Bubble.io pricing explained: What plan should you get?

Bubble.io is a platform that lets users with no programming knowledge create complex and logic-driven web apps and SaaS.

The features that ship with Bubble.io are rich, and with a logical mind, you can create just about everything.

But just as complex as the platform is the Bubble.io pricing plans.

Therefore, in this article, we will dive deeper into what pricing plans you should get and what features it includes.

Bubble.io pricing plans

There are 5 different Bubble.io pricing plans: Free, Starter, Growth, Team, and Enterprise. Each of these plans has different features included.

Below is a summary of all plans, who it is aimed at, and what’s included.

Free – $0 per month

• Ideal for: projects under construction, hobby projects, and learning.
• Features included: development version, API connector (though APIs can’t be tested), component library, 1 app editor, 50k workload units per month, and 6 hours of server logs.

Starter – $29 per month

• Ideal for: businesses and applications trying out the Bubble platform and hobby projects.
• Features included: everything in the free plan, custom domain, access to backend workflows, and launching an app with basic server capacity (shared among other Bubble applications).

Growth – $119 per month

• Ideal for: complex projects facing consumers.
• Features included: everything in the Free and Starter plan, better server capacity (3 units with the ability to add 7 extra units), two editors for collaborative development, and two development versions.

Team – $349 per month

• Ideal for: big projects with scaling in mind and high usage.
• Features included: everything in the Free, Starter, and Growth plans, 5 app-editors, sub apps, 25 custom branches, 500k workload of units per month, and 20 days of server logs.

Enterprise – price on request

• Ideal for: massive and complex web apps with many concurrent users.
• Features included: everything in Free, Starter, Growth, and Team, including hosting location, a dedicated server, priority support, custom amount of workload units, enhanced security, centralized admin, direct database access, single-sign-on, etc.

Enterprise is a bit more special than the other Bubble.io pricing plans we will cover in the Bubble.io Enterprise plan at the end of this article.

Agency subscription – $78 per seat per month

Agency subscription is for teams or freelancers that build projects for clients. Therefore, it differs from some features seen in the other plans.

• Ideal for: agencies and freelancers.
• Features included: 2 app editors, recurring workflows, premium version control, 150k workload of units/month, 10 custom branches, and 2 days of server logs.

Features and Benefits

Let us head over to the features of each Bubble.io pricing plan in detail.

A fair warning: this section is long and aimed at those who want to know the complete list of quirks and features in each plan of Bubble.io. If you want a complete overview, please refer to the pricing plans or the conclusion below.

Let us jump in.

Hosting

Workload units

The interesting part of Bubble.io compared to other no- and low-code alternatives is that they don’t show the bandwidth limit for each plan but rather the workload units.

• Free: 50k workload of units/month.
• Starter: 175k workload of units/month.
• Growth: 250k workload of units/month.
• Team: 500k workload of units/month.
• Enterprise: custom amount of workload of units/month.

What is workload?

Bubble.io refers to workload as a metric that measures the work Bubble does to run your app. This means that all activities in your app count as workload.

Workload is measured per month. If you need more workload, Bubble is flexible, but you have to pay for more workload units.

Therefore, it is challenging to calculate it beforehand.

One way is to test your Bubble app and see how many regular workload units the app is using.

File storage

• Free: 0.5 GB.
• Starter: 50 GB.
• Growth: 100 GB.
• Team: 1 TB.
• Enterprise: 1 TB.

File storage is the total space your uploads can have. Even the Free plan is generous (unless you upload high-resolution videos).

Now, you can add more total file storage if you need that, but it can only be done with an already-paying plan. You can increase the file storage by 100 GB for $3.

Database rows

• Free: 200 entries.
• Starter: Unlimited.
• Growth: Unlimited.
• Team: Unlimited.
• Enterprise: Unlimited.

A database row, or entry, is a row in the database. When you insert a row into the database, it counts as one row taken up.

This might be a bit technical, but it is quite simple.

Let us say you have a table called Posts (in database language, we call a table the place where all similar information is).

Posts can have different columns, e.g., title, content, date modified, published, and author.

When you insert a row into a Bubble.io web app with a table called Posts, you insert information that has information on all columns, as shown below.

ID	Title	Content	Date modified	Published	Author
1	A new journey	This is my first post	22. October 2023	Published	Christoffer
2	An update for my journey	This is my second post.	10. November 2023	Draft	Christoffer

If the above table existed in your Bubble web app, you would have used two entries (and 198 left in the free plan).

Password protection

• Free: Editor only.
• Starter: Editor and run mode.
• Growth: Editor and run mode.
• Team: Editor and run mode.
• Enterprise: Editor and run mode.

Password protection limits access to the project by requiring a username and password to see or edit the web app.

Note that the Free plan only provides password protection to the editor.

SSL certificate

Every Bubble.io plan has an SSL certificate enabled.

An SSL certificate tells your visitors that data sent from client to server is secured, and almost every browser shows a verified status in the URL field.

Enterprise-only hosting features

• Choice of hosting region: this feature lets you select the region where your server and data are located.
• Dedicated instance: a dedicated instance provides the best-performance web app. Enterprise plans have access to a dedicated instance.
• Host multiple apps on one plan: With the Enterprise plan, you can host multiple web apps. These shared apps also share resources.

Editor

Access to the live version

• Free: No.
• Starter: Yes.
• Growth: Yes.
• Team: Yes.
• Enterprise: Yes.

Put differently, access to the live version is the actual web app on the internet.

Component library

Every plan includes the component library.

The component library is a set of pre-made building blocks to construct the UI.

Publishing

Custom domain

• Free: No.
• Starter: Yes.
• Growth: Yes.
• Team: Yes.
• Enterprise: Yes.

All paid plans of bubble.io support custom domains. That being said, you don’t need a custom domain, but it is recommended.

A custom domain provides trustworthiness and brand awareness to your Bubble app.

If you don’t connect to a custom domain, your app is live at yourapp.bubbleapps.io, with an SSL certificate enabled by default.

Branding

• Free: Bubble.
• Starter: White-label.
• Growth: White-label.
• Team: White-label.
• Enterprise: White-label.

Branding is about the ability to showcase your web apps with your logo or if a Bubble logo is present.

The free plan is the only plan that requires a Bubble logo.

Features

This section covers other features that aren’t covered in the previous sections but are just as important.

API Connector

Every plan supports the API connector.

The API connector is an important feature. It lets you connect your Bubble.io app to a service through the API. Almost all we do with third-party services uses an API.

Now, this isn’t special for no-code alternatives, but what makes it special is the features that Bubble.io ships with the API functionality. You can integrate your web app with external APIs in ways that are difficult in other no-code alternatives.

What is an API?

An API (Application Programming Interface) lets two services communicate with each other.

That means sending, reading, updating, and deleting data. This is called CRUD-operations (Create, Read, Update, and Delete).

Almost everything on the web is done through API calls (when we use APIs, we “call them”).

Why is it important for my Bubble.io web app?

Allowing your Bubble web app to connect to an API gives endless opportunities. Every service that provides an API can be used inside your web app.

Some examples where an API can integrate into your web app:

• ChatGPT API
• PayPal API
• Youtube API
• Instagram API
• Weather API

Integrating your web app with an API gives you access to almost all the functionality you can do in the actual service.

Bubble app API

• Free: No.
• Starter: Yes.
• Growth: Yes.
• Team: Yes.
• Enterprise: Yes.

The previous features described the API Connector, but this feature is about providing an API from your web app.

You create a SaaS and want users to integrate with their platform. You can then provide them with your API and give them access.

If you’re creating a web app or SaaS, this feature is handy and can increase the number of users wanting to use your web app, especially if they can integrate with their preferred tools.

This feature is only available on paid plans.

Plugin Subscriptions

• Free: No.
• Starter: Yes.
• Growth: Yes.
• Team: Yes.
• Enterprise: Yes.

If you have heard of WordPress, you probably have heard of WordPress plugins. Bubble.io also has a marketplace for free and paid plugins.

Plugins extend the Bubble functionalities, from connecting to different services to providing better SEO for your site.

Plugins subscriptions are only available for paid plans.

Final words on the Bubble pricing plans: Who should pay for Bubble.io?

Bubble.io has been advertised as a more complex no-code builder, and with good reason.

Those who learn the Bubble platform can create complex and unique web apps that usually take a whole team of developers.

That being said, there is a steep learning curve, so it would require a good amount of tweaking and playing around with the platform.

Bubble.io pricing plans are quite complex themselves, but here is a simple list:

• Free $0: best for those wanting to learn Bubble.ios platform, can’t publish to the web.
• Starter $29: best for those who want to publish a small web app. It can be used with a custom domain.
• Growth $119: best for those who build with others and have a complex web app facing consumers.
• Team $349: best for teams with a web app with high usage and scaling in mind.
• Enterprise: best for the massive web app with many users with specific needs, like server location, custom Cloudflare integration, and advanced security measures.

If you’re starting with Bubble.io, I wouldn’t be so concerned with the pricing plans. Just start building on the Free plan and upgrade when needed.

Those who have some no-code background and have a web app idea ready can, with good reason, jump on the Starter pricing plan. This will get you started with a live app that can be accessed through the internet through a custom domain.

If you want an updated overview of Bubble.io pricing plans, you can get that from the official Bubble website.

Alternative for the design-oriented

If you’re more design-oriented and don’t need too much complexity, Framer is a great alternative. It provides a more design-first approach, where responsiveness and animations are prioritized.

It doesn’t allow so much complexity as Bubble.io, but Framer goes a long way if you don’t need complex features.