SciPhi vs SimplyRetrieve: A Detailed Comparison

Priyansh Khodiyar's avatar
Priyansh KhodiyarDevRel at CustomGPT
Comparison Image cover for the blog SciPhi vs SimplyRetrieve

Fact checked and reviewed by Bill. Published: 01.04.2024 | Updated: 25.04.2025

In this article, we compare SciPhi and SimplyRetrieve across various parameters to help you make an informed decision.

Welcome to the comparison between SciPhi and SimplyRetrieve!

Here are some unique insights on SciPhi:

SciPhi is an open-source RAG platform that touts massive scale, hybrid search, and auto-generated knowledge graphs. It’s developer-friendly and highly flexible—if you’re ready for the learning curve.

And here's more information on SimplyRetrieve:

SimplyRetrieve is an open-source RAG stack you run on your own hardware. It keeps data in-house and pairs with open-source LLMs, giving developers full visibility into the pipeline.

Expect hands-on setup—GPU drivers, Python deps, scripts—before you’re up and running.

Enjoy reading and exploring the differences between SciPhi and SimplyRetrieve.

Comparison Matrix

Feature
logo of sciphiSciPhi
logo of simplyretrieveSimplyRetrieve
logo of customGPT logoCustomGPT
Data Ingestion & Knowledge Sources
  • Handles 40 + formats—from PDFs and spreadsheets to audio—at massive scale Reference.
  • Async ingest auto-scales, crunching millions of tokens per second—perfect for giant corpora Benchmark details.
  • Ingest via code or API, so you can tap proprietary databases or custom pipelines with ease.
  • Uses a hands-on, file-based flow: drop PDFs, text, DOCX, PPTX, HTML, etc. into a folder and run a script to embed them.
  • A new GUI Knowledge-Base editor lets you add docs on the fly, but there’s no web crawler or auto-refresh yet.
  • Lets you ingest more than 1,400 file formats—PDF, DOCX, TXT, Markdown, HTML, and many more—via simple drag-and-drop or API.
  • Crawls entire sites through sitemaps and URLs, automatically indexing public help-desk articles, FAQs, and docs.
  • Turns multimedia into text on the fly: YouTube videos, podcasts, and other media are auto-transcribed with built-in OCR and speech-to-text. View Transcription Guide
  • Connects to Google Drive, SharePoint, Notion, Confluence, HubSpot, and more through API connectors or Zapier. See Zapier Connectors
  • Supports both manual uploads and auto-sync retraining, so your knowledge base always stays up to date.
Integrations & Channels
  • Ships a REST RAG API—plug it into websites, mobile apps, internal tools, or even legacy systems.
  • No off-the-shelf chat widget; you wire up your own front end API snippet.
  • Ships with a local Gradio GUI and Python scripts for queries—no out-of-the-box Slack or site widget.
  • Want other channels? Write a small wrapper that forwards messages to your local chatbot.
  • Embeds easily—a lightweight script or iframe drops the chat widget into any website or mobile app.
  • Offers ready-made hooks for Slack, Microsoft Teams, WhatsApp, Telegram, and Facebook Messenger. Explore API Integrations
  • Connects with 5,000+ apps via Zapier and webhooks to automate your workflows.
  • Supports secure deployments with domain allowlisting and a ChatGPT Plugin for private use cases.
Core Chatbot Features
  • Core RAG engine serves retrieval-grounded answers; hook it to your UI for multi-turn chat.
  • Multi-lingual if the LLM you pick supports it.
  • Lead-capture or human handoff flows are yours to build through the API Use case.
  • Runs a retrieval-augmented chatbot on open-source LLMs, streaming tokens live in the Gradio UI.
  • Primarily single-turn Q&A; long-term memory is limited in this release.
  • Includes a “Retrieval Tuning Module” so you can see—and tweak—how answers are built from the data.
  • Powers retrieval-augmented Q&A with GPT-4 and GPT-3.5 Turbo, keeping answers anchored to your own content.
  • Reduces hallucinations by grounding replies in your data and adding source citations for transparency. Benchmark Details
  • Handles multi-turn, context-aware chats with persistent history and solid conversation management.
  • Speaks 90+ languages, making global rollouts straightforward.
  • Includes extras like lead capture (email collection) and smooth handoff to a human when needed.
Customization & Branding
  • Fully bespoke—design any UI you want and skin it to match your brand.
  • SciPhi focuses on the back end, so front-end look-and-feel is entirely up to you.
  • Default Gradio interface is pretty plain, with minimal theming.
  • For a branded UI you’ll tweak source code or build your own front end.
  • Fully white-labels the widget—colors, logos, icons, CSS, everything can match your brand. White-label Options
  • Provides a no-code dashboard to set welcome messages, bot names, and visual themes.
  • Lets you shape the AI’s persona and tone using pre-prompts and system instructions.
  • Uses domain allowlisting to ensure the chatbot appears only on approved sites.
LLM Model Options
  • LLM-agnostic—GPT-4, Claude, Llama 2, you choose.
  • Pick, fine-tune, or swap models anytime to balance cost and performance Model options.
  • Defaults to WizardVicuna-13B, but you can swap in any Hugging Face model if you have the GPUs.
  • Full control over model choice, though smaller open models won’t match GPT-4 for depth.
  • Taps into top models—OpenAI’s GPT-4, GPT-3.5 Turbo, and even Anthropic’s Claude for enterprise needs.
  • Automatically balances cost and performance by picking the right model for each request. Model Selection Details
  • Uses proprietary prompt engineering and retrieval tweaks to return high-quality, citation-backed answers.
  • Handles all model management behind the scenes—no extra API keys or fine-tuning steps for you.
Developer Experience (API & SDKs)
  • REST API plus a Python client (R2RClient) handle ingest and query tasks Python SDK.
  • Docs and GitHub repos offer deep dives and open-source starter code SciPhi GitHub.
  • Interaction happens via Python scripts—there’s no formal REST API or SDK.
  • Integrations usually call those scripts as subprocesses or add your own wrapper.
  • Ships a well-documented REST API for creating agents, managing projects, ingesting data, and querying chat. API Documentation
  • Offers open-source SDKs—like the Python customgpt-client—plus Postman collections to speed integration. Open-Source SDK
  • Backs you up with cookbooks, code samples, and step-by-step guides for every skill level.
Integration & Workflow
  • Runs as a microservice—slot it into doc pipelines, CRMs, or any enterprise workflow.
  • Trigger ERP updates or support tickets straight from query escalations Integration overview.
  • Run it locally: prep a GPU box, drop data, run prepare.py to embed, then chat.py for the Gradio UI.
  • Updating content means re-running scripts or using the new Knowledge tab; scaling is a manual process.
  • Gets you live fast with a low-code dashboard: create a project, add sources, and auto-index content in minutes.
  • Fits existing systems via API calls, webhooks, and Zapier—handy for automating CRM updates, email triggers, and more. Auto-sync Feature
  • Slides into CI/CD pipelines so your knowledge base updates continuously without manual effort.
Performance & Accuracy
  • Hybrid search (dense + keyword) keeps retrieval fast and sharp.
  • Knowledge-graph boosts (HybridRAG) drive up to 150 % better accuracy Benchmark details.
  • Sub-second latency—even at enterprise scale.
  • Open-source models run slower than managed clouds—expect a few to 10 + seconds per reply on a single GPU.
  • Accuracy is fine when the right doc is found, but smaller models can struggle on complex, multi-hop queries.
  • Delivers sub-second replies with an optimized pipeline—efficient vector search, smart chunking, and caching.
  • Independent tests rate median answer accuracy at 5/5—outpacing many alternatives. Benchmark Results
  • Always cites sources so users can verify facts on the spot.
  • Maintains speed and accuracy even for massive knowledge bases with tens of millions of words.
Customization & Flexibility (Behavior & Knowledge)
  • Add new sources, tweak retrieval, mix collections—everything’s programmable.
  • Chain API calls, re-rank docs, or build full agentic flows Customizability.
  • Lets you tweak everything—KnowledgeBase weight, retrieval params, system prompts—for deep control.
  • Encourages devs to swap embedding models or hack the pipeline code as needed.
  • Lets you add, remove, or tweak content on the fly—automatic re-indexing keeps everything current.
  • Shapes agent behavior through system prompts and sample Q&A, ensuring a consistent voice and focus. Learn How to Update Sources
  • Supports multiple agents per account, so different teams can have their own bots.
  • Balances hands-on control with smart defaults—no deep ML expertise required to get tailored behavior.
Pricing & Scalability
  • Free tier plus a $25/mo Dev tier for experiments.
  • Enterprise plans with custom pricing and self-hosting for heavy traffic Pricing.
  • Free, MIT-licensed open source—no fees, but you supply the GPUs or cloud servers.
  • Scaling means spinning up more hardware and managing it yourself.
  • Runs on straightforward subscriptions: Standard (~$99/mo), Premium (~$449/mo), and customizable Enterprise plans.
  • Gives generous limits—Standard covers up to 60 million words per bot, Premium up to 300 million—all at flat monthly rates. View Pricing
  • Handles scaling for you: the managed cloud infra auto-scales with demand, keeping things fast and available.
Security & Privacy
  • Customer data stays isolated in SciPhi Cloud; self-host for full control.
  • Standard encryption in transit and at rest; tune self-hosted setups to meet any regulation.
  • Entirely local: all docs and chat data stay on your own machine—great for sensitive use cases.
  • No built-in auth or enterprise security—lock things down in your own deployment setup.
  • Protects data in transit with SSL/TLS and at rest with 256-bit AES encryption.
  • Holds SOC 2 Type II certification and complies with GDPR, so your data stays isolated and private. Security Certifications
  • Offers fine-grained access controls—RBAC, two-factor auth, and SSO integration—so only the right people get in.
Observability & Monitoring
  • Dev dashboard shows real-time logs, latency, and retrieval quality Dashboard.
  • Hook into Prometheus, Grafana, or other tools for deep monitoring.
  • An “Analysis” tab shows which docs were pulled and how the query was built; logs print to the console.
  • No fancy dashboard—add your own logging or monitoring if you need broader stats.
  • Comes with a real-time analytics dashboard tracking query volumes, token usage, and indexing status.
  • Lets you export logs and metrics via API to plug into third-party monitoring or BI tools. Analytics API
  • Provides detailed insights for troubleshooting and ongoing optimization.
Support & Ecosystem
  • Community help via Discord and GitHub; Enterprise customers get dedicated support Support info.
  • Open-source core encourages community contributions and integrations.
  • Open-source on GitHub; support is community-driven via issues and lightweight docs.
  • Smaller ecosystem: you’re free to fork or extend, but there’s no paid SLA or enterprise help desk.
  • Supplies rich docs, tutorials, cookbooks, and FAQs to get you started fast. Developer Docs
  • Offers quick email and in-app chat support—Premium and Enterprise plans add dedicated managers and faster SLAs. Enterprise Solutions
  • Benefits from an active user community plus integrations through Zapier and GitHub resources.
Additional Considerations
  • Advanced extras like GraphRAG and agentic flows push beyond basic Q&A GraphRAG.
  • Great fit for enterprises needing deeply customized, fully integrated AI solutions.
  • Great for offline / on-prem labs where data never leaves the server—perfect for tinkering.
  • Takes more hands-on upkeep and won’t match proprietary giants in sheer capability out of the box.
  • Slashes engineering overhead with an all-in-one RAG platform—no in-house ML team required.
  • Gets you to value quickly: launch a functional AI assistant in minutes.
  • Stays current with ongoing GPT and retrieval improvements, so you’re always on the latest tech.
  • Balances top-tier accuracy with ease of use, perfect for customer-facing or internal knowledge projects.
No-Code Interface & Usability
  • No no-code UI—built for devs to wire into their own front ends.
  • Dashboard is utilitarian: good for testing and monitoring, not for everyday business users.
  • Basic Gradio UI is developer-focused; non-tech users might find the settings overwhelming.
  • No slick, no-code admin—if you need polish or branding, you’ll build your own front end.
  • Offers a wizard-style web dashboard so non-devs can upload content, brand the widget, and monitor performance.
  • Supports drag-and-drop uploads, visual theme editing, and in-browser chatbot testing. User Experience Review
  • Uses role-based access so business users and devs can collaborate smoothly.

We hope you found this comparison of SciPhi vs SimplyRetrieve helpful.

SciPhi can power a deeply customized RAG stack, but expect significant engineering effort. If speed to launch trumps fine-grained control, you might look to a simpler managed service.

If local control and privacy outweigh convenience, SimplyRetrieve is a solid DIY route. Just be ready for the ongoing maintenance that comes with a self-hosted system.

Stay tuned for more updates!

CustomGPT

The most accurate RAG-as-a-Service API. Deliver production-ready reliable RAG applications faster. Benchmarked #1 in accuracy and hallucinations for fully managed RAG-as-a-Service API.

Get in touch
Contact Us
Priyansh Khodiyar's avatar

Priyansh Khodiyar

DevRel at CustomGPT. Passionate about AI and its applications. Here to help you navigate the world of AI tools.