Dify vs Retool
as AI assistants see them, week of 2026-09-14
Dify and Retool both sit on the edges of AI assistants' recommendations, with overall scores of 7 and 8 out of 100 and mentions in 10 and 11 of 69 answers, respectively. Dify stands out for self-hosted, open-source builds, named in all 3 of 3 answers on that question, and shows up for chatbot products and cheap builders too. Retool leans toward internal tools, named in 3 of 3 answers there, and 3 of 4 for top builders in 2026. Head-to-head, Retool edges ahead in 5 questions, Dify in 3, with 12 ties.
Head to head
| metric | Dify | Retool |
|---|---|---|
| score | 7 | 8 |
| questions won | 6 | 7 |
By assistant
Dify
| assistant | score | named in, this week | usual spot, this week |
|---|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT | 10 | 10% of answers | #1.0 |
| Claude | 12 | 30% of answers | #11.5 |
| Gemini | not sampled this week | ||
| Perplexity | 3 | 5% of answers | #4.0 |
Retool
| assistant | score | named in, this week | usual spot, this week |
|---|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT | 5 | 5% of answers | #1.0 |
| Claude | 12 | 30% of answers | #11.0 |
| Gemini | not sampled this week | ||
| Perplexity | 9 | 15% of answers | #5.7 |
Where they differ
Only Dify gets named for
- What's the best open-source AI app builder I can self-host?
- What's the best AI app builder for building an AI chatbot product?
- What are the best free or cheap AI app builders?
Only Retool gets named for
- Which AI builder is best for internal tools and dashboards?
- Which AI app builder makes the most production-ready apps?
- What's the best AI app builder for a solo founder?
- What's the best AI tool to build a full web app from a prompt?
More comparisons
Not sold on either?
Scores count how often each assistant names a product, weighted by position. How the score works · Full AI app builders leaderboard