Why switch to a different backend?

[DylanS]

Hello!

I am thinking about maybe switching to Xano, but I want to hear what good things will it bring?

What will be easier? What will be harder etc

Thanks

[Victor]

Hi @DylanS,

I think @bhanu and @xano can give an advice about this

Best,
Victor.

[bhanu]

Thanks @Victor

@DylanS here’s what I wrote previously, but if you need anything specific, happy to help with more information.

Value of external collection?

@valentine I am leaning more towards @xano as I continue to build more features, here are few of my reasons: Authentication managed by Xano - I can use the entire collections with any platform for various activities Heavy data manipulation activity- easily possible with Xano External API (this one is big for me) - I can combine multiple external API calls into a single function in Xano and connect it to one endpoint for Adalo’s consumption. Automations - Xano has inbuilt automations, I don’t h…

[DylanS]

Thanks for sharing!
I definitely see big upsides too switching!

I will experiment a bit with it

[ShawnPB]

Hi bhanu!

Will it make app faster if I switch backend to Xano, I am currently store all data on adalo, and the app run very slow

Thanks in advance!

Shawn

[bhanu]

@ShawnPB it definitely will increase the performance with @xano because all your on screen logic is handled by Xano and it’s built specifically as a backend service.

[ShawnPB]

Thank you for your reply! Sounds great!

[AddyEdwin]

What is the speed and performance like, when pulling data such as lists or a details page inside your app?

[bhanu]

Large lists load instantly from Xano compared Adalo & the performance when using external API calls (i.e. custom actions) via xano is super impressive.

I don’t have stats handy to show, but my users have definitely noticed the improvement.

[AddyEdwin]

Thanks, that’s very encouraging to know. I’m currently using Airtable right now, and the main reason I’ll still be using Airtable for the forseeable future is because it’s easy enough for our mostly non-tech users to also work on it. However, I face some long loading times when pulling data from Airtable, or it takes a 2-3 seconds for the correct data to show up.

Wanted to know if you had any experience working with Airtable and how it compares to Xano in terms of performance in Adalo apps specifically.

Tagging @xano directly as well if you could provide some insights for us.

[bhanu]

Ohh yes, I started with Airtable for one app and experimented with Xano. Ever since, @xano has become my default backend

[alexbarciog]

Hi! Is there a tutorial how to change it to xano?

[bhanu]

I dont think there’s any, but I imported Airtable into Xano and continued from there.

[AddyEdwin]

If it’s OK with you, can you let me know how much faster Xano was for you, compared to Airtable, for these?

• pulling up information in a details page, such as text, images?
• if loading custom lists of 50+ items was faster or not
• whether the speed of actions was faster
• whether you faced any glitches or other issues that went away with Xano?

Also looking at Xano, I see that there’s a limit of 10GB/25GB depending on the plan. In Airtable we use the Pro plan which has a limit of 20GB per base. In Xano, is this limit per base or per account?

(Secretly crossing fingers it’s per base because we have 10+ bases 20GB each)

[bhanu]

My primary reason to switch to xano was to perform complex data manipulations and calls external APIs directly from backend.

And in terms of speed, there’s no rate limit of you go on a paid version and unlimited backend automations.

Space - I think it’s at base level.

@xano can you confirm?

[xano]

Hey everyone sorry we’re late to the party!

Thanks as always @bhanu for helping field questions.

@DylanS @ShawnPB We would love for you to give us a try! There are some nuances around using an external backend like Xano + Adalo and passing data back and forth,but Adalo is well aware and working on making it easier. That said we have lots of users including @bhanu who have made things work!

For everyone here, we do Orientation/Office Hours with the founders multiple times a week so feel free to stop in and ask any questions you might have. We’ll help get things resolved.

Office Hours & Orientation

@AddyEdwin

Re: Speed - The query speed will depend largely on where you are in the world. Our free/essential plan servers are U.S. based but we have region-specific servers once you move into the dedicated resource paid plans. All that said, we have little to no complaints about our speed even when using our U.S. servers. To summarize, since we are 100% focused on the backend we have really optimized the query speed performance from database to front-end and work well with front-ends like Adalo.

Re: Airtable Import - We allow you to select the bases you’d like to bring in and have the ability to bring in all relationships and content. That said, we optionally allow you to download + import attachements OR maintain them in airtable and we link to them from within Xano.

Re: Storage - Storage is shared across workspaces so unfortunately if you were bringing in 200GB and you were on the essential plan, you would need to pay for 190GB of additional storage and I’m happy to chat with you separately about our a la carte pricing for this. For now i’d recommend just keeping the files in airtable and using Xano to reference them as you try it out to see if Xano is the right fit.

[AddyEdwin]

Thanks. I’ll give it a go on my end at first and test the performance for several elements. I’ll get in touch with you when we’re ready to migrate

[brunoribeiro]

I am using Directus on a powerfully NYC1 Digital ocean droplet. Lists with more then 5k records takes less than 2 seconds to load. 1k instantaneous. if you bring your data close to Adalo’s red server it reduce the latency and make it as fast as it can be. My users are in Brazil and NYC servers have a relative good latency here. About 60 to 120 ms.