Plobal is the largest competitor to Tapcart. While their pricing is slightly cheaper than Tapcart, we think their offering is worse. Plobal pitches a white glove service and the ability to unlock greater customization than Tapcart, however, we spoke with merchants who were disappointed with both. They mentioned that customization was unlocked through images, i-frames, and spaghetti code that caused their app to crash for customers. The white glove service that was pitched fell short of expectations.
Read our full guide on: eCommerce App Builders 🔨
Best for: Medium ($10M+ revenue) and Enterprise ($50M+ revenue) size companies
Plobal is a tool that allows you to develop a custom mobile app for your Shopify store without coding.
Plobal was founded in India by Atul Poharkar in 2016. Previously Atul was working on another company also called Plobal focused on social discovery. In 2016, he pivoted the company to focus on building mobile apps. Plobal has raised a total of $14 million dollars from big name investors including Bessemer, Elevation Capital, and Better Capital.
Plobal previously supported multiple eCommerce platforms, but now they only help Shopify and Shopify Plus merchants create apps.
Plobal like Vajro, offers live selling capabilities. For brands who are excited about live selling, this is the reason to consider Plobal or Vajro.
Like Tapcart, Plobal also offers the ability to add custom code blocks. This will allow you to bring in HTML and CSS elements into your app which will unlock more customization than other app builders.
Plobal offers three pricing tiers: Growth, Essential, and Enterprise. The Growth plan is $199 per month when billed monthly or $166 when billed annually (17% savings). The Growth plan includes a native iOS and Android App and 4 standard integrations from their pre-existing integration partners. The Essential plan costs $499 per month or $416 when billed annually (17% savings). The Essential plan includes 7 standard integrations and unlocks additional features like product filters and videos on the homepage. The Enterprise plan costs $1,199 when billed annually and also has a 1% success fee charged on all purchases that occur in the app. The Enterprise plan has a dedicated success manager and access to all of Plobals advanced features including product variant swatches on the PDP and product metafields.
All plans will require you to pay an Apple Developer fee ($99/year) and Google Play ($25 one time fee) that are charged by Apple and Google in order to publish your app in their app stores.
What is Plobal?
Plobal is a software tool that allows you to develop a custom mobile app for your Shopify store.
How does Plobal work?
Plobal uses Shopify’s APIs and SDKs to create native apps for Android and iOS that work with Shopify’s existing data structures.
Why not use Plobal?
Plobal pitches white glove service and greater customization than other app builders, but in conversations with customers, we found people felt they didn’t live up to their expectations.
What are the benefits of an app?
There are a lot of benefits to having an app:
Does Plobal work with non-Shopify platforms like WooCommerce or BigCommerce?
No. Unfortunately, Plobal only works for Shopify and Shopify Plus merchants. If you want to develop an app for a non-Shopify store, you will have to use a competitor.
What are examples of Plobal apps?
Looking for inspiration for your Plobal App? Check out these Plobal apps:
Show Me Your Mumu iOS / Android
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