What is Windmill used for?

Windmill is listed as a Developer Tools tool on TiloBox. Review the overview, features, and official documentation on this page to decide whether it solves your specific workflow.

How do I get started with Windmill?

Start with the project's GitHub repository and official website for supported installation and deployment instructions. Test the setup with representative data or a small project before rolling it out more widely.

What license does Windmill use?

Windmill is listed under the AGPL-3.0 license. Read the complete license text and the project's notices before using, modifying, or distributing the software.

Is Windmill ready for production use?

Production readiness depends on your requirements. Review maintenance activity, security practices, documentation, backup and upgrade procedures, and compatibility with your stack; then validate it in a non-production environment.

Is Windmill an alternative to Zapier?

Windmill is listed as an alternative to Zapier. Compare the core workflow, deployment model, integrations, and licensing against your must-have requirements before switching.

Developer Tools Alternative to Zapier Alternative to Retool Alternative to Airflow Alternative to Temporal

Windmill

Turn scripts into workflows, UIs, and scheduled jobs. Open-source alternative to Retool and Temporal.

View on GitHub Visit website

LicenseAGPL-3.0

GitHub stars17.7k

Last commit1 weeks ago

Tags7 topics

Internal ToolsRustWorkflowsPythonDeveloper PlatformLow CodeTypescript

Overview

Why consider Windmill?

Windmill is an open-source developer platform that converts Python, TypeScript, Go, and SQL scripts into auto-generated web UIs, complex workflows, and scheduled jobs.

Guided learning

Learn Windmill by building

Practical setup notes, real use cases, and copy-ready examples in one focused guide.

3 min read 10 sections

In this guide10 sections

What is Windmill?

Windmill is an open-source, high-performance developer platform built with Rust, Svelte, and PostgreSQL that turns scripts (written in Python, TypeScript/Deno/Bun, Go, Bash, Rust, and SQL) into internal web UIs, background workers, scheduled cron jobs, and distributed multi-step workflows.

It acts as an open-source alternative to proprietary internal tool builders like Retool and workflow orchestrators like Temporal, Retool Workflows, and Airplane. Windmill infers JSON schemas directly from script arguments, automatically generating interactive web forms and providing a drag-and-drop app builder with granular permission management.

Who Is It For?

Backend & DevOps Engineers: Converting operational maintenance scripts into secure, self-service web apps with audit logging for non-technical team members.
Data Engineering Teams: Orchestrating complex ETL pipelines and database transformations across Python, SQL, and external APIs.
Platform Teams: Building customized internal administrative portals without writing boilerplate frontend code or API plumbing.

Key Features

Multi-language script execution: Native runtime support for Python, TypeScript (Bun/Deno), Go, Bash, SQL, and Rust.
Automatic UI generation: Function signatures and type hints automatically generate input forms and validation logic.
Visual low-code UI builder: Drag-and-drop buttons, data tables, modals, and charts bound directly to runnable backend scripts.
Distributed workflow orchestration: Branching logic, parallel loops, approval gates, error retry policies, and suspend-resume hooks.
Enterprise secret management: Secure credential vaulting with role-based access control and workspace isolation.

Deploying Windmill with Docker Compose

yaml

1version: '3.7'

3services:

4 db:

5 image: postgres:15-alpine

6 container_name: windmill_db

7 restart: unless-stopped

8 volumes:

9 - ./db_data:/var/lib/postgresql/data

10 environment:

11 - POSTGRES_PASSWORD=secure_windmill_db_pass

12 - POSTGRES_USER=windmill

13 - POSTGRES_DB=windmill

15 windmill_server:

16 image: ghcr.io/windmill-labs/windmill:latest

17 container_name: windmill_server

18 restart: unless-stopped

19 ports:

20 - "8000:8000"

21 environment:

22 - DATABASE_URL=postgres://windmill:secure_windmill_db_pass@db:5432/windmill

23 - MODE=server

24 depends_on:

25 - db

27 windmill_worker:

28 image: ghcr.io/windmill-labs/windmill:latest

29 container_name: windmill_worker

30 restart: unless-stopped

31 environment:

32 - DATABASE_URL=postgres://windmill:secure_windmill_db_pass@db:5432/windmill

33 - MODE=worker

34 - WORKER_GROUP=default

35 depends_on:

36 - db

Start the stack:

bash

1docker compose up -d

Open http://localhost:8000 in your browser, log in with default credentials admin@windmill.dev / changeme, and immediately set a secure password.

Practical Use Cases

1. Self-Service Customer Refund Portal

A backend engineer writes a 20-line Python script connecting to Stripe API; Windmill auto-generates a web form that customer support agents use to issue refunds with mandatory supervisor approval steps.

2. Multi-Step Data Ingestion Flow

A data team builds an automated pipeline that queries PostgreSQL, runs AI text embedding with a Python script, and uploads structured vectors into Qdrant every night at 2:00 AM.

3. Incident Remediation Playbooks

A DevOps team builds emergency playbooks (e.g. "Restart Kubernetes Ingress", "Flush Redis Cache") with approval steps and one-click execution from mobile browsers.

Troubleshooting and Limitations

Worker Group Scaling: Heavy data processing jobs should be assigned to dedicated worker groups (WORKER_GROUP=native) to prevent blocking interactive UI script executions.
Python / Node Package Caching: Windmill caches PyPI and NPM dependencies automatically; configure persistent worker volume mounts to avoid re-downloading packages across container restarts.

Official Resources

Official Website: https://www.windmill.dev
GitHub Repository: https://github.com/windmill-labs/windmill
Documentation: https://www.windmill.dev/docs

Related tools

More options with a similar category or technology profile.

diskus

Minimal, fast alternative to du -sh written in Rust using multi-threaded directory traversal.

peco

Simplistic interactive filtering tool for Unix pipelines, process lists, and file trees.

Dapr CLI

Command-line tool for managing Dapr distributed application runtime environments and sidecars.

Freeze

Generate beautiful image screenshots and SVGs of code snippets and terminal outputs.