How AppBuild.diy works
AppBuild.diy is run by AppInstitute, a no-code app builder for small businesses — restaurants, salons, gyms, churches — with industry templates. Its “Wrap your SaaS” offer is for apps built with Lovable, Base44, Bolt, v0, Replit, Cursor or Claude Code. You paste your app’s URL and get a web app version first; then its team takes care of the stores — certificates, builds, uploads, submission and resubmission — under your own Apple and Google developer accounts, which you invite them into. If the app isn’t approved, you get a full refund.
AppBuild.diy doesn’t say which wrapper technology it uses. Its FAQ says web changes go live as soon as you deploy and a store rebuild is only needed for the icon, the name or new native features, so the app shows your hosted site. Native features — push, camera, purchases, location, biometrics and more — are added by pasting a prompt it gives you into your AI builder.
How CapWrapp works
Connect the GitHub repo your project lives in — Lovable, Bolt and Base44 sync to GitHub in one click. If it is still a website, CapWrapp commits Capacitor, the open-source native runtime from Ionic, along with the iOS and Android projects. When you pick a commit, CapWrapp starts GitHub Actions in your own account: the web app is built and bundled into both apps, signed with keys from CapWrapp’s vault, and uploaded to TestFlight and Google Play’s internal testing track. From the Releases page you send a tested version to App Review or promote it to production on Google Play, with What’s New already translated. The store listing is written once and translated by AI. More in how CapWrapp works.
Done for you, or done by you
The biggest difference is not technical. AppBuild.diy is a service: a team does the store work for you, on its schedule. CapWrapp is a tool: it automates the same work — signing, version numbers, uploads, review submissions — so you can do it yourself in a few clicks, any time.
- Control. With CapWrapp, any commit can go to your testers as soon as it’s built. Nobody else needs to be in your Apple or Google account: CapWrapp works from API keys kept in its vault.
- Your code in the app. AppBuild.diy’s app follows your live site. CapWrapp bundles the code from your repo, so the app works the way you tested it, and the native projects stay in your repo if you leave.
- Effort. AppBuild.diy asks less of you, and its refund guarantee takes the risk out of a first submission. With CapWrapp you create the app records on Apple’s and Google’s sites yourself, guided by a checklist and the App Store submission checklist.
Pricing
AppBuild.diy prices by the number of people using your app: free up to 10 users, Business at $49 a month or $299 a year up to 1,000 users, and Business Pro at $99 a month or $499 a year with no user limit. CapWrapp is a subscription priced by active apps, with every feature on every plan: $29 a month for up to 3 apps, $99 for 10 and $249 for 50 — $20, $79 and $199 a month billed yearly. An app counts as active for 30 days after you ship it, teammates are free, and every plan starts with a 14-day free trial with no card. Builds run on your GitHub account’s Actions minutes.
The number of users never changes CapWrapp’s price, so an app that takes off doesn’t move you to a bigger plan. Whichever tool you pick, Apple charges $99 a year for a developer account and Google $25 once.
Moving from AppBuild.diy to CapWrapp
- Sync the project to GitHub from Lovable, Bolt or Base44.
- Connect the repo in CapWrapp and let it add Capacitor, with the same bundle ID and package name as your current app so the new builds update the same store listings.
- Create an App Store Connect API key and a Google Play service account, and connect them in CapWrapp. You can then remove the outside team from your developer accounts.