Stockpress vs Air: Which Digital Asset Management platform is right for your team?

TL;DR

Both Stockpress and Air help teams organize, find, and share digital assets. The difference comes down to what your team is primarily trying to solve. Air is a creative operations platform — genuinely excellent for creative review, approval workflows, and visual collaboration. Stockpress is a full Digital Asset Management platform built for every team in the organization, with storage-based pricing, unlimited users, and governance tools that scale beyond creative.

Choose Air if creative production workflows, moodboarding, and approval cycles are your primary need and you’re comfortable with credit-based pricing.

Choose Stockpress if you need a platform that works for marketing, sales, ops, legal, and external partners — not just the creative team — with predictable pricing and no per-seat costs.

What is the difference between Stockpress and Air?

The clearest way to understand the difference is to look at what problem each platform was designed to solve.

Air was built as a creative workspace first. Its boards, review workflows, and visual interface make it genuinely strong for agencies, designers, and content production teams that need structured approval cycles and in-context feedback. It describes itself as a “creative operations platform,” and that positioning is accurate.

Stockpress was built as a Digital Asset Management platform for every team in the organization, not just creative. That means marketing, brand, sales, content, ops, legal, and external partners all work from the same library — with the permissions, metadata, and governance tools to support that scale.

Who is Air built for?

Air is genuinely a strong platform for a specific type of team. It’s worth being honest about where it shines, because the comparison matters.

Air excels for agencies and in-house creative teams producing high volumes of visual content who need structured review cycles. Its boards give creative work a visual home — assets are displayed as thumbnails, making it fast to browse, annotate, and approve work in progress. Timestamped video feedback, version stacking, and Kanban-style project tracking make it a natural fit for teams where content creation and review is the core workflow.

Air also integrates well with the tools designers already use — Figma, Slack, Notion, and Adobe Creative Cloud — so it can slot into a creative production workflow without disrupting existing habits. Its desktop app (“Air Flow”) syncs local folders to the cloud, which freelancers and studio photographers often find useful.

If your team’s primary challenge is managing the creative production process from brief to approval, Air is a credible option worth evaluating.

Where teams begin to outgrow Air

Air’s strengths as a creative platform can become limitations when the platform needs to serve the whole organization rather than just the creative team.

Your asset library becomes everyone’s platform

Air starts as a creative workspace. When marketing, sales, legal, product, web, and external agencies all need to access and use the same approved assets, a platform built around creative production workflows starts to introduce friction for people who aren’t creative professionals. The visual board interface is excellent for designers — it’s less intuitive for a sales manager looking for the right one-pager or a regional ops team downloading approved templates.

Stockpress is built around the idea that DAM ownership doesn’t belong to one team. Every plan includes unlimited users across every department, with permissions designed to give different groups access to exactly what they need.

Pricing becomes harder to predict

Air’s credit-based pricing model is genuinely flexible — credits work across storage, AI image editing, and video creation — but that flexibility makes monthly costs harder to predict. Your available storage isn’t a fixed GB cap; it updates in real time as your library and AI usage grow. Teams that prefer budgeting against a fixed, predictable number often find that more difficult to manage as usage scales.

Stockpress uses storage-based, published pricing where the tier you’re on determines the cost, regardless of how many people are using the platform or how many AI searches they run. The price you see is the price you pay.

Governance becomes more important

As more departments and external partners rely on the same asset library, the need for more granular control increases. Which team can download which assets? Who can upload? When do files expire? Which version is the approved one for external use?

Stockpress includes flexible permissions and sharing controls, version control, expiration dates on files, file watermarking, and custom metadata — built for teams where asset governance matters as much as asset discovery.

Why some Air customers move to Stockpress

These are the most common reasons teams make the switch. Each one answers a real question the organization was asking.

1. We needed unlimited users without unpredictable costs

Both platforms offer unlimited seats, but Stockpress’s storage-based pricing means that the cost doesn’t change as more departments, freelancers, or external partners join the platform. There are no credits to manage, no per-AI-action charges, and no surprises when the team grows.

2. We needed a platform the whole organization could use

Air’s visual, board-first interface works beautifully for designers. It’s less natural for salespeople, operations teams, or legal — who need to find, download, and use approved assets without learning a creative production workflow. Stockpress is designed for the full range of people who use content, not just the people who create it.

3. We needed more predictable pricing

Credit-based pricing that varies with AI usage and storage activity makes budgeting harder than a fixed monthly tier. Many organizations find it easier to plan around a published, storage-based price that doesn’t change based on what the team actually does with the platform that month.

4. We needed stronger governance

Collections, custom user roles, expiration dates, watermarking, and FTP access matter more as the asset library serves a wider audience. Stockpress includes these in the platform rather than requiring a higher tier or a separate conversation.

5. We wanted migration included

Stockpress offers free migration for teams coming from Air and other platforms — reducing the risk and the manual effort of moving an organized asset library to a new system. That means the content structure your team already built doesn’t get lost in the move.

How migrating from Air to Stockpress works

Migration from Air is more manageable than most teams expect. The process doesn’t mean starting from scratch — it means moving what you’ve already built into a system designed to preserve and extend it.

Step 1: Export your assets from Air. Air allows bulk export of files either via API or download. Before you begin, take stock of your existing organization — boards, tags, and folder structure — because these can inform how you set up Collections in Stockpress.

Step 2: Import into Stockpress. Assets can be brought in directly via API or upload of your downloaded Air files.

Step 3: Preserve your structure with Collections. In Stockpress, Collections can live inside other Collections, so the hierarchy you had in Air can be rebuilt exactly — or improved — without flattening everything into a single library.

Step 4: Deduplicate. Stockpress includes duplicate file detection to clean up any redundancies that accumulated over time in your Air library before they migrate into the new system.

Step 5: Apply AI tagging. Stockpress’s AI and custom tagging works across images and video, making the migrated library immediately searchable — including facial recognition for photo libraries.

Step 6: Set permissions and invite your team. Configure which teams see which Collections, assign custom roles, and invite everyone — unlimited users, no additional cost.

Step 7: Go live. Most teams are fully operational within days, not weeks. Stockpress’s self-serve setup means you don’t need a formal implementation project to start seeing value.

Most teams don’t migrate because they want a different platform. They migrate because they want the same content to be easier to trust, easier to find, and easier to share.

Can Stockpress replace Air?

Yes — for most use cases, and with some important nuance.

Stockpress replaces Air’s core function of organizing, finding, and sharing approved digital assets. It handles images, video, documents, design files, and any other file type, with AI-powered search, Collections, version control, and external sharing that covers everything a team needs to work from a shared asset library.

What Stockpress doesn’t replicate is Air’s creative production workflow — specifically the Kanban project boards, moodboarding, and structured review cycles built for creative teams working from brief to approval. If that production workflow is central to how your team works, it’s worth evaluating whether you need that layer in a DAM or in a separate creative project management tool alongside a more organization-wide asset management platform.

For teams where the primary need is asset organization, findability, governance, and organization-wide sharing, Stockpress handles those functions more completely than Air does at scale.

Feature comparison

Pricing comparison

Both platforms publish their pricing, which is worth noting — most enterprise DAMs don’t. The key difference is how costs scale over time.

Air’s pricing is credit-based. Credits are the platform’s universal currency for storage, AI image editing, and video creation. Your monthly storage isn’t a fixed GB cap — it updates in real time as your team uses the platform. This is flexible, but it makes budgeting over time less predictable, particularly for teams that use AI features heavily.

Stockpress prices by storage tier, not by user count or AI usage. The entry paid plan starts at $99 a month for 200 GB with unlimited users. Every plan includes the same unlimited users from the Essential tier up, which means the bill doesn’t change as more departments, freelancers, or external partners join the platform. There are no implementation fees and migration is included.

For a broader comparison of how DAM pricing models differ, see our guide to how much DAM software costs in 2026.

Choose Air if…

• Creative production, moodboarding, and structured review cycles are the primary workflow
• Your team is primarily designers, creative directors, and agencies
• In-context feedback on images and video is essential to how you work
• Integrations with Figma, Notion, and Slack are central to your stack
• Credit-based pricing works for how your team uses storage and AI

Choose Stockpress if…

• Multiple departments beyond creative need to access, use, and share the same assets
• Predictable, storage-based pricing matters more than usage flexibility
• Unlimited users need to join without changing the monthly cost
• Governance, permissions, and expiration controls are important at scale
• You want Shopify integration, custom brand portals, or FTP access
• Free migration support matters for moving an existing library

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Air a Digital Asset Management platform?

Air describes itself as a creative operations platform. It includes DAM capabilities — storage, tagging, search, and sharing — but it’s built primarily around creative production workflows, including review cycles, approvals, and project boards. It works well as a DAM for creative-first teams, but it’s less suited to organization-wide asset management with complex governance needs.

Can Stockpress replace Air?

Yes, for most DAM use cases. Stockpress handles asset organization, AI-powered search, version control, permissions, and external sharing more completely than Air at scale. The one area Stockpress doesn’t replicate is Air’s creative production workflow — specifically Kanban boards and timestamped creative feedback — which some teams handle separately in a project management tool.

Which is better for marketing teams, and which is better for creative teams?

For marketing teams, Stockpress is the stronger fit. Marketing teams typically need to find, use, and share approved assets across campaigns and channels — they’re not running creative review workflows. For creative teams, Air has stronger production features — Kanban boards, timestamped video feedback, and moodboarding. Stockpress is the better choice if creative teams also need their assets accessible across the broader organization, not just within the creative workflow.

How difficult is it to migrate from Air to Stockpress?

Less difficult than most teams expect. Stockpress offers free migration support, and the process — export files and metadata, mirror your structure, or create a new one in Stockpress, apply AI tagging, invite the team — can typically be completed in days rather than weeks. Most teams run Stockpress in parallel with Air during the transition, so there’s no disruption to the existing workflow.

Can I keep my folder structure when moving from Air to Stockpress?

Yes. Stockpress Collections can live inside other Collections, so you can mirror the same hierarchy you had in Air and deepen it in Stockpress too. Boards become Collections, nested organization becomes Collections-in-Collections, and nobody has to relearn where everything lives on day one.

What happens to metadata and tags when I migrate?

Custom metadata and tags can be preserved during migration. Stockpress supports custom tag categories, so the tagging structure your team built in Air transfers rather than being rebuilt from scratch.

Which is more affordable — Stockpress or Air?

Both publish pricing and both offer free plans. Stockpress’s pricing is storage-based and fixed — the monthly cost doesn’t change based on how many people use the platform or how many AI features they run. Air’s credit-based model is flexible, but monthly costs can vary as AI usage and storage grow. For teams that prefer predictable budgeting, Stockpress tends to be easier to plan around over time.

Does Stockpress have a Shopify integration?

Yes. Stockpress integrates with Shopify, which Air does not currently offer. For ecommerce teams managing product photography and campaign assets alongside a Shopify store, that integration removes a significant manual step in the content workflow.

Can I migrate while still using Air?

Yes. Most teams set up Stockpress in parallel, organize the new library, test it with a subset of the team, and switch fully once they’re confident the structure is right. You don’t need to shut down Air before Stockpress is ready.

Does Stockpress have a free plan?

Yes. Stockpress offers a free plan with unlimited users, 3 GB of storage, and no credit card required. It’s a real plan with core DAM features included, not a time-limited trial.

Thinking about moving from Air?

Whether you’re comparing platforms for the first time or already using Air and exploring alternatives, Stockpress can organize your existing library, preserve the way your team already works, and make migration straightforward — without a formal implementation project or hidden fees.

Try Stockpress for free — no credit card required.

Book a demo — see how Stockpress handles your specific use case.