Quick answer
It depends - Both let you start building with AI for nothing, but they meter that usage in different shapes. Base44 hands out a flat 25 message credits and 100 integration credits every month, no card required, and lets you keep up to 5 apps on the free plan. Lovable resets a smaller pool every day instead: 5 build credits daily, up to 30 a month, plus separate monthly pools for Cloud hosting and in-app AI features.
How the free tiers compare
Base44's free plan is a flat monthly allowance: 25 message credits and 100 integration credits, sign-up with no credit card, and room for up to 5 apps. Lovable's free plan runs on a daily grant instead, 5 build credits a day capped at 30 a month, with a separate 20 Cloud hosting credits and 4 AI feature credits added each month. Base44's first paid tier, Starter, is $16 a month billed annually; Lovable does not publish a price for any paid tier on its public pricing page.
Base44 vs Lovable free tier, side by side
| Base44FTV 57 | LovableFTV 39 | |
|---|---|---|
| Free plan creditsBase44 resets monthly; Lovable resets daily for build credits and monthly for the other two pools. | 25 message credits/month, 100 integration credits/month | 5 build credits/day (up to 30/month), plus 20 Cloud hosting credits/month and 4 AI feature credits/month |
| Apps on the free plan | Up to 5 apps | No published app cap; limited by the credit balance instead |
| Credit card required | Not required | Not stated on the pricing page |
| First paid plan price | Starter - $16/month billed annually | Not published on the pricing page |
After you outgrow the free tier
Base44 publishes its first paid price directly: Starter is $16 a month when billed annually. Lovable's pricing page publishes no price for any paid tier.
Cost at real usage
| Usage | Base44 | Lovable |
|---|---|---|
| Outgrowing the free credit allowanceLovable publishes no paid-tier price on its pricing page. | $16/month (Starter, billed annually) | Not published |
Estimates, not quotes. Usage-based rates change - verify with the vendor's pricing page before committing.
When to pick each one
Pick Base44 when…
- You want a flat monthly credit count that's easy to plan around: 25 message credits and 100 integration credits.
- You want to sign up and build without entering a card.
- You want to keep more than one project going at once: up to 5 apps on the free plan.
- You want built-in authentication, a database, and analytics without adding separate services.
Pick Lovable when…
- You'd rather have a credit refresh every day than wait for a single monthly reset.
- You want hosting usage tracked separately from build usage, so a busy demo doesn't eat your building budget.
- You're fine publishing on a lovable.app subdomain while on the free plan.
- You want a small monthly allowance for AI features running inside the apps you build, on top of the build credits.
Bottom line
Base44 is the simpler free plan to reason about: a flat monthly credit count and no card at sign-up. Lovable spreads a smaller credit pool across daily builds, monthly hosting, and monthly AI-feature use, which suits steady daily work better than a single big monthly budget.
Read the full listings: Base44 and Lovable. Scores use the FTV methodology at /ftv. Browse more head-to-heads on /compare, or see the top-ranked free tiers on /top.