Yingdao RPA 影刀
China's drag-and-drop RPA platform for desktop, web and mobile bots
Overview
Yingdao RPA (影刀/ShadowBot) is Hangzhou Fork Intelligent's visual RPA platform automating desktop, web and mobile tasks via drag-and-drop flows, JavaScript/Python scripting and an AI Power layer with MCP support. Used by 30,000+ enterprise staff and 300+ universities.
Pricing
Pricing shown for reference only. These figures reflect RECATOOLS research as of 12 Jul 2026 and may be out of date or incomplete. This is not financial or purchasing advice — always confirm the current price on the provider’s official website before making any decision.
- Design Studio access
- PC & mobile automation (limited runner)
- Personal/non-commercial use only
- Full Runner + Studio access
- Up to 99 automated apps
- Scheduled & trigger-based execution
- Third-party app integrations
- Unlimited automated apps
- Private robot marketplace
- AI Power capabilities
- Dedicated technical support
What you can produce with Yingdao RPA 影刀
- Drag-and-drop visual flow designer (no-code)
- Cross-platform automation: Windows, macOS, Android, web
- Process recording + reusable element/component library
- JavaScript/Python scripting for custom logic
- AI Power natural-language flow generation
- Official MCP server for AI agent integration
- Central console for scheduling and team-wide deployment
ASEAN Perspective
Yingdao RPA 影刀 in Southeast Asia
ASEAN-region availability and pricing notes coming soon. Drop the editorial team a note via /contact/ if you can supply local context (Singapore/Malaysia/Indonesia/Thailand/Vietnam).
Yingdao earned its popularity the straightforward way: a drag-and-drop designer that a non-developer can pick up in about a week (enough for the entry-level certification, per user accounts), while still exposing JavaScript and Python for anyone who wants to go deeper. That combination -- accessible but not dumbed-down -- is why Zhihu reviewers consistently call it the "grassroots" RPA choice next to pricier enterprise suites.
It has real limits. Element capture gets unreliable against older Delphi/QT desktop apps and slow-loading web pages, forcing a fallback to image recognition and fixed coordinates that make flows brittle. Performance drags on very large datasets -- hundreds of thousands of Excel rows will visibly slow it down. Frequent updates are a double-edged sword too: new releases sometimes change how older commands behave, breaking existing flows. Solid for office workers and SMBs automating day-to-day tasks in a China-facing environment; less suited to heavy-data enterprise pipelines or teams needing English-first support.
What people say
Yingdao (影刀), sometimes rendered ShadowBot, comes out of Hangzhou Fork Intelligent Technology, founded in 2019 and backed by a stack of institutional investors -- Goldman Sachs and Tencent among them -- across rounds that included a $100 million Series C in 2022. By the company's own numbers, more than 30,000 enterprise employees use it day to day and over 300 universities have brought it into coursework, with a community library of 1,000-plus shared automation templates.
User writeups on Zhihu are unusually consistent on what works: the drag-and-drop Studio gets someone writing simple flows within a week, and one detailed six-month review calls it "a genuinely cost-effective, populist RPA tool" well suited to office workers, small businesses and people learning RPA for the first time, rather than needing a dedicated automation team. A flow can call an API directly when needed, and finished robots run through a lightweight player so non-technical teammates can execute a shared workflow without touching the builder.
The same reviews are specific about where it breaks down. Older client-server software built on Delphi or Qt, and web pages that load slowly or use non-standard elements, can defeat Yingdao's element-capture logic -- reviewers describe falling back to image recognition and hard-coded coordinates, which makes those flows more fragile than ones built against standard web/Windows elements. Throughput is another named limit: processing spreadsheets with hundreds of thousands of rows visibly slows the engine down. And because Yingdao ships updates fast, several reviewers note that command behavior sometimes shifts between versions, requiring existing flows to be patched to keep working.
On pricing, Yingdao runs a tiered structure: a free Community edition capped at one user and non-commercial use, and Startup and Enterprise editions both sold on request rather than listed publicly. Older secondhand estimates from Chinese forums put entry pricing at a few RMB per use and enterprise multi-seat annual contracts in the low six figures RMB, though Yingdao doesn't publish these numbers directly, so treat specific figures as dated.
The newer AI Power layer and an official MCP server (yingdao_mcp_server on GitHub, MIT-licensed) point toward positioning the product for agent-driven workflows, not just scripted RPA -- a reasonable next step given how much of the RPA market is being squeezed by general-purpose AI agents.
Summary of public user & expert reviews, compiled by RECATOOLS.
About this listing
This entry was compiled from publicly available data including Yingdao RPA 影刀's official website, press releases, documentation, and reputable third-party publications. RECATOOLS is not affiliated with Yingdao RPA 影刀 unless explicitly stated.
Third-party AI tools update their pricing, features, availability, and policies frequently. Information here may be outdated by the time you read this — we make reasonable efforts to keep listings current, but cannot guarantee absolute accuracy.
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