FreighAI vs Raft
Both companies sell AI agents to freight forwarders. Both take work in from email, create structured tasks, keep a person in charge of the decision, and sit above the systems you already run.
The two products start in different places. Raft starts at the document. FreighAI starts at the inbox. Every email your company receives is read, understood and turned into a task for the right person, with the answer already drafted. Your team approves. Nobody lives in the inbox any more.
Where Raft is the better fit, this page says so, and Raft wins three rows of the matrix outright. Every statement about Raft was checked against its own pages on 3 September 2026.
- 01Raft and FreighAI both sell AI agents to freight forwarders. Both read what comes in, create tasks and keep your people in control.
- 02Raft is stronger on documents and customs. Its extraction pipeline is configured by your own team, customs brokerage is a published product area, and it takes work in over API, EDI and file drop as well as email. FreighAI offers no such feeds today.
- 03FreighAI starts at the whole company inbox. Every mailbox, every department, each conversation followed to the end and turned into a task for the right person, with the reply already written.
- 04FreighAI also does the legwork behind the email: the rate card, the carrier, the agent chase, the counter-offer, the won job. Raft’s published pages do not describe that pricing work.
- 05Several Raft areas are not established by its published pages. Silence is not absence, so ask about them. Bring one real email thread from last week to both.
What Raft does well
Raft presents a serious platform for freight forwarders and customs brokers. Its published story is coherent from the ground up. Centralise what the company knows, codify the rules, then run agents inside those rules with every action logged. A forwarder whose pain is documents, customs or accounts payable should take Raft seriously.
Raft’s Extraction Studio is “a low-code data extraction pipeline driven by your orchestration rules”. Your team defines the schemas, validation logic and output format once, then applies them “across any document, format, or source”, over commercial invoices, packing lists, bills of lading and certificates of origin. FreighAI reads the same documents but publishes no configurable pipeline of its own. On document depth, Raft is ahead.
Raft sells to customs brokers directly, under the line “AI agents built for clearance, compliance, and scale”. It describes classification, real-time validation against your own rules, version-controlled procedures, and “every action auditable, every decision traceable, escalation paths defined by you”. It claims bidirectional sync with “your TMS, ERP, customs authorities, and carrier networks”. FreighAI’s boundary is the opposite: direct customs filing and HS or duty lookup stay in the system you already use. Raft wins this outright.
Raft’s finance area promises “invoice resolution in minutes, not weeks”, indexing data “from any source, including carrier invoices, customs docs, EDI feeds, and TMS/ERP systems” and validating invoices “in the exact format your AP workflow needs”. FreighAI reads a carrier bill and matches every airway bill back to its job, checking line by line before it is booked. So this is an overlap, not a gap. Raft gives payable work more room and more public detail.
Raft’s Intelligent Inbox is “protocol-agnostic”, taking “email, API, EDI, file drop” with automatic routing and priority set by service level. FreighAI reads PDF, Excel, Word, forwarded email, WhatsApp messages, photos and scans. It does not offer EDI or API feeds today. If much of your work arrives as a feed, Raft wins this one too.
Raft publishes a trust centre and describes role-based permissions, complete audit logs and activity monitored in real time, with the escalation paths set by the buyer rather than the supplier. It also names a dedicated success manager, round-the-clock support and a team whose job is the change management around the software. For a forwarder answering to a customs authority or an internal audit function, that is a real part of the purchase. These are Raft’s own first-party claims. Its published task, shipment, savings, clearance, error and revenue figures are deliberately not repeated on this page, because that evidence has not been independently reviewed here.
Same layer, different starting point
Both products sit above the system of record and refuse a forced replacement. Both take work in, decide what it is, create a task and put a person on the decision. That makes this a real comparison rather than a category argument. The difference is where each starts. Raft starts at the document and works outward into the entry, the invoice and the shipment record. FreighAI starts at the email and works outward into the rate, the reply and the next department.
Routed to a person, or answered for them
Both products put the right item of work in front of the right person. The difference shows up in what that person does next.
Raft’s integration material says “Connected to everything. Replacing nothing.” and describes bidirectional sync with your TMS, ERP, customs authorities and carrier networks. FreighAI takes the same position. Keep your TMS for the records. FreighAI runs the work around them.
Where the work arrives, both are strong. Raft’s Intelligent Inbox promises “One place to capture all inbound requests … in any format. Automatically classified and routed to the right person on your team.” Each item is then tracked, “such as filing an entry, matching an invoice, or validating a document”.
FreighAI goes one step further on the same email. It watches every company mailbox, pricing, operations, tracking and accounts, and follows each conversation from start to finish. It writes the reply, creates the task, and puts it in front of the right person in the right department, beside the original conversation. Your team approves. They do not compose, forward, file or chase. The reply goes out in their name.
The email is only the start. The real time goes on what comes after it. Find the rate on the carrier’s site. Check the tracking in another tab. Open the TMS for the job. Look up what you charged this customer last time. Forward it to operations and wait. Chase the agent, or forget to. FreighAI does all of that itself. It pulls your rate cards, checks the carrier, looks up the customer’s history, reads the shipment status, and talks to your TMS or accounting system. It chases what has not come back. It passes the work from pricing to operations to accounts, with the email and everything it found attached. Nobody forwards it. Nobody re-keys it. Nobody asks for an update. Then it puts the finished piece in front of the right person, with the reply already written.
That is the honest difference. Raft routes the request to the right person and tracks the item of work until it closes. FreighAI routes it, does the work behind it, and hands over a finished answer for that person to approve. Whether Raft also drafts the outbound reply and holds it for approval is not described in Raft’s published material, checked September 2026. Ask to see it live.
Breadth of the job
Raft names three kinds of buyer: freight forwarders, customs brokers and trade finance, which reaches as far as banks handling letters of credit. FreighAI sells to one trade only, and covers the day from quotation through booking, tracking replies, partner discovery, carrier-bill matching and payment collection.
Neither shape is better on its own. A platform that also serves banks has to be configurable, and configurable takes setting up. One built for a single trade arrives with more of the freight assumptions already made.
- Every company mailbox, every department
- The reply drafted and sent in their name
- Rate cards, carrier and agent chasing
- Counter-offers, expiry and won jobs
- Tracking replies and payment collection
- Email, API, EDI and file-drop intake
- Extraction rules you define yourself
- Customs clearance and compliance
- Accounts payable and invoice matching
- Audit trails and escalation paths
What happens to one enquiry in FreighAI
Raft’s pages describe what happens to a document. Here is what happens to an enquiry.
An enquiry arrives. FreighAI reads it, notices the weight is missing and asks for it. It pulls your rate cards, checks the carrier for a live rate, and emails your agents for the lanes you do not hold, then chases them until they reply. It drafts the quote with your margin rules and what that customer paid on that lane last time. Your pricer approves and it goes. It follows up. When the customer pushes back, the counter-offer is already drafted. When the quote is old, it expires. When it is won, the job is created.
Where the rate can be fetched without waiting on a person — a carrier API, a portal read in the background, or your own uploaded rate cards — a priced quote goes out in 10–15 minutes instead of 1–2 hours. That holds for ocean and air just as it does for express; the mode does not change it. Where a lane has to be priced by another agent or over the phone, the wait belongs to whoever is answering — not to the software. FreighAI still writes the RFQ, chases the reply, and turns whatever comes back into a priced, margin-checked quote the moment it lands.
need DHL quote Gurugram → Ajman, 72kg, by Friday. urgent pls 🙏
Hi Marco — DHL Express, AED 425 + AED 35 handling. ETA Thu·18:00, valid 24h. PDF attached.
- 01Enquiry landsIn the same address your customer has always used.
- 02Gap foundThe missing weight is caught now, not at four o’clock.
- 03Prices gatheredYour cards first, the carrier next, agents for what is left.
- 04Quote writtenInside your margin rules, against this customer’s own history.
- GATERavi approvesOne click, and it leaves under his signature.
- 06Chasers runNobody sets a reminder for Thursday.
- 07Push-back handledThe lower number is ready before the pricer opens it.
- 08Closed or expiredA yes opens the job. A stale price retires itself.
At Infinity Logistics, average response time fell from more than 60 minutes to about 15 minutes, and the win rate rose from 35% to 73%. One forwarder’s measured outcome, named and dated. Not a figure any supplier can promise you.
Where the two differ
Every row is checked against public documentation. Where they do something we do not, the row says so.
- Where the work arrives
- FreighAI
- YesEvery company mailbox: pricing, operations, tracking, accounts
- Raft
- YesEmail, API, EDI and file drop, with routing rules and service-level priority
- What to verify
- Send the same week of email to both
- Intake over API, EDI and file drop
- FreighAI
- NoNot offered today
- Raft
- YesProtocol-agnostic ingestion, central to its Intelligent Inbox
- What to verify
- Raft wins this row. Check how much of your work arrives as a feed
- Each conversation becomes a task for a named person
- FreighAI
- YesThe task sits beside the original conversation, in the right department
- Raft
- YesRequests are classified, routed to the right person and tracked until they close
- What to verify
- Follow one request from arrival to closed
- The reply is drafted for that person to approve
- FreighAI
- YesThey approve rather than compose, and it sends in their name
- Raft
- Not establishedEmail integration and control over every key decision are described, but not a drafted reply held for approval
- What to verify
- Ask to see the reply drafted, approved and sent, live
- Document extraction depth
- FreighAI
- PartialReads PDF, Excel, Word, email, WhatsApp, photos and scans, but not as a configurable pipeline
- Raft
- YesYour own schemas, extraction rules, validation logic and output transformations
- What to verify
- Raft leads here. Run your five worst documents through both
- Customs declarations, classification and filing
- FreighAI
- NoDirect filing and HS or duty lookup stay in your own system
- Raft
- YesA published product area with compliance rules, audit trails and customs sync
- What to verify
- Raft wins this row. If filing is the job, start there
- Carrier-bill and invoice matching
- FreighAI
- YesEvery airway bill matched back to its job, checked line by line
- Raft
- YesPayable invoices validated into your AP format and matched at speed
- What to verify
- Bring one carrier invoice with a wrong line
- Prices an enquiry from your rate cards and carriers
- FreighAI
- YesRate cards, the carrier, and what that customer paid last time
- Raft
- Not establishedRate cards are documents held in its knowledge base, not a pricing workflow
- What to verify
- Price one live lane in both demonstrations
- Notices an incomplete enquiry
- FreighAI
- YesThe gap is caught on arrival and the question is already written
- Raft
- Not establishedNot described in Raft’s published material, checked September 2026
- What to verify
- Leave the gross weight off one enquiry and see who notices
- Sources a lane from your agent network
- FreighAI
- YesEvery agent asked at once, route and charges pre-filled, silent ones chased
- Raft
- Not establishedNot described in Raft’s published material, checked September 2026
- What to verify
- Choose a lane you hold no contract rate for
- Price negotiation, ageing and version history
- FreighAI
- YesThe lower number is pre-written, stale prices retire, each revision is kept
- Raft
- Not establishedNot described in Raft’s published material, checked September 2026
- What to verify
- Ask what happens when the customer pushes back on price
- Acceptance opens the job
- FreighAI
- YesThe job is raised unprompted, with the fields already carried across
- Raft
- Not establishedIts items of work cover entries, invoices and documents, not a won quote becoming a job
- What to verify
- Compare how far each goes after the customer says yes
- Chasing your customers for payment
- FreighAI
- YesA dedicated product for collection
- Raft
- Not establishedIts published finance area is payables, not receivables
- What to verify
- Ask who chases the overdue invoice
- RFQs and updates over WhatsApp
- FreighAI
- YesA live connection on the channel a lot of forwarding actually happens on
- Raft
- Not establishedNot described in Raft’s published material, checked September 2026
- What to verify
- Forward one WhatsApp enquiry to each supplier and watch what arrives
- Work that nobody has to remember
- FreighAI
- YesChasing, tracking checks, price ageing and follow-ups run unprompted
- Raft
- YesAgents run within your specifications, with service levels setting the order
- What to verify
- Ask each supplier what happens between six in the evening and eight in the morning
- Hand-offs between departments
- FreighAI
- YesPricing to operations to accounts, with the email attached
- Raft
- YesOperations, customs and finance share one workspace, and agents hand over
- What to verify
- Follow one job from pricing to operations to accounts
- Buyers outside freight forwarding
- FreighAI
- NoBuilt for freight forwarding operations only
- Raft
- YesCustoms brokerage and trade finance, including banks
- What to verify
- Raft wins this row if your group also runs a brokerage or a finance desk
“Not described” means Raft’s published pages did not establish an answer, so no fair yes or no could be given. It is not evidence that Raft lacks the capability. Close any row that affects your decision in the demonstration.
The question that settles it: who writes the reply?
Both products put the right email in front of the right person. Ask each one what that person does next. In FreighAI the answer is already written, priced and checked, and the person clicks approve.
- The answer arrives finishedYour team approves. They do not compose, forward, file or chase. The reply goes out in their name.
- The legwork is already donePulls your rate cards, checks the carrier, looks up the customer’s history, reads the shipment status, and talks to your TMS or accounting system.
- Nothing sends without a personYour team approves every reply before it sends.
Which one you should actually pick
If nobody should ever choose the other product, this page would not be worth reading. Here is where each genuinely wins.
- customs is the job: declarations, classification, compliance rules and the audit trail your regulator will ask for
- documents are the bottleneck, and your team wants to define the schemas and validation rules itself
- a large share of your work arrives as API calls, EDI feeds or file drops rather than as email
- accounts payable and carrier-invoice matching are the first thing you want fixed, or your group also runs a customs brokerage or a trade-finance desk
- you prefer Raft’s product, its rules model or its commercial terms after both have run the same work. That is a product-fit decision, not an oversight.
- the pain is the inbox itself: every department’s email turned into a task for the right person, with the reply drafted and sent in their name
- quotation is where the day goes: the missing detail, the rate card, the carrier, every agent emailed and chased, the counter-offer, the price that expires, the won job
- you want one platform carrying the work from enquiry through booking, tracking, carrier-bill matching and getting paid. FreighAI is built for mid-market forwarders of 40–200 people, who have no in-house platform team.
- you want the first workflow live on its own, and a connection to the TMS or ERP only when it earns one. Keep your TMS for the records. FreighAI runs the work around them.
- you prefer FreighAI’s approval model and scoped implementation after both have run the same week of email.
The line FreighAI sells on is “Same team. 5x more business.” It describes where the product aims, and no supplier can promise you a multiple. Judge both on the work they do to your own email.
Can FreighAI and Raft run together?
Yes, more comfortably than most pairs on this list. The overlap is real but not total. Raft’s published centre of gravity is the document, the declaration and the payable invoice. FreighAI’s is the enquiry, the reply and the task. A workable split gives Raft the entries and the payables, and FreighAI the commercial inbox, quotation, tracking replies and collection.
The split only works if one system owns the customer conversation. Two products drafting on the same thread will confuse your customer and your team. Settle that before either contract is signed. If customs is the whole problem, Raft alone is the simpler answer. If the inbox is the whole problem, so is FreighAI.
What should you put in front of each supplier?
Hand both companies identical material, on the same day.
- one full week of a department mailbox, with the history on each thread
- your five worst documents, in the formats they actually arrive in
- a normal enquiry, a difficult one, and one with a detail missing
- one carrier invoice with a line that does not match the job
- the customs entries or broker instructions you send today
- the rules that decide what a person is allowed to approve
Ask each supplier what happens when a rate cannot be fetched. Reading your own rate card is different from waiting on an agent, and any turnaround comparison that ignores where the rate came from is misleading.
Close both meetings with the same question. When the work is done, who writes the email that goes back to the customer, and whose name sits at the bottom of it?
Common questions
Does Raft do quoting?
Not described in Raft’s published material, checked September 2026. Rate cards appear once, as a document stored in its knowledge base, not as a pricing workflow. If quotation is your first problem, ask Raft to price one live lane and judge what you see.
Is FreighAI weaker on customs?
On direct filing, yes, and this page says so plainly. Filing and HS or duty lookup stay in the system you already use. FreighAI reads the customs email, creates the task, chases the missing paperwork and hands a finished pack to your broker or filing team.
Both say they route work to the right person. What is actually different?
What happens next. Raft describes capture, classification, routing and a tracked item of work. Your team approves. They do not compose, forward, file or chase. The reply goes out in their name. Whether Raft also drafts that reply is not described in Raft’s published material, checked September 2026. Ask both to show one live thread from arrival to sent.
Which is faster to put in?
This page makes no such claim. Raft publishes a deployment statement for its pre-built agents. FreighAI retired its earlier fixed-duration promises. We scope the first workflow, integration requirements and implementation plan with your team.
Which is cheaper?
Neither company publishes plans or prices. The Raft pricing address did not resolve to a plans page on 3 September 2026. Ask both for terms covering the same workflow, connections and volume of email.
Do both keep a person in charge?
Your team approves every reply before it sends. Your team approves. They do not compose, forward, file or chase. The reply goes out in their name. Raft says it keeps your team “firmly in control of every declaration and key decision” and lets you define the escalation paths. Ask both to show the exception path live.
- Raft homepage — an agentic AI platform for logistics, and the three buyers it names: freight forwarders, customs brokers and trade financeverified 2026-09-03
- Raft Platform — Intelligent Inbox “protocol-agnostic ingestion - email, API, EDI, file drop”, Extraction Studio, items of work, “Connected to everything. Replacing nothing.” and “every action auditable, every decision traceable, escalation paths defined by you”verified 2026-09-03
- Raft for Freight Forwarders — document extraction, “invoice resolution in minutes, not weeks”, and requests “automatically classified and routed to the right person on your team”verified 2026-09-03
- Raft Customs Brokerage — “AI agents built for clearance, compliance, and scale”, real-time validation with a complete audit trail, and sync with your TMS and customs systemsverified 2026-09-03
- Raft About — the company vision. It states no founding year, headquarters or funding, so none is given hereverified 2026-09-03
- Raft Trade Finance — letters of credit and counterparty screening, establishing that Raft’s buyer set reaches beyond freight forwardingverified 2026-09-03
- Raft pricing address — checked, and it does not resolve to a plans page, so no price statement is madeverified 2026-09-03
- Infinity Logistics customer reference, 15 May 2026 — response time and win rate, attributed to Infinityverified 2026-08-31
FreighAI claims come from the shared facts file, the M4 truth register and the signed Infinity Logistics customer reference of 15 May 2026. Raft’s published result figures and named customer quotations are deliberately not repeated. Its own about page states no founding year, headquarters or funding, so none is given. No feature absence is asserted from silence.
Bring one week of your email to both
Take five days of a real department mailbox, the enquiries inside it and the documents attached to it. Ask both teams to run it in front of you. Watch who does the work behind each email, who writes the reply, and whose name is on the message your customer receives.