# What you actually own when you leave Lovable

> The app you built on Lovable is code, a database, uploaded files and settings, and all of that can run on a machine you rent directly. What does not come with you is the credit balance: Lovable states credits are not refundable or redeemable for cash or any other value, and that in some cases remaining credits are deleted. So the product transfers and the prepaid balance does not.

Source: https://neurobird.com/lovable-migration/export-your-project/ | Neurobird | Updated 2026-08-28

Lock-in is one of those phrases that gets used to mean anything from a mild inconvenience to a hostage situation. It is worth being precise about which one this is, because the answer for Lovable is genuinely mixed: some of what you have is portable and some of it only exists inside the platform.

## What do you own when you leave Lovable?

      The app itself, and everything it is made of. Whatever you built by chatting to Lovable
      is, underneath the conversation, an ordinary web application: code, a database, uploaded
      files, configuration and a domain name. Nothing about those things is exotic, and nothing
      about them is inherently tied to one company's hosting.
      That is the reassuring half of the answer and it is worth saying loudly, because people
      convince themselves that an app built by chat is somehow not real software. It is real
      software. It was written in ordinary languages, it talks to an ordinary database, and it
      runs on an ordinary machine. The thing that was special was the way it got written, and
      that part has already happened.

      
## What does not come with you?

      The credit balance, and this is unambiguous:
      
> Credits aren't refundable or redeemable for cash or any other value.
> Lovable pricing page, source

      There is also a case in which what is left simply stops existing:
      
> In such cases, any remaining credits are deleted, unless otherwise required by the law.
> Lovable pricing page, source

      Prepaid balances almost always work this way and the terms state it in advance, so I am
      not going to call it a trap. But it does establish one useful fact about leaving: your
      credits are not an asset to be recovered or transferred. They are a right to ask this
      particular tool to do work, for a limited window. Anything left in the pool on the day you
      stop is a sunk cost, and the sensible thing is to spend down rather than to hold a balance
      you might not use.

      
## Why is a credit balance not portable?

      Because it is not money, and the platform says so in a second way too:
      
> The value of a credit and the rate at which they are consumed for a given action depend on your subscription plan and the feature used, and credits are not necessarily equal in value across different plans.
> Lovable pricing page, source

      A unit whose value depends on your plan and the feature you spend it on cannot be
      settled up in cash, because there is no exchange rate to settle at. It is a coupon that
      buys a variable amount. That works fine as long as you keep spending it, which is
      precisely the property that makes leaving feel expensive even when the app itself moves
      easily.
      | What you have | Comes with you? | Notes || The application code | Yes | Ordinary software, runs on an ordinary machine || Your database and its rows | Yes | Your users, orders and content are your data || Uploaded files | Yes | Images and documents move with the app || Your domain name | Yes | Registered to you, points wherever you say || The credit balance | No | Not refundable, not redeemable for cash or other value || The chat history that built it | Not the point | The output already exists as code |

      
## Is Lovable vendor lock-in?

      Partly, and the distinction matters. Lock-in in the hard sense means the thing you
      built cannot exist anywhere else, and that is not the situation here. Lock-in in the softer
      and more common sense means the cost of leaving is high enough that you keep not doing it,
      and that is closer to what actually happens.
      The friction is not one big wall. It is a set of small ones. The app runs where it was
      built, so nobody has ever had to make it run anywhere else. The hosting is bundled, so it
      never appeared as a separate decision. The database came with the platform, in Lovable's
      case a built-in backend called Cloud, so it was never chosen. And the balance you have
      already paid for evaporates if you stop, which is a quiet argument for staying that
      arrives every single month.

      
## What actually changes when the app is yours?

      Three things, and only one of them is about money. The bill becomes flat and
      predictable, so a busy month and a quiet month cost the same. The pricing risk goes away,
      because a change of terms at any one company stops being able to reprice your product.
      And the app stops having a single point of failure that you do not control.
      The third one is the one people underrate until it matters. An app that lives on a
      machine rented in your own name, with backups you can see, is a thing you can hand to
      another developer, sell with a business, or move to a different provider in an afternoon.
      An app that only exists inside one platform is worth exactly as much as that platform's
      continued goodwill toward your account.

      
## Does the app keep working after it moves?

      That is the actual job, and it is the reason to hire someone rather than the reason not
      to move. Moving code is easy. The parts that go wrong are the boring ones: moving a live
      database without losing rows, keeping the domain working with no gap in service, keeping
      the old copy running until the new one is proven, and finding out whether the backups are
      real before you need them rather than after.
      What that looks like from your side is short. You send a link. I read what the app
      actually uses and send back a fixed price. The app, its database, its files and its domain
      get set up on a machine rented in your own name, the old copy stays up until the new one
      is verified, and then the address moves across. You click something once near the end.

      
## What does it cost to actually own it?

      A fixed $500 for a straightforward app, which covers the app and database moved, the
      domain working with the padlock, a security layer in front, automatic backups, and a short
      plain English guide to what you now have. Apps with more moving parts start at $1,000,
      quoted after reading rather than guessing. After that the machine costs roughly $4 to $20
      a month, paid to the provider, in your name, on your card.
      
**DigitalOcean lists Droplets from $4.00 a month and Amazon Lightsail from $5 a month for 0.5 GB memory, 20 GB SSD and 1 TB of transfer, both at a flat rate that does not change with usage. DigitalOcean Droplet pricing**

      None of this is an argument against having used Lovable. Building by chat is a genuinely
      good way to get a first version of something in front of people, and plenty of apps worth
      moving would never have existed otherwise. The argument is only about the phase after the
      building stops, when what you want is not a tool that can change your app quickly but a
      quiet, cheap, boring arrangement that keeps it running and belongs to you.

## Questions

### Can you export a project from Lovable?

The app you built is ordinary software: code, a database, uploaded files, configuration and a domain. All of those are yours and can run on a machine you rent directly. What does not transfer is the credit balance, which Lovable states is not refundable or redeemable for cash or any other value.

### Do I own the code Lovable wrote for me?

The application is real software written in ordinary languages, talking to an ordinary database, and it can run on an ordinary server. The way it was written was unusual, but the thing that was written is not, and it does not depend on staying where it was built.

### What happens to my Lovable credits if I cancel?

They do not convert to anything. Lovable's pricing page states that credits are not refundable or redeemable for cash or any other value, and that in some cases any remaining credits are deleted unless otherwise required by the law. Spending a balance down is wiser than holding one.

### Is Lovable vendor lock-in?

Not in the hard sense, because the app can exist elsewhere. It is lock-in in the softer sense: hosting is bundled, the database came with the platform, nobody has ever had to make the app run anywhere else, and an expiring prepaid balance quietly argues for staying every month.

### What does it cost to move a Lovable app to my own server?

A fixed $500 for a straightforward app, covering the app and database, the domain with a working padlock, a security layer, automatic backups and a handover guide. Apps with more moving parts start at $1,000. The machine itself is then about $4 to $20 a month paid directly to the provider.

## Get a fixed price

Send the link to your app at https://neurobird.com/lovable-migration/#start . You get a list of what it uses and a fixed migration price back within one business day.