026: sessionize.com/pricing · sessionize.com. If a figure here has gone stale, the linked page is the truth.

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