Podio vs. Tape vs. InfoLobby

An objective comparison.

Although Podio, Tape, and InfoLobby share a lot of similarities, there are some subtle differences you should be aware of. Here we break down some of the main features to help you decide which product would be the best fit for your business.

We tried to make this comparison as objective as possible, and all parties were involved in the collaboration thereof.

	Podio	Tape	InfoLobby
Years in Business	14+	4+	1+ (Globi has been in business for 24+ years)
Pricing	Plus: $14/user Premium: $24/user You require a Premium plan to take advantage of the advanced workflows. All users must be on the same price tier.	Basic: $9/user Premium: $24/user You require a Premium plan to take advantage of the advanced workflows. All users must be on the same price tier.	$10/User $45/Admin Not all users have to be on the same tier. Only admins can create tables and workflows.
External users / Guests	Free Guests, but they cannot create items.	Guests have full access, but are limited (4 free guests per paid licence)	Guests have full access but require paid licence (own account).
Limits	500k items/app 5M workflow actions	500k items/app 5M workflow actions	Unlimited
Large Data	⨯ max 500k items / app	⨯ max 500k items / app	✓ Unlimited records / table
Data Views	★★★★ Table, Badge, Kanban, Calendar, Activity	★★★ Table, List, Kanban Calendar and Gantt on the roadmap.	★★★ Tables, Calendars, Activity
Split Views	✓ Yes	✓ Yes	⨯ No
Sub-Tables	⨯ No	⨯ No	✓ Yes
Item templates	⨯ No	✓ Yes	⨯ No
Async Scripts	⨯ No	⨯ No	✓ Yes
Record Validation	⨯ No	⨯ No	✓ Yes
Report Widgets	✓ Yes	⧗ Future Addition	✓ Yes
Basic Tasks	✓ Yes	✓ Yes – plus checklist fields	✓ Yes
Calendar	✓ Yes	✓ Yes	✓ Yes
Chat	✓ Yes	✓ Yes	⨯ No
@Mentions	✓ Yes	✓ Yes	✓ Yes
App Market	✓ Yes	✓ Yes	✓ Yes
User Permission Levels	★★★ Space level plus sharing at App and Item level	★★★★ Workspace, App and Record levels	★★★★ Space, Table, Record, and Field level
Web Forms	✓ Yes	⧗ Future Addition	✓ Yes
Publicly Embeddable Views	- Limited cached tables via PWA	✓ Yes – Summary only	✓ Yes – optional click through to detail
Email Integration	★★ Limited ability to email in. Transactional emails through PWA.	★★ Limited ability to email in.	★★★★ Fully Integrated Email Support for transactional emails on records is baked in.
Mobile App	★★ Dedicated mobile app with limited use. Web app does not work well on small devices.	★★ Dedicated mobile app with limited use (no record creation and edit). Web app does not work well on small devices.	★★★★ Mobile Apps + Web Responsive.
Calculation Fields	★★★★ Strong calculations using JavaScript that can reference related items.	★★★★ Strong calculations using modern JavaScript that can reference related items.	★★★★★ Fast SQL calculations + Strong LobbyScript(PHP) script fields that can reference ALL data.
Calculation Reliability	★★★ Asynchronous processing sometimes presents delays under load and can occasionally fail.	★★★★ Asynchronous processing could present account scoped delays under load and can potentially fail.	★★★★★ Calculations are performed in real-time as part of each SQL query. Always correct. Script fields are calculated on-demand on record view. Never cached.
Workflow Automation	★★★ Strong workflow abilities through PWA. PWA is a separate service and does not have direct access to Podio, resulting in intermittent errors.	★★★★ Strong workflow capabilities baked in.	★★★★ Strong workflow capabilities baked in.
Automation Ref Loops	★★★ Related items you can loop is capped.	★★★ Related items you can loop is capped.	★★★★★ Unlimited - You can loop all related records, no matter how many.
Export Data	★★ Export as Excel sheets only. No comments or files included.	★★★ Export as Excel sheets or CSV. Comments, subtasks and files included.	★★★★ Export Tables as Excel sheets or CSV & Raw export of all data in JSON format, including all comments, emails, and files.
Public API	✓ Yes	✓ Yes	✓ Yes
Portal Builders	✓ ProcFu	⨯ No	✓ ProcFu
Integrations	Google Drive, ShareFile, RIghtSignature, O365, Box, DropBox ShareFile, RightSignature, ClickSend, and SMTP supported in automations	MS Teams SMTP in automations	SMTP Any HTTP API Any and all oAuth2 compliant APIs (eg: Zoom, Xero, QuickBooks, Asana, Podio, MS Teams, MailChimp, DocuSign, Todoist, Google, etc)
Workflow Code	PWA uses PHP in a sandboxed environment. Each action can only call whitelisted PHP functions.	Uses Javascript. Can call all JavaScript (synchronous and asyncronous) as well as internal Tape functions and methods.	Uses LobbyScript - a custom DSL very similar to PHP. Can call only included functions and some specialized extended functions. Has access to API and all Data.
Data Access Speed	★★★★ Via Middleware.	★★★★ Via Middleware.	★★★★★ Direct SQL queries.
Infrastructure	All items are in a single database. No horizontal scaling possible.	All Items and Orgs are spread over database clusters. Can easily provision new clusters as required.	Each table is a physical SQL table. Orgs are spread over clusters. Can easily provision new clusters as required.
Bring your Own Database	⨯ No	⨯ No	⧗ Future Addition will allow you to connect your own on-prem MySQL database.
Website	podio.com	get.tapeapp.com	infolobby.com

* "Podio" is a registered trademark and used in this document purely to identify the product under Nominative Fair Use.

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“Finally Software that doesn’t suck.” “It was simple to get going, now we are discovering the power tools.” “I actually like using this type of software for a change” “I didn’t expect to make something right away… but it works.” “So glad that I jumped ship from <other software>” “Can’t complain.” “So good, I am using it twice.” “I made my grandmas cookbook with this software.” “Less work – more play thanks to InfoLobby”