About Budibase
Budibase is an open-source operations platform for building AI agents, automations and apps that run internal processes. It is model agnostic and describes itself as saving engineers many hours when building these tools, while handling security concerns. Topics place it in the low-code and no-code internal tools space, with CRUD apps and an SQL GUI.
The idea is to run requests, approvals and workflows on one platform instead of stitching several tools together. Staff constantly ask questions, request sign-offs and flag problems, and Budibase agents interpret those requests and carry out the work: creating records, sending approvals to the right people, updating apps and alerting teams. You connect the business systems your operations already rely on, and the platform also supports building data applications over databases and REST APIs.
You can use Budibase Cloud, where the vendor hosts it, or host it yourself with Docker, Kubernetes or DigitalOcean. The repository is written in TypeScript, and its license is listed as 'Other' on GitHub, so check the terms for enterprise features. It suits operations and engineering teams that want internal tools and AI automation without building everything from scratch.
Key features
- AI agents that run workflows
- Internal app builder for CRUD tools
- Automations connecting business systems
- Works with any AI model
- Self-host with Docker or Kubernetes
- Budibase Cloud hosting
Good fit for
- →Internal request and approval portals
- →Admin tools over existing databases
- →AI-assisted operations automation
- Built with
- TypeScript
- Tags
- low-code
- internal-tools
- ai-agents
- automation
- workflow
- self-hosted
- crud
- no-code
Budibase: questions and answers
- What is Budibase used for?
- Budibase is an open-source, model-agnostic operations platform for building AI agents, automations and internal apps that connect to your business systems. It is a good fit for internal request and approval portals, admin tools over existing databases, and AI-assisted operations automation.
- Is Budibase open source?
- Yes. Budibase is open source under a custom licence. Its source code is on GitHub at Budibase/budibase and is written mainly in TypeScript.
- Is Budibase free?
- Yes. Budibase is open source, so the software itself is free to use under the terms of its own licence. A managed cloud version is also available, with paid plans from $19 per month.
- Can I self-host Budibase?
- Yes. Budibase can be self-hosted on your own server or infrastructure.
- What is Budibase an alternative to?
- Budibase is an open-source alternative to Retool, Microsoft Power Apps, AppSheet and Softr. Other open-source alternatives to Retool include NocoBase, ToolJet and Appsmith.
- Is Budibase actively maintained?
- Yes. The most recent commit to Budibase was on 2 October 2026, and the latest release is v3.47.0, published on 28 September 2026. The project has 28k stars on GitHub.
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