Definely vs Noxtua

At a Glance

Definely and Noxtua both get filed under "European Harvey alternative," and both do get compared to Harvey in sales conversations. But they solve different problems. Definely lives inside Microsoft Word and helps lawyers check, proofread, and trace changes through contracts they are already drafting. Noxtua is a sovereign research-and-drafting platform built on German infrastructure, grounded in legal publisher C.H.Beck's own database. Picking between them is less about which is "better" and more about which workflow — and which jurisdiction — matches what your firm needs.

Product Philosophy and Core Workflow

This is where the two companies diverge most sharply, and it matters more than either vendor's marketing suggests.

Definely started as an accessibility fix. A co-founder who is registered blind needed a faster way to jump to defined terms and cross-references in a dense contract without losing his place. That single problem grew into five connected modules — Read, Proof, Cascade, Enhance, and Vault — that all run natively inside Microsoft Word. Cascade, launched in August 2025, traces how one amendment ripples across related documents, a capability few competitors attempt. Definely never asks a lawyer to leave the document they are drafting.

Noxtua takes the opposite starting point. It began as Xayn, an Oxford and Imperial College research spinout working on privacy-preserving AI and search. After an EUR 80.7 million Series B in April 2025, the company rebranded and repositioned around a single thesis: legal AI built entirely on European infrastructure, with zero dependency on US hyperscalers. Its flagship product, Beck-Noxtua, pairs Noxtua's own legal-tuned models with exclusive access to C.H.Beck's 60-million-document beck-online database — a research and drafting tool rather than a contract-review specialist.

Put simply, Definely answers "does this contract say what I think it says, and what breaks if I change it." Noxtua answers "what does German law say about this, and can you draft me a first pass grounded in trusted sources." Firms handling large multi-document deals lean toward Definely. Firms doing German-law research and drafting at scale lean toward Noxtua.

Compliance and Jurisdiction

Definely holds SOC 2 Type 2, ISO 27001, and ISO/IEC 42001 for AI management systems, audited by Prescient Security. That AI-specific certification signals real governance over agentic features, not just general information-security hygiene. But Definely is a UK company — Defeyene Legal Solutions Limited — which sits outside EU jurisdiction since Brexit. Definely does not publicly disclose a specific data-hosting region, so EU-based firms handling regulated matters need to ask directly where customer data resides and confirm Standard Contractual Clauses are in place for any UK-to-EU transfer.

Noxtua's compliance story starts from a structurally different position. As a German entity running exclusively on German and European infrastructure, it sits inside the same regulatory perimeter as its EU customers by default. There are no Standard Contractual Clauses to negotiate and no third-country transfer assessment required. Its certification stack goes deeper too: BSI C5, ISO 27001, 27017, 27018, 9001, TISAX, and, like Definely, ISO/IEC 42001 — making it the first German company certified against that AI-management standard.

For a firm where jurisdiction and infrastructure sovereignty are hard procurement requirements, Noxtua's German-entity, German-cloud structure removes a diligence step that Definely customers still have to run themselves.

Edge: Noxtua for EU jurisdiction and infrastructure sovereignty. Definely still clears a real compliance bar, but buyers do more of the verification work themselves.

Pricing and Accessibility

Neither company publishes prices, and both sell through a demo-then-quote sales process rather than a self-serve signup. That is standard for enterprise legal tech, but it means neither vendor lets a smaller firm gauge fit before committing time to a sales call.

Definely's pricing is quoted per firm size and module selection, with GBP as the base currency and annual billing. Given its customer base of established firms and $40 million in total funding, expect pricing calibrated for firms with dedicated technology budgets.

Noxtua sells user-based licences in EUR, quoted per seat, and only recently became accessible to smaller teams. Since spring 2026, the minimum has dropped from an enterprise-scale rollout to just 3 seats. Third-party legal-tech pricing trackers have reported figures around EUR 300-400 per seat per month for smaller licence blocks, though Noxtua has not confirmed these publicly and actual quotes vary by module and volume.

Neither number should be treated as a firm quote. Both are directionally useful for budgeting a sales conversation, not for a line-item comparison.

Edge: Marginal tie, with Noxtua's newly lowered 3-seat minimum giving it a slight edge for firms that want to trial the platform without a full-firm commitment.

Integrations and Ecosystem

Definely connects to iManage, NetDocuments, SharePoint, and Microsoft Word. That covers the document-management stack most large firms already run, and Vault's precedent search depends directly on the iManage or NetDocuments connection. There is no native CRM or e-signature integration, so contract-lifecycle work beyond drafting and review still needs a second tool such as Juro.

Noxtua's public integration list is narrower still: Microsoft Word and the beck-online legal database through Beck-Noxtua. Neither vendor exposes a public API or webhook support, which limits how deeply either tool can be wired into a firm's broader legal-tech stack today.

Edge: Definely for document-management integration depth, though both trail dedicated legal tech platforms built around open APIs.

When to Choose Definely

Choose Definely if your firm's actual pain point is contract review and drafting mechanics: finding what a defined term means, catching proofing errors, and tracing what breaks when a clause changes mid-negotiation. Cascade's ripple-effect tracing is a genuine differentiator for complex, multi-document transactions. Firms already standardised on iManage or NetDocuments get the cleanest integration path, and lawyers who do not want to leave Microsoft Word get Definely's biggest adoption advantage over any standalone platform.

Definely is the right pick if you need deep contract-review tooling inside the document editor lawyers already use, and UK jurisdiction is not a blocker for your compliance team.

When to Choose Noxtua

Choose Noxtua if data sovereignty and EU jurisdiction are non-negotiable procurement requirements, or if your matter volume is predominantly German law. Beck-Noxtua's grounding in C.H.Beck's beck-online content gives it research credibility that a general-purpose model cannot match for German statutes and case law. Public-sector legal departments and regulated enterprises that require BSI C5 or equivalent attestations before evaluation will find Noxtua's certification stack does much of that pre-qualification work.

Noxtua is the right pick if you need research and drafting grounded in trusted German legal sources, running exclusively on EU infrastructure. You should be comfortable with a research advantage that is still primarily German rather than pan-European.

The Verdict

Definely and Noxtua rarely compete for the exact same deal, despite both showing up as alternatives to Harvey. One is a contract-review specialist that goes deep on one workflow — checking, proofing, and tracing changes through documents — and does it inside the tool lawyers already have open. Noxtua is a sovereignty-first research and drafting platform that treats "where does the data live" as its core product claim rather than a compliance footnote.

Definely wins on document-management integration and a distinctive ripple-effect feature in Cascade, but sits outside EU jurisdiction and keeps its data-hosting location undisclosed. Noxtua wins decisively on EU compliance and infrastructure sovereignty, backed by a deeper certification stack, but its research strength is still concentrated in German law and its per-seat pricing runs at a premium once quoted.

For firms whose daily problem is contract review mechanics, Definely is the sharper tool. Firms that need EU-sovereign legal AI and can work within a German-law-centric research base today will find Noxtua the stronger match. Some firms handling both contract-heavy work and German-law research may reasonably end up running both, alongside a dedicated research platform such as Deepjudge for broader case-law coverage.

FAQ

Is Definely or Noxtua better for EU-based law firms?

Noxtua has the structural advantage for EU firms with strict data-sovereignty requirements, since it is a German entity running exclusively on German and European infrastructure with no Standard Contractual Clauses to negotiate. Definely is a UK company operating post-Brexit, so EU firms need to confirm SCCs and data-hosting location as part of due diligence, even though its ISO 27001 and ISO/IEC 42001 certifications are solid.

Do Definely and Noxtua compete directly with Harvey?

Both are commonly positioned as European alternatives to Harvey, but neither matches its full breadth. Definely focuses specifically on contract review and drafting support inside Microsoft Word, while Noxtua covers research, drafting, and document analysis but with research strength currently concentrated in German law.

Which tool has better pricing transparency?

Neither. Both Definely and Noxtua keep pricing entirely unpublished and require a demo before quoting, which is standard for enterprise legal tech but makes early-stage comparison shopping difficult. Noxtua's minimum has dropped to 3 seats since spring 2026, making it more accessible to smaller teams than a full enterprise rollout.

Can a firm use both Definely and Noxtua?

Yes, and some firms plausibly would. Definely handles Word-native contract review and drafting mechanics, while Noxtua handles German-law research grounded in C.H.Beck's beck-online database. The two tools address different stages of legal work rather than duplicating each other.

Which tool is better for firms outside Germany?

Definely's contract-review workflow is jurisdiction-agnostic, since Read, Proof, Cascade, Enhance, and Vault all work on document structure rather than legal-content grounding. Noxtua's Beck-Noxtua research module is strongest for German law specifically, so firms with primarily cross-border or non-German matters should confirm coverage before committing.