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Zoho Creator

Zoho Creator

Overview

What is Zoho Creator?

Zoho Creator is a low-code application development platform for building enterprise-class applications that run on mobile, tablet, and web. It is designed to allow users to create custom forms, configure workflows, build pages, and deploy apps quickly.

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Recent Reviews

Zoho Creator - Review

4 out of 10
October 19, 2022
Incentivized
We use Zoho Creator to eliminate the paper trail and automate most of our processes including:

1. Inventory
2. Manufacturing
3. Quality …
Continue reading
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Awards

Products that are considered exceptional by their customers based on a variety of criteria win TrustRadius awards. Learn more about the types of TrustRadius awards to make the best purchase decision. More about TrustRadius Awards

Popular Features

View all 6 features
  • Platform Security (17)
    8.8
    88%
  • Platform Scalability (17)
    8.6
    86%
  • Reusability (17)
    7.9
    79%
  • Platform User Management (17)
    7.8
    78%

Reviewer Pros & Cons

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Pricing

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Standard

$8

Cloud
per month per user

Professional

$20

Cloud
per month per user

Enterprise

$25

Cloud
per month per user

Entry-level set up fee?

  • Setup fee optional
    Optional
For the latest information on pricing, visithttps://www.zoho.com/creator/pricing.ht…

Offerings

  • Free Trial
  • Free/Freemium Version
  • Premium Consulting/Integration Services

Starting price (does not include set up fee)

  • $8 per month per user
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Features

Low-Code Development

Low-code development tools allow non developers to build simple process applications with little oversight. These tools simplify the application building process, and are frequently used for simple process applications.

8.1
Avg 8.7
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Product Details

What is Zoho Creator?

Zoho Creator is a low-code platform engineered to help organizations build scalable custom business solutions faster than traditional development methodologies. Built with enterprises in mind, the platform combines an application builder, an integration builder, and an analytics builder under a single subscription deployable with features that span across no-code, low-code, and pro-code to cater for different developer personas.

Why the Zoho Creator platform?

> It simplifies application development
> It reduces IT complexity and cost
> It supports extensive 3rd party integrations
> It enables extensive business process automations
> It has data privacy, data security, compliance at its core
> It scales as processes and business scales

Zoho Creator Features

Low-Code Development Features

  • Supported: Visual Modeling
  • Supported: Drag-and-drop Interfaces
  • Supported: Platform Security
  • Supported: Platform User Management
  • Supported: Reusability
  • Supported: Platform Scalability

Additional Features

  • Supported: Process blueprinting
  • Supported: Multi-device app builder
  • Supported: Unified builder

Zoho Creator Screenshots

Screenshot of Multi-Platform App builderScreenshot of Dashboards created using Zoho CreatorScreenshot of An overview of Hotel management dashboardScreenshot of Schedule and manage eventsScreenshot of BI and AnalyticsScreenshot of Help Desk overview

Zoho Creator Video

Build solutions faster with Zoho Creator

Zoho Creator Technical Details

Deployment TypesSoftware as a Service (SaaS), Cloud, or Web-Based
Operating SystemsUnspecified
Mobile ApplicationApple iOS, Android, Mobile Web
Supported CountriesGlobal - All countries
Supported LanguagesAt development platform level - Arabic, German, English, French, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish, Thai, Vietnamese, Chinese (Simplified) At application level - 60+ languages

Frequently Asked Questions

Zoho Creator is a low-code application development platform for building enterprise-class applications that run on mobile, tablet, and web. It is designed to allow users to create custom forms, configure workflows, build pages, and deploy apps quickly.

Zoho Creator starts at $8.

Power Apps, Mendix, and OutSystems are common alternatives for Zoho Creator.

Reviewers rate Platform Security highest, with a score of 8.8.

The most common users of Zoho Creator are from Small Businesses (1-50 employees).

Zoho Creator Customer Size Distribution

Consumers5%
Small Businesses (1-50 employees)30%
Mid-Size Companies (51-500 employees)50%
Enterprises (more than 500 employees)15%
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Comparisons

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Reviews and Ratings

(70)

Attribute Ratings

Reviews

(1-4 of 4)
Companies can't remove reviews or game the system. Here's why
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
ZOHO Creator is primarily used for digital transformation. We take our historical manual and paper-based processes and digitize them with automated workflow. This allowed us to automatically integrate our processes and provided a real-time Management Information System.
  • Standardizing of Data Types to improve data quality.
  • Workflow and automated notifications.
  • Reporting / Dashboards.
  • In C6, the new setup of permissions is not logical. Admins now have access to every application rather than specific applications, which impacts data confidentiality.
  • In C6, the new feature for having multiple environments is very limited as it does not work for ZOHO Creator applications that are linked to other Zoho Creator applications in the same workspace - which is not logical at all.
  • In C6, the revised permissions for Developers do not allow the developer to assign permissions to users or to publish forms, reports, pages, etc....which again is not logical.
ZOHO Creator is excellent for creating surveys and analyzing data in real-time - the reporting and dashboard features are very, very useful. ZOHO Creator is good for creating Smart forms - ie, forms where fields are displayed depending on the content of previous forms (ie, is the response to a radio button is "Yes," then display text fields....if not, hide it. This makes it very user-friendly. Also, the automatic format checking of fields (i.e., dates, emails, etc.) ensures data quality is high. The differences between Zoho Creator Users and Zoho Creator Customer Portal users means that you often have to create two versions of each App (i.e. for field permission settings), which can make it difficult to maintain.
Low-Code Development (6)
100%
10.0
Visual Modeling
100%
10.0
Drag-and-drop Interfaces
100%
10.0
Platform Security
100%
10.0
Platform User Management
100%
10.0
Reusability
100%
10.0
Platform Scalability
100%
10.0
  • Improved User Productivity - some admin roles have virtually disappeared as a result of using Zoho Creator, which means staff can focus on the core business (ie, providing a good service to Students).
  • As we are a not-for-profit University, we are always looking for ways of saving cost, and ZOHO Creator has allowed us to be more efficient; hence we are hiring fewer new staff and hence saving cost.
  • We now have an extensive Management Information System, with data provided in real-time that allows Senior Management to make fast and informed decisions.
ZOHO Creator is very easy to use. Anyone with a logical way of thinking can create a simple application using drag and drop and built-in functions. For developers (i.e., those with programming experience), extremely complex solutions can be created by using a combination of the built-in features and Deluge, HTML, etc. Overall it is a very usable platform.
The low-code features have allowed us to create user-friendly forms, which the user cannot submit unless the form is completed correctly (i.e., by using Mandatory fields by ensuring that fields are completed depending on responses to previous questions. Our data quality had increased dramatically as a result of using ZOHO Creator.
1. Data types such as email, phone, date, etc., mean that data entered is always in the correct format 2. Sub-Forms allow us to collect as many rows of data as we require without any restrictions 3. Workflow features such as Hide, Show, Enable, Disable, and Send Notifications greatly help with the effectiveness and usability of the forms/apps.
2500
ZOHO Creator is used in 15 different departments with RCSI covering (but not limited to) Finance, Estates Management, Student Recruitment, Research, Marketing, HR, IT, Student Health, Student Regulations, Admissions, and Quality.
20
The staff who support ZOHO Creator at RCSI are 1. Full-time Consultants with an extensive experience in system design 2. Full-time developers with extensive programming experience 3. Subject Matter Experts with departments who are Admins for the applications with their department.
  • Research & Audit System - allows for registration and management of all research projects.
  • Admissions System - allows for the processing of all student applications to RCSI Bahrain.
  • Quality Management System - allows for the management of all Quality Plans.
  • ZOHO Creator has been used to support COVID-19 Clinical Trials, but automatically the clinical response forms (these are the trial data collection forms) and provide real-time data analysis.
  • ZOHO Creator has been used to run surveys that are based on schedules linked to the academic year. After the initial setup, surveys are sent to certain students in certain years based on their timetable.
  • ZOHO Creator has been used to build a fitness app that is linked to the sports facilities within the university, allowing students to book gym sessions, classes, events, personal training, etc, as well as create a workout schedule and monitor progress.
Rafael Grandizoli | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
We needed to solve an internal problem by creating a new online software. One of the main requirement was to find something that we could create and give maintenance by ourselves, with no-code or low-code skills. Then with Zoho Creator we had the possibility to hire a company to develop the basis of our new software and then we could evaluate inside with our team.
  • Low-code skills needed to create complex process.
  • Easy to learn.
  • Best for simple form design software (that don't need 'beautiful' design).
  • A bit tricky for integrations with 3rd party software.
  • Layout customizations very limited.
  • A bit expensive when you need to give access to many users.
If you need to create a very simple CRM (or CRM-like) system, with tailor-made functions for your business, it is well suited. You can customize and create modules specific for your company needs. Another good use is when you need a separate software to handle a specific need, beside other software you already use.
Low-Code Development (6)
70%
7.0
Visual Modeling
60%
6.0
Drag-and-drop Interfaces
90%
9.0
Platform Security
90%
9.0
Platform User Management
60%
6.0
Reusability
50%
5.0
Platform Scalability
70%
7.0
  • Low cost to solve a specific need.
  • No needed to hire a huge/expensive platform (we created our own).
  • We keep the intelligence inside the company.
I gave 7 because it is better for internal use and internal solutions. If you need something to deliver to your clients (you will give them access to it), then you will have to work hard to give the layout a better look, and not use the using the standard template layout, which it's possible to do, but it will need an extra work.
Due to COVID-19 we had to reduce our team in the company, and IT resources have to be cut. But due to the low-code and low-complexity of our project we could keep developing our tool with the short team, which was not specialized in IT and/or not professional developers.
Creating form by only drag-and-drop fields speed up our process since it could be performed by interns without any IT skill.
We decided that proprietary programming language and develop the software from scratch would cost us more than our budget, and also it would take a lot of time we didn't have. Zoho Creator was chosen besides any other proprietary way to develop a software because it's low code and quick form creations (layout) that could be done by non-programmers/developers in the team.
8
Most of them are only operation the system created by our development team, and they represent the operational/business unit in the company. Apart of our CRM, the system created using Zoho Creator helps them to manage and organize all advertising campaigns we run for our clients, and also keep our reports up to date.
2
Due to the reduction of the team, there's only one project manager and me (an operations manager), both with IT skills and a bit of programming knowledge, which helps us on the low-code used to develop in Zoho Creator.
  • Create a campaign manager to fit our need
  • Integrate with already existing platforms
  • Aggregated data to our reports
  • Keep updating our current software with new funtions
  • Expand our integrations with other system
  • Try to improve the layout/UX with custom developments
Today Zoho Creator is included in our current plan from Zoho One, but if it was needed to pay apart it should be done because the software we created became very important for our team. The use of Zoho Creator contributes to endorse the Zoho One subscription year after year.
No
  • Price
  • Product Usability
Price was one of the main factors to use Zoho Cretor in our project because it was a tool already included in our plan with Zoho One. Besides that, the usability considering both the ability to create new features/forms and also for the user experience count points on the decision.
It's difficult to think on what to change because my project considered a lot of limitations, including the COVID-19 period, that impacted on time and resources for development. If I could change something, I would include a professional (or a company) with experience on Zoho Creator development just to deliver the solution in a short time.
  • Implemented in-house
Yes
The project had a lot of changes and many features requests were added before it was even released the first version. Also due to the COVID-19 we had to reduce our team and lost most of the IT team that helped us. But we could break the project into phases (using kanban/agile) and it was possible to handle it.
Change management was a big part of the implementation and was well-handled
Since it was a turbulent moment for our company, we had to focus on what was the most important need and prioritize them besided the others. We also had to discuss things that was unecessary in the first moment, and let them 'on hold' until we really see it's needed. When we could involve all the team into the project and explain our limitations on development, it was possible to easily handle everything.
  • Don't know how to do something and alocate days from the team to study and learn
  • When we don't find the answer, understand how to ask for help (to the support team)
  • Integrate data properly into our existing DW
Even if it is a easy to use platform, it got some issues on the implementation that could easily handle by IT teams. In our scenario this team don't exist anymore, and the business/marketing team had their expectations that it was quickier to be implemented. So, consider a professional help on this implementation could be cost more (of cource) but it would be helpful to manage the issues and expectations.
We didn't need a lot of support for it, since all the documentation was well written. Only when we needed a bit more of coding skills we could count on their support to analyse the case and give us the best way to do it, sending the code already done (just copy-paste).
No, we didn't purchase premium support because both the documentation for Zoho Creator and Deluge are well written, and also because our project was not that complex. The support given by Zoho team is good and they could help us when it was needed, with code samples or a guide on what to do.
No
I don't know if this count, but there was a day that my colleague working on a script for 2 weeks and could not get it working. When we sent it to support they replied after a few days with the solution just to copy/paste and it works as expected.
  • Create forms
  • Write simple functions/actions
  • Store your data
  • Create widgets
  • Cloud database integration
  • Layout customization (with HTML/CSS)
Yes, but I don't use it
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Incentivized
Zoho Creator is a wonderful app and a program we use to manage data heavy components of our business. Creator is a great complement to Zoho CRM, where we manage most of our customers. The ability for Zoho Creator to talk to or syn with the Zoho CRM is what makes this tool so valuable. Part of our business includes entering and storing a lot of data. Once entered we use this data to generate intuitive reports and dashboards to give us insights in to this part of our business.
  • The ease of creating data collecting forms. Anything from creating a form to import all your old excel documents to creating a mobile on-site application where you can input data directly into the app. For a company like us this can help to eliminate the pen and paper approach to recording data.
  • Reporting features are excellent. Slicing and dicing the data from your forms to create any report is possible. Think of it has filters on steroids. The ability to combine data from different forms is a huge plus.
  • Dashboards! Zoho Creator has so much depth to it that it's easy for one to get lost if they are not as familiar with Creator, for example an exuctive or decision making manager. This is where dashboards come in. Admins can build intuitive and smart dashboards that combine all the relevant KPI's that a manager needs to see.
  • Zoho Creator has their own scripting language, Deluge, which is the powerful engine behind what makes Zoho Creator so great. Problem is if you have no coding background it can be a bit difficult to learn, and use to it's full potential.
  • The new UI is awesome, except for parts of the homepage. I wish there was a bit more room for custimization and organization of all your stored apps.
  • The ability to create documents or what they once called record summaries from your stored data. This is our most requested feature for them to add, is an integration with a word processor such as Zoho Writer and the ability to create mail merge like documents within the app.
If you wish to initiate workflows while using online data application, you will love Zoho Creator. This is where we see the biggest efficiency gain in regards to operations. What use to take multiple steps we can now setup as workflow with (mostly) other Zoho apps so that once something is entered once the data gets moved to other apps where actions are taken. It's awesome. As far as less suited, I would say if you are looking to design feature rich and intuitive dashboards, you could be left wanting more. The dashboards work great for us. The data is really what's important, so I can design a dashboard to present the data we need to see and filter it anyway we want. Considering I am not a developer or expert deluge/html pro, creating custom pages or dashboards to really spice it up is not for me.
Low-Code Development (6)
96.66666666666666%
9.7
Visual Modeling
80%
8.0
Drag-and-drop Interfaces
100%
10.0
Platform Security
100%
10.0
Platform User Management
100%
10.0
Reusability
100%
10.0
Platform Scalability
100%
10.0
  • With using Zoho Creator we are able to build apps that we may otherwise pay a pretty penny for. We may risk some features we could get from a 3rd party app but the fact that the data we do collect can easily syn with our CRM and Accounting systems makes up for this.
  • Negatively speaking, it takes time to fine tune and really craft your application. I am not a coder, nor do I have a coding background, so patience is key as you design and build out your application.
We've been using Creator for many years. I've come to realize that I know what Creator can do, and accept that since I am not a developer I may have to settle for using Creator in a "simpler" way. With that said, I can build, design, and deploy applications myself. I also understand the Zoho team , the Zoho community, and Zoho Partners are available to assist me in taking our application from it's "simpler" form to a more complex full fledged application.
Our most used app was built in Creator to store data. Once we integrated with Zoho Books (as was always the plan), it opened up a whole new business flow productivity gain for us as we were able to reduce manual data entry. Possibly the next step is to integrate 3rd party API to recognize even more efficiency gains and have a better solution for our customers. The analytics provides us crucial dashboards for monthly meetings and budgeting for the next year.
Form builder and report builder. The integration fields are very useful assuming you are a Zoho One customer and use many of the other Zoho apps.
I've looked into this app but never really considered using it. Zoho Creator has met and exceeded all our expectations as a database management app there's been no need to stack it up against others.
5
Sales, Finance, Operations
1
Just a self taught Zoho enthusiast who enjoys the operational efficiencies that the Zoho platform provides.
  • Data repository
  • Workflow/Integration with Zoho Books
  • Process orders and again integrate with Zoho Finance
  • For IT device management
  • To create automated alerts when monthly customer data is off by +-10% of expected value
  • To run March Madness Poll each year
  • Integrate with 3rd party APIs
  • Create/integrate customer portals
  • Continue to enhance the apps we already use with Zoho feature releases
This app really fits our needs and reduces manual processes by integrating with other Zoho apps, mainly Zoho Finance. The support team is awesome and the platform continues to push the boundaries of what's possible with a low-code/no-code solution.
No
  • Product Usability
We needed an application we had full control over, was easy to use, and kept all the data we needed organized and accessible for our team. This was easily possible with Zoho Creator.
Wouldn't change a thing. Maybe I would've dug deeper into some of the Zoho Creator competitors to see what was possible with those apps, but since we have always been a Zoho CRM customer the built-in integration made Zoho Creator the easy choice.
  • Implemented in-house
Yes
Only because we have used Creator for awhile and as our business grows and becomes smarter our apps need to also adapt to reflect our current business workflow.
Change management was a small part of the implementation and was well-handled
Not much to say about this. Our apps have evolved with our growth, but our original needs have not changed much.
  • Lack of deluge knowledge
  • User permissions
We started slow so I feel like we didn't miss much. This allowed more time for me to learn more about Creator and all it's features, and implement them into our apps as necessary.
Zoho Creator support has been amazing. Our tickets are answered in a timely manner by friendly support staff. We've never had an issue go unanswered. I applaud the Zoho Support staff!
No, I can't say I even knew this was an option?
Many times. They've assisted me with deluge functions on a couple occasions where I was able to immediately release new features of our internal apps to our team, all thanks to Zoho support staff!
  • Creating forms
  • Creating reports
  • Creating workflows
  • Setting user permissions (for Zoho One users)
  • Creating record summaries/templates
  • Sharing applications
Yes
Honestly, not quite as smooth as the desktop version but I think that is common. Overall we are satisfied with the mobile app
Aaron Thornock | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
We use Zoho Creator as a backend database and database tool set to help us automate real estate contracts.
  • Flexible.
  • Easy to program.
  • Does a lot of the work for you in database creation and manipulation.
  • Hosted already so you don't have to figure out your own hosting solution.
  • Control - Zoho allows you complete control and portability over your data.
  • Integration with other web services.
  • Design tools to control the look and feel could be improved. I believe they are working on this.
  • Ability to store very sensitive information, such as social security numbers/encrypted database.
  • Easier way to manage multiple access profiles available to web/customer users.
Highly secure databases may not be a good fit, though I understand that Zoho is developing the ability to export the whole database and tools (Zoho Creator) to a user's server. This would eliminate this issue. It is useful for a highly customizable data base with minimal programming experience required.
  • Very high ROI. The system provides the whole backend of our website.
  • KnackHQ
I've used Knack previously. It has better/easier controls over user authenticated access and a better/more fun to use UI. However it is less flexible than Zoho Creator. With Zoho I can pretty much do anything I can dream up. Knack is powerful, but more limited than Zoho Creator.
1
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