GravityView only works with Gravity Forms. It reads the entries Gravity Forms stores and displays them on the front end, so it cannot show Contact Form 7 submissions. If your forms live in Contact Form 7 and you want to keep them there, CF7 Views is the tool built for that. If you are open to moving to Gravity Forms, GravityView then opens up a much wider set of layouts and features.

GravityView requires a separate Gravity Forms license; it is not bundled. Gravity Forms starts at $59 per year, so a GravityView setup means paying for both plugins. CF7 Views has the edge on the form side here: it runs on Contact Form 7 and Flamingo, which are both free.

CF7 Views has the lower entry cost. It offers a free version and paid tiers from $59 per year, and its Contact Form 7 and Flamingo dependencies are free. GravityView starts at $119 per year and needs a Gravity Forms license on top. What the higher price buys is more layouts (including Maps), built-in export, entry approval, a lifetime license option, and a 30-day money-back guarantee, so the right call depends on whether you need that breadth. You can compare the tiers on the GravityView pricing page.

CF7 Views has a free version on WordPress.org that covers a basic Table View of your Contact Form 7 entries, with its paid tiers unlocking List and DataTable layouts, search, and add-ons. GravityView does not have a free version; it is premium-only, though it is backed by a 30-day money-back guarantee if it is not the right fit. So if a no-cost starting point matters most, CF7 Views is the one with a free tier.

Yes, both can do this now. GravityView includes front-end entry editing in its core plugin, so users can update their own entries and you choose which fields are editable. CF7 Views added front-end editing too, but only on its top Developer tier ($199 per year), through an inline or popup editor. If front-end editing is central to your project, check which tier of each plugin you would need.

CF7 Views has historically required Flamingo, the free add-on that saves Contact Form 7 submissions to the database, and its own FAQ still lists Flamingo as required. Recent versions have added native entry storage, which softens that dependency, but Flamingo remains the documented setup. GravityView does not need Flamingo at all, since Gravity Forms stores its own entries.

For a searchable directory with a map, GravityView is the better fit. Its List and Layout Builder layouts, customizable search bar, and the Maps layout in GravityView Pro let you build and plot a directory without code. CF7 Views can display the same records as a filterable table or list, but it has no maps layout, so it cannot place entries on a map.

If Contact Form 7 already meets your form needs and you only want to display or lightly manage those submissions, adding CF7 Views is the lower-effort, lower-cost path, since it works with your existing forms. Switching to Gravity Forms and GravityView is worth it when you need more than display: multiple layouts, maps, entry approval, built-in export, and room to build directories, portals, and dashboards. It is a bigger change, since you would rebuild your forms in Gravity Forms, so weigh the added capability against the migration effort.