Directualvs
Bubble
Bubble: Pick Bubble if you want one tool for both front end and backend, with a much larger ecosystem of plugins and agencies.
Directual
No-code backend with a visual workflow engine, used behind other tools rather than instead of them
As of 31 August 2026, Directual is free to use. A backend platform: database, generated API endpoints and a visual workflow engine, with only a basic front-end builder. Softwr lists it under No-Code. Directual is available on Web.
Overview
What Directual does
Directual is a no-code platform aimed at the server side. You define a database schema, build API endpoints over it, and construct business logic as scenarios: visual workflows made of steps that read and write data, call external services, run on a schedule or fire on a database event. A page builder exists but is deliberately secondary, and most real implementations use Directual as the backend for a front end built somewhere else. Two things distinguish it commercially. First, being backend-only fits the shape most projects actually end up with: a designed front end in Webflow or FlutterFlow talking to an API, rather than one vendor owning the whole stack. Second, and more important for ownership, the platform can be deployed on your own infrastructure on the top plan, so the data and logic do not have to live with the vendor permanently. Most no-code platforms have no answer at all to that question; this one has an answer, at a price. Buyers are technical founders, agencies and internal teams that want API-backed applications without writing server code, particularly where record volume is beyond what Airtable-class tools handle. The trade-off is that you are still assembling a stack: Directual plus a front-end tool plus the design work that implies, so the build is two systems to learn rather than one, and visual workflows become genuinely hard to read once a scenario grows past a single screen.
What people use it for
- Providing the backend for a Webflow or FlutterFlow front end that needs real data, authentication and logic
- Replacing an Airtable base that has outgrown its row limits without hiring a backend developer
- Event-driven workflows such as order processing or scheduled billing runs that must run without a person triggering them
- Organisations with a data residency requirement that rules out most no-code platforms, using the self-hosted tier
Related searches
The honest half
Where it falls short
Concrete and checkable, so you can decide whether any of them matter to you. This is the half of a review a vendor will not write about Directual.
- The front-end builder is basic, so any project needing a designed interface means learning and paying for a second tool, and time to launch is closer to a two-system build than a one-tool build.
- Visual scenarios become unreadable once the logic is non-trivial; a workflow that would be forty lines of code sprawls across a canvas, and reviewing what a colleague built is slow.
- Debugging asynchronous, event-triggered scenarios is harder than debugging code, because failures surface as records left in an unexpected state rather than as a stack trace at the point of failure.
- Self-hosting is confined to the top commercial tier, so the ownership advantage is available only to buyers already spending at the high end.
- The pool of agencies and freelancers who know Directual is small next to Bubble or Airtable, so handing a finished system to someone else to maintain is harder and more expensive.
Cross-shopped
What people choose instead of Directual
Each pairing was judged by two reviewers asking whether a buyer would genuinely weigh the two against each other. The ones that failed were deleted rather than published.
- DirectualvsBackendless
Backendless: Pick Backendless for another backend-first platform with real-time database features and its own mobile SDKs and hosting.
- DirectualvsBudibase
Budibase: Pick Budibase if the goal is internal tools over existing databases and you want an open source, self-hostable option from the start rather than only at the top tier.
Pricing
What Directual costs
Taken from the vendor's own pricing page. Prices move, so check before you buy.
Directual
On request
- Free tier with capped records and API calls
- Paid tiers priced by database rows, API calls and scenario runs
- Self-hosted deployment on the top tier only
Capabilities
Features
Visual database designer
Defines objects, fields and relations with indexing, sized for large record counts
Scenario builder
Business logic as visual workflows triggered by events, schedules or API calls
Generated API endpoints
Publishes read and write endpoints over your data with per-endpoint authentication
Event-driven triggers
Runs logic when a record changes rather than only when something is requested
Role and permission model
Controls access at object and field level for API consumers
Scheduled jobs
Runs recurring work such as billing cycles or data syncs without an external scheduler
Basic web page builder
Renders simple admin screens where a designed front end is unnecessary
Self-hosted deployment
Available on the top tier for teams that cannot keep data on vendor infrastructure
Answered, with sources
Questions people ask
Each answer names the page it came from, so you can check it rather than take our word for it.
Is Directual a replacement for Bubble?
Not directly. Bubble builds the whole application; Directual builds the backend and expects you to bring a front end such as Webflow or FlutterFlow.
Can I host it myself?
Yes, on the top commercial tier. That is unusual in no-code and it is the main reason regulated buyers look at it at all.
How does it cope with large data volumes?
It is built on a real database with indexing rather than a spreadsheet abstraction, so record counts that break Airtable-class tools are within its normal range.
What happens to my logic if I leave?
The data exports and the API is documented, but scenarios are platform-specific and have to be reimplemented, unless you are already on the self-hosted tier.
Keep looking
Where to go from Directual
- Directual alternativesEvery product people weigh against it
- Directual pricingPlans, floors and what the tiers exclude
- Directual badgesWhich rules it meets, and the figure behind each
- All No-Code softwareThe full category
- Best No-Code softwareThe shortlist, and how it was cut
Best No-Code software for
Compare Directual with
- Bubble
- Quickbase
- Zoho Creator
- WeWeb
- FlutterFlow
- Caspio
- Momen
- Stacker
- Mendix
- Appian
- Whalesync
- Corteza
- Superblocks
- ToolJet
- Draftbit
- WeWeb
- Whalesync
- Corteza
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Softwr does not host reviews and shows no star rating for Directual, because a rating we did not collect is not ours to publish. What is here is the pricing and platform detail from the vendor’s own pages, limitations we could state concretely, and alternatives a reviewer confirmed people weigh against it. Tell us if any of it is wrong.
More on Directual
Directual alternatives
What people switch to, and what they give up
Directual pricing
Every tier, and where the cost actually lands
Compare Directual
Put it head to head with anything we hold
Directual badge
Its rating, and an embed for your own site
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