CheqqThe Cheqq alternative to SmartSuite
A solution library covers the processes someone else had.
SmartSuite ships polished solutions for the work most companies share. Cheqq builds the process you actually run — the one with your exception in it — described in your words and compiled into steps you can read.
What SmartSuite is forA work-management platform with a database underneath. SmartSuite's strength is arriving with the shape already drawn: solutions per department, forms, dashboards and automations that a team can adopt on day one without designing anything.
A workspace with no shape until you describe one. You get the same records and automations, plus published apps, real document output and an agent per system — and the starting point is a sentence about your process rather than the nearest template to it.
Why people start looking
Nothing here is a knock on SmartSuite. These are the points at which one product stops being the right shape for the job, whichever product it is.
The template is 80% right
Every process has the bit that is specific to you, and that bit is usually why the work is hard. Bending a pre-built solution around it costs more than building the thing you meant.
Automations that only go one way
Real operations branch, loop, retry, wait on a person and sometimes undo what they already did. A rule builder handles the simple half well and the other half not at all.
Everything happens inside the workspace
Work management assumes the people doing the work have accounts. Customers, suppliers and applicants do not — and they need a page, not a seat.
The output still gets made by hand
The system holds the numbers and someone still assembles the deck, the report and the spreadsheet that get sent out.
Cheqq vs SmartSuite
Row by row, in plain terms. Where SmartSuite is the stronger answer, the row says so.
SmartSuiteDescribe your process and it is built, or install a template and reshape it by asking. Nothing arrives assuming a department structure.
A large library of ready solutions by department, which is genuinely the fastest way to start if one of them matches you.
Collections with around 25 field types, relations, formulas, rollups and seven view types including multi-collection dashboards.
A rich field set with views, dashboards and reporting built for team work management.
Compiled workflows with branching, loops, sandboxed code, retries and approval steps that escalate. Runs keep their event history and can be resumed.
Automation rules with triggers, conditions and actions.
Any column can be given a job — research with citations, scoring, classification — priced before it runs, with your manual edits protected.
AI assistance for generating and summarising field content.
Published to their own address, with a server-enforced binding listing exactly which fields the app may read or write.
Forms collect from outsiders; the rest of the work stays inside.
Real .pptx, .xlsx, .docx and .pdf generated from your records, in your brand's fonts and colours — with direct editing, version history and published links.
Reporting and dashboards inside the platform.
Based on each product's publicly documented capabilities. Both move fast — if something here is out of date, tell us and we will fix it.
What you would build instead
Not features to evaluate — sentences you could type on your first afternoon, and what comes back.
Describe the exception, not the average.
The approval that skips a step for repeat customers. The escalation that only fires outside business hours. Say it once and read it back as steps — including the branch that made it yours.
The monthly pack, assembled from the records.
Not a dashboard someone screenshots. A real document generated from the same rows the team has been updating all month, in your fonts, exported as .pdf or .docx and sent.
When to stay with SmartSuite
We would rather you picked the right tool than picked ours. These are the cases where SmartSuite is the better answer.
- You want it working on MondayIf one of SmartSuite's solutions is close to your process, adopting it is faster than describing yours from scratch. Speed to a working system counts.
- The job is team work managementAssigning, tracking and reporting on work a team is doing is what SmartSuite is built around, and it is well built for it.
- You need per-department structure out of the boxA mid-sized company standardising HR, projects and operations at once gets real value from a coherent pre-built set.
Moving across, gradually
You do not have to switch in one go — most people run both for a while and let the SmartSuite side shrink.
Export the solution you rely on most
CSV per table. Import it, confirm the field types, and say which columns link to which — the relations come back.
Say what the automations were meant to do
Including the parts the rule builder could not express. You will see the compiled steps before anything runs.
Let the people outside in
The form that fed the process becomes a published app, and so does the status page you were emailing instead.
Switching from SmartSuite
Does Cheqq have pre-built solutions like SmartSuite?
It has templates that install as working systems — tables, automations and an agent already wired together. The difference is what happens next: you reshape a Cheqq template by describing the change rather than by reconfiguring it, so it stops being a template almost immediately.
Can it handle work management too?
Yes — tasks, assignees, statuses and boards are all collections and views. What Cheqq adds is that the process around them can run itself rather than waiting for someone to move a card.
How do people outside my company take part?
Through a published app at its own address. They need no account, and the binding you write lists the fields the app may read or write; the server enforces it on every request.
Is there a free plan?
Yes, with no card. Because your automations run deterministically once built, the day-to-day costs very little — you spend credits when a model actually runs.
Comparing something else?
vs NocoDB
vs Teable
vs Excel
vs Google SheetsBuild your process. Not the nearest one.
Describe how the work actually moves at your company, exception included. Free to start.
Start free