Run your business with the world’s leading business apps marketplace.

What is AppExchange? Which enterprise apps are right for me? These are the questions we hear a lot, and you’ll find the answers below. If you have others, please don’t hesitate to ask the community. We’re here to help.

AppExchange is the world’s leading business app marketplace. AppExchange apps are customized for Salesforce and extend Salesforce to every department and every industry. It’s a proven ecosystem of apps with millions of installs and thousands of customer reviews to help you find the best match for your business. And AppExchange is more than business apps. You can also find components, consulting partners, and developers to help you extend the power of Salesforce and run your business with apps.

Here are five steps for getting started on AppExchange.

  1. Define success: Make a roadmap that sets your goals for both long- and short-term success. Do you have a budget for paid apps or do you need to start with free apps?
  2. Use search and filters: Once you know your goals and your budget, the AppExchange site's search field, top-of-page filters, and navigation tools on the left can help you narrow your search.
  3. Read reviews: With over 50,000 user reviews, it's easy to get feedback from other users to help inform your decision.
  4. Try before you buy: Free trials are a great way to help you evaluate your next app. Use a Salesforce sandbox to mimic your production environment and see how the app will perform in your environment.
  5. Get to know your community: There are more than 14 million members in the Salesforce community, including hundreds of dedicated MVPs and customers who can share their knowledge and expertise.

Before installing an AppExchange app into your production instance of Salesforce, it’s important that you verify the requirements and test the functionality of the app listing. It's recommended that you take the steps below before installing a listed app to your production organization.

  1. Check edition compatibility: Verify that the custom app that you want to download only includes components that are compatible with your Salesforce Edition.
  2. Check external services: If the custom app you wish to download has a reference to an external service, make sure you have access to that service. An example is an app that has links to Google Maps for account management. Access to Google Maps would be required for this service to work.
  3. Test drive: Most apps will have test drives available for use. As an admin or read-only user, you can take a test drive of the desired app before installing to review the core functionality.
  4. Installation into Developer Edition or Sandbox: Before installing the desired app into your production organization, it’s recommended that you first install the app into either a Developer Edition org or a Sandbox Edition org. Further testing the app in either of these environments will allow you to test the app beyond the constraints of a read-only user. Then you'll be able to create, edit, and delete records within this newly installed app. None of these actions are available within a test drive. You can sign up for a free Development environment here.
  5. If you are satisfied with the functionality of the desired app, you can install it into your production organization.

During the installation process, you'll be given the option of making the app available to all users, some users, or just admins. If you make the app only visible to admins, you can make it available to other profiles later.

No. You have limits on the number of custom tabs and objects, but not the number of apps.

Yes, AppExchange has more than 300 Salesforce1 mobile-ready apps. Just look for the Salesforce1 Mobile sash on AppExchange. In addition, some partners offer custom mobile solutions.

You can learn more about becoming an AppExchange partner on the Partner Community. Looking for further resources? The Partner Community for App Vendors is designed to help commercial app developers (ISV, OEM, Channel) through the lifecycle of building your app and your business.

There are lots of resources available to help you find the best apps. AppExchange has more than 50,000 reviews that can guide you to apps that have worked well for your peers. The All About AppExchange Apps group in the Success Community is a great resouce for connecting you to peers. You can also visit our content library for advice by department, industry, and company size.

When you go to AppExchange, click on "Free" on the left menu. Or you can use the filters on the top of the page to filter any category by free apps.

Salesforce Labs apps are developed by Salesforce employees. They are always free and are usually unmanaged packages. Visit the Salesforce Labs collection.

Anyone can browse and explore AppExchange demos and test drives. Salesforce administrators and users with the “Download AppExchange packages” permission can install AppExchange apps.

Yes. On AppExchange, we offer Private AppExchange, which lets you distribute apps within a single org. We also offer AppExchange Store Builder, which lets you build your own marketplace to distribute apps to partners, customers, and employees across multiple orgs.
All AppExchange apps go through a qualitative and quantitative review process to ensure applications meet a set of security standards and best practices. Specific requirements for each application will vary depending on platform architecture, and other factors.

Apps on AppExchange are distributed in managed or unmanaged packages. Packages are containers that hold the code and metadata associated with apps or components. Managed packages are maintained by the app provider and can be upgraded by the customer. Unmanaged packages are templates where the underlying code can be seen and changed but not upgraded. Package type is listed on the Details tab of an AppExchange listing.

To list an app publicly on AppExchange, the app must pass a security review. If a managed package passes the review, any custom apps, tabs, and objects it uses won’t count against the related limits in a customer’s organization. Additionally, a managed package that passes the review will not count against the contractual license limits of a customer’s organization. However, other limits — such as limits to the number of custom fields on an object — still apply. If the package is unmanaged, any resources it uses will count against the related limits in a customer's organization, regardless of whether it passes the security review.

Lightning Components are customizable, responsive building blocks for making apps and pages. Components contain all of the code they need to run, so you can reuse them in other apps and pages. Kickstart your app building process with an out-of-the-box set of Components built by Salesforce, build your own custom Components for unique uses, and find a powerful array of Components built by Salesforce partners, available on AppExchange.

Sign up for AppExchange communications, including weekly and monthly emails highlighting new and free apps, as well as AppExchange best practices and tips for extending Salesforce to every department.

 
 

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