Baserow

What Is Baserow?

If your team has been running operations on Airtable — tracking projects, managing content pipelines, organising inventory — you have probably had the compliance conversation at least once. Where exactly is this data stored? Who can access it? And what happens when a US subpoena reaches Airtable's servers in Virginia?

Baserow exists because those questions matter. Founded in 2020 in Amsterdam by Bram Wiepjes and Olivier Maes, Baserow is an open-source no-code database platform that gives you the familiar spreadsheet-meets-database interface Airtable popularised, but with a fundamentally different architecture underneath. The codebase is open-source. You can self-host it on your own infrastructure. Cloud data is stored in Amsterdam. And the company holds GDPR, HIPAA, and SOC 2 Type II certifications — not just on the enterprise tier, but across the board.

With over 150,000 users and backing from European investors including Inkef Capital, Seedcamp, and Frontline Ventures, Baserow has grown from a developer side project into a serious contender in the no-code database space. It is not a feature-for-feature Airtable clone — it is building its own path with an application builder, AI assistant, and an automation engine that are all maturing rapidly.

Key Features

The Database Core

At its foundation, Baserow is a relational database with a spreadsheet interface. You create tables, define field types (text, number, date, file, link-to-table, formula, lookup), and manipulate data through views. The view system is where Baserow shows its range: grid view for data entry, kanban for pipeline management, gallery for visual browsing, calendar and timeline for scheduling, and forms for data collection. All views reference the same underlying data, so changes propagate instantly.

The experience will feel immediately familiar if you are coming from Airtable. The grid view behaves like a spreadsheet, but fields are typed and relational — you can link records across tables, create rollups, and write formulas that reference linked data. It is a genuine relational database wearing a spreadsheet costume, and the transition from Airtable is close to frictionless.

Application Builder

This is where Baserow diverges from the typical database tool. The Application Builder lets you turn your database tables into fully functional web applications — dashboards, portals, internal tools — without writing code. You design pages visually, bind elements to your data, and publish applications that external users or team members can interact with directly. It is not as mature as dedicated no-code app builders like Retool or Appsmith, but it is integrated directly into the database layer, which eliminates the sync and API plumbing you would need with separate tools.

Automations

Baserow's automation engine supports triggers (row created, row updated, scheduled), conditions, router nodes for branching logic, and actions (send email, update row, call webhook). You can build multi-step workflows that react to data changes in real time. The system supports variables and formulas within automation steps, giving you meaningful logic without code. Compared to Airtable's automations, Baserow's are more transparent — you can see the full execution flow — but the action library is still growing.

AI Assistant

Baserow's built-in AI lets you describe what you want in natural language: "Create a project management database with tasks, deadlines, and team assignments." The assistant generates the tables, fields, and views. For self-hosted instances, AI traffic stays entirely within your infrastructure — Baserow B.V. has zero access to your prompts or data in self-hosted mode.

API-First Architecture

Every Baserow database automatically generates a REST API with full documentation. You get CRUD endpoints for every table, filterable and sortable, secured with scoped database tokens. This makes Baserow a viable backend for custom applications, not just an internal tool. Webhooks fire on row create, update, and delete events, enabling real-time integrations with Zapier, Make, n8n, or any system that accepts HTTP callbacks.

Pricing

Baserow's pricing is one of its strongest selling points, particularly against Airtable. The cloud plans are priced per active user per month:

Free — EUR 0. Unlimited databases, 3,000 rows per workspace, 2 GB storage. Includes grid, form, gallery, and kanban views plus 100+ templates. For small teams or personal projects, this is genuinely usable.

Premium — EUR 5/user/month. Bumps rows to 50,000 per workspace and storage to 20 GB. Adds the AI assistant, calendar and timeline views, and priority support.

Advanced — EUR 20/user/month. 250,000 rows, 100 GB storage, role-based permissions (RBAC), and free read/comment users. This is the tier for teams that need granular access control.

Enterprise (Self-Hosted) — Custom pricing. Unlimited everything, on-premise or private cloud deployment, SSO, dedicated support, and SLAs.

The open-source self-hosted edition is free with no row or storage limits — you are constrained only by your own hardware. For context, Airtable's comparable Team plan starts at $20/user/month with 50,000 records per base. Baserow's Premium tier delivers similar capacity at a quarter of the price.

Annual billing is available with discounts, though Baserow does not publish the exact discount percentage publicly.

EU Compliance & Privacy

This is the section that matters most if you are reading this on a European software directory. Baserow's compliance story is unusually strong for a company of its size.

Jurisdiction: Baserow B.V. is a Dutch company headquartered in Amsterdam. It falls under EU jurisdiction natively — no Privacy Shield workarounds, no standard contractual clauses with a US parent. Dutch law applies.

Data location: All cloud-hosted data is stored in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Not "EU region" with vague multi-country routing — Amsterdam specifically.

Certifications: SOC 2 Type II, GDPR compliant (with DPA available for paid plans), and HIPAA compliant. All data at rest is encrypted, TLS 1.2+ for data in transit, and role-based access controls are enforced at the infrastructure level.

Self-hosting: The nuclear option for data sovereignty. Deploy Baserow on your own servers via Docker, and Baserow B.V. has literally zero access to your data. No telemetry phones home, no licence server to check in with. Your data stays in your building, your VPC, your jurisdiction — full stop.

For organisations operating under GDPR, the self-hosting option eliminates the data processor relationship entirely. You are both the controller and the processor. For regulated industries — healthcare, finance, government — this is the cleanest compliance architecture available in the no-code database space.

Who It's Best For

GDPR-conscious teams replacing Airtable or Google Sheets who need their data in the EU with proper compliance documentation. The cloud tier handles this out of the box; self-hosting provides an additional guarantee layer.

Startups and SMEs looking for a powerful database and application builder without enterprise pricing. At EUR 5/user/month for the Premium tier, the cost difference against Airtable is substantial for growing teams.

Technical teams that want an open-source backend they can inspect, extend, and self-host. Baserow's API-first design makes it a legitimate application backend, not just a spreadsheet with extra steps.

Regulated industries — healthcare, finance, public sector — where self-hosting and triple compliance (GDPR, HIPAA, SOC 2) are hard requirements, not nice-to-haves.

The Verdict

Baserow is not trying to out-feature Airtable — it is building a fundamentally more trustworthy alternative. The open-source codebase, self-hosting option, EU data residency, and triple compliance certification create a data sovereignty story that no US-based competitor can match. The trade-offs are real: fewer integrations, a younger automation engine, and an application builder that is still finding its stride. But for European teams where data control is non-negotiable, Baserow delivers where it counts — and at pricing that makes the switch from Airtable feel less like a compromise and more like an upgrade.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Baserow a good replacement for Airtable?

Yes, for most use cases. Baserow covers the core Airtable functionality — relational databases, multiple views, forms, automations, and API access — while adding self-hosting and EU compliance. The main gaps are Airtable's larger integration marketplace and more mature scripting extensions. If data sovereignty matters to your organisation, Baserow is the strongest alternative available.

Can I import my Airtable data into Baserow?

Baserow supports CSV imports, and you can export Airtable bases as CSV files for migration. The field types map reasonably well, though linked records and some formula fields may need manual adjustment after import. Baserow also provides documentation for the migration process.

Is the self-hosted version really free?

Yes. The open-source edition under the MIT licence is free to use with no row limits, storage caps, or user restrictions. You pay only for your own hosting infrastructure. Some enterprise features (SSO, advanced RBAC, audit logs) require the enterprise self-hosted licence.

How does Baserow handle backups and data recovery?

Cloud-hosted instances include regular automated backups with point-in-time recovery. For self-hosted deployments, you manage your own backup strategy — Baserow runs on PostgreSQL, so standard PostgreSQL backup tools (pg_dump, WAL archiving) work as expected.

What programming languages can I use with the Baserow API?

The REST API works with any language that can make HTTP requests. Baserow provides auto-generated API documentation for every database you create, with examples and authentication via database tokens. There are community SDKs for Python and JavaScript, and the n8n and Zapier integrations provide no-code API access.