Elicit
Tabular extraction and screening workflows over academic PDFs with human-in-the-loop review.
Officefreemiumresearchsystematic-reviewextraction
- Pricing
- Freemium with paid credits; verify site
- Platforms
- Web
- Regions / languages
- English-first workflows
- Last verified
- 2026-05-03
What is Elicit?
Elicit targets researchers running structured reviews who need fast screening, column extraction, and summarization across many PDFs.
It is not a substitute for preregistered protocols or statistician sign-off—treat outputs as draft tables pending verification.
Key features of Elicit
- Column-oriented extraction tuned for review matrices
- Human-in-the-loop disagreement tracking on supported tiers
- Integration mindset with Zotero or CSV pipelines
- Supports Web usage
Pros of Elicit
- Cuts spreadsheet grunt work on large PDF sets
- Encourages transparent screening logs for audits
- Strong fit for grad teams running living systematic maps
Cons of Elicit
- OCR and table errors propagate without manual QA
- Sensitive PDFs may violate IRB if uploaded casually
- May not fit trials requiring cdisc clinical stats packages only
Typical Elicit workflows
- Upload corpus per protocol
- Define extraction columns
- Batch screen with dual reviewers
- Export CSV for meta-analysis tools
Practical tips for Elicit
- Strip identifiers before upload when feasible
- Lock column definitions before dual screening starts
- Start with the workflow "Upload corpus per protocol" for faster onboarding
Who Elicit is for
- Grad teams running living systematic maps
- Consultancies producing rapid evidence memos
- Teams that need consistent office workflow output quality
Who Elicit is not for
- Trials requiring CDISC clinical stats packages only
- Organizations requiring strict constraints beyond Elicit default operating model
Elicit FAQs
- Does Elicit replace Covidence or DistillerSR?
- Overlap exists, but feature depth for blinded screening and PRISMA flows differs. Pilot both on the same ten papers.
- Can Elicit extract numerical results from tables?
- Sometimes, but verify every numeric cell against the PDF. Models misread merged cells.
Tools similar to Elicit
- Scite — Citation classification that labels references as supporting, contrasting, or mentioning—plus assistant workflows.
- Semantic Scholar — AI-assisted literature search with citation graphs, paper alerts, and PDF access where licensed.
- Papers with Code — Community-indexed papers tied to code repositories, leaderboards, and task datasets.