Lovable alternatives: 3 free & open-source picks
Curated, verified, and actually free. No trials, no crippled tiers. Star counts and last-activity dates checked by hand, not scraped and forgotten.
Chats a React app together, or clones an existing site into one; bring your own model keys.
Open source visual builder that edits a real React codebase with AI, Figma-style.
last updated 2026-08-07 · no votes, no pay-to-list · just what's real
bolt.diyMIT source, but its WebContainers runtime needs a commercial licence for production business use.
ContinueAcquired and read-only, and an editor agent was never a hosted prompt-to-app product.
| tool | license | running it | platforms | stars | active |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| open-lovable | open source | self-host, real ops | web, self-hosted | 28,217 | 2025-11 |
| Onlook | open source | docker to self-host | web, self-hosted | 26,433 | 2026-07 |
| Dyad | open source | one-click install | macos, windows | 21,100 | 2026-08 |
People pay because the model is the product and the wrapper is the delivery, and because Lovable turns a brief into a deployed app with a database behind it without anyone opening a terminal. The subscription buys model access, safe execution, and hosting that makes the result shareable. If none of that applies to you, any pick above saves $300 a year.
Is there a free alternative to Lovable?
Yes: open-lovable, Onlook, Dyad. Every tool on this page is either open source or genuinely free to use long-term: no trials, no crippled tiers.
Should I just build my own Lovable?
Our verdict is NOT REALLY. The wrapper is easy: a CLI that sends your brief to a model, writes the files, and starts the dev server is one sitting of work. The model doing the writing is the actual product, and you cannot rebuild that. Everything Lovable puts around it, the hosted preview, the deploy, the database wired up for you, and a non-developer being able to use any of it, goes with the subscription. If you'd rather build, the exact one-shot prompt is free at canivibecodeit.com/lovable.
