Bento was a personal database application created by FileMaker, Inc., the Apple subsidiary now known as Claris.
Released in 2008 for the Mac and later adapted for the iPhone and iPad, Bento was designed for people who needed to organize information but did not require the full development capabilities of FileMaker Pro.
Its name referred to the Japanese bento box, in which different foods are organized into separate compartments. The metaphor described the application well: Bento offered a visually attractive place to collect and organize contacts, projects, events, inventories, collections, and other personal or small-business information.
A database for everyone
FileMaker Pro was already known as an accessible database platform, but it was nevertheless a professional application development tool. Creating a FileMaker custom app could involve tables, relationships, layouts, calculations, scripts, accounts, and privilege sets.
Bento offered a simpler approach.
Users organized their information into libraries, broadly comparable to database tables. Each library contained fields and records that could be displayed using customizable forms or table views.
Ready-made templates helped users manage information such as:
- Contacts
- Projects and tasks
- Events
- Expenses
- Inventory
- Membership lists
- Student information
- Recipes
- Collections
- Home and business records
The objective was not to teach database development. Bento presented structured information as a natural extension of the Mac’s other personal productivity applications.
Designed for the Mac
Bento was closely integrated with the Apple ecosystem and adopted the visual language of Mac OS X.
It could work with information from applications such as Address Book, iCal, and iPhoto. This allowed users to organize existing contacts, events, tasks, and media without necessarily creating duplicate collections of information.
Forms could include text, dates, checkboxes, images, files, lists, ratings, and related records. Themes and templates made the results visually polished without requiring the user to design a complete interface from scratch.
This combination of structure and simplicity was Bento’s defining characteristic. It was more flexible than a spreadsheet but less demanding than a professional database development platform.
Bento on iPhone and iPad
Bento was subsequently released for the iPhone and iPad.
The mobile applications allowed users to carry their libraries with them and synchronize information with Bento for Mac. They could consult contacts, update projects, record information, capture images, add voice memos, and use location data while away from their computer.
Bento 4 for iPad went further by allowing users to create and customize their libraries directly on the tablet. FileMaker described these individual databases as “apps,” even though they remained inside the main Bento application.
At a time when the iPad was still frequently described as a device for consuming rather than creating information, Bento demonstrated that it could also be used to build practical business tools.
A successful consumer product
Bento was not merely an experimental side project. By January 2012, FileMaker announced that more than one million units had been shipped across the Mac, iPhone, and iPad product family.
Its audience included individuals and very small organizations that wanted to organize their work without commissioning a complete custom application.
In many ways, Bento occupied the space between a spreadsheet, a personal information manager, and FileMaker Pro.
Why was Bento discontinued?
In July 2013, FileMaker announced that development of Bento would end. The Mac and iOS applications were removed from sale on September 30, 2013, and support continued until July 2014.
FileMaker explained that it wanted to concentrate its resources on the FileMaker product line, whose use on the iPhone and iPad was growing rapidly.
Existing users could continue using Bento, but the absence of future updates made migration increasingly important as macOS and iOS evolved.
FileMaker provided a migration tool and encouraged Bento users who required a more sustainable database platform to move their information to FileMaker Pro.
Bento and FileMaker were not the same product
Although they were developed by the same company, Bento was not a simplified FileMaker file format or a different interface for FileMaker Pro.
Bento had its own data model, application format, synchronization system, and feature set. A Bento library could not simply be opened as a FileMaker custom app.
FileMaker Pro provided far greater capabilities, including relational database design, scripting, calculations, security, multi-user hosting, integrations, and highly customized interfaces.
Migrating from Bento therefore meant transferring the data and rebuilding the required structure and workflows in FileMaker.
A product ahead of its time
Bento anticipated many ideas now associated with no-code and personal productivity platforms:
- Ready-to-use templates
- Visual form creation
- Structured data without database terminology
- Desktop and mobile synchronization
- Media and location fields
- Personal applications built by their users
- An interface designed for people rather than database specialists
Its combination of simplicity, attractive design, and structured information remains unusual even today.
Bento also showed that there was a real audience for tools positioned below professional application development platforms. Its million-unit success demonstrated that many people wanted something more structured than a spreadsheet without needing the complete power of FileMaker Pro.
What can former Bento users do today?
Bento should no longer be used as the basis for an active application. Modern versions of macOS and iOS are not designed to support software that has been discontinued for more than a decade.
If an old Bento library still contains valuable information, the priority should be to recover and export that data before the original application or hardware becomes unusable.
Depending on the requirement, the information could then be moved to:
- A FileMaker custom app
- A spreadsheet
- A dedicated contact or project-management service
- A modern cloud database
- Another specialized business application
For applications requiring custom workflows, relationships, automation, mobile access, and secure multi-user hosting, FileMaker remains the natural successor.
Preserving Bento data with fmcloud.fm
At fmcloud.fm, our FileMaker experience extends across several generations of the platform and its related products.
We can help organizations recover data from legacy Bento libraries, analyze their structure, and rebuild the useful parts as a modern FileMaker custom app.
The objective is not necessarily to reproduce Bento screen by screen. It is to understand why the original library was created, preserve its valuable information, and design a sustainable application around the way the organization works today.
The resulting FileMaker app can then be securely hosted and accessed through FileMaker Pro, FileMaker Go, WebDirect, or a custom web integration.
