Hmmm, Adalo? so bad i feel about it

Dear @YousefAbubaker,

May I please ask you to refrain from posting comments like this one.
It doesn’t bring any value to the conversation and looks provocative and not constructive.

Thank you for understanding.

Best,
Victor.

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Hey @RonDeveloper

Have you had a chance to look into the API documentation for IAPHUB? Get subscription | IAPHUB

It may be possible to implement a way to check if the user has an active subscription with an API call. I have not personally used IAPHUB for this, but I have used Stripe in the same regard.

Both IAPHUB by Pragmaflow and the Stripe components are there to simply capture the payments and set up subscriptions, however, the API has more technical functionality that can be implemented. Perhaps someone with more experience with IAPHUB can chime in on it.

Basically, I’d need an active IAPHUB account to test if it’s possible.

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Hi @RonDeveloper,

That’s unfortunate you haven’t received reply about IAP Beta subscriptions. I tested this beta one it in several apps - it works. Setup is not very straightforward, though as you’re a developer it shouldn’t be an issue for you. With this component you can check subscription validity, restore it & etc.
Let me check if there is a possibility to join.

As for IAPHUB - never had an experience with it so can’t help here.

Best,
Victor.

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Hi @RonDeveloper and everyone,

Follow-up: to get access to IAP Subscriptions Beta, please submit a support ticket here Submit a Support Ticket with this request. Tagging Ben Reynolds @ben1 as he can give more guidance on this.

Best,
Victor.

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I did both a while ago submitted a support ticket and contacted Ben. Hopefully I can get access soon. And nice to hear that it’s implemented in the Adalo beta :smiley:

I’ve been in very close contact with the IAPHUB team, they will try to implement an interface to Adalo, but it may take some time.

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@Flawless You can test everything with IAPHUB with the free test account but only in sandbox mode.

You can have a look here I started there a note about it: Recurring Subscriptions IOS / Android - Adalo component

I won’t be able to test until Wednesday/Thursday as I have a few projects on the plate to take care of today and tomorrow. I’ll check it out.

My priority at the moment is to get the beta of the new native IAP because it seem it have everything I need at the moment.

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Glad that this topic has lessons to learn, it will become feedback to all of us.

For experience makers that want to port their app to Adalo, they should focus on edge cases, because they know how to compare, any doubt that it will not satisfy you, it is a red flag already, unless you don’t really have a choice and the only option is to move forward.

For those looking to build MVP, bring critical factors that are really important and should be done in simplest way possible but still bring the value to customers, focus on these first, don’t build other things unless these factors can be contained.

This would avoid unnecessary claims of wasting time, wasted money, efforts etc, because not every tool can be perfect for every situation.

If you need nosql database for scalable users but need multiple writes to synchronize data, Adalo might not be the choice.

If you need responsive web app with flexbox style, Adalo is not there yet.

If you need internal webhook without added cost for using other automation tools, Adalo is not yet.

But if you want to build quick iterations of your ideas and have filtered critical factors to be those that are within Adalo current features, you hit the jackpot, your apps will be done much quicker than other tools.

Those critical factors are lesson learned here.

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Dear Adalo Community Leaders,

from the point of view of good communication, every criticism is good and valuable because it offers the opportunity to make improvements or to explain points that may not be understandable in more detail. If you don’t get any criticism, it usually means that the users are so dissatisfied and don’t see a chance to raise their concerns and leave Adalo without a word. Do not take criticism as an attack on Adalo himself. From the point of view of the affected user, the arguments are always correct for the user himself, otherwise they would not write them. See the criticism as an opportunity to improve. Everyone who uses Adalo liked it otherwise they wouldn’t have written complete apps with it or ported it as in my case.

The role of the community leaders of this forum is also not clear to me. Those aren’t Adalo employees, are they? So why all the fuss when personal criticism is being leveled?

These users would like to use Adalo, but from their personal point of view they have reached a point that makes it impossible for the moment for them to do so. If there is a fix, all the better. If not, it’s a pity that you lose an Adalo user.

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Community leaders are Adalo users who have a lot of experience helping on the forum and are invited to the community leaders program to further help members. They also have permissions to open, close, delete topics, etc if necessary, and have a dedicated channel where they can discuss issues or ask for second opinions. For example, if there is a topic that isn’t getting an answer, we might discuss it there, or contact the Adalo team if we see a major issue that needs attention.

The community leaders are individuals though with their own opinions, like you say, not Adalo staff. I think definitely the consensus is to leave discussions to run unless they are not constructive or get really out of hand, or spammy. Criticism of Adalo is fine in my opinion if it’s polite and constructive. We all have our favorite issues on what we’d like the platform to improve and develop further.

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I appreciate everyone’s honesty above. It really helps when new to a platform and understanding what platform is good for your project. Commission based review websites and youtube videos do not help much, haha.

This is always a worry when there is so many no-code options. Maybe a lower entry price with limitation of only being able to make 1 app would make sense.

This would be super helpful and help Adalo retain more creators I’m sure. Your responses were very clear and helpful, including about beta subscriptions, sounds very promising. Monetization is king, most people don’t pay $50/m for a hobby software and every other feature supports this goal.

Your post Yongki was very honest and helpful, and quite reassuring to me that Adalo is definitely the best app for myself at this time.

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You can’t just think to build an app in Adalo and expect that it will work flawlessly. Expecially if it is a Crypto app based on blockchain APIs…
Maybe too much for a starting point.

Adalo is best suitable for restaurant/estate/booking apps, more complex structured apps need a deep studying in how to get actions and components work faster. Is full of exemple here in the forum on how you can speed up your apps, just to remind some :
• Don’t try to load all the records from a long collection in a single list
• Avoid visibility conditions
• Split actions (with a lottie or another screen) when clicking action is triggered
• Compress images before uploading on Adalo database

It’s just up to you, trust me I gave up multiple times because of performances, but later on learned to live with this “issue”.

Best
Eugen

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Exactly, we have to be realistic every platform has its positives and negatives, you cant expect low beginning learning curve to mean no learning curve and unlimited options. If it was thst easy every man and his nan would be making apps. Hehe.

I got to admit the “slow” and lack of optomisation rumours surrounding Adalo almost put me off, lucky the free plan and forums made me feel otherwise.

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Interesting. Perhaps you’re based in the US or wherever Adalo’s primary servers are hosted? Outside of the US, the delays on native apps is insane. I downloaded some example apps from the Adalo Showcase and was actually blown away by how slow loading and broken most of the Native apps were when trying to access from New Zealand. I’ve tried over our dedicated Fibre connection (1000/800), a VPN relay in Sydney (Australia) and mobile 5G to ensure it wasn’t “our” connection.

Bubble suffers the same issue - and to get an instance stood up closer to your home (e.g. Sydney is the nearest AWS for New Zealand), it is $425+ per month with Bubble. In some cases, if this results in a more performant app, it can be justified.

But at this point Adalo needs to pivot and consider alternative approaches to Low Code because with the likes of Budibase and AppMaster completely redefining the approach with host-your-own type solutions (as an option), the old school locked-in model isn’t going to last for much longer.

As others have said, Adalo’s interface/UX builder is first class. But as far as backend is concerned, clearly there are issues and if your biggest market is the US, then who cares about the rest of the world right?

I had to cancel my subscription as soon as I saw the native response time on finished, published apps (we’re talking BASIC applications that weren’t loading MBs of rows or images). I wasn’t about to go and make the same mistake as the OP of this thread did.

I came here today to check in on whether performance or host-your-own instance plans were available yet… doesn’t look like it. So I guess I’ll check in with y’all in another couple of months.

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Budibase looks a long way off, but always nice to see opensource projects. AppMaster isnt low or no code, its clearly visual scripting from its own screenshots. How they can say no code next to visual script screenshots which is basically coding, just in a visual way which takss longer is bizarre. But so its their pricing plans. 1 app, $5/m. But want to make 2 apps $165/m! Eh!

Certaintly can think of better options out there if Adalo aint for you in its current state. I thought you could use external databases with Adalo now though, from reading above.

Yes, I agree @JL_LJ

I’m not an API expert. haven’t even gotten there, but yes, I agree, some API access should be free, too.

The idea of having a free - open - sandbox to build, learn, launch, experiment would be a BIG defensive move by Adalo, making it hard for competitors

+less churn, means: more in their marketing funnel, with only money making happy customers paying.

More-over, just a thought… angel-investors (of any kind) could pay into Adalo for some sort of connection with startups, off-setting the price for founders + This means, incentives are aligned, further helping Adalo, because angel investors, you, I, and Adalo all want to win. Again, just a thought here.

I think you said it, “allow users to create apps…not stressing (time/money)”
Adalo should think about solving that!

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Thanks @Toddy , great stuff. Also very important, we are turning into a shift of coding to no coding (I was a programmer, now I basically just use No code tools and only use programming when it is really needed), we are going to see a big market rising for this new movement, but big downfalls also, probably only 5%/10% of companies will stay at the top, the others will just die eventually. I do hope Adalo stays at the top, in terms of UI/UX design, it is the most user friendly so far. We still have time as all tools I use so far have their own Strengths and Weaknesses.

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I’m from NZ as well. I have looked at most of the no-code cross-platform solutions and it came down to Appgyver and Adalo.

Appgyver is missing a few things and there is way too much uncertainty after it was acquired by SAP, despite their reassurances. If Appgyver introduced a paid plan I would have a bit more confidence. Having said that Appgyver is a true data-centric no-code solution – In my opinion, its powerful.

I have to say, I trust Adalo more, they seem open and honest - If you watch some of the townhall meetings – To me, they seem pretty open and genuine and they are trying to fix issues. You won’t get this level of open communication from the founders of other no-code solutions. David and Ben seem like good genuine hard working blokes.

Adalo has the best interface and is a well-rounded solution. But I see too many posts about poor performance. But I don’t know if its just new users designing apps poorly or whether its actual issues with Adalo. To be honest I’m being selfish and lazy I guess, I need to build a complex solution and test out the performance perhaps, But I have invested a bit into learning Appgyver, so not too sure if I want to invest more time learning Adalo. I mean learning the basics is easy but making a complex app to test takes time.

For me performance is key, then features. Having said that you also need some critical features to start with, which Adalo has. I haven’t published any apps with Adalo. We really need Adalo to provide some info/evidence to show how an app performs. Just an example app with some real stats. Let’s say an app with 10K records and an app with 100k or 500k records with filters and pagination etc. These apps should be well designed and optimised – Showing us the best case scenario – A crm app or an uber app or whatever.

Being in the pacific (NZ), I would always go for AWS or GCP in the Sydney region. So if I was to use Adalo, I would definitely use external data. Looked at Supabase, Back4App and Xano. Xano will be my preference as it has good learning resources and its a true no-code back end. But it concerns me that all api requests are routed through Adalo. I know what their reason is, but it kind of takes away a chunk of the performance advantage you get from external data. This is annoying.

As for Bubble, I think it’s the probably the poorest no-code solution despite their very large user base. Compare them to Adalo, appgyver, wappler, draftbit, flutterflow, clutch, glide whatever – Bubble is way behind and slow to innovate. Yes, it’s a somewhat powerful solution but they can’t provide you with a decent back end for the price. You don’t get to choose your region and its like $800 to get a dedicated solution. I think they are very closed minded and relying on their cult following. They have been around for like 10 years and have plenty of funding but still can’t provide a decent value-based backend or cross platform capability? The vast majority of their email communications/promotions are about paid bootcamps and promotions or something like that – I always found that confusing – Trying to sell bootcamps to no-coders is their biggest news item to email their userbase! They started in 2012, 100M revenue from 250k user base in 2017, 1M userbase now, 100M funds raised in 2021 – Still no cross-platform capability. Now compare them to Adalo - Adalo has done way more in a short period of time and only just raised 8M this year. I know who I’d choose if the choice was between bubble and Adalo.

PS - I’m not too sure if the person who actually started this thread had a genuine concern or not. They provided no real evidence - Not doing anyone any justice. But the topic of performance is a worthwhile one in my opinion.

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This happens to be the best thread in a on the forum for me. I was imagining the burst of ideas if Adalo experts come together to brainstorm on solving an issue, I was literally reading every line word after word. Thank you to all the experts, it was educative. The emotions revealed undeniable passion. Hello @Flawless please I would like to have your direct contact. Thanks.

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