Filevine
Smokeball
| Feature | Filevine | Smokeball |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Contact sales | From $39/mo |
| Free Plan | ✗ No | ✗ No |
| Rating | 4.3 / 5 | 4.5 / 5 |
| Best For | plaintiff-firms, insurance-defense, personal-injury, litigation-teams | small-law-firms, mid-size-firms, litigation-practices, billable-hour-firms |
| Founded | 2014 | 2007 |
| Case Management | ✓ | ✗ |
| Document Automation | ✓ | ✓ |
| Ai Contracts | ✓ | ✗ |
| Task Management | ✓ | ✗ |
| Reporting | ✓ | ✓ |
| Client Portal | ✓ | ✗ |
| Automatic Time Tracking | ✗ | ✓ |
| Matter Management | ✗ | ✓ |
| Billing | ✗ | ✓ |
| Microsoft Integration | ✗ | ✓ |
✓ Filevine Pros
- Excellent for litigation firms
- Good document automation
- AI contract tools
- Strong task management
✗ Filevine Cons
- Not ideal for transactional practice
- Pricing not transparent
- Implementation timeline long
✓ Smokeball Pros
- Automatic time recording
- Deep Microsoft Office integration
- Strong document automation
- Excellent for billing accuracy
✗ Smokeball Cons
- Windows-only desktop app
- Higher price point
- Learning curve for automation
The Verdict
Filevine is built for plaintiff firms and insurance defense, with a focus on case-management and document-automation. Smokeball targets small law firms and mid size firms and leads with automatic-time-tracking and document-automation.
Filevine uses custom enterprise pricing, while Smokeball starts at $39/mo — a tangible advantage for teams with a fixed budget.
Neither tool offers a free plan, so factor the subscription cost into your decision from the start.
This is a genuinely close comparison. If you can, sign up for both free trials (where available) and run a one-week test with your actual team tasks before deciding.