No more typing reviews! Try our Samantha, our new voice AI agent.

Adobe ColdFusion vs Retool comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 17, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
6.3
Adobe ColdFusion boosts ROI by reducing development time, manual processing, cloud costs, and increasing productivity compared to PHP.
Sentiment score
6.5
Retool saves time and money, reducing developer dependency, while offering efficient, cost-effective solutions with a minimal monthly expense.
Our development cycle improved by around 25 to 30%, which allowed us to deliver more.
SDE III at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
Since we have relatively few employees within the organization, I would say that return on investment is excellent.
Engineering Specialist at a outsourcing company with 10,001+ employees
We saved at least 25 percent of development time with Adobe ColdFusion.
Cloud Engineer at TO THE NEW Digital
We had fewer front-end resources, and while developing with Retool, we did not need many front-end team members, which saved on salaries.
software engineer at a non-tech company with 1,001-5,000 employees
I think we can see time saved to start the proof of concept and maybe money saved because I was able to develop the mobile app alone without needing additional resources.
IT consultant for healthcare sector at Freelancer
We have seen a return on investment because we are building these internal dashboards 30 to 50% faster, so we are saving approximately 30 to 50% of an employee's time.
Product Manager at a tech vendor with 11-50 employees
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.3
Adobe ColdFusion users benefit from responsive customer support, efficient escalation, and detailed guidance on licensing, configuration, and deployment issues.
Sentiment score
5.5
Retool's customer service is mixed, with varying satisfaction levels, reliance on external resources, and praise for prompt assistance.
The technical team also helped us towards the relevant documentation and provided step-by-step assistance whenever needed.
SDE III at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
I reached out to them regarding integration failures and received a very quick response with detailed documentation.
Engineering Specialist at a outsourcing company with 10,001+ employees
They provided clear guidance and helped us troubleshoot a deployment issue very quickly.
Cloud Engineer at TO THE NEW Digital
The customer support is amazing; overall, AWS customer support is very professional and fast.
software engineer at a non-tech company with 1,001-5,000 employees
It is very easy to learn and integrate within our database and infrastructure because we are already on Amazon Web Services, and our entire tech stack is on Amazon Web Services.
Product Manager at a tech vendor with 11-50 employees
Technical support team is available, but I haven't needed to contact them.
Full Stack PHP/Python AWS Developer at Binary Port
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.0
Adobe ColdFusion efficiently scales resources, improving performance and handling larger datasets and user loads for enterprise applications.
Sentiment score
6.7
Retool efficiently scales, supporting many users with large datasets, offering customization and security, although complexity may rise with features.
Adobe ColdFusion is very scalable, and I have found it easy to scale as our needs have grown.
SDE III at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
As we have grown, we have been able to handle more users and larger datasets without any major performance issues.
Cloud Engineer at TO THE NEW Digital
Regarding Adobe ColdFusion's scalability, we were using an on-premises machine and scalability was fine.
Engineering Specialist at a outsourcing company with 10,001+ employees
It's scalable and doesn't experience any slowdown when handling increasing data volumes.
Full Stack PHP/Python AWS Developer at Binary Port
Retool is more suited for startups, but it can get messy at scale.
software engineer at a non-tech company with 1,001-5,000 employees
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.0
Adobe ColdFusion is reliable for enterprise apps, handling backend tasks well, with noted scalability and helpful but costly support.
Sentiment score
8.4
Retool is highly rated for dependability, with users experiencing minimal issues, praising its stability and reliable performance.
It supports load balancing, clustering, and high availability.
Software Developer at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
We run several business-critical applications on it, and there are few issues that we encounter.
SDE III at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
Adobe ColdFusion is really stable and very reliable.
Cloud Engineer at TO THE NEW Digital
Retool is stable in my experience.
IT consultant for healthcare sector at Freelancer
 

Room For Improvement

Adobe ColdFusion requires modernization, better documentation, enhanced tooling, improved integration, performance optimization, and flexible licensing for users.
Retool's front-end and usability limitations frustrate users, highlighting needs for enhanced customization, integration, and non-technical user support.
Adobe should invest more in open-source IDE tools to have robust, error-free linting, formatting, and auto-completion standards that match the seamless experience found in environments such as Python.
Project Associate at Isuna Technologies
Expanding the ecosystem and improving integration with popular DevOps and cloud-native tools would be beneficial.
SDE III at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
Adobe ColdFusion can be improved if there was an AI feature integrated through prompt engineering, which would be very helpful.
SR Solution Engineer at VATSIN TECHNOLOGY PVT LTD
Retool needs more customization options, as it should not be limited to a few customization features; it should be broader, with more features available for users to utilize.
software engineer at a non-tech company with 1,001-5,000 employees
AI tools, features, and machine learning capabilities should be added as they would be helpful in the future.
Full Stack PHP/Python AWS Developer at Binary Port
There should be better documentation or support for non-technical users, providing a platform to learn and implement Retool effectively.
Construction Data Analyst at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
 

Setup Cost

Adobe ColdFusion is priced for enterprises, offering strong performance, but may be costly for smaller businesses compared to open-source alternatives.
Retool's pricing is affordable for small setups but can be expensive for larger deployments compared to industry leaders.
It is positioned more towards the enterprise market, so it's not the lowest-cost option compared to some open-source alternatives.
SDE III at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
The pricing for Adobe ColdFusion is fair, and performance is a solid aspect of this tool for me.
Cloud Engineer at TO THE NEW Digital
The pricing, setup cost, and licensing experience were good as the free plan was enough for us.
IT consultant for healthcare sector at Freelancer
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Retool is that it is straightforward but somewhat pricey compared to other industry leaders such as Sentry and others.
Product Manager at a tech vendor with 11-50 employees
 

Valuable Features

Adobe ColdFusion provides rapid app development, seamless integration, robust support, and cost-effective, efficient solutions with extensive features.
Retool streamlines development with a user-friendly interface, enabling rapid MVP creation and enhancing productivity with extensive customization features.
Adobe ColdFusion reduces development cost, with less boilerplate code compared to Java or .NET.
Software Developer at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
The rapid development capabilities really stand out, especially the built-in tags and functions that simplify database interaction, form handling, and API creation.
SDE III at a tech vendor with 1,001-5,000 employees
Previously, creating an admin panel took us 10 to 15 days, but now we are able to create it in one to two hours, which is very useful for us.
SR Solution Engineer at VATSIN TECHNOLOGY PVT LTD
Retool positively impacts our organization by saving costs compared to using other data repositories, and teams prefer Retool for daily tasks that perform customizations to showcase web pages or link their data backend, making it more efficient and cost-effective than other software available in the market.
Construction Data Analyst at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
Compared to other solutions, the time is 30 to 50% shorter when we are building an internal tool using Retool.
Product Manager at a tech vendor with 11-50 employees
Retool provides built-in features with all processing happening within the platform, which is a significant advantage.
Full Stack PHP/Python AWS Developer at Binary Port
 

Categories and Ranking

Adobe ColdFusion
Ranking in Rapid Application Development Software
18th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
6.7
Number of Reviews
13
Ranking in other categories
Low-Code Development Platforms (15th)
Retool
Ranking in Rapid Application Development Software
17th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
12
Ranking in other categories
AI Software Development (21st)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Rapid Application Development Software category, the mindshare of Adobe ColdFusion is 1.6%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Retool is 1.4%, up from 0.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Rapid Application Development Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Retool1.4%
Adobe ColdFusion1.6%
Other97.0%
Rapid Application Development Software
 

Featured Reviews

TusharGoel - PeerSpot reviewer
Cloud Engineer at TO THE NEW Digital
Rapid development has accelerated data‑driven web portals and improved user satisfaction
Some of the best features of Adobe ColdFusion in my experience are rapid development capabilities, built-in database connectivity, and seamless integration with the database. Additionally, its scripting language is straightforward and allows me to build and iterate quickly while maintaining solid security features. I rely most on the built-in database connectivity of Adobe ColdFusion because it makes pulling and manipulating data much faster and easier. That is the core of how I structure most of my applications. I really appreciate how Adobe ColdFusion handles built-in caching and session management. That makes a significant difference in performance for my applications. We have reduced the development time by around 25 to 30 percent, and user satisfaction is very high since we can deliver features faster. We have also cut maintenance costs by streamlining workflows. This has been a huge boost for us. The biggest impact of using Adobe ColdFusion was on a customer-facing portal, which we built using its rapid iteration capabilities. We cut the feature release cycle by almost a month. End users have commented that the site is snappier and more responsive, which has improved their daily service experience.
YL
IT consultant for healthcare sector at Freelancer
Has provided a quick way to build mobile apps and could improve usability for non-technical users
The best features Retool offers include the ability to quickly create a mobile app and use this mobile app in a native mobile app for Android. I found the process of creating and deploying those mobile apps for Android with Retool to be smooth as the documentation is very good, and I found answers and examples to create a mobile app. I can access a debug mode in the mobile app which was really convenient to make tests and find what can be improved, where I have a problem, and how to correct it. Retool positively impacted my organization as the proof of concept we built gave us a way to convince power users and key users before developing the real software. It was a way to maintain the launch date of the project, which helped speed up the project timeline and save resources.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Rapid Application Development Software solutions are best for your needs.
900,644 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Construction Company
16%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Construction Company
22%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Comms Service Provider
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business8
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise8
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise4
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Adobe ColdFusion?
Regarding my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing, I was not involved in pricing decisions. As for setup cost, I was given a machine to deploy Adobe ColdFusion with everything related...
What needs improvement with Adobe ColdFusion?
Adobe ColdFusion can be improved if there was an AI feature integrated through prompt engineering, which would be very helpful, though I have not checked for that in an updated version. Overall, it...
What is your primary use case for Adobe ColdFusion?
My main use case for Adobe ColdFusion is to create the admin panels of the application, which is very beneficial for us and helps to reduce a lot of time. I used Adobe ColdFusion to connect the dat...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Retool?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing for Retool is that it is straightforward but somewhat pricey compared to other industry leaders such as Sentry and others. I feel it is an eigh...
What needs improvement with Retool?
I do not have specifics on how Retool can be improved because we are using it for internal tool building only. Regarding needed improvements, perhaps Retool can focus on not building customer-facin...
What is your primary use case for Retool?
We started using Retool last September, so it has been more than nine months now. Our main use case for Retool is an internal operations dashboard built in Retool for our AI agents. Whenever we shi...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Inspirus, Promisan, Webapper, Giva, Frontech Solutions Inc, Digicon, ITX Corp, Wall Street Magnate, SimulTV, ten24 Digital Solutions, Prospective Medical Data International Inc, Alcatel-Lucent
Information Not Available
Find out what your peers are saying about Adobe ColdFusion vs. Retool and other solutions. Updated: June 2026.
900,644 professionals have used our research since 2012.