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What is Bellini

Overview

Bellini is a low-code application development tool (LCAD) that empowers frontend developers to build custom web and mobile apps, dashboards, and reports. You build applications by dropping UI components onto a canvas and binding them to data from REST or GraphQL APIs — no boilerplate, no complex setup. Bellini is designed to accelerate the delivery of high-impact, data-driven solutions across any business function.

What You Will Learn

  • What Bellini is and what problems it solves
  • What kinds of applications you can build with Bellini
  • How Bellini's visual development model works
  • How Bellini connects to your data sources
  • How to extend Bellini with custom code and integrations
  • How Bellini handles deployment, security, and the development lifecycle

When To Use This

Use this page when you are evaluating Bellini for the first time and want to understand what it is, what it can do, and whether it fits your use case. Use Bellini Concepts once you are ready to understand the platform's building blocks in detail.

Prerequisites

No prerequisites required. This page is intended for anyone evaluating or getting started with Bellini.

What You Can Build with Bellini

Bellini is purpose-built for three categories of deliverables, all from a single platform.

Custom Enterprise Applications

Bellini enables developers to build custom enterprise applications that streamline complex processes and enhance user experiences. Create unified interfaces that consolidate diverse data sources, provide sleek UIs for databases, and modernize legacy applications with minimal effort. Bellini is the tool of choice for developers aiming to deliver high-impact, user-centric solutions across various business functions.

Common use cases:

  • Internal tools and admin panels
  • Customer portals and self-service interfaces
  • Workflow automation frontends
  • Legacy application modernization

Dashboards

Bellini makes it straightforward to build dashboards that aggregate data from multiple sources into cohesive, interactive visuals. Use built-in chart, table, calendar, and map components to surface real-time insights, and bind them directly to your APIs so data stays current without manual refresh logic.

Reports

Build reports with dynamic, user-interactive elements that pull live data from your APIs and databases. Bellini's data visualization components give you everything you need to present data clearly — and because components bind directly to data sources, reports always reflect the latest state.

For more, see Types of Apps You Can Create.

How Bellini Works

Bellini follows a simple, visual development model. You build application pages by dragging and dropping components onto a canvas. Bellini provides 27 built-in UI components and 9 layout components out of the box — covering forms, tables, charts, navigation, and more. All components can be customized using their properties or CSS. See Bellini Built-in Components for the full component list.

Connecting components to data is equally straightforward. You configure a REST or GraphQL API by providing its schema (OpenAPI or GraphQL), and Bellini automatically generates a typed service with a function for each operation. You then bind those functions directly to component properties — no manual fetch logic required.

Data Integration

Bellini connects to virtually any data source your organization uses.

APIs and SaaS Platforms

Bellini integrates with any service that exposes a REST or GraphQL API — including internal organizational APIs, third-party platforms, and SaaS applications. You provide the OpenAPI or GraphQL schema, and Bellini handles the rest. See REST APIs and GraphQL APIs.

Databases

In collaboration with Martini, Bellini offers connectivity to SQL, NoSQL, and data warehouse databases. Martini exposes these databases as REST or GraphQL endpoints with access controls, which Bellini components bind to directly. See Database Access.

Extensibility

When the built-in components and bindings are not enough, Bellini lets you go further:

  • Custom components — Build reusable components using standard HTML, CSS, and JavaScript with configurable exported properties.
  • Custom functions — Write JavaScript functions to transform, filter, or aggregate data as it flows into or out of any component.
  • External libraries — Integrate any JavaScript or CSS library to extend the UI and behavior of your applications.
  • Martini integration — Add advanced server-side logic via Martini, a separate integration platform that exposes databases and workflows as secure REST or GraphQL APIs consumable by Bellini.

Web and Mobile Deployment

Bellini applications can be deployed as responsive web apps or exported as native mobile apps — from the same codebase.

Responsive Web Applications

Deploy responsive web applications with a single click. Web apps are hosted by Bellini on AWS CDN infrastructure, ensuring fast and reliable global distribution. See Deploying Web Apps.

Native Mobile Applications

Export your Bellini application as a native iOS or Android app. Bellini's components provide access to native mobile functionality, enabling you to deliver full-featured mobile experiences. See Mobile Applications.

Security and Access Management

Bellini provides flexible, enterprise-grade authentication and authorization for your applications.

  • Enable or disable authentication per application.
  • Public and private pages — control which pages require login.
  • OAuth 2.0 scope-based access — restrict pages to users with matching token scopes.
  • Identity provider integration — connect to your existing SAML-compatible directory server.
  • Built-in user directory — use Bellini's own user management when no external IdP is needed.

For more, see Authentication & Authorization.

Development Lifecycle

Bellini provides integrated tools that support the full development lifecycle — from coding to release.

  • Git integration — Built-in support for Bitbucket, GitHub, and GitLab. Version-control applications and components, collaborate with your team, and clone repositories directly within Bellini. See Source Control.
  • Multiple environments — Define and manage UAT, Staging, Production, or any custom environment to support structured testing and release workflows. See Managing Environments.
  • Automated deployment pipelines — Bellini exposes endpoints that integrate with your CI/CD pipelines for automated deployments from a Git repository to any environment. See Automated Deployment.
  • Developer Console — Monitor messages, filter errors by component, and trace issues to their source without leaving the platform. See Developer Console.
  • AI-assisted development — AI code completion in editors, contextual Ask AI help anywhere in the platform, and an AI Chat interface for generating applications and components from natural language. See AI Features.

Helpful Resources