An In-Depth Look: Is LegacyBox Truly Worth the Investment?

An In-Depth Look: Is LegacyBox Truly Worth the Investment?

LegacyBox is one of the most popular digitization services available, so anybody looking to preserve their home movies, film reels, or photos is bound to come across them. However, being the most popular doesn’t necessarily mean the best, so is LegacyBox worth it or not?

Since 1999, Capture has preserved millions of memories, so we know the industry and what digitization customers want. That’s why we put together this guide on whether LegacyBox quality and results are worth the price. 

Keep reading to learn what LegacyBox.com is, examine LegacyBox reviews, evaluate their pricing structure, understand the pros and cons of LegacyBox, compare them to other options, and decide whether it’s the right choice for your precious memories. 

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What is LegacyBox?

legacy box offer

Before we can truly evaluate whether LegacyBox is worth it, it’s important to answer the question, “What is LegacyBox?”  To put it simply, LegacyBox is a company that will turn your analog media into digital files. This includes audio cassettes, videotapes, film reels, and old photos. 

They work by sending you a LegacyBox kit, which is a box that you can fill with your memories. Then, you add barcode stickers for tracking and use the included prepaid shipping label to send them to where LegacyBox is located in Chattanooga, Tennessee. 

They will then process your order and ship it back to you in 12 weeks. You will get your digital format copy as a digital download, USB thumb drive, or DVD as well as your original media back. While we will look at how much LegacyBox costs in a little bit, their pricing is based on the number of items like VHS tapes, MiniDV tapes, Super 8 reels, or photo slides, prints, and negatives you have. 

LegacyBox Reviews: What Customers Are Saying

One of the best ways to learn about any company is to read the reviews, so what do LegacyBox reviews say? Well, first, you have to consider Kodak Digitizing reviews and SouthTree reviews as well as LegacyBox because they are all owned by the same company. However, make sure that you don’t consider reviews that have to do with specific services offered by those brands that aren’t relevant to LegacyBox.com. 

SiteJabber has over 700 LegacyBox reviews and in general, they are pretty good since they have a 3.5-star rating. Similarly, they have a 3.9 rating on Trustpilot, but when you start digging in, you start to recognize recurring issues. While a lot of people praise good quality digital copies, exceptional customer support, and claim that how it works was easy and convenient, the negative reviews are hard to ignore. 

Many negative reviews indicate that LegacyBox is overpriced, but we’ll discuss that in a minute. More importantly, some people say that LegacyBox lost their precious memories or took significantly longer than 12 weeks to deliver average or below average digital results. Some even go so far as to say that the poor quality combined with expensive pricing for digitizing family memories makes LegacyBox seem like a scam. 

That being said, they do have many satisfied customers, so it’s important to consider other important factors. If you’re wondering how much does it cost to convert VHS to digital with LegacyBox, the next section on pricing should help! 

Analyzing LegacyBox Pricing

legacybox pricing

LegacyBox pricing is based on the number of items you have, where one item is a single videotape, film reel, audio cassette, or 25 photos. 

They accept many different formats including 8mm, 16mm, and Super 8 film, Betamax, MicroMV, MiniDV, Digital8, VHS-C, S-VHS, S-VHS-C, and PAL format VHS as well as photo slides, prints, and negatives. Even if you have a mixture of all these different types, their pricing structure does make it easy and convenient to add up how much it will cost, but is the price actually worth it?

Without a LegacyBox discount code, the cost comes down to:

  • 2-Item Starter - $65.98
  • 10 Item Family - $299.98
  • 20-Item Closet - $599.98
  • 40-Item Trunk - $1,179.98

While that may not seem too bad, it adds up especially since they charge an extra fee for every order just to include a digital download (or you can choose a DVD or USB flash drive copy). That’s why a lot of people say that their pricing includes hidden costs or isn’t as transparent as it should be. 

Even without that additional cost, if you compare LegacyBox vs. Capture, you’ll see that Capture is slightly cheaper for videotapes and film reels and substantially cheaper when it comes to photos. Additionally, if you choose Capture as an alternative to Costco film, you’ll be able to get the same deals on DVD copies that you used to. 

If you compare LegacyBox with other competitors, you’ll also see that their pricing is higher than the average. So, is LegacyBox worth it? Yes to preserve your memories, but considering the risk of long turnaround time, negative customer reviews stating lost memories, and the higher-than-average pricing structure, we would say that choosing LegacyBox over some of the alternatives is not worthwhile. 

That being said, there are still some pros to choosing LegacyBox. 

Pros and Cons of Using LegacyBox

If you are looking for a way to convert old tapes, films, and photos for the first time, then it’s smart to weigh the pros and cons of different options before comparing the results. Here’s a list of the downsides and benefits of LegacyBox:

legacybox pros and cons

Pros

  • Convenient with prepaid shipping label
  • Accepts many formats including old tapes, audio cassettes, film reels, and family photos
  • 14 years of LegacyBox experience 

Cons

  • There’s a lot of negative LegacyBox customer feedback 
  • Slow 12-week turnaround time 
  • Expensive pricing structure compared to LegacyBox alternatives 
  • Have to pay for digital download 

LegacyBox Alternatives: How They Compare

When it comes to LegacyBox vs. competitors, you need to consider turnaround time, security, pricing, and other factors. In addition to comparing LegacyBox vs. Costco, Capture, ScanCafe, and iMemories reviews, you can also consider VHS to digital converters, photo scanners, and other DIY options. 

While a DIY option is one of the most affordable, there are some downsides. A converter or scanner from Amazon won’t create professional results, especially with the cheaper options. Plus, they can be highly time consuming and for videotapes you will still need a vintage camcorder, VCR, or some other type of device to play the tapes. 

When it comes to digitization services, LegacyBox offers convenience that you won’t find from most because they will ship you the box. While that makes things easy, when it comes to most other factors, they are one of the worst choices you can make for your memories. 

For example, Capture offers a state-of-the-art tracking and security system, and LegacyBox only offers barcode tracking and status updates. Also, LegacyBox has a 12-week turnaround time while other options including Capture, ScanCafe, and iMemories are all faster. 

Even though LegacyBox offers over 14 years of experience, they still don’t have as much experience as Capture (23 years), ScanCafe (17 years), or iMemories (18 years). Plus, LegacyBox complaints are often glaring and point out things like lost memories or hidden costs. 

So when it comes down to it, is LegacyBox worth it and are they reliable?

Is LegacyBox Reliable? Delving into Quality and Experience

While the results are not one of the biggest complaints that arise and many people praise the customer service, convenience, and satisfactory results, since many people say that they lost their memories, didn’t convert all of them, or took a long time to get their LegacyBox back, we would say that they aren’t reliable, at least when compared with other options. 

Then, when you add in the high cost and other factors, it becomes clear that there are better options out there. That being said, we don’t agree with some customer reviews that claim LegacyBox is a scam. It’s clear they are a real company with years of experience.

We also believe that they strive to preserve memories just like other digitization services. However, we think that it’s important to not simply choose any service, but to get the best available for your priceless memories. 

Conclusion: So, Is LegacyBox Worth It?

In our opinion, preserving your priceless memories forever is always worth it, but that doesn’t mean that the price is worth it when compared to LegacyBox competitors. When considering price compared with quality, security, turnaround time, and other factors, LegacyBox just doesn’t really seem worth it because there are cheaper options out there that offer the same or higher quality. 

Want the best for your old home movies, films, and photos? Click here to see how Capture stacks up against our biggest competitors, including LegacyBox.  

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