AI App Builders That Export Your Code Without Lock-In

Lovable, Bolt.new, v0, Replit and Base44 all let you export your code to GitHub. The hard part to take with you is the rest: the database, your users' logins and the backend your code still calls. A Dyad app lives on your computer from the first prompt, with its login and data in your own Supabase or Neon account.

So skip "can I export?" and ask this instead: if I leave, what do I have to move by hand?

Which AI app builders let you export your full code?

Here's what each builder's own docs say, as of October 18, 2026. The last column decides how stuck you are.

Does exporting the code end the lock-in?

Not on its own. You'll often read that exports only go one way, but the table says otherwise: most of these builders sync both ways now. What keeps you is everything the code connects to.

Lovable says it plainly: its export holds the source and the files that define the database's structure, and you "export the database and download storage files separately." Its Cloud database export does include your user accounts. But there's no one-click move from Lovable Cloud to your own Supabase project, and "moving the PostgreSQL database alone does not move authentication, storage, realtime, or Edge Functions." While your app still uses Lovable Cloud, those pieces keep running through Lovable.

Base44 is the clearest case of code that still needs its builder. Its exported app is a standard React project, but it reaches its data through Base44's own SDK. With two-way sync, your data definitions (Base44 calls them entities) "are managed in Base44 and are not included in your local repository."

Firebase Studio shows what happens when the builder itself goes away. Google is shutting it down on March 22, 2027, and the workspaces go with it. You can still take the code out as a zip or a GitHub repo. The apps won't lose their data either, because the database and logins were never inside Studio. They're in Firebase, and Google says "your databases and user data will continue to function normally." Where the data lives decides what you lose. The code was never the risk.

Want to know where a builder stands before you put months into it? Build a throwaway app with a login and one table. Take the code out and run it on your own computer. Then ask where those user accounts and rows are, and whose account they're billed to.

Export code and GitHub sync in Lovable, Bolt.new, v0, Replit, Base44 and Bubble

Lovable

Connect GitHub (GitLab and Bitbucket work too) and Lovable keeps the repo in sync. The zip download sits under Project settings. On any plan, you can skip the backend move entirely: connect your own Supabase project instead of using Lovable Cloud. Then the login and data already sit in an account you own. We cover the rest in Dyad vs Lovable.

Bolt.new

Download a zip from the project menu (Export, then Download), or connect GitHub. Bolt commits each working change and pulls in outside edits. If Bolt and GitHub both change at almost the same time, Bolt keeps its version and overwrites GitHub's. New projects start on Bolt Database, and you can export table rows from it. More in Dyad vs Bolt.new.

v0

Connect GitHub and v0 creates a private repo and pushes your code to it. From then on, the repo is the source of truth, not v0. v0 says you can still export the code and deploy elsewhere, though environment variables, deployments and previews expect a Vercel project. See Dyad vs v0.

Replit

Choose Download as zip from the file tree menu, or connect a GitHub repo in the Git pane. Watch the login choice more than the export: with Replit Auth, "your users sign in with their existing Replit accounts." Clerk Auth is Replit's other option, with the accounts inside your app. Our Replit alternatives guide walks through moving the database.

Base44

Two-way GitHub sync starts on the Builder plan, $40 a month billed annually. To work on it locally, you run Base44's command-line tool, signed in to Base44, against a local Base44 backend or your live one. Our Base44 alternatives guide covers what moving off it involves.

Bubble

Bubble apps "can only be run on the Bubble platform; there's no way of exporting your application as code." You can export your data as CSV files, but you'd rebuild the app's logic somewhere else.

Own the full source code and host it anywhere with Dyad

Dyad is our free, open-source AI app builder, and it runs on your computer. You describe the app in a chat, and Dyad writes it as a normal project in a folder on your disk (~/dyad-apps/ by default). Every version is a Git commit you can roll back to.

There's no export button and no sync to set up first. Open the folder in VS Code or Cursor whenever you like, then switch back to Dyad and keep chatting. Sync to GitHub pushes it to a repo in your own account. Publish to Vercel, or deploy it anywhere else.

The parts that usually keep you are yours too. When your app needs a login or a database, Dyad connects your own Supabase or Neon account. There's no Dyad-hosted database to move out of. Stop using Dyad tomorrow and the app, its users and its data stay right where they are.

Will Chen, who created Dyad, built it as a local, open-source app builder because, in his words, "you should feel like an owner, not a renter." When the code, the login and the data sit in accounts you hold from day one, lock-in has nothing to hold on to.

So where do your users' logins live right now?

FAQ