Switching from another tool?
We built importers first, marketing second. Whatever you use today, your work opens in OpenSankey. MFASankey is the new generation of these tools: for each one you will find what we learned from it, what we added, and when staying on it is still the right call. Then a detailed feature-by-feature table telling you what is strictly equivalent, what exists in a different form, and what only one side has — file formats included.
The STAN heritage
The reference freeware for substance flow analysis in research and teaching. Open your
.smfa and .zmfa models directly in your browser.
The e!Sankey heritage
The commercial desktop standard for industry. We differ on three things: browser, public pricing, and a true reconciliation engine.
Read the comparisonThe SankeyMATIC heritage
The beloved free web generator. Paste your diagram text as-is, then add interactivity, hierarchy and data that SankeyMATIC can't.
Read the comparisonThe dividing line: what the tool expects of your data
Sankey diagrams all look alike. What really sets these tools apart is the state your data must be in before you start.
A drawing tool — SankeyMATIC and e!Sankey both are — expects values that are already known and already consistent with each other: every arrow carries a number you type in. If your inputs and outputs do not add up, it is up to you to arbitrate, by hand.
A material flow analysis engine takes the problem from the other end: it treats every node as an equation, every ratio and every uncertainty as a constraint, and it computes what you have not measured. That is what makes it possible to produce a defensible flow balance from about 10% of known data, where a drawing tool requires practically all of it. STAN shares that family of approaches; e!Sankey and SankeyMATIC do not.