Best No-Code App Builders and Databases (2026): Airtable, Softr and Alternatives
Last verified: October 30, 2026
All four tools here store structured data and let you build something usable on top of it, but they charge for completely different things: Airtable and Softr meter by seat, Softr stacks two more meters on top of that, Knack charges by records and storage with unlimited users, and Baserow is the only one that's genuinely free and unlimited if you self-host it. The other fact that should shape this whole guide: Airtable changed owners in September 2026, and the company that bought it has a public track record of raising prices and cutting staff after past acquisitions.
ToolsGavel's top pick: Airtable (4.4/5, from $20/mo) — Airtable remains the deepest, best-connected no-code database here, backed by 4.6-out-of-5 scores on both G2 (3,303 reviews) and Capterra (2,250 reviews), the largest combined sample in this guide. A real free plan (1,000 records, 5 editors, no card) lets you test it before paying, and Interface Designer covers simple internal apps without a separate builder. The catch is pricing risk, not features: Bending Spoons closed its $1.285 billion acquisition of Airtable on September 4, 2026, and announced large staff departures five weeks later, the same company that raised Evernote's price 86% and cut 75% of WeTransfer's staff after buying them. Per-seat pricing is also the dominant Trustpilot complaint (2.0/5, 61% one-star), so budget for cost per editor, not just per base.
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at no extra cost to you. Tools we partner with are listed first, but that never changes a score — how we test.
Audited prices verified against live vendor pricing pages — full dataset in the Pricing Gap Index.
1
Airtable Best all-round database ★★★★★ ★★★★★ 4.4
Airtable remains the deepest, best-connected no-code database here, backed by 4.6-out-of-5 scores on both G2 (3,303 reviews) and Capterra (2,250 reviews), the largest combined sample in this guide. A real free plan (1,000 records, 5 editors, no card) lets you test it before paying, and Interface Designer covers simple internal apps without a separate builder. The catch is pricing risk, not features: Bending Spoons closed its $1.285 billion acquisition of Airtable on September 4, 2026, and announced large staff departures five weeks later, the same company that raised Evernote's price 86% and cut 75% of WeTransfer's staff after buying them. Per-seat pricing is also the dominant Trustpilot complaint (2.0/5, 61% one-star), so budget for cost per editor, not just per base.
Best for: Teams that want the deepest database and the broadest app ecosystem, and are willing to track Bending Spoons' next move on price and staffing · from $20/mo
2
Softr Best for client portals and internal apps ★★★★★ ★★★★★ 4.3
Softr is the clearest choice here for a buyer who wants a real client portal, member site or internal tool on top of existing data, most often an Airtable base, Google Sheets, or Softr's own database, backed by a 4.7 G2 score across 749 reviews. Combined with Airtable, Softr becomes the front end a client logs into while Airtable stays the backend database and automation layer your team uses directly. The catch is three separate meters stacked on every plan, records, workflow actions and seats, which one reviewer called 'extremely difficult to monitor or manage,' plus $6 to $24 a month per extra builder seat on top of the plan price. Pairing it with Airtable also means Airtable's new ownership risk flows through to whatever you build on Softr.
Best for: Teams that already have (or want) structured data in Airtable, Google Sheets or Softr's native database and need a client portal or internal app built on top without hiring a developer · from $19/mo
3
Knack Best flat price for many users ★★★★★ ★★★★★ 4.1
Knack charges by records and storage, not by seat, so every plan, including the $49-to-$59-a-month Starter tier, includes unlimited app users, a direct fix for the per-seat complaints that dominate Airtable's and Softr's reviews. That makes it the strongest fit for an internal team, an ops dashboard, a CRM, a portal, that has already outgrown seat-based pricing. The catch is cost at the low end and review depth: Knack's entry price is the highest of the four, and its 115 G2 and 99 Capterra reviews are a thinner sample than Airtable's or Softr's, with no Trustpilot presence to cross-check against.
Best for: Internal teams running ops dashboards, CRMs or portals that have outgrown per-seat pricing and need every employee to have access without paying for each one · from $49/mo
4
Baserow Best open-source, self-hosted option ★★★★★ ★★★★★ 4.0
Baserow is the only tool here with a genuinely free, unlimited option: the self-hosted Community edition has no row or storage ceiling at all, bounded only by your own server, and its cloud Premium tier is the cheapest paid entry point in this guide at roughly $10 to $12 a user a month. An official Make.com integration partnership and zero acquisition risk, there's no company to buy, round out the pitch. The catch is review depth and labor cost: G2 shows only 1 review for Baserow, Capterra's 69 is the only usable sample, and self-hosting the free tier is a real technical job, not a one-click swap.
Best for: Teams that want full data ownership and zero vendor lock-in, or the cheapest cloud entry point if self-hosting isn't an option · from $10/user/mo
The sticker price on each of these tools is almost beside the point; what matters is the unit behind it. Airtable and Softr both charge per seat, but Airtable meters one thing (editor seats, plus records per base) while Softr stacks three meters on top of each other (records, monthly workflow actions, and separate builder, team-user and client-user seat caps). Knack breaks from both: it charges by records and storage only, and bundles unlimited users into every plan, so headcount never shows up on the invoice. Baserow splits the difference depending on how you deploy it, per-user seat pricing on its cloud product, or zero cost and no ceiling at all if you run the open-source Community edition on your own server.
| Tool | Cheapest paid price | Metering unit | Free plan | Per-seat pricing |  G2 |  Capterra |
|---|
| Airtable | $20/seat/mo annual ($24/mo monthly) | Per-editor seat + records/base | Yes (1,000 records, 5 editors) | Yes | 4.6/5 (3,303) | 4.6/5 (2,250) |
| Softr | $19/mo annual ($25/mo monthly), flat | Records + workflow actions + seat caps (3 meters) | Yes (5,000 records, 3 builders) | Yes (builder/team-user/client-user caps) | 4.7/5 (749) | 4.7/5 (64) |
| Knack | $49/mo annual equiv ($59/mo monthly), flat | Records + storage, unlimited users | No | No | 4.3/5 (115) | 4.5/5 (99) |
| Baserow | $10/user/mo annual (cloud); $0 self-hosted | Per-user seat + rows + storage (cloud); unlimited self-hosted | Yes (3,000 rows/2GB cloud; unlimited self-hosted) | Yes (cloud only) | 4.5/5 (1 review) | 4.6/5 (69) |
What a 10-person team actually pays
Run the same scenario through all four pricing models, a 10-person team that all need full edit or use access, with data comfortably inside each tool’s entry tier (under 20,000 records, under 2 GB of storage, under 10,000 workflow actions a month), and the gap gets concrete fast.
| Tool | Plan needed for 10 people | Monthly (annual billing) | Annual cost |
|---|
| Knack | Starter (unlimited users, flat) | $49/mo | $588/yr |
| Softr | Pro (covers 10 team users, 2 builders, 50 client users, flat) | $99/mo | $1,188/yr |
| Baserow cloud | Premium, 10 user seats | $10 x 10 = $100/mo | $1,200/yr |
| Baserow self-hosted | Community edition | $0/mo (your own server cost not included) | $0/yr + server |
| Airtable | Team, 10 editor seats | $20 x 10 = $200/mo | $2,400/yr |
Knack wins this specific scenario because its price doesn’t move with headcount at all; the $49-a-month Starter plan covers 2 people or 20 the same way, as long as records and storage stay under its cap. Softr and Baserow’s cloud tier land close together in the middle, both still cheaper than Airtable because neither multiplies a per-seat rate by 10 the way Airtable’s Team plan does. Airtable is the most expensive of the four at this headcount for the same reason it draws the most per-seat complaints in review platforms: 10 editors at $20 a seat adds up fast, even on the lowest qualifying tier. Baserow’s self-hosted option sidesteps the subscription entirely, but the $0 line item hides a real cost, your own server and the time to maintain it, that the other three tools absorb into their monthly price.
How we picked
Every price, limit and review score in this guide came from each vendor’s own pricing page or documentation, checked directly on 2026-10-30, cross-referenced against G2, Capterra and, where available, Trustpilot. Review platforms disagree sharply for Airtable (4.6 on G2 and Capterra versus 2.0 on Trustpilot) and are too thin to call settled for Baserow (1 G2 review) and Knack (no Trustpilot presence at all); both gaps are reported directly rather than averaged into one misleading number.
The ranking is editorial, not a function of which tool pays us a commission. Airtable and Softr lead this guide on ecosystem size and purpose-built positioning, not on payout rate. ToolsGavel may earn a commission if you sign up through a link on this page; that never changes the order the tools appear in.
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Frequently asked questions
What's the difference between Airtable, Softr, Knack and Baserow?
Airtable is the database at the center of this comparison: a spreadsheet-database hybrid with the deepest ecosystem and automations of the four. Softr is an app layer that renders a client portal or internal tool on top of a data source, most often an Airtable base, Google Sheets, or its own native database; it doesn't have to be paired with Airtable, but it usually is. Knack combines the database and the app builder in one product and charges by records and storage instead of by seat, so every plan includes unlimited users. Baserow is an open-source, Airtable-style database that's free and unlimited when you run it on your own server, with a separate per-user cloud option if you'd rather not self-host.
Which of these is cheapest for a 10-person team?
Knack, if your data stays under its Starter tier's 20,000-record and 2 GB caps: $49 a month billed annually covers unlimited users, so a 10-person team costs the same as a 2-person one. Softr's Pro plan, at $99 a month annually, covers 10 team users as a flat price. Baserow's cloud Premium tier runs about $100 a month for 10 users, or $0 a month self-hosted if you're willing to run your own server. Airtable is the most expensive of the four at this headcount: 10 editor seats on the Team plan runs $200 a month billed annually, because Airtable charges per seat rather than a flat rate.
Is it still safe to build on Airtable after the Bending Spoons acquisition?
Airtable's product and pricing are unchanged as of this guide's last check on October 30, 2026, and it remains the most capable, best-supported database of the four. But Bending Spoons, which closed its $1.285 billion acquisition of Airtable on September 4, 2026, and announced large staff departures five weeks later, has a public track record at its other acquisitions: Evernote's personal annual price rose 86% within about two years of that deal, and WeTransfer cut 75% of its staff within weeks of its acquisition closing. Treat today's Airtable pricing and support level as current, not guaranteed for the next year or two.
Can Softr and Airtable be used together?
Yes, and it's the most common way people actually use Softr: Airtable holds the records, views and automations, and Softr turns that base into a permissioned app a client or customer can log into, something Airtable's own Interface Designer doesn't fully replace for outside users. The combination means Softr's app inherits whatever happens to its Airtable backend, including any future price or feature change under Airtable's new ownership, so it's worth knowing Softr also works on top of Google Sheets or its own native database if that dependency ever matters.
