Brandfolder DAM review: fit, pricing model and integrations

What Brandfolder is

Brandfolder is a cloud DAM platform that stores, organises and distributes brand and marketing assets, now sold as Brandfolder by Smartsheet. Brandfolder was established in 2012 in Denver, Colorado. Smartsheet completed its acquisition of Brandfolder in September 2020 for USD 155 million in cash and stock.

The Brandfolder home page and the Smartsheet Help Center describe these components:

• Digital asset management: sections, labels, custom fields and an asset modal per file
• Brandguide: always-current brand guidelines
• Content Automation and templating: on-brand documents and projects from templates
• Proofing and creative workflow: review of creative work before release
• Portals and Smart CDN: sharing with external users and embedding assets on the web
• Brand Intelligence: AI-driven tagging and analytics, sold as a separate product
• Smartsheet panel: Brandfolder assets inside Smartsheet work management

Smartsheet announced in February 2026 that Getty Images runs its Media Manager product on Brandfolder by Smartsheet.

Where Brandfolder fits

Brandfolder fits marketing and brand teams that need fast adoption, portals for partners and assets embedded across websites. DAMSelection places Brandfolder in the brand and marketing DAM segment of the vendor directory.

DAMSelection assessment: Brandfolder fits well under these conditions.

• The organisation already runs Smartsheet for campaign and project work and wants assets in the same workspace.
• Salsify is the PIM, and the team wants a connector built by the DAM vendor.
• Websites and partner channels need image CDN links that resize images and stop serving expired assets.

DAMSelection assessment: another segment fits better under these conditions.

For direct comparisons, see Brandfolder vs Bynder, Brandfolder vs Canto and the Brandfolder alternatives shortlist.

How Brandfolder covers the core DAM jobs

Brandfolder documents capabilities across all four core DAM jobs, with the most detail on delivery links and the least on rights management.

Brandfolder duplicate detection deletes only exact pixel matches. Cropped, resized or re-exported copies pass through, so a content audit before migration still matters.

Smart CDN links follow the asset lifecycle. A link updates when the asset changes and stops serving when the asset expires, loses approval or is deleted.

Brandfolder auto-tagging applies tags generated by Google AI and works best on assets up to 20 MB or 75 megapixels. Brand Intelligence is sold as a separate product, and DAMSelection has found no availability labels for its features.

Product content and PIM integration

Brandfolder documents one PIM integration built by Brandfolder itself: Salsify. The Fit Map records no Brandfolder connector for Akeneo, inriver or Stibo STEP, and DAMSelection has not yet checked those marketplaces for Brandfolder.

Edits to a synced field in Brandfolder revert to the Salsify value. Setup runs through the primary Brandfolder contact and requires Owner or Administrator rights.

DAMSelection assessment: buyers on another PIM should plan an API integration and budget for it. The PIM and DAM Fit Map shows connector depth per PIM.

Hosting, security and contract checks

Brandfolder stores assets on Google Cloud Storage, with storage locations in the US and Europe across three availability zones. The security article does not say how a customer selects the region that holds its data.

Smartsheet regional hosting, including Frankfurt, covers Smartsheet content and does not mention Brandfolder. The data residency entry lists the clauses that close this gap.

What to test in a scripted demo

Brandfolder should demo its documented claims on the buyer's own assets, following the scripted demo method.

1. Show the storage region of a new EU account and where backups and AI tagging run.
2. Embed a product image with Smart CDN at three widths and in WebP, then expire the asset and time the cut-off.
3. Sync 20 products with Salsify, edit a product field in Salsify, and delete one attachment in Brandfolder.
4. Upload 50 assets with near-duplicates and show what duplicate detection catches.
5. Run auto-tagging on 100 of your assets and show the share of usable tags.
6. Build a portal for 20 partners with your Brandguide and track downloads per partner.
7. Show the Brandfolder panel inside Smartsheet on a live campaign plan.

Pricing questions to ask

Brandfolder publishes no prices and routes both its Premium and Enterprise plans to a demo. Video AI is a Premium inclusion, and Brand Intelligence appears as a separate product without a published price.

Ask these questions before the second demo:

• Price Premium and Enterprise separately and list what Enterprise adds.
• Define how users, guest users and portal viewers are counted.
• State the storage and CDN bandwidth allowances and the overage prices.
• Price Brand Intelligence and confirm whether AI tagging carries volume limits.
• Confirm whether the Smartsheet panel needs a Smartsheet Business or Enterprise plan.
• Cap renewal increases, given the ownership change in 2025.

Worked example: a team serving product images through Smart CDN to an online shop pays for storage and delivery traffic. Model both lines, plus Brand Intelligence, in the TCO calculator over five years.