The Complete Guide to Scribe Alternatives (With Honest Pros and Cons)

Table of Contents

• Why You Should Trust This Guide
• Just Want the Highlights?
• 1) Trails (The One We Built)
• 2) Tango
• 3) Whale
• 4) Trainual
• 5) Folge
• 6) HubSpot Guide Creator
• 7) Floik
• 8) Guidde
• Still Deciding? Here’s a Quick Feature-by-Feature Breakdown
• Final Thoughts

You know the drill: someone on your team pings you with, “Hey, how do I do this again?” Next thing you know, you're sharing your screen or typing out a long Slack message that eats up your afternoon. And just when you think it's handled, the same question comes back a week later.

Sound familiar?

We’ve been there too. As our team grew, we kept running into the same roadblocks. Unclear processes, scattered documentation, and repeated training that drained time from everyone. That’s what led us to dive deep into this space and research existing solutions. Some were clunky. Some were overbuilt. None quite fit.

So we built our own: Trails—a simple, polished step-by-step guide builder that makes documentation fast and actually usable.

But this guide isn’t just about Trails. It’s a deep, honest look at all the major Scribe alternatives we explored—what they’re good at, where they struggle, and which one might be right for you.

Here’s what I’ll cover:

• 8 tools you can use instead of Scribe, depending on your priorities
• How each one compares to Scribe
• Our take on their tool

So if Scribe isn’t quite working for your team—or you're just curious what else is out there—this should help you make the right call.

Why You Should Trust This Guide

As part of our competitive research, we spent weeks deep-diving into this space. We researched every tool we could find. We read hundreds of user reviews. This guide reflects all of that work—along with our honest take on what each product gets right (and where it falls short).

Just Want the Highlights?

• Want something simple and intuitive? Trails is built for fast guide creation without all the extra clutter.
• Need a self-hosted solution? Folge.me lets you keep everything local.
• Looking for onboarding and training tools? Whale and Trainual are more LMS-focused.
• Want product demo videos? Floik or Guidde is your best bet.
• Already using HubSpot and just want a basic tool? The free HubSpot Guide Maker might be enough

1) Trails (The One We Built)

Why we built Trails: After researching every tool out there, we realized none of them struck the right balance between simplicity and functionality. Some were overly complicated, others didn’t support the kind of lightweight guide creation we needed. So we built our own.

What Trails does:

• Capture your process in the browser
• Add voice-based transcriptions instead of writing everything manually
• Blur sensitive info automatically
• Organize guides into folders and manage teams
• Export and embed anywhere

Just the essentials. No fluff, no bloat.

What differentiates us:

• Super clean UI
• Voice transcription makes guide creation fast and hands-free
• Smarter pricing for larger teams: Trails offers lower rates for view-only users, so you’re not paying full price for teammates who just need view only access. Scribe doesn’t differentiate, which can get expensive fast.

Where we fall short:

• No desktop capture (yet)
• No analytics on who has viewed your guides
• Doesn’t offer full training paths or LMS-style learning modules
• No SSO or enterprise identity management

Best for: Teams that need to create step-by-step guides for SOPs, onboarding, or internal processes and want a simple, fast tool without all the bloated extras.

2) Tango

We spent time researching Tango and came away impressed. It strikes a nice balance—powerful enough for creating SOPs and internal docs, but still smooth and easy to use. While it can definitely handle basic step-by-step guides, its real strength is in digital adoption: helping teams adopt and navigate internal tools more efficiently—especially tools like CRMs, helpdesks, project management software, and internal portals.

• Pin guided on-screen walkthroughs (Nuggets): This feature lets you “pin” help directly onto your software. So if a user is on a specific page—like a CRM or dashboard—they’ll see a floating tip or walkthrough right there, guiding them through what to do next. It’s like giving users a sticky note that appears at the exact moment they need help.
• Guide Me (link): This feature walks users through a task in real time, step-by-step. Instead of just reading a guide, users click a “Guide Me” button and Tango highlights exactly where to click and what to do next—like an interactive GPS for your software.

Source: Tango

Limitations

• Future support of their digital adoption product is questionable since they pivoted their efforts towards revenue ops automation
• Similar to Scribe, they charge per $24 per user per month irrespective of their role (creator or viewer) which can really add up.

Best for: Teams that need to adopt and navigate internal tools more efficiently

3) Whale

Source: Whale

Unlike Scribe, Whale’s platform is more tailored for structured training and documentation. While it can handle basic SOP creation, its real strength lies in employee onboarding and field training—especially when you need mobile-first access to procedures.

• Mobile-ready SOP access: Field teams can scan QR codes to access the most current version of company procedures, reducing errors and ensuring compliance on the go. A smart fit for teams working away from desks.
• AI Assistant for Instant Help: An integrated AI bot can answer questions in real time—great for new employees trying to navigate internal workflows or tools.
• Training & Learning Modules: Build custom training paths with embedded quizzes to assess comprehension and track learning progress. A lightweight but effective learning management system.

Limitations

• Steeper learning curve: The UI isn’t the most intuitive—users need to learn a few custom terms like boards, playbooks, and cards, which can slow adoption.
• Two browser extensions required: One for capturing guides, another for searching documentation,which adds a bit of setup friction.

Best for: Teams focused on onboarding, training, and equipping field workers with mobile-accessible SOPs

Starts at: $99/month for 10 users

4) Trainual

Source: Trainual

Like Whale, Trainual functions more as a learning management system focused on employee onboarding, training and documentation.

Some of its strengths are

• Structured SOP & Training System: Create searchable, step-by-step playbooks with built-in quizzes and training paths.
• Visual Org Management: Map out roles, responsibilities, and team structures to streamline onboarding.
• AI-Enhanced Docs: AI helps draft content and surface answers to common questions quickly.

Limitations

• More complex setup: Designed for structured training—can feel like overkill for just creating step by step guides or sops.
• Higher starting cost: Begins at $199/month for 25 users, which may be steep if your team is small.
• Two browser extensions required: One for capturing guides, another for searching documentation, which adds a bit of setup friction for your teammates.

Best for: Teams building formal training systems with assessments, org mapping, and compliance tracking

Starts at: $199/month for 10 users

5) Folge

Source: Folge

Folge is primarily self-hosted guide recorder built for individuals who want to create step-by-step documentation locally.

My main concern with Folge is that it isn’t built for teams. It’s primarily a single-user desktop app, so it lacks real-time collaboration, user permissions, or shared workflows. If your team needs to co-author guides, share updates across departments, or manage documentation centrally, Folge will quickly start to feel limiting.

That said, if you’re a solo creator who just wants a straightforward tool to document processes on your own machine, Folge might actually be a better fit.

Best for: Individuals or solo operators who need a fast, export-ready guides.

Starts at: $89 one-time for personal use; $155 for business license

6) HubSpot Guide Creator

Source: Hubspot Guide Creator

Hubspot’s Guide Creator is a free tool released by Hubspot to capture guides. In my opinion its pretty barebones, no surprise since this is not Hubspot’s core offering. Compared to Scribe’s or Trail’s free plan, I really don’t see any value in using this tool given some of its limitations.

Limitations

• No support for blur, annotations, video, or audio: It’s screenshot-only with limited editing capabilities.
• Lacks team and role management: No way to organize guides, assign permissions, or collaborate with others.

Best for: HubSpot users who need a fast, free way to document simple browser tasks without leaving their existing workflow.

Starts at: Free (via Chrome extension)

7) Floik

Source: Floik

Floik is a strong alternative if your focus is on creating product marketing assets like product videos or interactive demos. Its standout feature is the ability to capture a single workflow and repurpose it into multiple formats—whether it’s a step-by-step guide, a video, or a live demo. It also includes enhancements like AI-generated voiceovers to help elevate your product videos.

They cover a wide range of use cases since they offer 3 output formats. The most unique feature out of all of the products in this list is their live demo feature, which allows users to click through a virtual walkthrough of the process. This is most useful if you are a sales team looking to send personalized demo's to potential clients and puts them adjacent to tools like Storylane and Guideflow.

Keep in mind that Floik was acquired by Document360 in May of 2025, so there is some uncertainty as to whether they stay in the market or continue iterating on their product.

Their pricing starts at $49/month per user, which can feel steep if you’re not taking full advantage of the video or demo features. If your main need is creating internal SOPs or straightforward step-by-step guides, tools like Scribe or Trails may offer better value.

Best for: Teams focused on product marketing, especially those creating customer-facing assets like launch videos, website embeds, or interactive product demos. Floik is a great fit for sales and marketing teams who want to repurpose workflows into multiple formats and deliver personalized walkthroughs to prospects.

8) Guidde

Source: Guidde

Similar to Floik, Guidde is primarily built for creating video-based documentation. It’s especially useful for teams that want to turn complex processes into short, easy-to-follow explainer videos.

One of its standout features is the built-in video editor, which gives you a high level of control—you can trim clips, rearrange steps, add AI voiceovers, subtitles, and customize branding to make your videos look polished and professional.

Use cases where branded, high fidelity video matters, like product marketing or customer-facing support content would see the most benefit from using Guidde.

Other use cases, like internal documentation and SOP's would be a better fit for the less video-focused tools like Scribe and Trails. The full-featured video editor of Guidde would be unnecessary in these situations.

Best for: Teams that need polished, branded video content—especially for customer support, onboarding, or product marketing. Guidde shines when explainer videos need to look professional and customized, making it a strong fit for external-facing documentation where visual quality matters.

Still Deciding? Here’s a Quick Feature-by-Feature Breakdown

Final Thoughts

At the end of the day, no tool works for everyone—it all comes down to what your team actually needs. If you’re looking for something lightweight and simple for internal guides, Scribe or Trails (our tool) could be ideal. But if you’re after polished product videos, Floik or Guidde might be a better fit. For formal training programs, tools like Trainual or Whale shine.

We wrote this guide to help you cut through the noise and find what actually works for your workflow. Whether you’re moving away from Scribe or just exploring better alternatives, we hope this helped clarify the trade-offs—and maybe saved you from a few more “how do I do this again?” messages.

Try out Trails, its Free!