How is this government & public sector ranking decided?

Mechanically. The 20 approved government & public sector listings on this page are sorted by their published rating, highest first, with the number of ratings behind each score as the tie-break and the product name as a final tie-break so the order is stable. Those ratings are aggregated from public sources, not collected from Softwr readers, this site hosts no reviews, so the order is a summary of what is already published elsewhere, not a verdict of our own. Nothing on this page is paid placement.

Is this list re-ordered for enterprise?

No, and it would be dishonest to imply otherwise. The catalogue records no data about which team sizes or roles each tool suits, so the ranking is the same published-rating order as the unsegmented list. What the enterprise framing changes is which of the figures below matter most. Enterprise buyers rarely pay a published price. The listings here with an unpriced tier are the ones with a sales motion, and those are the ones that will quote.

How much does government & public sector software cost?

Across the 20 government & public sector tools listed here, paid plans start between $150 and $10,000 a month, with a median entry price of $500. The most expensive single tier published in the category is $10,000 a month (CityView). 6 of 20 also publish a $0 plan.

What is the cheapest government & public sector software?

6 of the 20 tools listed here cost nothing at all. Among the ones that charge, American Legal Publishing has the lowest published entry price at $150 a month. Cheapest and best value are different questions: check which tier the capability you need actually appears in before you compare starting prices.

Is there free government & public sector software?

Yes, 6 of 20 tools in this category publish a plan priced at $0. 6 of them are free outright, with no paid tier above. A tool is only counted as free here when it publishes a $0 plan, an open-source licence, or a starting price of zero, a free trial does not count.

What features should government & public sector software have?

Judging by what vendors put in their own published pricing tiers, the most frequently named capabilities in this category are api access (2 of 17 tools that publish plan detail), storage (2) and surveys (2). Treat those as the category baseline. Anything named by only one vendor, such as analytics or cloud storage, is a differentiator rather than a standard, so it is worth deciding whether you need it before it narrows your shortlist to one.

How is government & public sector software usually billed?

subscription (11), usage-based (3), free (2), freemium (1), plus 1 less common arrangements, counted across the 20 listings on this page. The distinction that costs money is per-seat versus flat: a per-user plan at the same headline price scales with your headcount and a flat subscription does not.

What does government & public sector software actually cover?

The 20 tools on this page do not describe themselves the same way. The subject tags they carry most often are government (20), public-safety (4), civic-engagement (3), cloud-infrastructure (3), fedramp (3). That spread is the honest answer to what the category means in practice: it is not one product shape, and two tools filed under government & public sector may overlap on very little.

How many government & public sector tools are listed on Softwr?

20 approved government & public sector listings appear on this page, including Accela, American Legal Publishing, AWS GovCloud, Axon Records. Each links to a full breakdown with its pricing tiers and plan detail, and the category can be filtered by price and sorted by rating above. You can also read the shortlist view at /best/government-public-sector, which ranks the same set by published rating.

Government & Public Sector · ranked shortlist

Best Government & Public Sector software for Enterprise in 2026

20 approved government & public sector listings, ordered by published rating with the method stated below rather than assumed. Enterprise buyers rarely pay a published price. The listings here with an unpriced tier are the ones with a sales motion, and those are the ones that will quote.

Tools ranked: 20
Entry price range: $150-$10,000
Publish a $0 plan: 6 of 20

How this ranking is derived

The sort key

Published rating, highest first. Ties break on the number of ratings behind the score, then on product name so the order never depends on what the API happened to return first. That is the whole rule, there is no weighting, no score of our own, and nothing paid: no sponsored slot runs on these pages.

Where the ratings come from

No listing in this set carries a rating, so the order falls back to name. Those scores are aggregated from public sources rather than collected here, Softwr hosts no reviews of its own, which is also why no rating on this page is marked up as ours in structured data.

What the pool is

Approved government & public sector listings, capped at 20 per page; 20 came back for this one. It is not the whole market, and a tool being absent means we hold no record of it rather than that it failed a test. The unranked full set is on the government & public sector category page.

The ranking

Each entry lists why it sits where it sits, drawn from its own published rating and pricing.

#1
Accela
Highest rated here
Civic Solutions for Modern Government
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $800 a month, with no free plan.
Billing
subscription
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, permitting, licensing, civic-engagement
Accela breakdown Compare with American Legal Publishing
#2
A
American Legal Publishing
Municipal Code Solutions
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $150 a month, with no free plan.
Billing
subscription
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, legal-publishing, codification, ordinances
American Legal Publishing breakdown Compare with AWS GovCloud
#3
AWS GovCloud
Secure Cloud for Government
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Free, no paid tier is published at all.
Billing
usage-based
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, cloud-infrastructure, fedramp, compliance
AWS GovCloud breakdown Compare with Axon Records
#4
Axon Records
Digital Evidence and Records Management
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $1,500 a month, with no free plan.
Billing
subscription
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, public-safety, evidence-management, body-cameras
Axon Records breakdown Compare with Azure Government
#5
Azure Government
Trusted Cloud for Government
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Free, no paid tier is published at all.
Billing
usage-based
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, cloud-infrastructure, fedramp, microsoft
Azure Government breakdown Compare with Bang the Table
#6
Bang the Table
Community Engagement Platform
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $600 a month, with no free plan.
Billing
subscription
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, community-engagement, public-participation, surveys
Bang the Table breakdown Compare with CentralSquare
#7
CentralSquare
Public Safety and Administration Software
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $1,500 a month, with no free plan.
Billing
subscription
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, public-safety, cad, dispatch
CentralSquare breakdown Compare with Citizen
#8
Citizen
Real-time Safety Alerts
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Free, no paid tier is published at all.
Billing
freemium
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, public-safety, community-alerts, emergency
Citizen breakdown Compare with CitizenLab
#9
CitizenLab
Digital Democracy Platform
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $500 a month, with no free plan.
Billing
subscription
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, digital-democracy, participatory-budgeting, civic-tech
CitizenLab breakdown Compare with CityView
#10
CityView
Community Development Software
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $10,000 a month, with no free plan.
Billing
Model not published
Tags
government, community-development, permitting, municipal
CityView breakdown Compare with CivicPlus
#11
CivicPlus
Civic Engagement Technology
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
Billing
quote
Tags
government, civic-engagement, website, communications
CivicPlus breakdown Compare with CKAN
#12
CKAN
Open Source Data Portal Platform
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Free, no paid tier is published at all.
Billing
free
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, open-data, Open Source, data-portal
CKAN breakdown Compare with ClearGov
#13
ClearGov
Financial Transparency for Government
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $200 a month, with no free plan.
Billing
subscription
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, transparency, budgeting, visualization
ClearGov breakdown Compare with DataSF
#14
D
DataSF
San Francisco Open Data Portal
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Free, no paid tier is published at all.
Billing
free
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, open-data, municipal, san-francisco
DataSF breakdown Compare with DocuWare
#15
DocuWare
Document Management and Workflow Automation
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
Billing
Model not published
Tags
government, document management, workflow, automation
DocuWare breakdown Compare with eCode360
#16
eCode360
Digital Municipal Codes
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $175 a month, with no free plan.
Billing
subscription
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, legal-publishing, digital-codes, zoning
eCode360 breakdown Compare with Google Cloud for Government
#17
Google Cloud for Government
Innovation Cloud for Government
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Free, no paid tier is published at all.
Billing
usage-based
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, cloud-infrastructure, fedramp, google
Google Cloud for Government breakdown Compare with GovQA
#18
GovQA
Government Request Management
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $400 a month, with no free plan.
Billing
subscription
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, records-management, foia, e-discovery
GovQA breakdown Compare with Granicus
#19
Granicus
Digital Government Experiences Platform
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $500 a month, with no free plan.
Billing
subscription
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, civic-engagement, digital-services, communications
Granicus breakdown Compare with IAPro
#20
IAPro
Internal Affairs Case Management
- No rating on record, so it ranks below everything that has one.
- Paid from $500 a month, with no free plan.
Billing
subscription
Published tiers
1 tier
Tags
government, public-safety, internal-affairs, accountability
IAPro breakdown

What government & public sector software costs

Counted from the published pricing of the 20 listings on this page. A tool counts as free only where it publishes a $0 plan, an open-source licence or a starting price of zero.

Cheapest paid plan: $150American Legal Publishing
Median entry price: $500across 12 priced
Dearest entry price: $10,000CityView
Publish a $0 plan: 6of 20

Paid government & public sector plans in this set start anywhere from $150 a month for American Legal Publishing to $10,000 for CityView. The median entry price across the 12 tools that publish one is $500, half of them start below that figure and half above it.

6 of 20 publish a $0 plan, and 6 of those charge nothing at all. 12 tools have no free tier of any kind.

American Legal Publishing pricing CityView pricing CityView plans

How these vendors bill

The billing model each of the 20 government & public sector listings publishes, counted. Two tools at the same headline price are not the same purchase if one of them charges per seat.

subscription: 11
usage-based: 3
free: 2
freemium: 1
quote: 1

What comes as standard, and what you pay extra for

Every capability named in a published pricing tier by any of the 17 government & public sector tools here that break their plans down, counted once per vendor. This measures what vendors choose to advertise as a selling point, not everything the software does, an absence below is silence, not a missing feature.

Named most often

API Access , 2 of 17
Storage , 2 of 17
Surveys , 2 of 17

Named by fewer

Nothing else is named by more than one vendor, beyond the list on the left, no two of these tools describe their tiers the same way.

Named by exactly one vendor: Analytics, Cloud Storage, Database, Forums, Online Codes, RMS. Those are differentiators rather than table stakes.

What “Government & Public Sector” covers in practice

The subject tags that recur across these 20 listings, with the number of tools carrying each. A category label is a filing decision; this is the closer read of what is actually filed under it.

government20
public-safety4
civic-engagement3
cloud-infrastructure3
fedramp3
communications2
legal-publishing2
municipal2
open-data2
permitting2

Carried by a single tool: accountability, cad, community-engagement, digital-democracy, emergency, licensing, participatory-budgeting, transparency. If one of those is the reason you are here, the category page is the wrong lens, go straight to that product.

How to choose between them

Four things the numbers above should change about your shortlist.

Start with the free tiers if there are enough of them

6 of 20 government & public sector tools here publish a $0 plan, which is enough to run a real trial without a purchase order. A free tier is worth more than a free trial when you are evaluating: a trial expires on the vendor's schedule, a free plan expires when you outgrow it. The thing to check before you commit is which of the capabilities below sit above the free line, starting with api access, the single most frequently named capability in this category's published tiers.

Read the spread before you read the features

$150 to $10,000 is a $9,850 spread on entry price alone, and a spread that wide is never about polish, it is about who the vendor built for. Tools at the bottom of this ladder are priced for one person or a small team; tools near $10,000 are priced for a department with a procurement process. Decide which of those you are before you compare capability, or you will shortlist four tools that were never competing for the same buyer.

The billing model matters more than the headline number

This category splits across 5 billing models: subscription on 11 listings, usage-based on 3, and 3 other arrangements across the rest. A per-user price and a flat subscription at the same headline figure are not the same purchase, the first one grows with headcount and the second does not. Multiply by your real team size before you compare two numbers side by side.

Compare government & public sector tools directly

Every pairing below is a full comparison: the same checklist applied to both, so a gap in one is a gap in the other.

Go straight to the numbers

Accelapricing alternatives
American Legal Publishingpricing alternatives
AWS GovCloudpricing alternatives
Axon Recordspricing alternatives
Azure Governmentpricing alternatives
Bang the Tablepricing alternatives

Build your own comparison See the shortlist instead

Questions people ask about government & public sector software

Answered from the listings on this page, and nowhere else.

How is this government & public sector ranking decided?: Mechanically. The 20 approved government & public sector listings on this page are sorted by their published rating, highest first, with the number of ratings behind each score as the tie-break and the product name as a final tie-break so the order is stable. Those ratings are aggregated from public sources, not collected from Softwr readers, this site hosts no reviews, so the order is a summary of what is already published elsewhere, not a verdict of our own. Nothing on this page is paid placement.
Is this list re-ordered for enterprise?: No, and it would be dishonest to imply otherwise. The catalogue records no data about which team sizes or roles each tool suits, so the ranking is the same published-rating order as the unsegmented list. What the enterprise framing changes is which of the figures below matter most. Enterprise buyers rarely pay a published price. The listings here with an unpriced tier are the ones with a sales motion, and those are the ones that will quote.
How much does government & public sector software cost?: Across the 20 government & public sector tools listed here, paid plans start between $150 and $10,000 a month, with a median entry price of $500. The most expensive single tier published in the category is $10,000 a month (CityView). 6 of 20 also publish a $0 plan.
What is the cheapest government & public sector software?: 6 of the 20 tools listed here cost nothing at all. Among the ones that charge, American Legal Publishing has the lowest published entry price at $150 a month. Cheapest and best value are different questions: check which tier the capability you need actually appears in before you compare starting prices.
Is there free government & public sector software?: Yes, 6 of 20 tools in this category publish a plan priced at $0. 6 of them are free outright, with no paid tier above. A tool is only counted as free here when it publishes a $0 plan, an open-source licence, or a starting price of zero, a free trial does not count.
What features should government & public sector software have?: Judging by what vendors put in their own published pricing tiers, the most frequently named capabilities in this category are api access (2 of 17 tools that publish plan detail), storage (2) and surveys (2). Treat those as the category baseline. Anything named by only one vendor, such as analytics or cloud storage, is a differentiator rather than a standard, so it is worth deciding whether you need it before it narrows your shortlist to one.
How is government & public sector software usually billed?: subscription (11), usage-based (3), free (2), freemium (1), plus 1 less common arrangements, counted across the 20 listings on this page. The distinction that costs money is per-seat versus flat: a per-user plan at the same headline price scales with your headcount and a flat subscription does not.
What does government & public sector software actually cover?: The 20 tools on this page do not describe themselves the same way. The subject tags they carry most often are government (20), public-safety (4), civic-engagement (3), cloud-infrastructure (3), fedramp (3). That spread is the honest answer to what the category means in practice: it is not one product shape, and two tools filed under government & public sector may overlap on very little.
How many government & public sector tools are listed on Softwr?: 20 approved government & public sector listings appear on this page, including Accela, American Legal Publishing, AWS GovCloud, Axon Records. Each links to a full breakdown with its pricing tiers and plan detail, and the category can be filtered by price and sorted by rating above. You can also read the shortlist view at /best/government-public-sector, which ranks the same set by published rating.

Keep reading

Neighbouring categories

Adjacent in the same taxonomy, not a ranking.

How this ranking is derived

The sort key

Where the ratings come from

What the pool is

The ranking

Accela

American Legal Publishing

AWS GovCloud

Axon Records

Azure Government

Bang the Table

CentralSquare

Citizen

CitizenLab

CityView

CivicPlus

CKAN

ClearGov

DataSF

DocuWare

eCode360

Google Cloud for Government

GovQA

Granicus

IAPro