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Getting started

Architecture diagrams usually cost an afternoon in a drawing tool and go stale within a month. Datadef is an AI diagram tool for data and cloud architecture: describe the system, paste its infrastructure code, or connect its repository, and it draws an editable diagram with typed nodes, real flow edges, nested zones, and column-level detail. This page covers the two ways to use it: free on the scratch canvas, and with Pro.

The Datadef dashboard: a prompt bar for describing your architecture, a scratch canvas shortcut, and recent projects
The dashboard: describe your architecture, or paste an image, or drop a file.

How it works

  1. 1Open the scratch canvas with no account, or start a 7-day free trial of Pro for the full product.
  2. 2Describe your system in the prompt bar, naming the real technologies, layers, and tables, or paste infrastructure code, or attach a file.
  3. 3Datadef draws the diagram. Refine it on the canvas by hand or by asking the AI panel for changes.
  4. 4Share it with your team, embed it in a README, or keep it syncing from your repository.

Try it without an account

The scratch canvas is the full editor with no signup:

  • 1 AI diagram and 2 AI edits a day. Pasting SQL, Prisma, or Terraform counts as the day's diagram. The limit is enforced server-side and resets daily.
  • Your diagram is saved in your browser's local storage, not on Datadef's servers. Clearing browser data clears the diagram.
  • Manual editing and PNG export have no limit. Sharing, cloud projects, and version history are part of Pro, because they need the diagram to live server-side.

What Pro adds

An account is Pro or Team: signing up starts a 7-day free trial, card required. Pro is what unlocks the rest, for $12 a month or $96 a year:

  • Unlimited AI diagrams and AI edits, under fair use, including the detailed mode.
  • Cloud projects with folders and version history, AI import from files, and PNG and JPEG export.
  • Diagrams that stay current: repository sync, and live embeds that update themselves in a README, Notion, or Confluence.
  • Sharing and public links, and the MCP server for Claude Code, Cursor, Claude, and ChatGPT.

It starts with a 7-day free trial. A card is required, and if you cancel before the trial ends you are not charged. Cancelling later takes none of your diagrams away: if a subscription ends, the account can still open and export everything it made, and published embeds keep serving. The full rules are on Plans and billing.

Your first diagram

The short version

Type what your system is into the prompt bar, on the scratch canvas or the dashboard, and be specific: name the technologies, the layers, the tables that matter. A vague prompt gets a generic diagram; a named stack gets your stack.

From there: refine it on the canvas, invite people from the Share dialog, or put it in a README with an embed. You can also skip prompting entirely and generate straight from a repository; see Repositories. Or start from a working example in the template gallery.