How do you know which SaaS tools are worth replacing with a custom build?
Four questions reveal whether a SaaS is worth replacing: Does your team use fewer than half its features? Is the cost more than £100/month for your whole team? Is there no deep integration into your payment rail or accounting system? And can your data be exported cleanly? If all four are yes, you have a strong candidate.
Strong replacement candidates
One main job, clear data model, no proprietary algorithm.
The best candidates do one thing well: schedule jobs, track time, manage field engineers, capture inspection data, or book appointments. Their entire feature set is a database, a form builder, and a dashboard — possibly with a mobile app. Examples: Joblogic, WorkPal, Clockify, InventoryBase, Commusoft, Sign In App, Dashpivot.
Poor replacement candidates
Deeply embedded, compliance-critical, or proprietary-network tools are not worth the migration risk.
Do not replace payment rails (Stripe, GoCardless), email infrastructure, accounting systems (Xero, Sage), or tools with 20+ integrations your whole stack depends on. Do not replace tools where the vendor's data network is the value (job boards, LinkedIn Recruiter). And do not replace tools where regulatory certification is tied to the vendor.
Related questions
A simple contact and deal tracker is an excellent candidate. A deeply integrated CRM with 20+ plugins, marketing automation, email sync, and territory management is probably not. We tell you honestly in discovery.
Sources
- Retool 2026: ~35% of organisations have replaced a SaaS with custom software
- Zylo 2026 SaaS Management Index: ~51% of SaaS licences unused
- Forbes: "If a product is essentially 'a simple database plus a form plus a dashboard,' customers will ask why they are paying recurring fees."
See what your SaaS spend looks like with a flat annual fee.
Enter your seat count and current monthly price. The calculator uses real build-cost estimates and shows you the five-year crossover.