Airtable

Pros

Airtable has the power and functionality of a database but is as easy to use as a spreadsheet! As someone who sells software (saas), Airtable allowed me to essentially create programs for my clients even though I do not code. Airtable sets the new gold standard for what a spreadsheet should be able to do. i cannot go back to a normal spreadsheet now.

Cons

There are a few critical features you'll run into that stop this software from being perfect unfortunately. It's a shame too because they seem very obviously needed and demanded; things like having storage space increase option past premium plan limit, writing formula across cells from multiple tables instead of just the same table, etc. I have hope these things will be part of the development roadmap soon though.

Pros

Where to even begin! I love how it's the 21st century excel spreadsheet. I can collaborate and keep track of clients and projects all under one document. I also, love how it live updates and the amount of features that airtable could give my company keeps growing. Because it's such a broad type of software I can customize it to exactly my needs and exactly my preferences.

Cons

There are some limitations with the advanced features, but that is understandable because the free version (which I use) is already so powerful that I can't believe they are offering it for free.

Pros

When I first started to use Airtable, I came away deeply frustrated with it's usability. It's sometimes slow, straightly obtuse to use and has many "pending features" that would be extremely helpful for some of the simplest of tasks.

However, there came a time when I had to organise a league table for a tournament over the internet, and all of sudden, Airtable clicked.

What Airtable is good at is creating a database of entries for a specific use, so for example, making an internet registration form where a user can enter data and "register" their interest in a particular thing is so quick and easy to do.

I created an application form which auto stored the data into a highly organised table that I could then use however I wanted (I created a league table from the registered users with ease and shared the results of the league as the scoring progressed) - all via the internet, I don't know of a way that I could have achieved this without AirTable, Google Docs would have been a possible solution, but Airtable allows you to add attachments easily (so images, etc) as well as allowing you to manipulate (And hide) data in any way you can think of using Rollups and Lookups - two of it's most powerful features.

Once you get used to it, Airtable becomes useful, and I can see myself using it again and again when I want to organise a very specific and distributed task on the internet.

Cons

Don't think this is Excel in a different disguise, it's not, it's not as adaptable and not as powerful as Excel. You couldn't use it to track a project or manage a holiday system or anything like that, but creating a full customer list for a newsletter? Yep, easy, that's the kind of thing it DOES do really well.

It could use a few more features on the free tier of the software (the paid tier unlocks "blocks" - which is a strange name for plugins, which allow you to view the data in different visual ways but ultimately it's not as well integrated as it should be and therefore has a limited use)

Another thing is that Airtables mobile interface is woeful compared to it's desktop version, and for some reason you can't access the desktop website via mobile. I have no idea what compelled them to make this decision but it's something they need to address in the future. The mobile layout is next to useless.

Pros

Flexibility! I love being able to have a calendar, kanban, timeline, visual gallery all in one.

We use this for all our content planning and management. We tried so many solutions and this is what finally worked for us.

Cons

It has many features but at times it’s hard to know the best way to build things out, none of the templates for workbases were close enough to build off from.

Wish it was easier to link information within different tabs in bases.

Pros

Airtable essentially powers my entire business. It acts as a CRM, marketing planner, content planner and task management app - it's very configurable and has powerful features for creating, modifying and reporting on data.

Cons

Recently there has been repeated incidences of downtime which are worrying - and they have a habit of launching new features that are not fully tested and cause issues.