Sticker price is the wrong way to compare ERPs. What matters is total cost of ownership (TCO) over years — and here open-source changes the math.
What drives TCO
- Licensing — per-user and per-module costs, over time.
- Implementation and customization.
- Maintenance and upgrades.
- Vendor lock-in — the cost of not being able to leave.
The open-source advantage
With an open-source ERP like Odoo, you avoid heavy license fees and lock-in, and you can customize freely. For most companies that's roughly 80% of enterprise functionality at 20% of the cost.
When proprietary still wins
Very large, highly regulated enterprises with niche requirements may still need heavyweight suites — but that's the exception, not the rule.
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