Box alternative
A Box alternative priced for a business of one.
Box's pricing page opens with “Choose the best plan for your business,” and Box's docs put its AI for documents on the Business plan, which needs three users. For a business of one, that's two empty seats and at least $540 a year. Granite's price is for one person: your first 25 documents free, then $99 a year, with every document read, named and filed as it lands.
Best Box alternatives in 2026
If you run a business on your own, each row below is a question to ask about your Box plan: what it reads, what it files for you, and what it costs one person.
| Feature | Granite | Box |
|---|---|---|
| Plans one person can buy | Both of them, Free and Paid. Every account is one person, and nothing is priced per user | Individual and Personal Pro are single-user. Business Starter through Enterprise Plus are priced per user, 3 users minimum |
| Plans with AI that reads a document | Yesboth, Free included: each document is matched to one of more than 110 document types and named for what it is | Business and above, per Box's docs on Box AI for Documents. Not Individual or Personal Pro |
| Plans where a scan is searchable by its words | Yesboth: scanned PDFs and phone photos (JPEG, PNG, WebP, HEIC) are read on upload, so search finds them by what they say and opens the page that matched | Text PDFs and scans taken in the Box app. Scanned PDFs you upload: Enterprise Advanced and Shield Pro customers. Photos aren't on Box's list of file types it searches inside |
| Plans that keep a document's details as fields | Yesboth: a 1099-NEC's payer, payer TIN and nonemployee compensation come off the page as fields of their own | Business Plus and above, as custom metadata fields. Box AI extracts them from Enterprise up |
| Upload by email on your plan | On Paid: forward an attachment to your private Granite address and it's read and filed | “Not available to Starter accounts and Personal accounts,” per Box's docs |
| Sending one document to your accountant | Yesany plan: a link to just that document, which you can revoke and which ends after 1, 7 or 30 days. Every view is logged. There's no password option | A shared link on every plan. Passwords and expiry dates aren't available on the free Individual plan |
| Who keeps the filing and the deadlines | YesGranite does. A car's papers go under the car, with no folder to pick. An invoice's due date or a license's expiry shows up on Home, and a Monday email lists what's due in the next 30 days | You do: the folder you pick, plus Collections you create and drag files into. |
| Several people editing the same files | Noone person per account, with no co-editing. On Paid, you can invite people into a vault one at a time | Yesshared folders on every plan, and Box Notes with up to 30 people editing at once |
| Word, Excel and other working files | NoGranite takes PDFs, photos, plain text and Markdown. Save a Word or Excel file as a PDF to bring it in | YesBox searches inside Word, Excel, PowerPoint, CSV and Google Docs files |
| What one person pays in a year | $0 for 25 documents and 1 GB, or $99 for Paid, with no document cap and 100 GB | $0 Individual · $120 Personal Pro, billed annually · at least $540 for Business (3 users × $15 × 12) · at least $900 for Business Plus, where fields start. Searchable uploaded scans start at Enterprise Advanced, which has no price on Box's pricing page |
Other Box alternatives
Box's main competitors, going by Gartner's review pages and Google's AI overview, include these three.
Dropbox
For working from the same folders on a laptop, a phone and the web, kept in sync. Basic is free with 2 GB on up to 3 devices, and Plus is $119.88 a year for 2 TB.
Google Drive
For a business that runs on Google Docs and Sheets, kept in folders you share with other people. 15 GB is free, counted together with Gmail and Google Photos.
Microsoft OneDrive
For files that live on a Microsoft account. 5 GB is free, with Outlook.com attachments counted against it, and Microsoft 365 Personal is $99.99 a year for 1 TB.
Why switch
When the whole team is you
Four things that are different when Granite keeps the paperwork.
You stop being the filer
Running a business on your own means you're also the bookkeeper, the filer, and the person who has to find the contract at 9pm. Granite takes the filer's job, Free plan included. A client's 1099-NEC comes in named for the client and the tax year, and the contract turns up when you search for what's in it, not for where you put it. The organizing happens even if you never find a Sunday to file.
Your first helper doesn't need a seat
Sooner or later someone helps with the books: a bookkeeper, or a spouse who does the quarterly numbers. On Granite Paid, you invite them to the vault as a viewer, or as a collaborator if they'll add documents too. They sign in with their own Granite account and find every document already named and filed. Granite has no seats, so the invite doesn't change your bill.
Tax season with your accountant
Your tax forms gather into a collection for their tax year as they arrive, the 1099s from clients included. When your accountant asks, export that one collection as a ZIP of the original files and send it. The ZIP opens without Granite, so they don't need an account. Before you send it, our tax document checklist shows the forms a solo owner usually collects, so you can spot the one that hasn't arrived.
Your business and your household, in separate vaults
Box labels its free plan as the one “for personal use,” and a business of one has a personal side too. On Granite Paid, the business, the household's papers and a rental property can each have their own vault, and every plan comes with one Personal vault. The business's profile also lists what a business usually has, like formation documents, a business license and a business owner's policy, so a gap shows up.
FAQ
Box alternative FAQ
- Is there a free version of Box?
- Yes. Box's free plan is called Individual: one user, 10 GB of storage, 250 MB per upload, one version of each file and 5 Box Sign signature requests a month. In a 2025 post, Box announced new AI experiences for Individual and Personal Pro as “coming soon,” without a date. Granite's free plan covers 25 documents for the life of the account, each one read, named, filed and searchable.
- Can Box AI answer questions across all my files?
- Box's docs say it answers from one file at a time until Enterprise Plus. On Business, Business Plus and Enterprise, Box AI “pulls information only from the document you loaded in preview.” From Enterprise Plus up, you can ask about as many as 10 files at once. On Granite Paid, Ask takes a plain-English question, searches your whole vault, reads the documents that fit (up to 8 per question) and links to the page the answer came from.
- Can I bring a whole Box folder into Granite?
- Yes, through Box's own download. In Box on the web, select the folders you want (Ctrl+A selects everything) and click Download, and Box sends them as a single zip file. Open the zip on your computer and drag the folder onto Granite in your browser, where each PDF, photo or text file is read as it lands. There's no Box importer, so that's the whole route. Each upload can be up to 50 MB, and a password-protected PDF opens with its password. Free covers 25 documents, so a business folder with more than 25 files needs Granite Paid.
- Does Granite have SOC 2 or HIPAA like Box's business plans?
- No. Granite hasn't had a SOC 2 audit yet (our security page says we intend to pursue Type I within our first year), and it doesn't offer a HIPAA BAA. Box lists SOC 1/2/3 compliance support on its Business plans and HIPAA on Enterprise, encrypts files with AES 256-bit at rest and in transit, and sells a KeySafe add-on for holding your own keys. Granite encrypts each file under its own key and encrypts the details it pulls out of your documents. Its servers do decrypt your documents to read them.
Keep exploring
More on Granite
- You don't have a filing problem. You have a finding problem.Why finding a document by what it says beats remembering where you put it.
- Granite for small businessReceipts, invoices, licenses and tax forms for a business run by one person.
- Tax document checklistThe forms to have in hand before you send anything to your accountant.
- Why a scanned PDF won't searchWhat's missing from a scan, and the quick test that tells you.
- Granite vs DropboxIf your business folders sync through Dropbox instead of Box.
- Granite vs Google DriveIf the business runs on Google Docs and the paperwork ended up beside them.
- How Granite reads a documentWhat happens between the upload and the name it ends up with.
- Collections and separate vaultsTax years, cars and properties that group themselves, and a vault for each part of your life.
- What Granite encryptsPer-file keys, encrypted details, and why Granite's servers can read your documents.
- Granite's two plansWhat Free covers, and the one paid plan with no document cap.
Upload this year's 1099s and see where they land.
Start with your clients' 1099s and your business license, and see each one come back with its name and its tax year or expiry date. The first 25 documents are free, and you won't need a card.