How is PICO Portal Individual different from Litmaps?
ComparisonDiscovery is not screening. PICO Portal Individual ranks against your criteria and keeps the rationale.
What does Litmaps do that PICO Portal Individual does not?
Litmaps is built for discovery and for watching a map grow.
Litmaps maps citations from seed papers and helps you discover the next papers. Open Litmaps.
How do they compare on search, answer, and screen?
| PICO Portal Individual | Litmaps | |
|---|---|---|
| Access | 14-day free trial. No department contract. | Free tier, plus a paid plan. |
| Search | 470 million articles from OpenAlex, ORCID and PubMed. | Citation maps. |
| Answer | Plain language. Each claim links to a source you can open. | None. |
| Screen | Named reviewer, time, rationale, and the source passage. | None. |
Who should use which?
PICO Portal Individual — A question, a screen, and a cited answer.
Litmaps — A map of a field from seeds you already trust.
Can I use PICO Portal Individual and Litmaps in the same review?
Yes. Keep Litmaps for Citation maps. Put the include or exclude in PICO Portal Individual. The record shows the named reviewer, the time, the rationale, and the source passage.
Do I name Litmaps in the methods?
Yes, if you searched there. Also name PICO Portal Individual if the decision sits there. A reader must be able to open the same record.
Can a student start without a university license?
Yes. PICO Portal Individual starts with a 14-day free trial and does not need a department contract. Litmaps: Free tier, plus a paid plan.
What do I lose if I leave Litmaps?
Litmaps is built for discovery and for watching a map grow.
Does either tool write the review?
No. Litmaps returns None. PICO Portal Individual returns a cited answer. You write the sentence.
Where is the decision record?
On the PICO Portal Individual record: named reviewer, timestamp, rationale, source passage. Litmaps: None.
Can I upload a file from Litmaps?
Yes, if it is a citation file. You then see that file in the same queue as the OpenAlex results.
Which tool do I open first?
Open Litmaps if you already have a list. Open PICO Portal Individual if you have a question and no file.
Is the answer a substitute for the paper?
No. Open the citation. The passage is on the record so a second person can check the claim.
What can a supervisor check?
The question, the search, each include or exclude, and the passage. You see the queue, the conflicts, and the agreement while the stage is still open.