CommonLook (Allyant) vs. Ockem Proof
Allyant plays both sides of the market: CommonLook software for specialists who remediate in-house, and per-page remediation services for everyone else. Proof replaces the loop itself — not the person operating it.
CommonLook PDF is the long-standing professional’s editor — a serious tool that expert remediators drive document by document, with validation reports at the end. Allyant’s services arm remediates for you at per-page rates, quoted per project, with a published average turnaround of 3–5 business days. Ockem Proof automates the checker-fix-recheck loop those experts run by hand: machine fixes are independently re-verified, only judgment calls reach a human, and every document leaves with a criterion-by-criterion certificate at one flat published price.
Side by side
| CommonLook (Allyant) | Ockem Proof | |
|---|---|---|
| What you buy | A software license (CommonLook PDF, web or desktop) or per-page remediation services — both priced by quote. | Certified documents at one flat published price each. |
| Who does the work | Your trained specialist in the editor, or Allyant’s services team. | The machine, plus your judgment calls — or Assured, where experts finish every human lane. |
| Time to a price | Contact sales for software; services are quoted per project. | Published pricing; the free assessment prices your whole library up front. |
| Turnaround (services) | Average 3–5 business days per document; 2-day rush available. | Hours — an automated pipeline with decision queues at your pace. |
| Verification | Validation reports; the operator checks their own work in the tool. | Independent re-verification after every fix, and a pessimistic gate: no certificate while any check is unresolved. |
| Evidence artifact | Downloadable validation report and remediation history. | A certificate with per-criterion outcomes, named attestations, and immutable version history. |
| Ramp-up | A professional tool — training and remediation expertise expected. | First certified document the day you sign up. |
Choose CommonLook (Allyant) if…
- You employ remediation specialists who live in a professional editor and want the industry-standard toolchain.
- You need alternate formats beyond accessible PDF — braille, audio, large print — under one vendor.
- Procurement strongly favors the long-tenured incumbent with tens of thousands of customers.
Choose Ockem Proof if…
- You need to budget the corpus today — flat published pricing, no quote cycle for software or services.
- Days-per-document doesn’t survive contact with a deadline and a large backlog.
- You don’t want to hire and train remediation specialists to operate a professional editor.
- You need per-document evidence with named attestations, not a report the operator generated about their own work.
Fair questions
Isn’t CommonLook the industry standard?
As an expert’s editor — yes, and we’d never pretend otherwise; many professional remediators check their work with it. The question is whether you want to staff and run that loop by hand. Proof exists to automate the checker-fix-recheck cycle those experts spend their day in, leaving humans only the judgment calls. If you already employ specialists and they’re keeping up with your volume, CommonLook is a reasonable tool. If the backlog is winning, the loop is the problem — not the operator.
Allyant says automation alone can’t guarantee conformance. Aren’t you automation?
We agree with the premise — that’s why Proof is not automation alone. Every machine fix is independently re-verified against the rule engine, criteria that genuinely require judgment are routed to a named human whose decision is recorded, and a document cannot be certified while any check is failed or unresolved. The disagreement isn’t human-versus-machine; it’s whether the human should do the tedium or just the judgment.
Are we comparing against the software or the services?
Both, because Allyant sells both and the ladder maps cleanly: if you were going to license CommonLook and staff it, compare that to Auto-Certified, where the machine does the work and you keep the judgment calls. If you were going to send documents to their services team per page, compare that to Assured, where experts finish every human lane at a per-document price. Either way, the certificate with named attestations comes standard.
Competitor details are taken from allyant.com public pages and published partner and third-party listings as of July 2026 and may change. If we’ve got something wrong, tell us and we’ll fix it.