Ellty vs SmartRoom: permission depth against a modern setup

SmartRoom has been in the market since 2004 and describes itself around three ideas: permissions, Q&A and security. It is the kind of room an adviser picks when the process has many bidder groups with different rights and the sell side wants fine control over every folder. Ellty arrived in 2020 with the same transaction controls, built-in AI features and a self-serve model. On the security criterion they are almost level. Most of the difference sits in how each one is bought and how it feels to the people using it every day.

As with every comparison on this site, the scores come from six weighted criteria built from vendor documentation, published pricing, security attestations and our twelve-point feature checklist. They describe what each vendor documents and certifies, not the result of a staged deal. Ellty can be checked through its trial; SmartRoom through a vendor-led demo.

Security posture

Ellty 9.4, SmartRoom 9.3. Both apply dynamic watermarks, both offer document rights control, two-factor login and a full audit trail, and neither lists single sign-on. SmartRoom holds SOC 2 and ISO 27001; Ellty lists SOC 2 (infrastructure). SmartRoom also redacts inside the platform, which Ellty does not list.

Redaction is the practical point. On a sale where customer names, salaries or personal data appear in hundreds of files, an in-room redaction tool lets the sell-side team mask information without exporting, editing and re-uploading each document. With Ellty, the same work happens in a separate tool before upload. It is a familiar routine for most advisers, but it is one more step and one more copy of the file outside the room.

Certification matters in a different way. If a bidder’s information security team will only accept vendors with ISO 27001, SmartRoom answers directly, while Ellty needs the SOC 2 report and a short explanation. Ask counterparties early which they require.

Deal workflow

Ellty 9.5, SmartRoom 8.9. Both have structured Q&A, bulk upload and permission groups, the core of a sell-side process. SmartRoom’s strength is permission design: complex rights across many groups are its stated focus. Ellty’s lead comes from AI features, which SmartRoom does not list, and native e-signature. In practice, AI features help on both sides of a deal, from a sell-side team checking a large upload for gaps to a buyer summarising the contents of a folder before a call with management.

Feature coverage follows the same pattern: Ellty ships eight of our twelve checklist items and SmartRoom seven. Neither offers a mobile app or a public API.

Everyday usability

Ellty 9.8, SmartRoom 7.3. This is the biggest gap in the matchup. Our usability criterion rewards self-serve setup, a trial that lets buyers judge the interface before committing, and a guest view simple enough for first-time users. SmartRoom’s demo-led sale and its depth of permission settings mean more onboarding and more configuration before a room goes live. That depth is valuable to a specialist administrator. It is less helpful to a target’s CFO who has to upload documents between other work, or to a bidder’s junior lawyer who just needs to find the leases.

Pricing

Ellty is listed from $149 a month; a six-month sale process comes to about $894 at the entry rate, after a 14-day free trial. SmartRoom quotes per project and does not list a trial. Our pricing clarity scores are 9.7 and 7.5. The gap reflects visibility and predictability: with a quote, the total depends on what the vendor scopes and on what an extension month costs if the deal slips. Ask SmartRoom for a written quote that includes overage terms, then compare it with Ellty’s rate over the same months using the cost calculator above or our pricing guide.

Service and support

Ellty 9.2, SmartRoom 8.8. Both describe support aimed at deal deadlines. SmartRoom sells through a demo, so onboarding is part of the conversation from the start; Ellty is set up self-serve with support behind it. Whichever you choose, confirm in writing how support is reached at night and at weekends, and whether a named contact covers your process.

Permission depth in practice

Consider a sale with eight bidders, two of them trade buyers who compete with the business. The sell side wants the financial buyers to see full customer contracts, the trade buyers to see redacted versions, and nobody to see the pricing schedules until the second round.

In SmartRoom, the team would build that matrix of groups and folder rights in the platform, redact customer names in the trade buyers’ copies inside the room, and rely on the audit trail to confirm the setup worked. In Ellty, the team would build the same groups and folder rights, prepare redacted copies before upload, and place them in folders only the trade buyers can open. Both reach the same outcome; SmartRoom keeps the redaction step inside the room, while Ellty asks for one more step outside it but gives the team AI features for the review and a faster setup.

Questions to put to each vendor

Because one of these rooms is bought through a demo and the other can be opened in an afternoon, the evidence you collect will look different. Close that gap with the same written questions to both.

Ask SmartRoom how long a typical room takes from signed order to first bidder login, what the quote includes in terms of users, data volume and term, and what an additional month costs if signing slips. Ask whether redaction can be applied to a batch of files at once or only page by page, since that decides how much time it really saves on a large upload.

Ask Ellty for its current SOC 2 report under NDA and read the scope section, because a counterparty’s security team will do the same. Ask how its AI features handle your documents, where processing takes place and whether content is used for anything beyond your own room. Confirm how permission groups behave when a bidder is moved from the first round to the second.

Put both sets of answers in one table before deciding. Teams often find that the question they cared about most at the start, such as price or certification, is settled quickly, and that the deciding factor turns out to be who will administer the room day to day.

When neither is the right answer

Some processes need features neither vendor lists. If your IT policy requires single sign-on for every external tool, look at iDeals or Datasite instead. If the deal team expects to approve answers from a phone, neither lists a mobile app. And for a very large auction run by a global bank with dozens of bidder groups, the bank may already have a framework agreement with another provider that makes the choice for you. Our investment banking shortlist covers those cases.

Which one for which team

For other rooms with deep permission controls, see the investment banking shortlist.