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Magic xpa Application Platform vs Salesforce Platform 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
13th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
Application Server (9th), Application Infrastructure (16th)
Salesforce Platform
Ranking in Mobile Development Platforms
3rd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
97
Ranking in other categories
PaaS Clouds (8th), Rapid Application Development Software (5th), Low-Code Development Platforms (7th), No-Code Development Platforms (1st), Business Orchestration and Automation Technologies (15th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the Mobile Development Platforms category, the mindshare of Magic xpa Application Platform is 3.3%, down from 4.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Salesforce Platform is 5.8%, down from 8.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Mobile Development Platforms Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Salesforce Platform5.8%
Magic xpa Application Platform3.3%
Other90.9%
Mobile Development Platforms
 

Featured Reviews

Mylsamy T. - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Associate - IT at Himalaya Wellness Company
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.
Sharmila-K - PeerSpot reviewer
Cloud Transformations and Infrastructure Delivery Manager at a university with 10,001+ employees
Integration processes improve but scripting requires effort
The updates, pricing part, and upgrades to the products are some of the most valuable features with the Salesforce Platform.With the Salesforce Platform, I have minimal experience of approximately one and a half years. I get minimal exposure, once every three or two months, especially during holidays. The Salesforce Platform is connected to the cloud, which is beneficial. When it is integrated with different tools such as Microsoft BI Analytics, it helps us analyze much better. Currently, the integration itself is tricky as we have to use extensive scripting. It should be more of a plug-in and use solution. That is the only issue I see, but otherwise, I appreciate it.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Typically an experienced Magic developer can do the work of two to three experienced C#/.NET developers."
"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."
"xpa gives us a fast development speed."
"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.)."
"Typically an experienced Magic developer can do the work of two to three experienced C#/.NET developers. Customers are amazed at how quickly most new features can be added and bug fixes implemented. I have worked for four employers - including myself - using Magic, and in most instances, bug fixes are addressed and deployed in under six hours."
"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."
"In spite of the solution's high cost, we see a very large return on our investment."
"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."
"The stability has been great."
"There is very good documentation available and Salesforce offers good communication with its clients. It's very user-friendly and has a system that is easy to learn."
"Salesforce is the best one out there."
"I would recommend this solution; I am using it, and I am happy with it, and I don't see any major issues because it is a great platform."
"Its stability, performance, and usability are most valuable."
"Checking out or extracting a report is just a click away."
"The queue management of the solution is its most valuable aspect."
"The most valuable feature is ease of use."
 

Cons

"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."
"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)."
"Debugging .NET snippets is not possible, so it lacks the effects to solve problems. First you have to write and test your .NET code in VS, then you have to copy the .NET code in Magic xpa because there is almost nothing to debug it."
"The company has now released version 4 for web development, but this new release is still pretty hard to use for mobile and web development because it was not improved as much as we expected in the areas of user-friendliness or development-friendliness."
"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."
"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."
"I would like to see a spell checker included with optional language support. Currently, this has to be purchased from a third-party."
"There is room for improvement in Magic's marketing and licensing. I would like to see more integration of web functionality."
"With Salesforce, I do feel that I'm doing a lot of repetitive tasks."
"When it switched to lightning, it threw me for a loop."
"The licensing is on an annual basis. It is expensive."
"The initial setup is rather complex."
"The solution's UI is horrible."
"Salesforce is incredibly slow. It was difficult to run live sales calls and leveraging Salesforce at the same time."
"Getting reports in Salesforce is sometimes a little bit difficult. You need to do a lot of things to get detailed reports."
"Easier process to move to Lightning Components. There is a huge overtake of planning, testing and resources required to analyse what features would work."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The cost for developers is high because you have to pay for licenses as well as runtime."
"My clients have to purchase additional licenses in order to use what I built. It's not a fair approach."
"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."
"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 cost varies because nowadays Magic has tailor-made offerings for clients. I think the solution is worth the money."
"The licensing is too costly."
"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."
"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."
"I haven't had to buy Salesforce, however, I have heard it's $1500 a user."
"The cost of this solution depends on negotiations. It is somewhere between expensive and reasonable. There is always additional costs for consulting services. It's the kind of solution that requires consulting, but it is not a licensing cost. It is a consulting cost. It is CAPEX versus OPEX."
"It is expensive."
"It is expensive. Licensing is on an annual basis."
"I don't know anything about its cost, but I'm sure it has got a nice little price tag that goes along with it."
"The price of Salesforce Platform is very expensive. There are other solutions that are similar that cost a quarter of what Salesforce Platform does, such as HubSpot."
"Pricing and license differ and depend on how much license you are purchasing from them."
"It is an expensive program."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Computer Software Company
11%
Construction Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Government
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
University
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise2
Large Enterprise1
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business39
Midsize Enterprise26
Large Enterprise39
 

Questions from the Community

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Do you build applications using low-code or pro-code builders on Salesforce Platform?
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Also Known As

uniPaaS
Salesforce1, Force.com, Salesforce App Cloud
 

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
ADP
Find out what your peers are saying about Magic xpa Application Platform vs. Salesforce Platform and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
889,855 professionals have used our research since 2012.