Top 3 Hive Alternatives & Their Evaluations in 2024

As the market for AI/ML-powered solutions grows, so does the demand for data to train and deploy those solutions. Since not all companies can gather and prepare large-scale datasets by themselves, they rely on third-party data collection services to fulfill their data needs.

Hive is one such data collection service provider that gathers and prepares datasets for your data-hungry projects. Finding the right data vendor is crucial to the success of the project.

However, finding transparent and data-driven evaluations of such vendors can be difficult and time-consuming. Due to some weak points in the company (which we will discuss later in the article), companies might need information on Hive alternatives to make data-driven decisions.

This article aims to remedy that issue. We provide:

• A data-driven evaluation of Hive, including review and features
• Some weaknesses or cons of working with Hive
• And top 3 Hive alternatives to help you make the right decision for your data-hungry projects.

Hive Evaluation

Company review

Established in 2013, Hive offers AI solutions focusing on computer vision (CV) and deep learning solutions. The company offers a wide range of AI and data solutions for enterprises. In this article, we will focus on their AI data services.

Hive’s data offerings:

• Data collection and annotation through a crowdsourcing model
• Crowd size: ~5 million
• Data services provided in 12+ languages
• Data transcription, including speech-to-text
• Data translation
• Dataset preparation specifically for visual AI

Cons of working with Hive

Here are some weak points of working with Hive identified by customer reviews from different online sources:

• Customers suggest that overlapped images are not recognized by Hive data
• In order to use the tool, video data must be made available on a public platform
• Reviews from other sources stated that the company’s client management process is a bit confusing and takes time to get used to.
• Customers also say that the Hive app requires significant improvement and that billing can be made more transparent (See screenshot below).
• The language coverage is also significantly less than other alternatives.
• No pricing information is provided on the website.
• Data collection is not the key focus of the company.

User ratings

• AIMultiple: 4.6/5
• G2: 4.4/5
• TrustRadius: 9/10

Top 3 alternatives of Hive

This section highlights the top 3 alternatives of Hive in the AI data solutions space. 

1. Clickworker

Clickworker offers AI data solutions through a crowdsourcing model. The company offers the following services:

• Training datasets for AI/ML models (in ~45 languages and more than 70 target markets).
• Sentiment analysis training data
• SEO content & text creation services
• Their data collection platform includes an application

Sponsored

Clickworker specializes in data collection and annotation through a crowd that is based in over 150 countries. They can offer scalable datasets for your data-hungry projects.

User ratings

• AIMultiple: 3.9/5
• G2: 4/5
• GetApp: 4.4/5

Clickworker’s pros & Cons

Pros

• Data collection is the key focus of the company.
• Pricing information is available on the website, including details regarding different packages.
• The company offers free-trial and charges no license fee.
• The clients can also determine their own price rates for their project’s workforce.
• Clickworker provides image data from various angles, including 360° shots. 
• The data is provided in more than 45 languages and dialects.

Cons

• The crowd size (~4.5 million) is slightly smaller than other alternatives, such as Hive.

2. Appen

Another alternative to Hive is Appen which also offers data collection and management services via a crowdsourcing model. Their data is mainly for developing and improving AI-powered solutions such as computer vision (CV), facial recognition, voice recognition, etc.

Appen’s offerings include:

• Data collection service with datasets provided in over 180 languages.
• Data services are offered by a crowd of around 1 million contributors based in over 130 countries.
• Data solutions of all data types (image, video, audio, text).
• Data annotation and mode evaluation services are also provided.

User ratings

• AIMultiple: 4.5/5
• G2: 4.1/5
• GetApp: 4.1/5

Appen’s pros & cons

Pros

• The company offers a relatively more diverse crowd (170 countries, 235 languages).
• Also offers pre-labeled datasets.
• Offers other services such as data transcription, classification, and translation.

Cons

• No pricing information is provided on the website.
• The company does not offer any free trials.
• The crowd size is significantly smaller than other alternatives, such as Clickworker and Hive.
• Information regarding the crowd’s demographics and qualifications is not provided on the website. 

3. Telus international

Established in 2005, Telus International is a Canadian company that offers data solutions through a crowdsourcing model to offer:

• Scalable and custom datasets of different types (Video, image, audio, sensor-fusion, & text).
• Content summarization, formatting, and processing
• Data entry, analysis, and enrichment
• Dataset creation across multiple languages

User ratings

• AIMultiple: 5/5
• Gartner: 4.2/5

Telus International’s pros/cons:

Pros

• A significantly more diverse crowd than other alternatives such as Hive (500+ languages and dialects)
• Offer secure data solutions with built-in validation and spot-checking of workers (based on client’s requirements).

Cons

• Even though the crowd is more diverse, the size (~1 million) is significantly smaller than other alternatives, such as Clickworker and Hive.
• No pricing details are available on the website.
• Fewer reviews are available online to evaluate the company’s services.

For more in-depth knowledge of data collection, feel free to download our whitepaper:

You can also check our data-driven list of data collection/harvesting companies to find the option that best suits your project needs.

Further reading

• Top 4 Data Collection Methods
• Crowdsourced AI Data Collection Benefits & Best Practices

If you need help finding a vendor or have any questions, feel free to contact us: