Bubble vs Webflow
Both are no-code tools. Here is what separates them.
What Bubble is
Bubble is a no-code application builder, described by its makers as a no-code AI app builder for both web and mobile apps. Apps are assembled visually rather than written, and paid plans from Starter upward include custom domains and backend workflows. Plans are priced by which surfaces an app needs. Starter costs $32 per month for web only, $49 for mobile only and $69 for both. Growth is $134, $199 and $249 across the same three splits, and Team is $399, $529 and $649. Choosing web only where mobile is not needed is the single largest lever on the bill. Running the app is metered separately in workload units, shortened to WU, and twelve distinct activity types feed an app's monthly total. The rates are published per action, which makes the cost of a design decision calculable before it is built. A database search costs 0.3 WU, and each thing that search returns adds 0.015 WU. Writing or modifying a thing costs 0.5 WU and deleting one costs 0.1 WU. An aggregate query is 0.2 WU and a group by query 0.3 WU. Loading a page's HTML costs 0.15 WU, a server-side workflow action 0.6 WU, and evaluating a backend database trigger event 0.05 WU. API traffic is asymmetric: an outbound call costs 0.1 WU, while an inbound Data or Workflow API call costs only 0.01 WU. Plugins are charged on time as well as calls, at 0.2 WU per server-side action plus 0.0005 WU for every millisecond it runs, and the SQL Connector charges 0.1 WU per call plus 0.015 WU per row retrieved. The consequences of running out matter as much as the rates. Warning emails go out at 75 percent and 100 percent of the allowance. Workload used beyond the allowance costs $0.30 per 1,000 units where no workload tier has been bought, and if overages are switched off, an app that exhausts its workload goes offline. Workload tiers can only be bought on Starter, Growth or Team, and Free plan apps can neither buy a tier nor turn overages on, so a free app has a hard ceiling rather than a rising bill. Every paid app also gets 100,000 monthly workload units for its Development environment, keeping test runs off the live allowance. Extra file storage is charged at $3 per 100 GB. Read together, the workload model means an inefficient search that returns thousands of things is not just slow, it is a line item. Bubble publishes enough detail to estimate that cost during design rather than discover it in a bill.
What Webflow is
Webflow is a browser-based tool for designing and building websites visually. Pages are laid out and styled directly rather than written as code, and the result is published as a live, responsive site. No code is written to produce the layout. It is aimed at cross-functional teams of marketers, designers and developers working on the same site, and includes collaboration tools for that. Behind the visual editor sits a CMS for content that changes: blogs, resource sections and anything else that comes from a structured collection rather than a hand-built page. A new blog post is an entry in a collection rather than a page designed from scratch. Webflow calls it a composable CMS. There is also built-in storage for web apps, a REST API for reading and writing data from outside the platform, and AI-driven personalisation for varying what different visitors see. Sites can be published and hosted on Webflow, or exported and hosted anywhere else, which is the escape hatch for anyone worried about being tied in. Sites are built to be SEO-friendly, analytics are supported for understanding traffic, and integrations include Zapier and Google Analytics. Directory listings add Figma and Mailchimp to that list, and support is offered by email. Pricing is a subscription. There is a free Starter plan. Basic is $15 a month and Premium $25 a month, both billed yearly. The Team plan is $2,500 a month and requires an annual contract. Enterprise is custom priced, with custom billing available. Ecommerce is charged separately: the Standard plan supports up to 500 ecommerce items and takes a 2% transaction fee, and the Advanced plan raises the limit to 15,000 items. Webflow was founded in 2013. It reports 3.5 million users and $335 million raised in total funding. It is not open source and does not offer self-hosting, so the design tool runs in Webflow's cloud whatever you do with the finished site. Exporting is the way to move that site elsewhere.
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