Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Magic xpa Application Platform vs OutSystems comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 4, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Magic xpa Application Platform
Ranking in Mobile Development Platforms
9th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
Application Server (8th), Application Infrastructure (14th)
OutSystems
Ranking in Mobile Development Platforms
1st
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
51
Ranking in other categories
Rapid Application Development Software (3rd), Low-Code Development Platforms (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Mobile Development Platforms category, the mindshare of Magic xpa Application Platform is 4.0%, up from 2.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of OutSystems is 21.4%, down from 22.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Mobile Development Platforms
 

Featured Reviews

Mylsamy T. - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables us to develop more than 90 applications in-house, which are used across our organization
It's a bit difficult to work with purely web-based applications to get the data and display it. There have been a few times when the connection was disconnected between the server and your browser. The connectivity on browser-built applications needs to be improved. The mobile application development could be easier. They could include different external applications, like finger sensors. I'm not sure whether it's in version 3.8 or not.
Bireswar Das - PeerSpot reviewer
A low-code platform for the development of mobile and web enterprise applications
To illustrate a case, the customer initially had a private cloud, essentially a data center hosted within it. They needed a disaster recovery solution, which would involve using a public cloud. This situation led to some deployment challenges due to the hybrid nature of their setup. However, once we implemented the solution for them, they were extremely satisfied. The process was not only effective but also quite speedy. To be more precise, we completed it in around 100 days, even though they initially requested it to be done in four months. They were very pleased with the efficiency of the implementation.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Magic is rapid, it's a tool which we use to develop, change and maintain our programs. xpa has a lot more features onboard and it gives us the opportunity to do such things so that we can easily adapt and maintain our programs. It gives certain benefits to stay with our customers and the market."
"Being able to make changes to existing programs to comply with last minute changes in requirements, and/or being able to fix, test, review, and deploy new code in a manner of hours instead of days, definitely gives us a huge advantage over our competitors and this is only possible thanks to Magic’s speed of programming."
"Speed of development and database connectivity (MS SQL, Oracle, DB2, Btrieve/Pervasive PSQL, ODBC, MySql, and SQLite)."
"Magic’s unique approach to development ensures that the programmer stays focused on the objective of the program (i.e. display all customers in California), instead of the repetitive tasks that surround it (i.e. connect to database, open customers table, create the query to retrieve records within the specified criteria, fetch the result of the query, connect it to a data grid, etc.)."
"The speed of development is the quickest for any tool on the market."
"The best feature of Magic is the development time. The time it takes to develop something is incredibly fast if you compare Magic with, for example, Java."
"The Magic xpa Application Platform is very suitable for production since it is easy to update. The program is simple to upgrade and deploy. The solution is convenient in production. You need to adjust the data, then adjust the program which is not difficult."
"What I found most valuable in the Magic xpa Application Platform is that it has a client-server and web browser technology that's perfect for company users."
"The OutSystems' most effective features for speeding up development cycles are the process orchestration and the drag-and-drop updating of business processes."
"The drag-and-drop feature is very valuable."
"It is much easier to develop applications with the product’s IDE."
"OutSystems' low-cost approach has positively impacted our productivity, because we were able to develop faster with OutSystems, enabling us to implement many changes during our sprint."
"The tool makes the development process easier."
"It is a stable solution."
"For me, the most valuable feature is the flexibility the tools give us to change any customer requirements on the fly, when we are in a meeting. I also like how easy it is to deploy the code between environments and how easy it is to integrate OutSystems with other systems."
"One of the valuable features of OutSystems is the very small lead time for the delivery of projects."
 

Cons

"I would like to see a spell checker included with optional language support. Currently, this has to be purchased from a third-party."
"It is missing basic charting tools for bar/pie/series charts. It is left to the developer to acquire and deploy charting tools or the customer to purchase a third-party reporting tool to produce charts."
"When you have several tasks, you open a screen in a task in developing mode, and you don't see the parent screens. Debugging lacks the effects to solve problems. You have to do it first in a kind of studio. Then you have to be sure that you can do it in Magic because there is almost nothing to debug it. It's practically impossible to debug. You have to be sure before you put your snippets."
"The configuration of the xpa RIA mobile environment is complex and a discouragement to new developers. Also, Magic's documentation can be less than complete at times which leads to frustration for new developers. (I encourage new Magic developers to join the Magic Users Group)."
"There is room for improvement in Magic's marketing and licensing. I would like to see more integration of web functionality."
"Throughout my career, I've encountered difficulties when integrating new technologies with Magic xpa Application Platform. In particular, when attempting to incorporate features from other development languages into earlier versions of the solution called uniPaaS. I struggled to integrate .NET components due to the limited options available. This made the process more challenging and complicated. I find it challenging to create a more user-friendly experience for users who may be comparing the system to other systems they have used outside or within the company on different platforms."
"Magic has a tradition, when it adds new technologies/features to the Magic development tool, to provide either no documentation or documentation that does not provide an organized approach for bringing this new technology/feature to experienced Magic programmers."
"They want to be one toolbox for everything, but primarily, we are using xpa to develop desktop applications, and in that area they're lacking functionalities, flexibility, and modern stuff."
"Currently, in mobile applications, we don't have push notifications."
"Mobile apps should have been fully native."
"I'd like to see AI features integrated into the solution."
"We had some lagging issues under high data loads, and the solution needed to be customized to improve this."
"I would like to see more integration between the use of artificial intelligence to speed up the process delivery time."
"The largest obstacle currently associated with OutSystems is its high cost and limited availability of skilled personnel. Despite being a rapid application development platform, having a highly skilled individual familiar with the platform can be much more beneficial than an inexperienced individual. Because there is a shortage of people with the necessary OutSystems skills, utilizing the platform can become expensive. This makes little sense, considering that a rapid application development platform should be accessible to the average person. However, having a highly skilled individual can greatly increase productivity, making the cost worthwhile."
"The customer service and support are maintaining a two-day SLA for everything. 48 hours is very high."
"The resource availability needs to be increased."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Magic is not the cheapest IDE out there. If you are considering Magic xpa, you should do a cost-benefit analysis to feel comfortable with your decision. The Magic sales staff is very helpful in providing pricing."
"The cost for developers is high because you have to pay for licenses as well as runtime."
"The main problem with the Magic xpa Application Platform is pricing. You have to pay a lot of money for development, and you also have to pay a lot for the deployments and runtime, while in most competitors, you have to pay a lot for one of the two and not both."
"There are different licenses, we have the application and the online application. There are two different licenses for two different program sites for the Magic xpa Application Platform."
"It's not cheap. The licenses are not cheap. Not at all. They cost much money. There are other tools with free licenses but Magic asks for a lot of money."
"The licensing is too costly."
"The licensing cost varies because nowadays Magic has tailor-made offerings for clients. I think the solution is worth the money."
"My clients have to purchase additional licenses in order to use what I built. It's not a fair approach."
"There is a need to make yearly payments towards the licensing costs attached to OutSystems. It is an expensive product."
"OutSystems is a very expensive solution, and it has to be cheaper."
"The price is okay. OutSystems isn't expensive. It's a mid-range solution."
"OutSystems is expensive, and they changed the pricing model in the last couple of years. It's changing too much and it's becoming unstable. They are constantly shifting their prices based on users, courses, and other factors."
"You should contact OutSystems for more details but my opinion is that it is not for small business budgets."
"There is a free trial to use this solution and other options available, such as enterprise. There are different subscription plans."
"I would rate it five to six out of ten."
"It is still very expensive, so small companies can’t generally afford it... Still, the time saving on development and delivery is worth the value."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Mobile Development Platforms solutions are best for your needs.
844,944 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Insurance Company
10%
Government
9%
Educational Organization
33%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Ask a question
Earn 20 points
Which solution is better for developing non-ITSM applications: OutSystems or Service Now?
The short answer is that OutSystems is far better for 2 main reasons. Firstly, with Service Now you are locked into that platform for good. The business model is to lock in and then keep pumping th...
What industries do you think OutSystems is most useful for?
I cannot really name an industry in which OutSystems cannot be beneficial. Who does not want to make top-notch applications that work in no time? And OutsyStems does exactly that. The low-code plat...
How did you decide which OutSystems edition was the best one for you?
We started using OutSystems fairly recently, so we are still on the free version of it. My company is still testing how we like the platform, but so far, we have been satisfied with it and will li...
 

Also Known As

uniPaaS
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

ADD, Cape plc, Adecco, Kuno Kinzoku Industry Co., GE Capital, Dove Tree, CBS Outdoor, Paris-Nord Villepinte Exhibition Center, Allstate Life Insurance Company, Titan Software Systems
Randstad, Warner Brothers, HP, Intel, ING, Banco Popular, Thrivent Financial, Bacardi, Kent State University, Bacardi, FICO, ING, Vodafone, AbbVie, Estafeta, Siemens, Vopak
Find out what your peers are saying about Magic xpa Application Platform vs. OutSystems and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.
844,944 professionals have used our research since 2012.