Coda vs Quadratic

Coda is a document platform where docs behave like apps. Founded by former YouTube executive Shishir Mehrotra and based in San Francisco, it combines pages of text with tables that act as real databases, with formulas, views, buttons and automations. Grammarly acquired Coda in late 2024, and Mehrotra became Grammarly's CEO.

Packs connect a doc to Slack, Jira, Google Calendar, GitHub and hundreds of other services so it can read and write live data, and automations run on schedules or row changes. Teams use Coda for OKRs, meeting rituals, product roadmaps, hiring trackers and lightweight internal tools. The pricing model is unusual: only Doc Makers, the people who create docs, pay, while editors and viewers are free. The free plan covers personal use with doc size limits; Pro and Business (formerly Team) add unlimited doc size, version history, cross-doc sync and unlimited automations, and Enterprise adds SSO and audit features. Coda AI handles summaries, drafting and filling table columns.

Coda fits operations and product teams with a few power users who build structured docs for everyone else. Complex docs can become hard to maintain, the template ecosystem is smaller and mobile apps lag the desktop. Notion is easier to adopt and has a much larger template library, Airtable is stronger as a pure database, and Confluence suits engineering-heavy wikis.

Quadratic is a browser-based spreadsheet from a US startup in Boulder, Colorado, backed by a $5.6M seed round led by GV in 2024. It looks like a familiar grid, but any cell can hold Python, SQL or JavaScript alongside normal formulas, which makes it a bridge between Excel and a data notebook. The app runs on WebAssembly and WebGL, so large sheets stay responsive in the browser.

You can connect databases such as Postgres, MySQL, Snowflake, BigQuery, Supabase and Neon, import CSV, Excel, Parquet and PDF files, and pull from QuickBooks, Mixpanel or Plaid. The built-in AI writes formulas, code and charts from plain-language requests, explains existing cells, and runs agents for auditing, fixing errors and enriching data; an MCP server lets Claude, ChatGPT or Cursor read and write sheets. The free plan has limited AI and connections, Pro and Business are priced per user with monthly AI credits, and Enterprise adds SSO and self-hosting.

Quadratic fits analysts and technical teams who outgrow spreadsheets but do not want a full notebook or BI stack. Equals is the closer pick for finance teams wanting a classic spreadsheet with live data, Grist suits structured relational data, and Airtable is better as an operational database for non-technical teams.

The vendor says sheets handle up to 100 million rows. Because AI usage comes from a monthly credit allowance, heavy users should check whether Business with on-demand credits is cheaper than several Pro seats.