# Retool

8 Hacker News commenters recommended Retool and 13 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 7 of 13 months.

**Verdict:** People recommend it for quickly building internal tools with ready data connections and AI-generated apps; critics say it is rigid, clunky, and replaced by AI coding.

## Why people recommend it

- Builds internal tools from text prompts (2 comments): "You describe your app in a text box and the AI builds it, with all the enterprise goodies like RBAC baked in." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49112494)) "I am in the process of switching my company's use of retool for an Ai generated backoffice." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47143657))
- Ready data connections and backends (2 comments): "That's basically solved with Retool, because all the resources and data connections are already provisioned" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48580701)) "AI app builders—such as Adalo, FlutterFlow, Base44, and Retool—configure Supabase backends" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49794455))

## What people warn about

- AI coding now replaces it (4 comments): "the calculus just wasn't there when I could spin up internal dashboard tools in less time with better functionality" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46772108)) "no differentiation and how easy it is to build internal CRUD tools" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48577007)) "I feel like they completely missed the vibe code train." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49112434))
- Rigid and clunky versus coding (3 comments): "Retool has become more clunky to use vs. writing code with AI to solve the problems we used Retool for." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46274922)) "while Retool added an MCP and now supports custom code they're still a reasonably rigid platform" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50000328)) "the AI integration within retool is messy compared to just letting Claude create the web app" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49179786))
- Slow to set up, gets in way (2 comments): "you could spend minutes to hours plugging together "programming-lite" concepts" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46680485)) "Retool would just get in the way." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48584198))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [Microsoft Power Apps](https://hackerapproved.com/p/microsoft-power-apps.md): 11 recommend
- [FileMaker Pro](https://hackerapproved.com/p/filemaker.md): 8 recommend
- [Breadboard](https://hackerapproved.com/p/breadboard.md): 7 recommend

## Where to get it

- [Visit the official site](https://retool.com/)

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Retool", https://hackerapproved.com/p/retool/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).