In the world of no-code mobile app builders, BuildFire offers a few advantages. It’s easy to learn and lets users publish their native mobile apps to the Apple App Store and Google Play Store.
Yet you might find that BuildFire has serious hangups, leading you to look for other options. But with so many no-code app builders on the market today, finding the perfect BuildFire alternative is difficult.
If you’re having trouble finding a BuildFire alternative that fits your needs, you’re in good company. We’ve done our research and selected a few strong frontrunners.
In this article, I’ll review the top 5 BuildFire alternatives.
The Top 5 BuildFire Alternatives
- Adalo, the best overall BuildFire alternative.
- Bubble, the BuildFire alternative with the largest ecosystem.
- Bravo Studio, the BuildFire alternative for designers.
- Glide, the best BuildFire alternative for aesthetics.
- GoodBarber, the BuildFire alternative for e-commerce and subscription apps.
Why Choose a BuildFire Alternative?
While BuildFire features an intuitive point-and-click building interface, it doesn’t have the design oomph to consistently produce unique and eye-catching apps. BuildFire also misses the mark in a few other areas.
Since 2014, I’ve helped freelancers, businesses, and organizations find the best app-builder to suit their needs. These folks consistently have the following issues with BuildFire:
High Price
BuildFire’s lowest pricing tier is an eye-watering $100/month (paid quarterly), and the small amount of features you get is equally painful. For instance, while you can publish to the Apple App Store and Google Play Store, you only get 100 downloads.
Solution: Pick an app builder with a reasonably priced lower tier, like Adalo or Bubble. Each app builder on our list has a lower-tier product way under $100/month, and they’re all more powerful than BuildFire’s.
Very Few Design Capabilities
While it has an easy-to-learn building interface, BuildFire doesn’t offer much to really make your app stand out in terms of aesthetics. Its elements, like buttons and text boxes, appear dated. Adjusting and configuring them can be tedious.
Solution: Select an app builder that has modern-looking elements and components, like Glide or Bravo Studio, two app builders that prioritize design. A modern look and feel will contribute to your app’s aesthetic and enhance user experience (UX).
No Ecosystem
The poet John Donne once said, “No man is an island,” a timeless nugget of wisdom that applies to no-code app builders too. An app builder is not just a tool, but also part of a thriving ecosystem. It needs to provide a platform for its users to communicate and collaborate.
App builders should have a collection of tutorials to help beginners, a message board or Slack channel where users can discuss new features, and opportunities for developers to create and publish their own APIs and plugins.
BuildFire does not have such an ecosystem, constraining both its power as an app builder and community potential.
Solution: Choose an app builder with a thriving community that provides access to an active message board and offers freshly developed plugins made by users with technical skills. For instance, Bubble, Glide, and Adalo have all built large and helpful ecosystems.
#1 The Best Overall BuildFire Alternative
Adalo
What is it?
Adalo is a no-code app builder for web and native mobile apps. It features an intuitive drag-and-drop interface that allows you to customize your app to your exact taste.
What does it do better than BuildFire?
While BuildFire offers an easy-to-learn interface, Adalo’s is more intuitive. It allows you to drop elements, text, pictures, and more right onto your canvas. You can also adjust each element’s size, color, and position by simply dragging your mouse.
Adalo has an enormous ecosystem full of tutorials and guides and a long list of resources. You’ll also find the latest plugins made by the Adalo developer community and a helpful message board where you can get answers if you get stuck building your app.
Who is it best for?
Adalo is the app builder I recommend more than others for a reason: It gives you the power to bring almost any app idea to life. Thousands of freelancers, entrepreneurs, and small and medium businesses have used Adalo to create everything from unique internal business apps to thriving social networks.
Final Verdict
With competitive pricing, a thriving ecosystem, and the ability to design modern-looking apps, Adalo is the best overall BuildFire alternative.
#2 The BuildFire Alternative With The Largest Ecosystem
Bubble
What is it?
Bubble is a no-code web app builder that’s been around for over a decade, and it features a vast ecosystem and a flexible app-building interface.
What does it do better than BuildFire?
Although Bubble’s building interface does have a bit of a learning curve, the Bubble ecosystem is enormous — the largest in the no-code app-building space. It provides enough videos and tutorials to get the hang of the app-building interface with a little bit of invested time.
Once you know what you’re doing, you’ll have the design freedom to make attention-grabbing, highly functional apps that you can supercharge with plugins from Bubble’s mammoth plugin library.
While Bubble doesn’t publish native mobile apps, you can create progressive web apps (PWAs) that users can log into from their phone’s web browsers.
Who is it best for?
Bubble can benefit businesses of all sizes, from scrappy startup teams to enterprises that fill floors in skyscrapers. While Bubble doesn’t build native mobile apps, it has the flexibility to create almost any web app you can imagine.
Final Verdict
While it takes some time to learn, Bubble is a much cheaper BuildFire alternative that can produce high-quality apps. It also has a large and supportive ecosystem.
#3 The BuildFire Alternative For Designers
Bravo Studio
What is it?
Bravo Studio is a no-code app builder that transforms Figma designs into stunning native mobile apps.
What does it do better than BuildFire?
If you’re a designer and have Figma experience, Bravo Studio is your go-to BuildFire alternative. Mix and match which Figma designs you want to make into apps, and then choose the one to publish in the Apple App Store or Google Play Store.
While its ecosystem has room to grow, try out the Bravo Academy to get the most out of Bravo’s app-building interface. You’ll learn how to leverage Bravo for maximum design freedom to create breathtaking apps unique to your own brand.
Bravo Studio does have a limited backend, so depending on the type of app you want to build, you might have to bring your own.
Who is it best for?
Any designer who works with Figma will find Bravo useful. For those who want to create unique native mobile apps from their own graphic designs, look no further than Bravo.
Final Verdict
Bravo Studio is the best BuildFire alternative for designers. You’ll get much more power and design freedom.
#4 The Best BuildFire Alternative For Aesthetics
Glide
What is it?
Glide is a powerful no-code web app builder that creates sleek and attention-grabbing apps right out of the box.
What does it do better than BuildFire?
While Glide offers less design freedom than BuildFire, its point-and-click interface provides powerful functionality. It has one of the largest ecosystems (though not as big as Bubble’s) and features an enormous template library.
When you choose Glide, you’ll get access to an expansive community of experts who frequent Glide’s message boards. You’ll get answers to questions and learn about Glide’s latest plugins and APIs.
If you’re having trouble learning Glide’s building interface, visit Glide University for tutorials, guides, and videos — it’s one of the most packed tutorial collections on this list.
Who is it best for?
Glide is a great choice for individuals and businesses that want to build a PWA. While many businesses use Glide to make beautiful internal business apps, you can also produce attractive public-facing PWAs.
Final Verdict
Glide gives you the resources and functionality to build apps that are more powerful and eye-catching than BuildFire.
#5 The BuildFire Alternative For E-Commerce and Subscription Apps
GoodBarber
What is it?
GoodBarber is a competitively-priced no-code mobile app builder for creating e-commerce and content-subscription apps.
What does it do better than BuildFire?
For those who want to create an online store, GoodBarber provides a better building experience than BuildFire. GoodBarber’s intuitive interface makes for easy editing, allowing you to swiftly and seamlessly add your product offerings and descriptions.
While GoodBarbers does have the most robust ecosystem, its design freedom and glossy elements create better, more modern-looking apps than BuildFire.
Who is it best for?
If you want to launch an e-commerce app or online store that you can publish in the Apple App Store or Google Play Store, GoodBarber is a no-brainer.
Both options are cheaper than BuildFire’s lowest tier, and you get unlimited downloads from the app stores.
Final Verdict
GoodBarber is a cost-effective, easy-to-use BuildFire alternative for creating specialized, professional-looking e-commerce apps.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the Best BuildFire Alternative?
The best BuildFire alternative is Adalo. It has a thriving ecosystem, provides the power to create stunning apps for all purposes, and at $36/month, is much cheaper than BuildFire. Adalo is also much easier to use.
What is the Cheapest BuildFire Alternative?
If you are a designer, you’ll be pleased to know that Bravo Studio, which turns your Figma designs into apps, is the cheapest app builder at $21/month. Unfortunately, people with zero Figma experience will struggle to use Bravo.
For those wanting to sell a content subscription from their app, GoodBarber is the cheapest version, at $30/month. If you want more flexibility but at the cost of a steeper learning curve, Bubble, at $32/month, is an option. However, Adalo is only $36/month. It’s almost infinitely more flexible than GoodBarber and is much easier to learn than Bubble.
What BuildFire Alternative Has the Largest Ecosystem?
Bubble, because it’s been around for over a decade, has the largest ecosystem out of any app-builder on my list. Because it has been around for over a decade, thousands of people have put in countless hours working with Bubble. Many of them are willing to share the lessons they’ve learned on Bubble forums.
