Exploring the best Airtable alternatives in 2025

Airtable is kind of a marvel, isn’t it? It’s like someone took a spreadsheet, gave it a shot of espresso, and turned it into a database that you can actually understand. It lets you build almost anything you can dream up. But… and there’s always a ‘but’… that power comes with a price. And sometimes, a pretty steep learning curve.

If you’re here, you’re probably starting to feel that. Maybe your monthly bill is creeping up with every new team member, or you’re spending more time building the perfect base than actually using it. Or maybe you just need something that’s less of a blank canvas and more of a straightforward project manager.

Whatever the reason, you’ve come to the right place. Let’s dig into why teams start looking for a change and check out some of the best Airtable alternatives out there.

What is Airtable?

So, what exactly is Airtable? At its heart, it’s a platform that lets you build your own apps without knowing how to code. Imagine a box of digital LEGOs. You start with a "base" (your project’s entire world) and fill it with "tables" of stuff you need to track.

The cool part is how all those LEGO pieces connect. You can link a client record to all their projects, flip your view from a simple grid to a Kanban board, or set up little robot helpers (automations) to do your boring tasks for you. It’s why people use it for everything from custom CRMs and project trackers to content calendars.

Airtable is a dream for anyone who loves to build and customize. But that whole DIY thing? That’s also where the headaches can start.

Key reasons to consider Airtable alternatives

While Airtable can do a lot, a quick browse through forums like Reddit shows a few common frustrations that send people searching for something new. Let’s get into them.

The pricing pinch

Airtable’s pricing looks fine at a glance, but it has a knack for getting expensive, fast. The per-user model means your bill goes up with every person you add who needs to edit something.

But that’s just the beginning. Many teams get bumped up to pricier plans not for the fancy new features, but because they hit a ceiling on the number of records or automations. Want a key feature like two-way sync? Or better user permissions? Often, those are locked away in the high-end Business and Enterprise plans, forcing you into a big budget decision just to keep growing.

The steep learning curve

Airtable’s biggest selling point, its “build-it-yourself” flexibility, can also be its biggest roadblock. Putting together a base that actually works well for your team isn’t just about dragging and dropping fields. You have to think like a database designer, figure out how your data should connect, and keep the whole system from falling apart as your needs change.

If your team doesn’t have a dedicated "Airtable person" who genuinely enjoys that kind of tinkering, the platform can feel like a chore. Instead of making you more productive, it becomes this expensive, complicated tool that no one really knows how to manage properly. It’s a very different experience from tools built for a specific purpose, like project management, which guide you from the start.

Gaps in project management

If you’re primarily looking for a tool to manage projects, you’ll start to see some holes in Airtable pretty quickly. It doesn’t come with things that are standard in other platforms, like a built-in team chat, detailed ways to see who’s working on what, or advanced dashboards for tracking progress.

Sure, you can usually hack together a solution for these things. But that means wrestling with third-party integrations or spending hours tweaking your base. This just adds another layer of complexity (and potential cost), which is why many teams eventually look for a tool that handles project management from the get-go.

Scattered knowledge

Here’s a problem that goes beyond just Airtable. Even with a tool that’s meant to centralize things, your company’s important information is probably all over the place. The answer you need might be in an Airtable attachment, but it could just as easily be in a Google Doc, a Confluence page, or a Slack thread from three months ago.

This wild goose chase for information is a massive time-waster. Your team either spends forever digging through different apps or, more likely, just asks someone else a question that’s already been answered a dozen times. Simply swapping one database for another doesn’t fix this core issue of information living in separate silos.

Top Airtable alternatives for different needs

Instead of just throwing a long list at you, let’s break down the best Airtable alternatives based on what you’re actually trying to accomplish.

Smartsheet

• Best for: Teams who basically live in spreadsheets but need more muscle for project management, like Gantt charts, dependencies, and automated workflows.

• Why it’s a good alternative: Anyone who’s used Excel or Google Sheets will feel right at home in Smartsheet. It keeps the familiar grid layout but layers on powerful project management tools, serious security features, and great reporting. You get the comfort of a spreadsheet with the functionality of a true PM tool.

• Pricing: Smartsheet doesn’t have a free forever plan, but you can try it for 30 days. The Pro plan starts at $9 per user per month (billed annually).

ClickUp

• Best for: Teams who want one single place to manage everything, from simple tasks to company-wide goals, documents, and team chat.

• Why it’s a good alternative: ClickUp is a bit more structured than Airtable. It’s packed with project management features right from the start, so you spend less time building and more time doing. It’s built to be the "one app to replace them all," with different task views, whiteboards, and goal tracking all under one roof.

• Pricing: ClickUp offers a pretty good free plan for personal use. Paid plans for teams start at $7 per user per month for the Unlimited plan (when you pay for the year).

Notion

• Best for: Teams who want to mix their knowledge base, project plans, and simple databases into one connected workspace.

• Why it’s a good alternative: If Airtable is a database that can handle text, Notion is a document that can handle databases. It’s fantastic at blending free-form text (like meeting notes or wikis) with structured tables. This makes it a great hub for company knowledge, where your project tasks can live on the same page as the creative brief.

• Pricing: Notion has a strong free plan for individuals. The Plus plan, designed for teams, starts at $12 per user per month (billed annually).

Baserow

• Best for: Tech-savvy teams who need complete control over their data, care about privacy, and want the freedom to tweak the platform’s code.

• Why it’s a good alternative: Baserow is an open-source option that looks and feels a whole lot like Airtable. The big difference is you can host it on your own servers, which gives you total control over your data and helps you avoid being locked into one vendor. It’s a solid choice for companies with strict security rules or anyone who wants to build on top of their tools without limits.

• Pricing: Baserow has free cloud and self-hosted plans with generous limits. Their paid cloud plans are also very affordable, starting at just $5 per user per month.

Airtable alternatives: A full pricing breakdown

When you’re comparing costs, try to look beyond the monthly price. The real story is often in the details, like the limits on records, automations, and storage. Those are usually the things that sneak up on you and force an upgrade as your team grows.

Tool	Free Plan Highlights	Starting Paid Plan (Annual)	Best for Teams Seeking
Airtable	Up to 5 editors, 1,000 records/base, 100 automations/mo	Team: $24/user/month	Ultimate database customization
Smartsheet	No free plan (30-day trial)	Pro: $9/user/month	Spreadsheet-centric project management
ClickUp	Unlimited tasks, 5 spaces, 100MB storage	Unlimited: $7/user/month	All-in-one project management
Notion	Unlimited pages, 10 guests, basic automations	Plus: $12/user/month	Integrated docs and databases
Baserow	Free cloud & self-hosted options with generous limits	Premium: $5/user/month	Open-source control and data privacy

Discover a visual breakdown of the top no-code and open-source Airtable alternatives to find the best fit for your team.

A different approach: Adding an AI layer

Moving your whole company off a tool like Airtable is a huge deal. It’s disruptive, costs a lot of time and money, and forces everyone on your team to learn something new from scratch. But what if you could fix your biggest problems without having to ditch the tools you already use?

Instead of jumping to a new platform, think about adding an AI brain on top of everything you already have. That’s the idea behind eesel AI. It’s an AI platform that securely connects to all of your company’s knowledge, wherever it happens to be, whether that’s in Airtable, Notion, Confluence, Google Docs, or your old support tickets in Zendesk.

eesel AI then uses all that connected knowledge to automate work and give instant answers. It can be the brain behind an AI agent in your helpdesk, an internal Q&A bot in Slack, or a chatbot on your website.

eesel AI connects to all your existing tools, creating a single source of truth without migration.

How eesel AI works with your current tools

• Get started in minutes, not months: Forget about spending the next quarter migrating data and rebuilding workflows. With eesel AI, you just connect your knowledge sources, and you can have a working AI agent up and running in a few minutes. It’s a self-serve platform, so you can jump right in without sitting through a sales call or a mandatory demo.

• Bring all your knowledge together, instantly: eesel AI tackles that "scattered knowledge" problem we talked about. It connects to all your apps and even reads through your team’s past conversations to learn your brand’s voice and common answers from day one. You’re not starting from scratch; you’re building on the wisdom you already have.

• Test it out with confidence: A little nervous about letting an AI talk to your customers or employees? eesel AI has a powerful simulation mode that lets you test it on your past support tickets in a safe space. You can see exactly how it will perform and get a forecast of its impact before you ever turn it on. You stay in complete control and can roll it out gradually as you get more comfortable.

The eesel AI simulation mode lets you test the AI's performance on past data before going live.

Choosing the right Airtable alternatives for your team

At the end of the day, the best Airtable alternative is the one that solves your team’s biggest problems. Whether you need the familiarity of a spreadsheet, an all-in-one project manager, or the total control of an open-source tool, there’s a great option waiting for you.

But just remember that switching platforms is a big commitment. It costs time and money, and it doesn’t always fix the root issue of scattered information and manual work.

Before you start a massive migration project, ask yourself if simply making your existing knowledge more accessible could solve your problems more easily. Try eesel AI for free and see how its AI agents can learn from your Airtable bases, docs, and helpdesk in minutes. You might find that the best alternative isn’t a new tool, but a smarter way of using the ones you already have.