A spreadsheet calculates. A base structures. Trouble starts the day a spreadsheet is asked to carry a process shared by several people.
Almost every tracker starts in a spreadsheet, and rightly so: nothing is faster for laying out an idea. The drift is gradual and shows in three signs. One column holds both dates and free text. A formula slipped by a row six weeks ago and nobody noticed. Two people each keep their own copy, because working together in one sheet always ends up overwriting something. At that point the file is no longer calculating: it is carrying a process, a use it was never designed for.
The questions to ask any tool, ours included. The answer given here is Thingsform's.
The field type, set once and for all: a date stays a date, a closed list stays closed. The three spellings of the same site, which make comparison impossible and only surface at the first review, become structurally impossible to enter.
Through a form, including one filled in the field with no signal. Nobody types straight into the table, which removes at a stroke the most common class of incident: the overwritten row, the shifted column, the accidentally deleted formula.
Base is read natively by the CRM, ThingsMail and Documents, inside the same account. The shared file stops being exported to three destinations that then each drift apart, with nobody knowing which one is authoritative.
Distinct views and interfaces sit on the same table: a field worker sees three useful columns, a manager sees the full picture. Nobody duplicates the sheet to build themselves a readable version, which is the usual origin of diverging copies.
The Base module is included from the Pro plan. The forms that feed it are available from the free plan: start there, because half the benefit already comes from typed entry and from nobody writing into the table any more.
Often, no. Here are both cases, in the honest order.
Yes, by file import. Use the opportunity to clean up mixed columns: it is the only moment when that work is simple, and it decides whether your data will be usable in six months or merely archived.
Partly, and that is the trade-off to accept: a typed structure constrains entry. The gain shows at the first review, when the figures compare without prior cleanup. For free-form calculation, keep a spreadsheet alongside — the two uses do not replace each other.
With the form that feeds the file, before the table itself. Stopping direct entry into the sheet already fixes most incidents, and it can be set up on the free plan, so with no commitment and no major decision.
We describe neither the features nor the pricing of another vendor, which change without notice to us. This page sets out the criteria to examine and Thingsform's answers. For the other tool, its current terms are authoritative.
Google Sheets is a trademark of its publisher, cited here for reference. This page does not describe its features or pricing, which change over time: refer to its current terms.
The right way to decide
Rebuild your hardest form on the free plan, and have it filled in the field. Half a day is enough, and the answer stops being a matter of opinion.