When you are building a multi-tenant Software as a Service (SAAS) platform, you should be spending most of your energy on the actual product rather than the billing, accounts, user management, provisioning and the rest. If you identify a good SaaS framework, a lot of the external functionality is already in the framework.
There are a few good frameworks that can be used for this very purpose:
Top 4 SaaS Application Frameworks for New Applications
1. Spark
Laravel Spark provides the framework for a SAAS site for a flat rate of just under $100. The framework includes services like subscriptions, billing, and invoices that are tedious to code. That doesn’t mean that it isn’t versatile, however. How you chose to bill users is incredibly flexible.
Laravel is based in JavaScript, a powerful and versatile coding language. As a result, it’s easy for users to go in and change code – even code that is part of the framework itself. They also boast advanced user interface making it easy for early-stage coders to make the most of the framework despite its many advanced features.
Spark is great for websites that need to manage a lot of users. Tasks that are important for managing users including profile images and security concerns like passwords and two-factor identification are built into the framework from the beginning.
Spark is also great with languages (not coding languages, spoken languages). Unfortunately, Laravel doesn’t provide an easily accessible list of supported languages. You might still not be able to have your website translated into Romani, but this feature is definitely something for organizations with an international footprint to look into.
2. Icarus
Armia also offers a framework called Icarus. The Icarus framework includes many basic features as well as billing, subscription, and API integration. That makes it easy for elements in the framework to work together with other files and device systems and hardware for a more cohesive and user-friendly experience even in advanced applications.
Many elements of user management are also automated so that users can focus on what their site does rather than how their site does it. Those elements that aren’t automated are made more manageable by powerful and friendly CMS modules. Modules for content and users mean that no matter what kind of service you offer to how many people, it can now be easily managed.
The one potentially big selling point for Icarus is the lightweight MVC. A Lightweight MVC means that engineering the website beyond the basic framework will be easier and will give the coder a higher degree of freedom than a clunkier MVC.
That is, provided your organization has a coder who is advanced enough to make good use of a lighter MVC. If you have a smaller or less experienced team, a lighter MVC might mean a more basic website that involves a bit more tinkering and you may be better off with a more restrictive but more defined framework.
The source code is available for download free of cost
3. Innomatic
Innomatic is an open source SAAS platform. It doesn’t offer many of the services offered by Laravel and Armia but what it does offer is scalability. The site claims that the platform uses single-tenant databases and multi-tenant code so that businesses of any size can use it. Innomatic predictably markets itself to startups that may have a smaller number of users.
Another great strength of the platform is how much consideration it puts into the frontend services. Innomatic’s framework includes a desktop that can be easily customized to fit your existing themes.
While it can be easy to overlook the importance of an attractive and user-friendly desktop, it can go a long way in attracting and retaining customers and clients.
One thing that you can see as a good thing or a bad thing about Innomatic is that the level of customer support that you receive is based on tiered payments.
That means that established organizations with experts coders can take advantage of the framework for less money. It also means that smaller and newer organizations with less expert coders may need to pay more money to make the most of the framework.
Innomatic can handle subscriptions, but some of the other important payment services will have to be manually coded by the user.
4. Magpie
Armia Systems offers another SAAS application framework called Magpie. Magpie is a MEAN framework, making it ideal for building dynamic websites. Dynamic websites are capable of hosting a wide variety of applications and file types.
Magpie also offers CRUD based API, so that all of the different file types can work together smoothly with each other and with other device systems and hardware.
It also makes it easy to manage and maintain large amounts of stored content. This makes Magpie perfect for more advanced projects or projects that require allowing interaction with varied content and tools.
Magpie also has a package installer that makes your website compatible with popular software packages for working with sites and services like Authorize.net and Amazon.
This is ideal for organizations that rely on other websites to do things like sell products, capitalize on add revenue, and conduct secure transactions.
While Magpie is particularly good for mobile or social applications, it’s also good for services like information technology and event registration.
What is the Best Framework for a New SAAS Application?
All of these SAAS application frameworks have fairly evenly distributed strengths and weaknesses. As a result, there isn’t really one “best” framework. The framework that is best for you depends on a number of factors.
What your organization needs from the framework, the kind of team that you have to work on it, and the budget that you are working with can all tip the scales in favor of one of these frameworks or the other.
To pick the best framework for you and your needs, don’t stop at this article. Visit the websites of the companies that we talked about and also read about some SaaS software examples.
Do your own research and contact their customer service representatives. Start a real conversation about what you need, what you expect from a provider, and what you can pay to see which ones can work with you and which ones will work for you.
If you are in the process of launching a new SaaS application, talk to our expert developers who created many multi-tenant applications
