iLab Reviews

Pros

Using the site has been a really positive experience overall. The full web platform works very well, you can quickly reserve microscopes or submit a request form as a user without any hassle. On the admin side, it covers a lot like scheduling microscopes for maintenance, taking an instrument offline for major repairs, reviewing request forms and adding notes, generating PDF invoices and adjusting charges when extra fees need to be applied. The support team deserves a lot of credit too. They reply fast and if a ticket doesn't include enough detail, they'll usually set up a call for the next day so you can walk them through the issue and show exactly what's going on.

Cons

Every now and then, like with any website or software, there are random issues where a page doesn't respond or a function isn't recognized correctly. That said, the process for getting help is very simple you submit a ticket and iLAB support typically gets back to you within 24 hours to collect more details and look into it. The longest I've personally had a ticket stay open was about a week so they move quickly and stay very responsive.

Pros

Reservations and scheduling have been working exactly as expected, with no problems at all. Overall, it's a user-friendly software that handles the job well and feels dependable to use.

Cons

The only thing I'd like to see improved is the UI since a few design choices feel a bit awkward. For example, the equipment list is smaller than it needs to be and the drag-to-select option can get frustrating when you need to adjust the times.

Pros

Handling around 40 research faculty groups, I really appreciate the grid-style layout for updating members and managing the accounts they can access. The green highlight that appears after a change is especially useful because it makes updates clear right away. It's also very helpful that the reporting can be exported to Excel, either as graphs or as raw data for further analysis.

Cons

At the same time, the system feels sluggish and pretty outdated. The faculty I work with constantly complain about iLab, saying it feels like it was built in a different language and doesn't make much sense to them. Creative and scientific users already tend to struggle with administrative tools but they seem to find iLab especially frustrating.