Moving from OpenELIS Global to LabFlow
An open-source, FHIR-native laboratory information system under the Mozilla Public License, deployed by ministries and implementers from single facilities to national networks. Last checked 7 November 2026. Check OpenELIS Global yourself, because a page that says something newer than this one is right.
The side-by-side comparison, with LabFlow's own limits, is on the LabFlow site. This page is about making the move.
Before you move
- Choose OpenELIS Global if you are a ministry, a public-health network or an implementer with technical staff, and a FHIR-native system with no licence cost across many facilities is the goal.
- Choose LabFlow if you are one laboratory without an implementation team, want hosting, a patient portal and a marketplace listing included, and can accept HL7 and FHIR as files rather than a live feed.
What you would give up, going by OpenELIS Global's own pages:
- Open source.
The move, step by step
- Get your data out of OpenELIS Global first. OpenELIS Global is open source and you run it, so a copy of your database is already yours to take. Keep it: LabFlow reads none of it directly.
- Create an account. Sign-in is with Google, and there is no password to set.
- Set up the laboratory. Five steps, including its name, departments and time zone.
- Build the test catalogue, then panels and reference ranges. These are typed in. There is no bulk import.
- Invite your staff and give each person a role.
- Add patients as they arrive. There is no bulk import of patients or of past results, so your old system stays your archive for what came before.
- Take orders. A system that sends HL7 v2 order messages can hand them over one at a time as files, each becoming a draft order, as interoperability explains. There is no live feed.
- Enter and release a result on a real sample before you switch the bench over, and run both systems side by side until you trust it.
OpenELIS Global's prices
As its own pages stated them on 7 November 2026, not converted between currencies. LabFlow's are on the pricing page.
| Plan | Price | What the page says | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| OpenELIS Global | Free | Zero licensing cost; open source (MPL); hosting and implementation are your own cost | Source |
What each one says it does
"Not stated on the pages we checked" is not a no. Ask OpenELIS Global. LabFlow's column lists only what has shipped.
| What we looked for | OpenELIS Global | LabFlow |
|---|---|---|
| A price on the public page | Yes (source) | Yes |
| A free plan, or free for the person | Yes (source) | Yes |
| Patients read their own results online | Not stated on the pages we checked | Yes. For results from laboratories that run LabFlow. |
| The person decides who sees a record | Not stated on the pages we checked | Yes. One frozen report at a time, by a link the person can withdraw. |
| Share one section only (one test, one report) | Not stated on the pages we checked | No. A share opens one whole report. There is no grant for the ECG only or the X-ray only. |
| A laboratory asks for access by the person's ID and the person accepts | Not stated on the pages we checked | No. Not in the product today. There is no ID to give and no request to accept. |
| Access can be withdrawn later | Not stated on the pages we checked | Yes |
| Records kept for years, stated on the page | Not stated on the pages we checked | In part. Free keeps 12 months, then read-only. The paid plans set no cap. No number of years is promised. |
| Quality control (QC) built in | Not stated on the pages we checked | Yes |
| HL7 or FHIR interfaces | Yes (source) | In part. As files, in and out. No live feed. |
| Several sites or branches under one account | Yes (source) | Yes |
| An Android app | Not stated on the pages we checked | Yes |
| Works in a browser | Not stated on the pages we checked | Yes |
| A desktop application | Not stated on the pages we checked | No. Not in the product today. Browser and Android only. |
| A backup commitment stated on the page | Not stated on the pages we checked | No. No backup or recovery commitment is made today. |
| Analytics for the laboratory | Not stated on the pages we checked | Yes |
| Collection work continues offline | Not stated on the pages we checked | Yes |
| Reports sent by SMS or WhatsApp from the system | Not stated on the pages we checked | No. An SMS link opens on the handset. Nothing is sent from the system. |
| Hosted by the vendor (cloud) | Not stated on the pages we checked | Yes. Hosted only. On-premise is not offered. |
| Open source | Yes (source) | No |
What LabFlow does not have
LabFlow has no ID a person can give a laboratory, no laboratory access requests and no sharing section by section. It has no desktop app, promises no retention period and makes no backup commitment. No laboratories run it in production. Status and limits has the full list.