# Kentico Xperience 13 — DXP Scorecard > Mature .NET DXP reaching end-of-life December 2026. New builds should start on Xperience by Kentico. **Category:** Enterprise DXP · **Suite Capability:** 45/100 (ranked #43 of 46) **⚠ End of life:** 2026-12-31 (v13) — recommended successor: xperience-by-kentico Source: https://www.dxpscorecard.com/platform/kentico-xperience Last reviewed: 2026-10-26 ## Summary Kentico Xperience 13 is a self-hosted .NET digital experience platform with a capable built-in marketing suite: contact segmentation, A/B testing, marketing automation, email and a full e-commerce module. Its editorial workflow and page builder remain solid for mid-market teams. But Kentico ends all support on December 31, 2026, with no paid extension, so it is a platform to migrate off, not one to buy. Every current customer now faces a rebuild, most often on Xperience by Kentico. ## Composite Scores - Suite Capability: 45/100 - Cost Efficiency: 42/100 - Build Simplicity: 39/100 - Operational Ease: 40/100 - Platform Velocity: 39/100 - Compliance & Trust: 47/100 - AI Enablement: 17/100 ## Use-Case Fit - Marketing: 55/100 - Commerce: 44/100 - Intranet: 33/100 - Multi-Brand: 43/100 ## Category Scores - 1. Core Content Management: 56/100 - 2. Additional Platform Capabilities (DXP Features): 53/100 - 3. Technical Architecture: 47/100 - 4. Platform Velocity & Health: 39/100 - 5. Total Cost of Ownership: 42/100 - 6. Build Simplicity: 39/100 - 7. Operational Ease: 40/100 - 8. Use-Case Fit: 44/100 - 9. Regulatory Readiness & Trust: 47/100 - 10. AI Enablement: 17/100 ## Strengths - **A complete marketing suite in the box** (65.6/100) — Contact profiles, contact groups, personas, page and email A/B testing, visual marketing automation and lead scoring all ship with the product. Marketers can segment visitors and act on their behavior without buying a separate automation tool. For a mid-market team this replaced several subscriptions with one license. - **Mature editorial workflow and version history** (67.3/100) — Workflows support custom steps, a graphical designer with conditional branching, role-based approvals, email notifications and a full history per page. Pages keep every version with compare and rollback, deleted items go to a recycle bin, and Publish from and Publish to dates control scheduling. Regulated or approval-heavy teams get a dependable audit trail. - **Page builder and form builder marketers can use** (65.7/100) — Marketers compose pages from sections and widgets by drag and drop, rendered on the real site, with templates and editable areas that limit which widgets can be used. The form builder adds conditional fields, smart fields for progressive profiling, autoresponders and automation triggers. Once developers have built the widget library, campaign pages need no further code. - **Built-in e-commerce** (63/100) — The commerce module covers products with variants, bundles and digital products, multi-currency pricing, taxes, payment methods, orders and more than 30 store reports. Its discount engine handles catalog and order discounts, volume pricing, buy X get Y, coupons and gift cards. Content and commerce live in one system, though developers must build the checkout. - **Full control of where data lives** (66/100) — Because the platform is self-hosted, content and visitor data stay on infrastructure the customer chooses, in any data center or cloud region. Built-in consent management and personal data erasure APIs support GDPR, though erasure needs developer work and the Enterprise license. Organizations with strict sovereignty rules have no vendor cloud to vet. - **Many sites from one installation** (57.7/100) — One instance runs many sites, each with its own content tree, domains, cultures and roles, while page types, widgets and templates are shared. Each site can have its own approval workflow. Groups running several related brands avoid separate installations, although content reuse across sites is limited. ## Weaknesses - **Support ends December 31, 2026** (25.8/100) — From January 1, 2027 Kentico ships no hotfixes, security patches or technical support, and it offers no paid extended support. The last feature release was Refresh 14 in December 2025, and 2026 has brought security fixes only. Every customer must replatform, and no new project should start on this version. - **A serious security record and heavy patching** (35/100) — Two critical 2025 flaws in the content staging service allowed unauthenticated access, appeared in the US government's list of actively exploited vulnerabilities and could be chained to remote code execution. Kentico shipped 19 hotfixes in 2026, each a coordinated redeployment with a production database script, and two of them broke features. After 2026 any new flaw stays open. - **Almost no AI** (6.3/100) — There is no AI writing, image generation, agent automation or Model Context Protocol (MCP) server for connecting AI assistants. The only AI pieces are machine translation with your own Microsoft or Google key and an archived Azure OpenAI module that suggests page categories. Kentico's AIRA assistant exists only in Xperience by Kentico. - **Weak fit for headless and JavaScript front ends** (34/100) — The only external API is a generic REST service, off by default, with no GraphQL and no separate delivery API. There are no official JavaScript or TypeScript SDKs and no native webhooks, so other channels need custom code. Teams building with React or Next.js will fight the platform. - **Complex to set up and build on** (35.3/100) — Every project runs two applications: a .NET Framework 4.8 admin on Windows and IIS, and an ASP.NET Core live site, both sharing one SQL Server database kept in sync by web farm settings. Developers also need Kentico's own query APIs and macro language. An experienced .NET developer needs one to two days just to get a working environment. - **A shrinking ecosystem** (35.5/100) — Kentico archived its integration modules for Algolia, Recombee, Bynder, Intercom and Zapier between December 2025 and February 2026, so they get no more fixes. Community activity, training and partner attention have moved to Xperience by Kentico, and new third-party content is mostly migration guides. Help for edge cases is getting harder to find. ## Ideal For - Current Kentico Xperience 13 customers planning their exit (fit 68/100) — The free, MIT-licensed Migration Tool moves content and data models to Xperience by Kentico, and Kentico converts existing licenses so customers do not pay twice during the move. The content model and marketing data carry over, even though code must be rebuilt. - Existing mid-market .NET sites needing a few more months of stable running (fit 62/100) — Sites already live can keep using the marketing suite, commerce module and workflows until December 31, 2026, with security hotfixes every two to four weeks. That buys time to run a proper replatforming project. - Organizations that must self-host for data sovereignty, as a short bridge (fit 60/100) — All data stays on customer infrastructure with no vendor cloud involved. This only holds while patches still arrive, so it suits a bridge period, not a long-term plan. ## Look Elsewhere If - Any organization starting a new website project (fit 5/100) — Support ends December 31, 2026 with no paid extension, so a new build would be unsupported within weeks of launch. Xperience by Kentico or another supported platform is the only sensible starting point. - Teams building headless or JavaScript-first experiences (fit 15/100) — There is no GraphQL, no delivery API, no JavaScript or TypeScript SDK and no webhooks. Every non-web channel needs custom integration work on a frozen product. - Security-sensitive or regulated organizations (fit 10/100) — The platform has a history of critical, actively exploited flaws, no vendor SOC 2 or HIPAA coverage for self-hosted installs, and no security patches after 2026. Running it unpatched would fail most security reviews. - Marketing teams wanting AI-assisted content (fit 8/100) — There is no AI writing, image tooling, content auditing or agent automation, and none will be added. Kentico's AI features exist only in its successor product. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What is Kentico Xperience 13? Kentico Xperience 13 is a self-hosted .NET digital experience platform that combines page management with built-in personalization, marketing automation, email and e-commerce. It runs as two applications on SQL Server, and Kentico ends all support for it on December 31, 2026. ### When does Kentico Xperience 13 reach end of life, and what should customers do? Kentico Xperience 13 reaches end of support on December 31, 2026, after which Kentico ships no hotfixes, security patches or technical support, and offers no paid extension. Customers should migrate now, typically to Xperience by Kentico using the free Migration Tool and license conversion. - Verify with the vendor: Kentico Product Support Lifecycle Policy: https://www.kentico.com/customers/supportcenter/support-lifecycle ### How does Kentico compare to Sitecore? Kentico Xperience 13 is simpler and cheaper to license than Sitecore XP, with partner-quoted rates of $12,500 to $22,300 a year. Sitecore XP and SitecoreAI win for large enterprises needing a supported roadmap, since Kentico Xperience 13 loses all support after December 2026. - Kentico Xperience 13 vs Sitecore XP head to head: https://www.dxpscorecard.com/head-to-head?a=kentico-xperience&b=sitecore-xp - Kentico Xperience 13 vs SitecoreAI head to head: https://www.dxpscorecard.com/head-to-head?a=kentico-xperience&b=sitecore-ai ### How does Kentico compare to Umbraco? Kentico Xperience 13 bundles marketing automation, A/B testing, contact scoring and e-commerce that Umbraco leaves to add-ons or integrations. Umbraco wins on cost and longevity: it is open source, also built on .NET, and still developed, while Kentico Xperience 13 support ends December 31, 2026. - Kentico Xperience 13 vs Umbraco head to head: https://www.dxpscorecard.com/head-to-head?a=kentico-xperience&b=umbraco ### What do current customers say is their favorite thing about being on Kentico Xperience 13? Reviewers say their favorite thing about Kentico Xperience 13 is the editing experience and its fit for mid-market teams, reflected in a 4.3 out of 5 rating across more than 200 Gartner Peer Insights reviews. Customers also praise Kentico's fast, in-house support engineers. ### What is the 5 year TCO of Kentico Xperience 13? Kentico Xperience 13 has no sensible five-year total cost of ownership because support ends December 31, 2026. Partners quote licenses at $12,500 to $22,300 a year plus $12,000 to $30,000 yearly hosting, so the real cost is migration, often $50,000 to $150,000 for complex sites. - Verify with the vendor: Kentico Product Support Lifecycle Policy: https://www.kentico.com/customers/supportcenter/support-lifecycle - Verify with the vendor: Kentico How to Buy: https://www.kentico.com/platform/how-to-buy ### What are the best alternatives to Kentico Xperience 13? The most direct alternative to Kentico Xperience 13 is Xperience by Kentico, its supported successor with a migration tool and license conversion. Other .NET options are Umbraco, Optimizely CMS and Sitefinity, while Sitecore XP suits larger enterprise programs. - Kentico Xperience 13 alternatives guide: https://www.dxpscorecard.com/editorials/kentico-13-alternatives ### Does Kentico Xperience 13 have built-in AI features? Kentico Xperience 13 has almost no built-in AI. It offers machine translation through Microsoft Translator or Google Translate with your own keys, plus an archived Azure OpenAI module that suggests page categories. Kentico's AIRA assistant exists only in Xperience by Kentico. - Verify with the vendor: AIRA in Xperience by Kentico: https://www.kentico.com/platform/aira ### How hard is Kentico Xperience 13 to implement and maintain? Kentico Xperience 13 is hard to implement and maintain. It runs two applications, a .NET Framework 4.8 admin on Windows and IIS plus an ASP.NET Core site, on SQL Server, and every hotfix needs coordinated redeployment and a production database script. ### What are some of the biggest criticisms of Kentico Xperience 13 from current customers? Reviewers of Kentico Xperience 13 most often criticize recompile downtime, little improvement over Kentico 12, and reliance on developers for page type changes. Customers are also frustrated by the forced migration to Xperience by Kentico and by 2026 hotfixes that broke the page builder. ## Alternatives Looking for alternatives to Kentico Xperience 13? The DXP Scorecard analyst team rates 8 replacement platforms in "Best Kentico Xperience 13 Alternatives in 2026" (https://www.dxpscorecard.com/editorials/kentico-13-alternatives), with a recommendation on who should move and who should stay. Ratings updated 2026-10-28. ## Implementation Partners Agencies, development shops and systems integrators listed on The DXP Scorecard as implementation partners for Kentico Xperience 13: Addact Technologies, DDSN Interactive, Citro Digital, Kehren Development. The partner network is sponsored: Premier and Featured placements are paid, Listed placements are free. Partner listings are never read by scoring and do not affect Kentico Xperience 13's scores or rank. Listing: https://www.dxpscorecard.com/platform/kentico-xperience#partners - **Addact Technologies** (Implementation Partner, free listing) · https://www.addact.net - **DDSN Interactive** (Implementation Partner, free listing) · https://ddsn.com/services/web-app-design/kentico-development-services · Website: https://ddsn.com - **Citro Digital** (Implementation Partner, free listing) · https://citrodigital.com - **Kehren Development** (Implementation Partner, free listing) · https://www.kehrendev.com --- Scored by The DXP Scorecard — an independent site; scorecards and platform inclusion are unsponsored, while the implementation partner network is sponsored and never read by scoring. Reproduce with attribution (CC BY 4.0). https://www.dxpscorecard.com