Basic Database Management Overview

This is a high-level overview of Xano and how to manage some of the basics. We're not diving into the deep technical details of database architecture. Xano is a powerful backend platform, and working deeply within it requires years of experience and a foundational understanding of relational databases. That’s not the purpose of this walkthrough. Instead, this is about what you need to know to operate and manage the core data of your application.

Your Xano instance is the source of truth for your app. It stores all key data—users, companies, points, permissions, and more. Anytime your frontend displays information, it's pulling that from here. So it's important to know how to perform basic actions like adding, deleting, or modifying records. These changes have an immediate effect on the frontend experience.

When you log into Xano, the dashboard is what you'll land on. It may look slightly different from what you see here depending on your permissions, but the layout should be familiar. On the left, you’ll find the main tabs: Dashboard, Database, APIs, Tasks, Libraries, and Settings.

One quick but powerful feature on the dashboard is the "Last 24 Hours" API activity tracker. This gives you a live look at all the API requests made in the past day. It’s one of the first things we check when troubleshooting. For example, if you see red error codes like 401 (Unauthorized), that just means someone tried to access something they weren’t permitted to—Xano correctly blocked it. That’s not necessarily a sign of something broken. Other codes, like 500 (Server Error) or 404 (Not Found), are more concerning and indicate an actual failure or missing resource. On the flip side, a 200 means everything went through as expected.

Let’s talk about the Database tab. This is where all your live tables live. For example, your Users table, Companies, Points, etc. From here, you can directly edit records, find individual users, change their role or point balance, and check if everything is syncing correctly. These tables are structured like a spreadsheet—you can see the fields, sort them, and click into each row to view or edit its data.

There’s also a new feature called the Database Assistant, which lets you ask questions like “Where does Josh at movercreative.com exist?” and it will try to point you to the right record. It’s not AI magic, but it helps speed up navigation. For example, if you ask “What role does this user have?”, it will return something like: The user's role is stored in the role column of the users table. It’s useful for quick reference, even if you still have to go make the actual change yourself.

Next up is APIs. These are the pipelines that connect your frontend to your database. Each API is like a little program that does something—fetching records, adding a new entry, updating a row, etc. For example, you might have an API that gets all users with an “approved” status. You can test this by running it manually and checking the output. If you see an expired token or error, you know something’s not configured correctly. If it returns your expected data, you’re good.

This part matters because it’s what Wized is using to render content on your frontend. So when you see a list of rewards, users, or companies in the live app, that’s all being served by these APIs. Wized takes the result and displays it according to your Webflow structure.

Tasks are automated jobs. For example, one task might be running every 15 minutes to check company statuses or sync data from an external source. These are “set it and forget it” processes that run quietly in the background.

Libraries are reusable functions. Let’s say you have a “check if user is admin” function—you don’t want to rewrite that in every API. Instead, you build it once in the Library and call it whenever you need it. It keeps things cleaner and more maintainable.

Finally, the Settings tab gives you visibility into your exported data and your environment variables. If you export a CSV, you’ll find the download link here. You’ll also see environment variables—these are sensitive pieces like API keys. They’re hidden by default, and for good reason. Anyone with access to these keys could potentially compromise your system. So while they’re necessary for integration, they should be handled carefully.

That’s your Xano overview. You now have a working knowledge of how to inspect your data, troubleshoot issues, test APIs, and understand the flow between backend and frontend. In the next video, we’ll walk through how to upload or edit a CSV if you need to make bulk updates to your tables.

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