I’ve been working with no-code apps for a while, and as a die-hard tinkerer, I have a serious soft spot for them. For this article, I researched and considered over 100 different platforms, exploring each one and then conducting extensive testing on the top contenders.
Here are my picks for the eight best no-code app builders—whether you’re looking to flesh out that personal project or create a brand new SaaS product, one of these will get you to the finish line quickly.
The best no-code app builder software
Softr for complete beginners
Bubble for a balance between power and ease of use
Zapier Interfaces for automation
Glide for making easy apps for mobile devices Bildr for flexibility
Backendless for more control over your infrastructure and data FlutterFlow and Firebase for building for multiple platforms
For modular, scalable apps, WeWeb and Xano Featured Zapier partner: Jotform
Jotform Apps makes it easy to create custom mobile apps without any coding. With its drag-and-drop builder, you can combine forms, widgets, and branding into a fully functional app in minutes—no technical experience required. It’s perfect for teams that rely on data collection and want to streamline access through a single, easy-to-use app. Learn more about how to automate Jotform with Zapier.
Building an app without code: The requirements
How we evaluate and test apps
Our best apps roundups are written by humans who’ve spent much of their careers using, testing, and writing about software. Unless explicitly stated, we spend dozens of hours researching and testing apps, using each app as it’s intended to be used and evaluating it against the criteria we set for the category. We’re never paid for placement in our articles from any app or for links to any site—we value the trust readers put in us to offer authentic evaluations of the categories and apps we review. For more details on our process, read the full rundown of how we select apps to feature on the Zapier blog.
Most tools that let you build apps without code divide the process into three parts:
Structuring the database, which will hold all the information your users will input and request as they use the app.
Composing the user interface, where you’ll create the screens, buttons, and input fields that your users will interact with.
Building the logic of the app, which, put simply, is determining what happens once an event is triggered; for example, “when the user clicks the ‘Open’ button… open the pop-up.”
The best platforms create a visual programming experience that lets you put together an app exactly the way you want it, without having to code or even deeply understand the way computers think. In addition to making programming more accessible for the non-technical crowd, these app creators also help professional developers save time on building basic features, freeing up their schedule to tackle bigger coding problems.
Here’s what I looked for when testing each no-code app builder.
It’s really no-code. No HTML, no CSS, no JavaScript. For all the tools on this list, you don’t have to type a single line of code from beginning to end if you don’t want to. But if you’re skilled, brave, or both, I’m including three more complex options at the end where you can delve into low-code territory—and have more flexibility as a result.
Ease of use. The ideas behind visual programming need to be simple to comprehend. All of these apps have simple and easy-to-understand user interfaces, and the platforms function without major performance issues or strange errors. Keep in mind: the easier app builders on this list, while able to deliver good results, can’t compare with the power of those with a more demanding learning curve. If you’re building a unique product, consider investing the extra time and effort to have as much freedom as possible.
Help and documentation. Having a good knowledge base is just the beginning. I also prioritized platforms that have good “getting started” articles, interactive guides, videos, and any other resources to speed up your learning and help you solve problems as you build.
Flexibility. Personal project? Enterprise app? No matter what you’re looking to build, these platforms are flexible enough to let you build the features you want. For this reason, you won’t find platforms on this list that specialize in internal tools or other niche no-code use cases.
Community. Documentation only gets you so far, and that’s when having an active forum with more experienced builders is useful. These apps have active forums and independent content creators online, so you can kick back in front of YouTube and learn while sipping your coffee.