In Lovable, you get your code out by connecting the project to GitHub, the standard online place where code is stored. That works on every plan, including the free one, and paid plans can also download a zip. In Base44, both routes need a paid plan, and both sit in the top bar of the editor. On either platform, what comes out is the code: screens, pages, logic. What does not come out on its own is everything the code talks to: the rows in your database, your users’ accounts, their uploaded files, your secret keys, and the backend that runs all of it. You own the code on both. The app is more than the code.
Where the export lives in Lovable
A workspace admin or owner opens Workspace settings, then Git, then GitHub, and adds a connection. Lovable creates a repository for the project on your GitHub account. Changes made in Lovable sync to GitHub, and changes pushed to the active branch sync back. Each project connects to one repository, and Lovable asks you not to delete, rename or transfer it, because any of those breaks the sync. Disconnecting leaves the repository on GitHub, but syncing stops, and reconnecting creates a fresh one.
On paid plans there is also a Download codebase button, in Project settings under Git and in the code editor, which saves the project as a zip.
The repository holds your project’s code, including the migration files that define the database’s structure, and never the data inside the database. Lovable projects are standard web apps built with Vite and React, and they build to plain static files that any ordinary host can serve.
Where the export lives in Base44
Click Code in the top bar and the full file structure of your app opens. The GitHub icon next to it connects the app to a repository, and an Export project as ZIP icon at the top right of the code view downloads everything. Base44’s docs say both the zip and the GitHub connection need a paid plan. Sync is two-way: changes in Base44 are committed to the repository automatically, and local changes reach Base44 when you merge them into the branch named main.
The exported project is a standard React app built with Vite: a src folder for the frontend, an entities folder with one file per data model describing its fields (the shape of each table, not what is in it), and a functions folder for the backend functions. It depends on the Base44 SDK, a library that lets the exported code keep talking to Base44’s backend, and running it locally means installing the Base44 CLI, logging in and linking the copy to its app. Even the local version reaches back to Base44 for its data and logins.
In the app’s Dashboard, under Data, each table has an Export action that downloads a CSV.
What comes out, and what does not
| Lovable | Base44 | |
|---|---|---|
| The code | Yes: GitHub on any plan, zip on paid plans | Yes: GitHub or zip, paid plans only |
| Database structure | Yes, as migration files in the repository | Yes, as one schema file per entity |
| Database rows | A separate Cloud export, not the repository | A CSV per table from the Dashboard |
| User accounts | Passwords do not export usably | No export described in the docs |
| Uploaded files and secrets | Not in the export; a saved secret can never be viewed again | Secrets stay encrypted; no file export described |
| The backend itself | A managed Supabase project; no one-click move to your own | Database, logins and functions run on Base44; no self-hosting described |
Lovable’s docs say there is no one-click migration from its built-in backend to a Supabase project you own: you export the data, connect your own project, and rebuild the structure there. Base44’s backend is a NoSQL database, built-in login, Deno-based functions and hosting, all run by Base44, and the exported code is written to call it. On both, exported code keeps working only for as long as the backend it points at is still there.
Does Lovable or Base44 own your app?
No, and both say so in their terms. Lovable’s terms say that, as between you and Lovable, you own your Customer Data, including the applications and websites you build, and that you own the AI output generated for you. Base44’s terms say the customer owns all rights, title and interest in the code and applications the platform generates, to the extent such rights exist under applicable law, and that Base44 claims no ownership of Customer Data.
Two things sit beside that. First, both companies keep a broad license to use what you put into the platform, including for training their models. Lovable’s terms let you opt out at any time. Second, ownership is not the same as possession. Base44’s terms say it may delete all Customer Data and Generated Output at any time after an account ends, and that any export before then is at the customer’s risk. Owning code that only exists on someone else’s servers is a thin kind of owning. The GitHub copy is what makes it real.
The words “to the extent such rights exist” are there because copyright over AI-written code is unsettled law, for every AI builder. It is a lawyer’s question, not a reason to stay.
What taking it with you actually involves
The code is the easy half. Once it is in a repository you can run it on your own computer and host it anywhere that serves static files. The hard half is the backend. You have two choices: keep the app talking to the backend it was built on, which keeps costing, or replace it with services you own, which means moving the data, re-creating the logins, and re-wiring every screen that reads or writes. Deciding which, before you move, is what separates a clean exit from a half-moved app with two databases.
You can learn more, and get the full prompts and the decision tables, in our course, starting from You’ve Outgrown Lovable. The first lesson is free, no card.
In the next ten minutes: in Lovable, connect GitHub, whatever plan you are on, so a copy of your code exists outside Lovable tonight. In Base44, if you are on a paid plan, download the zip and export a CSV of each table. If you are not, that is the price of leaving, worth knowing now. Then open the export and read the folder names, not the code, and write down what came out and what did not. That second list is your moving plan.