Item: Power Apps
Rating: 7
Author: Nathan Roberts

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use PowerApps as an easy way to quickly develop apps that might otherwise take considerable time and resources. For instance, we recently built a help desk application using a PowerApp that had already been significantly developed. We just tweaked it for our needs. The automatic tie-ins to O365 and SharePoint made authentication data storage seamless.

Pros and Cons

Low-code design reduces learning curve to develop useful apps.
Pre-built templates means development time is reduced.

No desktop development environment.
Limited options to tweak code; there should be an override for advanced users.

Return on Investment

We've done a couple of projects where PowerApps saved us time and effort. It comes with our Office 365 subscription so it was no additional cost.

Alternatives Considered

PowerApps is the first low-code development service I've used.

Support Rating

One of the frustrations I've had with PowerApps is the lack of documentation. It makes me wonder if Microsoft is fully behind this product. Plus, they pulled the plug on the desktop version of the development environment. That's fine to move exclusively to the browser, except a lot of the functionality of the desktop version was not carried over. Bad move.

Key Insights

Do you think Power Apps delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Power Apps's feature set?

Did Power Apps live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of Power Apps go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy Power Apps again?

Yes

Likelihood to Recommend

If you have a need to quickly develop apps, PowerApps can be good. If you have a simple project and don't have an experienced developer available, PowerApps can be good. If you have a complex project that needs a lot of customization, PowerApps is probably not the way to go. Another way to say it: PowerApps has simultaneously impressed and depressed. It's impossible to recommend for every development scenario, but probably worth exploring when needs are conservative and skills and budget are at a premium.

PowerApps is a Good Start but Needs to Get Better

Overall Satisfaction with PowerApps