Bolt.new vs Lovable
Bolt.new and Lovable both list at $25/mo. Below: prices, free plans, whether AI can replace each one, and the free alternatives.
01Side by side
| Bolt.new | Lovable | |
|---|---|---|
| Listed price | $25/mo | $25/mo |
| Per year | $300 | $300 |
| Plan compared | Pro 10M | Pro |
| Billing | monthly | monthly |
| Free plan | Yes: Free. 300,000 tokens/day and 1,000,000 tokens/month; 10 MB file uploads; up to 333,000 web requests/month; unlimited databases. | Yes: Free. 5 build credits/day capped at 30 per calendar month; 20 Cloud credits/month; 4 AI credits/month; unlimited members. |
| Can AI replace it? | Nah | Nah |
| Build time with AI | closest consolation build: one sitting | closest consolation build: one sitting |
| Free alternatives listed | 3 | 3 |
| Prices checked | Aug 14, 2026 | Aug 14, 2026 |
Each column uses the plan that app's page lists. Plans include different things, so read both pricing pages before you switch.
02The short version
Bolt.new NahA consolation build is possible, but the paid product's decisive value sits outside a solo rebuild. For Bolt.new, generate and edit a small web project in a local sandbox from structured prompts. The hard boundary is browser sandbox, model orchestration, package execution, deployment, and hosted compute, plus frontier models, context infrastructure, and execution safety.
Leaving means giving up: browser sandbox, model orchestration, package execution, deployment, and hosted compute, frontier proprietary model, large-scale code retrieval and cloud sandbox fleet.
Free options: Dyad, Onlook and open-lovable.
Lovable NahThe 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.
Leaving means giving up: the frontier model, which is the actual product, hosted preview URLs and one-click deploy, a database and auth wired up for you and a non-developer being able to ship anything at all.
Free options: Dyad, Onlook and open-lovable.
03Free alternatives to both
Open source visual builder on a real React codebase; the grown-up sibling of the browser sandbox.
onlook.com →Same prompt-to-app loop in a cloud sandbox, powered by your own model keys.
github.com →04Questions
Is Bolt.new cheaper than Lovable?
Bolt.new and Lovable both list at $25/mo. The plans compared are Bolt.new Pro 10M and Lovable Pro; they don't include the same things, so check both pricing pages.
Can AI replace Bolt.new or Lovable?
Bolt.new: Nah. A consolation build is possible, but the paid product's decisive value sits outside a solo rebuild. For Bolt.new, generate and edit a small web project in a local sandbox from structured prompts. The hard boundary is browser sandbox, model orchestration, package execution, deployment, and hosted compute, plus frontier models, context infrastructure, and execution safety. Lovable: Nah. 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.
Are there free alternatives to Bolt.new and Lovable?
Yes. Dyad, Onlook and open-lovable are listed as free alternatives to both.
Prices change; confirm on the vendor's site before you decide.
Get new verdicts in your inbox.
One short email when new verdicts land: what AI can now do for you, and what it still gets wrong. No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.