Automation workflows have accelerated backend development and simplified API sharing for teams
What is our primary use case?
I preferably work in Python backend use cases. As a Data Engineer, I use FastAPI and build my code in Python. To create an API for front-end developers, I use ngrok.
I made an automation platform for the finance team in our office, where I serve as a backend engineer. Since I work in the data field, I use backend technologies. The backend code is entirely written in FastAPI. I need to give the API to front-end developers to embed in their code. Since the project is completely developed locally, I used ngrok for obtaining the APIs.
I used ngrok to get APIs. I built three modules: the user module, customer module, and finance module. For each module, I used separate APIs. Taking the ngrok URL as a constant and adding the other methods like POST and GET and whatever API I need to call, I used ngrok for my end-to-end backend.
What is most valuable?
The free tier of ngrok is one of the best features it offers. Initially, I used the free tier, and it gave me more tokens. Even when my API received many hits from the front end, I was able to use this ngrok backend API without any problems.
ngrok is very reliable.
When building our internal automation forms, we use ngrok for the backend part. It provides an easy step and is beginner-friendly, allowing us to integrate easily and test. Testing it in Postman and other tools is also very easy.
I was able to easily give my ngrok URL to the front-end developer. Development of APIs using ngrok is very fast.
Before going into the production environment, this ngrok free tier was actually saving our time and benefiting employees.
What needs improvement?
ngrok can be improved in the following way: when we unexpectedly close the laptop or sometimes close the page where we are running ngrok, that can be improved. The time limit for this can be extended.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using ngrok for more than a year.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
ngrok is also scalable. I was able to use it in many other use cases as well. It is good for scalability.
How are customer service and support?
The customer support is friendly and we were able to get our solution.
How would you rate customer service and support?
How was the initial setup?
The pricing was reasonable and the initial setup and licensing were also good.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The pricing was reasonable and the initial setup and licensing were also good.
Testing web apps externally has become faster and saves time and resources
What is our primary use case?
My main use case for ngrok is that when I boot up a server and want to test it non-locally, I can use ngrok to do that.
I created a Flask application and I wanted to make sure that it was performing in the way that I wanted it to, so I used ngrok to test it without booting up everything in production or development.
That's the only use case I have with ngrok; it's just good for testing, making sure the application that I've developed works in a quick manner, rather than having resources to boot it up.
How has it helped my organization?
ngrok positively impacts my organization by making deploying a lot easier, catching problems sooner without costing resources, as you can deploy it externally without it being external and see the problems to fix them fast.
What is most valuable?
The best features ngrok offers include creating an anywhere IP that's localhost but not localhost at the same time, allowing you to boot it up and see what your application is doing.
That quick setup with ngrok saved me money by not having the resources to boot up a development server or production, making sure my code is working in a dev server that is exposed in a way.
ngrok saves weeks of development time, as I am able to catch problems and fix them without deploying resources in dev servers or production servers.
What needs improvement?
I cannot think of anything for ngrok improvements, but knowing that you are able to deploy something externally without it being external is just the main reason I use it, and that is a game changer for sure.
Everything seems pretty simple with ngrok, and I love the documentation since it is really easy to use.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using ngrok for a year.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I am not sure about ngrok's scalability, as I just use it locally, so I do not know if it scales well or not.
How are customer service and support?
I have not reached out for customer support, but I have noticed the documentation is very well documented; I was able to find answers on their website with no issues.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I did not previously use a different solution for my needs.
What was our ROI?
I have seen a return on investment with ngrok, as I saved time and can spot problems faster instead of spending that time trying to get code to work.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
I have not done any costs for ngrok; it is just locally.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
ngrok was my first pick, as it was the only thing I could find that could do what I wanted it to do.
What other advice do I have?
My advice for others looking into using ngrok is that if you want to develop something and be efficient, you should use ngrok to deploy and check for issues externally. I would rate my overall experience with ngrok as a 10.
Good service, HORRIBLE customer service (LLMs basically), not transparent pricing
What do you like best about the product?
The actual service is good and easy to set up. The not transparent pricing policy and completely unacceptable support kills the product.
What do you dislike about the product?
The pricing mechanism is convoluted and not transparent at all.
What makes things worse is that when you eventually find out (always the hard way, without a warning beforehand) that you need to purchase an additional feature your new feature will be activated at the NEXT INVOICE cycle (i.e. next month). Just imagine having a client demo next day, for example...
The customer service is a true disgrace. I actually tend to believe that there is no human involved. Their replies are misleading (but always towards the direction of "buy the next subscription level and your problem will be solved" - surprise, surprise it then turns out that did not solve the issue), they do not seem to have the right context (they do not know their own pricing mechanism) and they do not seem to take into account urgency at all.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Using it for quickly sharing prototypes with other teams and hosting demos with clients
Best solution for POC
What do you like best about the product?
Ability to quickly tunnel local host to the internet allows for easy showcase of different proof of concepts
What do you dislike about the product?
The support for routing to custom domains is very complex
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Sometimes we are not sure if a solution is viable or not. So, we have to make proof of concepts for it that needed to be deployed on cloud solutions or we had to do complex network management for exposing ports, ngrok eases this in one line.
Great Tool For Local Hosting
What do you like best about the product?
Great tool for local hosts and can be used from anywhere. we can make our local pc like a host without any cloud services.
What do you dislike about the product?
nothing. everything is working perfectly.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Local Hosting
Networking
[AVOID] No support and the you cannot remove credit card or cancel subscriptions on your own
What do you like best about the product?
free version is okay, quick and easy to use, but of course, you are limited with the bandwidth and the ugly URLs.
What do you dislike about the product?
they have a predatory system. this is one of those companies where you cannot remove a credit card or cancel a susbscription even 2 hours after signing up. i signed up thinking custom domains would work, but it didn't. within 2 hours ngrok was contacted for a refund and no one communicated. they seem to want to keep you trapped. please avod this company and do not pay for upgraded services.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
not solving a problem, it created more problems
Experienced the ngrok with the handson experience with the help of credits
What do you like best about the product?
Undeployed can easily deploy with the help of the ngrok software application.
What do you dislike about the product?
If the cost of the service is slightly higher, then I will be very full to deploy the small project. they should include students offering those kinds of plans the it will helpful for easy deployment.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Actually, I am a final year student, I want to showcase my project to the interviewer during the interview if it is deployed it will give extra impression to deploy my small and tiny projects i had been using the ngrok website,
Makes local development easy
What do you like best about the product?
Been using Ngrok for around 4-5 years now. The set-up is so easy, that makes for a quick tool to use, with very little thought, when remote access is needed for either reviewing or for 3rd party webhooks, etc.
What do you dislike about the product?
Sometimes things do go wrong, and when they go wrong, they're quite hard to debug. Also, it seems that if you are serving a full web page, there can be time-outs if there are too many requests, even with a paid plan. However, this is definitely in the 1% of the time
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
When developing payment gateways, we needed a system that we have local webhooks for payment responses. This tool solved issue and gave us this ability with very little effort
Recommendations to others considering the product:
My recommendation would be to set up a config file from the get-go. It's not hard, but it makes setting up tunnels much much easier
A classic...
What do you like best about the product?
Command line, embeddable. Ease of integration.
What do you dislike about the product?
Scattered a bit, would rather have one control screen.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
Provide access to web app running in dev mode on my local machine.
Ngrok Local System Host tool
What do you like best about the product?
We can host our local pc as a Host. That's the best thing about this. Without AWS or GCP account, I can host this.
What do you dislike about the product?
As I have started exploring this tool so right now, I don't have anything which I wouldn't say I dislike.
What problems is the product solving and how is that benefiting you?
I was doing POC for the client, and i was able to show him that POC on my ngrok host and the same POC can be accessed by the client on his pc; that's the best part.
