Retool Reviews (2025): Pros, Cons, & Is It Worth It?

Retool is a favorite among technical teams for building internal tools quickly, thanks to its drag-and-drop components, extensive template library, and new AI features. But speed isn’t everything.

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Retool reviews highlight concerns around pricing, limited extensibility, and heavy self-hosting requirements, which leave many looking for alternatives.

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In this article, we will cover:

• The key features of Retool
• What users love and don’t about Retool
• Whether it’s right for you

Quick verdict 

Retool is a strong pick if you want a single tool for web apps, agents, workflows, portals, and mobile apps. The new Assist feature is fast and convenient. You can now generate complete web apps from prompts using AI directly in the Retool IDE. 

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However, it only supports web apps and relies on Retool’s own components, so deep customization and code export are still off the table.

What is Retool?

Retool is a low-code platform designed for teams that need to quickly build internal business tools like admin dashboards, data reporting panels, customer support tools, and workflow automation apps. You can use AI or drag components onto a canvas, connect them to your databases or APIs, and customize logic with JavaScript.

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Retool use cases include:

• Customer 360 dashboards for support teams
• Financial operations apps for risk management
• Lookup tools unify multiple data sources

Tech leads and engineering teams often opt for it because it's a Silicon Valley darling. While it dramatically accelerates app development, its popularity gives it significant visibility and adoption, even though it may not be the best solution for every situation.

Retool’s Key Features

Retool packs a wide range of features that make it appealing to teams. Below is an overview of the most important features:

• Pre-built UI components: Retool comes with a library of UI elements like tables, charts, forms, and buttons.
• AI app generation: The new Assist tab, available in public beta, lets you prompt AI to create or modify web apps directly within the IDE. It generates UI elements, queries, and event logic while maintaining conversational context. While fast, it’s limited to Retool’s internal component system, and you can’t fully edit or export the code.
• AI actions and agents: The Retool AI resource enables you to write queries that call AI models to perform tasks such as text generation, classification, and document extraction. You can also build agents to automate multi-step workflows and use the built-in vector database for power retrieval-augmented generation.
• Mobile apps: You can build native iOS and Android apps with offline mode, barcode scanning, and push notifications. This is valuable for field teams.
• External portals: Retool allows you to create customer or partner portals with built-in authentication and role-based permissions. These extend Retool beyond internal dashboards.
• Integrations: The platform connects to more than 70 databases and APIs, including databases, SaaS tools, and third-party APIs.
• Governance and versioning: Retool supports role-based access control, SSO, audit logs, and Git sync for version history. However, Git works as a sync mechanism rather than full branching and code ownership.
• Self-hosting: Enterprises can fully self-host Retool, which provides more control over infrastructure and data. The trade-off is that self-hosting requires significant DevOps resources, and updates usually trail behind the cloud version.

Retool reviews: What real users are saying

To balance my own testing, I looked at Retool’s reviews from sites like G2, Reddit, and Capterra. Overall, users appreciate Retool’s speed and integrations, but many complain about cost and limited flexibility.

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Here’s the breakdown of what people like most and where they get frustrated.

Pros:

• Fast to build with: Many users highlight how quickly they can create apps using Retool’s drag-and-drop components. The platform removes much of the boilerplate work, which helps small teams move faster.
• East integrations: Users appreciate Retool’s large library of connectors for databases and APIs. Connecting to PostgreSQL, Snowflake, or Google Sheets usually takes just a few clicks, which reduces setup time.
• Custom logic with SQL and JavaScript: Developers value the ability to write queries and add JavaScript inside components. This balance of low-code and coding flexibility gives more control compared to no-code tools.

Cons:

• Performance issues at scale: Users report that Retool can slow down when apps grow large or when queries pull heavy datasets. Because apps run in the browser, complex dashboards may feel sluggish.
• High cost for key features: Retool’s pricing model frustrates some teams. Features like SSO and Git-compatible version control are only available on the enterprise plan.
• Self-hosting complexity: Although Retool can be self-hosted, reviewers note that it requires significant DevOps resources to manage. Updates and new features also roll out more slowly compared to the cloud version.

My personal take on Retool

When I tried Retool’s AI builder, I was surprised how fast I had a working refund management app with tables, buttons, and queries linked to sample data in just minutes. This speed is a major plus if you need rapid prototyping.

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But unlike most AI builders, you never see the code. You can either keep prompting the AI or switch to visual editing, but that's it.

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The agent builder felt similar. It was easy to describe a workflow and get a step-by-step plan. The real problems started when I tried to get creative. The UI grid kept snapping elements back into place. And while the workflow builder’s flowchart interface made it easy to see how tasks connected, I could see it becoming cluttered if I layered more steps.

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My experience echoed a lot of user feedback. Once you hit the edge of what Retool’s components allow, your options to go further are limited.

Is Retool right for you?

Retool shines when speed matters more than flexibility. If your team needs internal tools quickly and you’re fine working within Retool’s framework, it delivers. But if you want more control, you’ll hit limits.

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Who will love it:

• Teams that want a fully self-hosted builder and have the DevOps resources to manage it.
• Companies with field teams that need mobile internal apps, since Retool supports native iOS and Android.

Who should avoid it:

• Developers who want pixel-perfect UI control or the option to export and host their code outside the platform.
• Teams that want a prompt-to-app builder.

The best Retool alternative: Superblocks

Both Superblocks and Retool now offer AI-assisted app generation, but the experience is fundamentally different. Retool’s Assist runs within its no-code IDE and generates Retool-specific components for web apps.

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Superblocks’ Clark, on the other hand, supports full-code generation with two-way live sync between the visual editor and your IDE. You get control over both AI-driven speed and full-code flexibility under enterprise governance

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Superblocks also addresses Retool’s self-hosting complexity. Instead of managing the entire builder yourself, Superblocks has a lightweight agent that runs inside your network. This keeps your sensitive data safe while the control layer runs in the cloud. It eliminates the DevOps burden.

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Read more: UI Bakery vs Retool vs Superblocks compared.

Final verdict

Retool will help you launch internal apps fast, especially if you’re fine with staying within its boundaries. It’s fast, well-integrated, and has a huge template library. For teams that need more coding freedom, no vendor lock-in or DSLs, and low-maintenance self-hosting, Superblocks is a more flexible pick. 

Build secure, governed internal tooling with Superblocks

Superblocks gives enterprises a secure, centrally governed way to build production-grade internal tools with no lock-in.

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We’ve discussed the key features that enable this, but just to recap:

• Flexible development modalities: Teams can use Clark to generate apps from prompts, the WYSIWYG drag-and-drop editor, or code. Superblocks syncs the changes you make in code and the visual editor.
• AI guardrails: Every app built with Clark abides by organizational standards for data security, permissions, and compliance. This addresses the major LLM risks of ungoverned shadow AI app generation.
• Centrally managed governance layer: It supports granular access controls with RBAC, SSO, and audit logs, all centrally governed from a single pane of glass across all users. It also integrates with secret managers for safe credentials management.
• Keep data on prem: It has an on-prem agent you can deploy within your VPC to keep sensitive data in-network.
• Extensive integrations: It can integrate with any API or databases. These integrations include your SDLC processes, like Git workflows and CI/CD pipelines.

Ready for fast, secure internal tool generation? Book a demo with one of our product experts.

Frequently asked questions

Is Retool free?

Retool is not free, but it does have a limited Free tier. The Free plan supports up to five users with unlimited apps, 500 workflow runs per month, and 5 GB of storage. However, features like role-based access control, audit logs, and external portals require paid plans, so most teams outgrow the free tier quickly.

Can Retool be self-hosted?

Yes, Retool supports full self-hosting. However, it requires significant DevOps resources, and updates often lag behind the cloud version, making it harder to manage at scale.

What programming languages does Retool support?

Retool primarily supports SQL and JavaScript. You can use SQL for database queries and add JavaScript inside components. It also supports Python scripts for backend automation or integrations, though the functionality is limited.

What industries benefit most from Retool?

The industries that benefit from Retool include SaaS, fintech, logistics, and healthcare. Teams in these sectors use it to build dashboards quickly, automate workflows, and rapidly create internal tools that connect to their data sources.

What’s new in Retool for 2025?

The biggest addition in 2025 is app generation from prompts, which allows you to build an entire app from a text prompt. Other features are AI Agents for creating workflows and AI Actions for tasks like text analysis.

Is Retool open source?

No, Retool is proprietary software, not open-source. If you want an open-source low-code platform, consider alternatives like ToolJet or Budibase.

Which is the best enterprise application platform?

The best enterprise application platform is Superblocks because it offers AI-native development, full-code extensibility, and a hybrid deployment model with a lightweight on-premise agent. This gives enterprises stronger governance, security, and flexibility while still letting teams build apps quickly.