First of all, I’ve been with Thunkable for about 4 years, over that time the platform has evolved and a lot of great features added. It is very good, there’s no denying that…
However, some features like the drag and drop builder, I never use…
Overall, Thunkable seems to be going the way of “how many users can we get on-board”, rather than “how can we make the existing tool better” - for current (professional) users (and promote that to new users e.g. “Professionals and Beginners alike use Thunkable!”).
Also, why, after 4 years is there still no responsive web UI builder, like Adalo, for example. Why is there an option to publish it, but no way to have anything but a portrait phone (or small tablet in DnD).
I feel like Thunkable doesn’t have clear goals, are your product managers on hiatus? Is Thunkable full of Devs and Sales people that don’t know what customers want and how to drive the company to support a wider market? Sorry but Thunkable seems floating in a fog of questions and answers with no radar to navigate.
There is a big list of things that could be added, and some other providers have as standard, here are some of them;
- Bluetooth
- Fingerprint Sensor
- Light Sensor
- Pedometer
- NFC
- Gravity and other Sensors etc.
- Phone/ SMS
- Audio settings (silent/ loud)
- Cryptography/ Key-guard
- Background activities
- Deep links (very useful)
- Transitions for screen links
- Onboarding/ interactive slideshows
- Firebase remote config
- Other Firebase Authentication options
- Faster map points/ poly rendering
- Navigation via Google or other map provider
- More built-in, external storage options e.g. S3 (AWS/ Wasabi)
Adding ChatGPT when Thunk could be adding business orientated features; like more external data connections, plugins that work with other services, integrations for Make.com, or n8n.io doesn’t make sense to anyone but casual users (I’d be happy to see examples of it being used IRL).
I’m sorry; but if Thunkable could integrate with 3rd party services as a one-click feature, then the service could start to be on-par with other ‘enterprise tier’ app builders?
Is Thunkable’s goals only to get the amateur users? If so why isn’t the UI more intuitive or seemingly hasn’t been improved in years (not including DnD, which IMHO is a mess anyway).
Or perhaps Thunkable actually wants to get Agencies and Enterprise customers on board, who can create apps for customers in minutes, not weeks - and bring those types of groups across from competitors, rather than being the sub-par option…
Look at Budibase.com, open source core, a decent start-up project and doing very well:
Anyone can run it on a cheap $10 VPS; it is a complete visual app builder with SQL, other database and dozens of other connections and integrations, as well as community plugins - and Thunkable still hasn’t improved it’s UX for ages, in fact there are new bugs and old ones still there.
For example, even now there are issues like the text box gets smaller when typing in a URL for the top bar navigation:
Lastly, can you please move Intercom Chat out the way. Some components that have few options don’t scroll, but then those options are hidden.
Maybe use something like Chatwoot or Chaskiq (both FOSS) so you can change some of the code and allow users to hide or drag the chat icon to a convenient location, for example a button on the top bar and hide it when not in use, it’s already possible on Intercom:
view links to Intercom articles...
Create a custom launcher | Intercom Help
Hide the Messenger | Intercom Help
There is documentation still up from years ago with useless information and empty promises of “it will be updated soon”… It’s the kind of tactic you see from tiny companies who want to have a big presence (more so in Asia as they know their western customers won’t visit), so have a lot of marketing, but lacking real information because they don’t have the operations or time to update it (of course Thunk has been updated, don’t get me wrong).
Honestly, it’s not really good enough for a company providing this kind of service to have bad UI, poor UX and old documentation. ChatGPT? How about a Full Screen view on the designer, or a Dark Mode, which everyone, everywhere has?
I think Thunk needs to really try and understand what new Agency/ Enterprise customers need, not just what the lowest paying users (think they) “want”…
More high-level features is better for everyone.
Please hire more devs…
If Thunk spends $100k on one senior developer, you’ll get more planning and more done overall, than a new team who want $30k each, because that Senior Dev will understand what you need, and know the hurdles and time it will take, rather than a team of newbies cracking out a buggy MVP in a week, that then has to undergo “public” testing and be put on the back-burner, or left not-working but in plain view.
*cough* IAP *cough*
Sorry to any community-only users who expect something for nothing, but life doesn’t work that way, and if Thunk doesn’t attract more paying customers over time and add more significant features to compete, how can the free version survive…
Please understand I’m being constructive to seek genuine improvement, not destructive just for the sake of it.
Better understanding = more features = more paid users = better features…
Thank you for your time.
Lastly; I can’t change my username on here, yes i’ve tried, and it’s a little frustrating…
