Structured desk research, stated limits, and no invented scores. This page explains exactly what our evaluations are — and what they are not.
What we do
Every tool page, comparison, and guide on this site is built from structured desk research: official documentation, pricing and terms pages, changelogs, and independent secondary reviews. We read the source instead of repeating marketing claims, and we weigh what a tool does against the real job it is supposed to do — for freelancers, creators, and small businesses, not for feature checklists.
Our criteria
- Does it do what it claims? The tool's actual capabilities, in plain language, with the limits stated next to the strengths.
- Pricing and plan transparency. Whether a free plan or trial exists, and where paid tiers live. We never invent dollar amounts — current prices are always on the vendor's own pricing page.
- Commercial-use terms. Whether the output can be used for client or commercial work, with the caveat that official terms govern and change.
- Privacy and data handling. What happens to what you paste or upload, and what to check before using a tool for client work.
- Realistic learning curve and support. How long it takes to get value, and whether help exists when you get stuck.
- Fit for the stated workflow. Recommendations are conditional — "best for X" — never a single declared winner.
What "verified" means
Tool pages carry a "Last verified" date. That stamp means we re-checked the page's public facts against official sources that month — descriptions, plan structure, and key limits. It is a freshness signal for desk research, not a claim of hands-on testing.
What we don't do
Unless a page explicitly says otherwise, no hands-on testing has been done. There is no secret test lab, no borrowed screenshots presented as our own, no invented scores, and no "we tried it for 30 days" claims. If you ever see a test claim on a page, it will follow the public protocol at How we test — and if a page doesn't link to a test report, no test happened.
Update cadence
Tool pages are re-verified quarterly; guides and comparisons are reviewed when the tools they cover change materially. Every page carries a dateModified stamp as the audit trail — if a fact matters to your decision, check the date first, then the vendor's site.
Corrections
Tools, prices, and policies change quickly, so some pages will go out of date. Our correction policy explains how to report an error and what happens next.