The 14 Best Digital Experience Platforms (DXP)
This study was conducted using Gartner's Magic Quadrant, a report that evaluates technology providers and assists buyers in assessing those that best meet their needs.
Gartner is a U.S.-based research and consulting firm specializing in the analysis and evaluation of information technology (IT). It is globally recognized for its research and strategic advice on technology, business, and market trends.
What is a Digital Experience Platform?
A Digital Experience Platform (DXP) is a technological solution that enables companies to manage, personalize, and optimize user interactions across multiple digital channels, such as websites, mobile apps, social media, email, and other touchpoints.
Its primary goal is to provide a seamless and consistent experience for users at every interaction point, delivering relevant and personalized content in real time.
With a DXP, your company can:
Publish content across multiple digital channels.
Send personalized and automated emails.
Manage user accounts and customer profiles.
Personalize the user experience in real-time.
Collect and analyze customer data to improve segmentation.
Automate marketing campaigns across various touchpoints.
Optimize conversions through A/B testing and content adjustments.
Unify the omnichannel experience on websites, apps, or social media.
Provide detailed analytics and reports on performance.
Ensure data protection and compliance with regulations such as GDPR.
These platforms are essential for companies looking to evolve in the digital era, as they provide the necessary tools to manage and enhance every aspect of customer experience in a complex and constantly changing digital environment.
Gartner Evaluation Summary
This Magic Quadrant evaluates providers that met Gartner's inclusion criteria for the DXP market and aims to support decision-making on provider and product selection.
Gartner did not add or remove any providers this year.
Evaluation Criteria for Digital Experience Platforms
This Magic Quadrant assessed providers that met Gartner's inclusion criteria for the DXP market, which included:
Marketing and selling their DXP product since at least June 2020.
Acquiring at least 10 new net customers in the 12 months before June 2023.
Having a market presence in at least two of the following regions: North America, Latin America, Europe, Middle East & Africa, Asia-Pacific, and Japan.
Generating at least $17 million in revenue with a revenue growth of at least 5% year-over-year in the 12 months before June 2023.
Capability to support implementation for clients through an ecosystem of certified partners that includes at least 10 implementation agencies and system integrators.
Additionally, native or integrated capabilities include:
Account services, including registration, login, and password management with authentication and access control.
Customer data management.
Customer journey mapping.
Personalization and contextual awareness.
Analytics and optimization.
Applied AI practices.
Navigation and search.
Collaboration and knowledge sharing.
Security and access controls.
The study identified the following strengths and weaknesses of the providers:
1. Adobe Commerce
Adobe's DXP is Adobe Experience Cloud, which includes Adobe Experience Manager (AEM), Adobe Target, Adobe Analytics, and Real-Time CDP, among others. It is available as a managed service PaaS and SaaS.
Adobe Experience Cloud has a global presence and serves clients of various sizes across multiple industries. Its primary use case is B2C, but some organizations also use it for B2B and occasionally B2E purposes.
Strengths: Proven solution with a wide range of innovative products for external digital experiences and numerous implementation and support options.
Weaknesses: Typically more expensive than other providers and requires technical resources with a steep learning curve, specialized skills, training, and longer implementation timelines.
2. Optimizely
Optimizely's DXP, known as Optimizely One, includes content management, personalization, customer data management, and analytics capabilities. It is available by subscription as a hybrid cloud solution.
Optimizely has a presence in Europe, the Middle East & Africa, and parts of the Asia-Pacific region. Its primary users are companies in retail, manufacturing and distribution, high-tech, healthcare, business services, and financial services, with use cases for both B2C and B2B.
Strengths: Provides a GraphQL API that unifies data; pricing and packaging are straightforward, scalable, modular, and transparent.
Weaknesses: Undergoing a roadmap transition, which may introduce a period of uncertainty, and has a steep learning curve, requiring clients to plan for adoption and implementation.
3. Acquia
Acquia’s open DXP consists of Cloud Platform, CMS, Site Factory, CDP, DAM, and Campaign Studio, offering a range of capabilities, including content management, personalization, analytics, and customer data management. It is available as a PaaS, with some components offered as SaaS.
Acquia has a presence in Europe, Latin America, and the Asia-Pacific region. It is primarily used in government, media, education, and financial services markets for B2C and B2B use cases, with some organizations also using it for B2E scenarios.
Strengths: Provides extensive customer journey mapping, personalization, and segmentation capabilities, augmented with AI, in a rich, intuitive interface.
Weaknesses: Its partner network is less developed, which may limit the availability of qualified talent for clients implementing or optimizing Acquia technology.
4. HCLSoftware
HCL’s DXP is known as Digital Experience, with core capabilities that include content management, DAM, CDP, and low-code application development. Some newer implementations are available as PaaS.
HCL operates globally, with its DXP used across verticals such as government, life sciences, insurance, financial services, and others, mainly by large enterprises for B2B, B2C, and B2E use cases.
Strengths: Emphasizes security, privacy, and industry experience, while offering predictable, consumption-based pricing.
Weaknesses: Some necessary DXP capabilities are only available in adjacent products, and its implementation timelines are often longer than expected.
5. OpenText
OpenText Experience Cloud includes content management, analytics, personalization, optimization, and DAM capabilities, available on-premises or hosted in a public or private cloud.
It has a global presence and is used in various sectors, including manufacturing, government, retail, financial services, and insurance. Its primary use case is B2C, but it also supports some B2B scenarios.
Strengths: Extensible and customizable technology with strong governance, security, account management, and audit capabilities in authenticated experiences.
Weaknesses: Primarily targets PaaS, managed services, and on-premises environments, with limited progress towards modern, cloud-native SaaS infrastructures.
6. Bloomreach
Bloomreach Commerce Experience Cloud comprises modules within content, discovery, and engagement pillars and is available as a fully SaaS solution.
Bloomreach has some partner presence in Latin America and focuses on digital commerce experiences, recently expanding into transport, healthcare, and other B2C and B2B sectors.
Strengths: SaaS-based product that is modular and privacy-focused, with compliance as a core strategy.
Weaknesses: Primarily focused on commerce-related use cases, lacking execution and strategy for non-transactional use cases.
7. Sitecore
Sitecore’s DXP suite consists of 11 products grouped into Content Cloud, Engagement Cloud, and Commerce Cloud; the first two are included in this research. It is available as PaaS in Sitecore Managed Cloud.
With a presence in Europe, the Middle East & Africa, and the Asia-Pacific region, Sitecore’s DXP is widely used across industries, particularly financial services, automotive, and manufacturing sectors for B2C and increasingly B2B use cases.
Strengths: Features accelerated, simplified, and high-quality integrations, with its newer products being fully cloud-native SaaS solutions with a strong modular vision.
Weaknesses: Most customers use on-premises, managed clouds, or self-hosted solutions.
8. Magnolia
Magnolia DX Core includes content management, personalization, and search capabilities, available on-premises or as a PaaS offering on a public or private cloud with various cloud platform options.
Magnolia has some presence in North America and the Asia-Pacific region and is deployed in mid-sized and large organizations across a range of industries, with a focus on banking, travel, hospitality, and manufacturing for B2C and B2B use cases.
Strengths: Adopts a composable approach through no-code connector packages, offering excellent customer service.
Weaknesses: Resists trends in native customer data management capabilities and is less suited for small organizations.
9. Liferay
Liferay’s DXP includes experience management, content management, personalization, and analytics capabilities, available via SaaS, PaaS, and on-premises or cloud implementations.
Liferay has a presence in Latin America, Europe, the Middle East & Africa, and the Asia-Pacific region, used by organizations in manufacturing, telecommunications, and government, and financial services for B2B, B2C, and B2E use cases.
Strengths: Reduces technical complexity and supports authenticated experiences that involve aggregating and orchestrating content, services, and applications from internal and external sources.
Weaknesses: Core DXP remains monolithic, with slow progress in cloud strategy and SaaS adoption.
10. Crownpeak
Crownpeak’s DXP includes content management, presentation, and orchestration, as well as adjacent capabilities in consent management, compliance, governance, and security, available as SaaS with Attraqt technology integrated into its cloud.
It has a presence in Europe and is often used by manufacturing, banking and securities, insurance, healthcare, and retail sectors for B2C and B2B use cases.
Strengths: Provides right-sized solutions with clear pricing, SaaS infrastructure, and a unique option to combine generative AI content and image generation with digital quality management.
Weaknesses: Has limited geographic presence outside Europe and lacks a sufficiently broad portfolio in customer data management, journey mapping, and analytics.
11. CoreMedia
Its DXP is CoreMedia Content Cloud, which offers capabilities for content management, integration, and interoperability. It is available as a PaaS managed by the provider or self-managed, either on-premises or in a public cloud.
It has a presence in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, North America, and the Asia/Pacific region. It is used in a wide range of vertical markets, including retail, telecommunications, manufacturing, financial services, healthcare, and media and entertainment. Its use cases are B2C, B2B, and B2B2C.
Strengths: It is the only DXP that integrates a cloud contact center to combine digital experiences driven by customer service, sales, and marketing with human interaction. Additionally, it provides packaged integrations with a wide range of technology providers.
Weaknesses: Clients may find additional capabilities that do not apply to their use cases and aspirations, and some report that it is difficult to set up and use.
12. Progress
Its DXP is called Progress DX and has capabilities for content management, user experience (UX) development of applications, and conversational interfaces. It is available on-premises, either hosted by the user or as a fully managed PaaS or SaaS.
It has a significant global presence, thanks to its own efforts and through partners. Progress DX is generally aimed at medium-sized organizations and is most commonly implemented for B2C use cases.
Strengths: It offers native conversational interface capabilities assisted by AI in 60 languages and authenticated experiences through extended capabilities and native integration in its UI component products.
Weaknesses: It continues to focus on developers rather than the business customer; furthermore, its cloud strategy can be confusing due to various hosting options.
13. Kentico
Its DXP includes two options: Kentico Xperience 13 and Kentico Xperience. Both are aimed at digital marketers, offering a wide range of capabilities, including content management, marketing automation, and digital commerce. The first is available as a managed PaaS in a private cloud, while the second is available as a self-managed SaaS.
It has a strong presence in North America. It is implemented in organizations within vertical markets such as financial services, healthcare, and manufacturing; and its use cases include B2C, B2B, and B2E.
Strengths: Provides clarity in its pricing and is low-cost; it is also recognized for its all-in-one operational simplicity.
Weaknesses: Kentico Xperience is absorbing significant development effort from the company, and the architecture of Kentico Xperience 13 has become obsolete.
14. Squiz
Its DXP is Squiz DXP, which includes capabilities for content management, search, personalization, customer data management, and integration. It is available in a SaaS or on-premises deployment model.
It has a small presence in North America, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. It is most frequently implemented in mid-sized organizations within vertical markets such as government, utilities, and higher education. Its use cases include B2C, B2E, and B2B.
Strengths: Its composability and deployment capabilities have improved through advances in its architecture, providing pre-designed B2E knowledge sharing and collaboration features suitable for intranets and employee portals.
Weaknesses: Its market presence and growth are the lowest, and it has fallen behind compared to other providers in terms of innovation in personalization, customer journey management, optimization, and AI.
Evaluation Publication
The full results of this study were published on Gartner's website, aiming to provide a benchmark for companies seeking a Digital Experience Platform.
You can find it on their website: https://www.gartner.com/en/documents/5215563
Conclusion
According to Gartner's analysis published in February 2024, the growth in DXP adoption by companies was 50%, and it is estimated that by 2026, at least 70% of organizations will be required to adopt composable digital experience platform technologies instead of monolithic suites.
Composable architecture offers greater agility, adaptability, and innovation potential, making it the most viable option for companies seeking modernity and effectiveness.
When evaluating providers, companies should consider how each platform addresses the requirements for future success, architectural vision, innovation, and breadth of possibilities, as a robust DXP can be a key driver of growth and customer loyalty in an ever-evolving digital environment.
