Comparison

Excalidraw vs AFFiNE

Excalidraw lands on Worth it, and AFFiNE lands on Depends.

Excalidraw

Worth it

Confidence: Medium

Buy the free, open-source version for quick diagrams and sketches . it costs nothing and reviewers love it.

Depends

Confidence: Medium

Buy if you're a solo user or tiny team wanting a free, privacy-first Notion+Miro hybrid and can tolerate rough edges.

Excalidraw versus AFFiNE
Compare	Excalidraw	AFFiNE
Verdict	Worth it	Depends
Best for	Quick sketches and wireframes	Privacy-focused solo note-takers
Who it's not for	Enterprises wanting Miro-style workshop templates and facilitation	Teams handling sensitive data . RCE CVE, ignored XSS reports
Privacy	Open-source with past medium-severity XSS CVEs; Excalidraw+ adds SOC 2 certification and E2E encryption.¹⁰	Active 2026 CVEs include remote code execution; researchers report ignored XSS findings; no dedicated security page found.
Support quality	No support evidence in sources	Security reports allegedly ignored for months
Public sentiment	Users love Excalidraw for quick, effortless sketching and rate it around 4/5, with minor gripes about scaling and drawing-tool limits.^⁴	Sentiment is split: privacy-minded fans praise the lightweight local-first design, while others complain it feels raw and unstable.
Biggest gotcha	Excalidraw+ ($7/mo) needed for team persistence and workspaces; free version stores locally^⁶	Open-source license is not MIT despite marketing framing; verify terms before commercial use