Salon booking software compared.

The short answer

Start from where your new clients come from, because that decides which fees you pay:

• Most new clients find you on a booking marketplace: Fresha or Booksy, which charge a one-time fee only on new clients their marketplace sends you, Booksy only while its Boost promotion is switched on.
• Most come from your own Instagram, referrals and Google profile: GlossGenius, whose pricing page lists no marketplace commission, or any tool you can link to from your own pages.
• You want to pick features one by one and connect other software: Vagaro, which prices its features separately and offers APIs and webhooks.
• You already take payments with Square: Square Appointments keeps bookings and payments together.

The details below come from each vendor's pricing page in October 2026. Pricing changes, so check again before you move your diary. If you are also looking at other tools, such as Phorest or Timely, put them through the same checks.

What matters for a salon

Every tool here takes bookings online and keeps a diary. These are the points where they differ, and the ones that cost money later:

• Fees on new clients who come through the tool's marketplace.
• Deposits, cards on file and fees for no-shows and late cancellations.
• Reminders: text or email, how many texts are included and what extra ones cost.
• How the price grows when you add a stylist, a chair or a second location.
• Card processing fees, which apply on top of every plan.
• Connections: whether a website chatbot or a reminder workflow can read and write bookings through an API.

Also check the client card on a real client: colour formulas, patch-test dates, notes about sensitive skin and photos. Every tool stores these differently, and moving them later is the hardest part of switching.

Fresha and GlossGenius, side by side

Fresha's pricing page lists an Independent plan for a one-person business and a Team plan that charges for each bookable team member, plus Enterprise for larger groups. Card payments carry processing fees, and paying through Fresha is optional. A one-time fee applies to brand new clients who discover you through the Fresha marketplace, never to returning clients. Text and WhatsApp reminders come with a monthly allowance per plan or per team member, and further texts are paid as you go. Email notifications are free.

GlossGenius sells three beauty plans, Standard, Gold and Platinum, which differ mainly by team size and features, with a separate family of plans for medspas. Every plan includes a booking website. Client notifications are listed as unlimited, and marketing texts come as credits that grow with the plan. Deposits, cancellation and no-show policies and cards on file are built in, and card processing uses one fee structure across plans. Its pricing page mentions no marketplace or commission on new clients.

In practice: a solo lash artist who fills her book from Instagram and referrals pays nothing for a marketplace she does not use on GlossGenius, and gets a booking website with it. A four-chair salon in a busy town that wants strangers to find it on an app gets Fresha's marketplace, and pays the new client fee only on clients the marketplace actually sends.

Vagaro and Booksy

Vagaro prices its features separately and charges by bookable calendar licence. Its pricing page says that once you reach seven licences, further staff cost nothing extra, and each location is priced on its own. Appointment reminders and notifications are included in every plan, and a marketplace listing is free. Its pricing page also offers APIs and webhooks for connecting other software, which none of the other pricing pages here mention.

Booksy's base subscription covers one provider, with a charge for each extra team member, and its pricing page says confirmations and reminders are free. Boost, its marketplace promotion, costs nothing to switch on and takes a one-time commission, with a cap, on a new client's first visit while Boost is on. It does not apply to clients who find you through your own marketing. No-show protection is included, with processing fees on the payments it takes.

Square Appointments

Square Appointments suits a salon that already uses Square's card readers and till. Its pricing page describes a free plan for solo professionals, Plus for growing teams and Premium for large salons. Plus adds a cancellation policy with no-show fees, appointments that need more than one staff member and a waitlist. Premium adds scheduling for resources, such as a treatment room or a pedicure chair.

Square publishes a Bookings API. Its developer documentation says software that creates or changes bookings for the business, such as a chatbot, needs the salon to be on a paid Appointments plan. More on general booking tools in booking software compared.

Fees on new clients

Marketplace fees are fair when the marketplace really sends you the client, and annoying when it charges for a client you found yourself. Read how each tool decides who counts as a marketplace client:

• Fresha: its pricing page says the fee applies to brand new clients who discover you through the Fresha marketplace, and not to new clients who come through your own website, Instagram or Facebook.
• Booksy: the commission applies to clients who book you for the first time while Boost is switched on, and not to clients who find you through your own marketing.
• GlossGenius: its pricing page lists no marketplace commission.
• Vagaro: its pricing page lists a free marketplace listing and mentions no commission.

Use your own booking link everywhere you promote yourself: your website, your Instagram profile, your Google Business Profile and your email signature. Then the tool can tell your clients from the marketplace's, and you only pay for the ones it sent.

Deposits and no-show protection

A missed colour appointment can cost a whole afternoon, so this matters more for a salon than most businesses. Fresha lists upfront payments and fees for no-shows and cancellations among its payment features. GlossGenius builds in deposits, cancellation and no-show policies and cards on file. Booksy includes no-show protection. Square puts no-show fees on its Plus plan.

Whichever you use, write the rule in plain words and show it next to the booking button, as well as on the payment screen. For example: "New colour clients pay a deposit when booking. It comes off your bill. If you cancel with less than 48 hours' notice, the deposit is kept."

Apply it the same way to everyone, and decide in advance who on your team may waive it. A rule the front desk bends for regulars and enforces for strangers causes more arguments than it saves.

Reminders and text allowances

Many clients read a text sooner than an email, so check what each tool includes and what happens when the allowance runs out:

• Fresha includes a monthly allowance of text and WhatsApp reminders per plan or per team member, then charges for each further text. Emails are free.
• GlossGenius lists unlimited client notifications, with marketing texts sold as credits.
• Booksy lists confirmations and reminders as free, with a monthly allowance for marketing texts.
• Vagaro includes unlimited notifications and appointment reminders in every plan.
• Square lists appointment reminders on its free plan.

Keep reminders and marketing apart. A reminder about a booking the client made is one thing. An offer or a newsletter by text needs the client's permission in many places, and texting has rules of its own. Write the reminder for a first-time client: the time, the address, where to park and a link to move the appointment.

Pricing by stylist, chair and location

The way a tool counts staff decides what growing costs. Count your bookable people before you compare, including part-timers and the nail technician who works two days a week:

• Fresha charges for each bookable team member on its Team plan.
• Booksy adds a charge for each extra team member after the first.
• Vagaro charges per calendar licence up to seven, then adds staff at no extra cost, and prices each location separately.
• GlossGenius sets its plans by team size, with one tier for teams of ten or more.
• Square Appointments sets its plans by size and features, from solo to large salons.

A worked example: a salon with four stylists, two part-time nail technicians and a treatment room has six bookable people and one room. On a per-member tool, that is six charges. On a tool that counts calendars, check whether the room needs one too.

Can a chatbot or reminder workflow connect?

This is where salon tools differ most, and pricing pages say least. It matters if you want a website chatbot to put booking requests into your diary, rebooking reminders sent by another system or new clients copied into your email list.

• Vagaro: its pricing page offers APIs and webhooks for connecting other tools.
• Square Appointments: a public Bookings API, with writes on paid plans.
• Fresha: its pricing page names no API, and sells a paid Data Connector add-on for sending Fresha data to spreadsheets and other software. Ask exactly what it reads and whether anything can write bookings back.
• GlossGenius and Booksy: their pricing pages mention no API. Ask the vendor before you plan anything that depends on one.

Without an API, a chatbot can still answer the questions that stop a booking, such as patch tests, how long a balayage takes and whether there is parking, and send each booking request to the salon's inbox in the same format, for the front desk to put in the diary. That is how a salon chatbot works when the booking software cannot connect. Where it can, the request goes straight in. We check which applies before we promise either, and AI chatbots explains how we test one before launch.

Switching tools without losing clients

A switch in your busiest season risks lost bookings, so plan it for a quiet month:

• Export the client list, client cards and notes, and every future booking, then check the new tool imports them.
• Ask whether stored cards, gift card balances, packages and memberships can move. If they cannot, decide how you will honour them.
• Keep both diaries running for a short overlap, so bookings made in the old tool are kept.
• Change every booking link on the same day: website, Instagram, Google Business Profile and email signature.
• Tell regular clients by message, with the new link, before their next booking.

If future clients reach you through a marketplace, check how the new tool's marketplace treats the clients you bring with you.

How to choose

Run a real week of your salon through two free trials:

• Book a new client yourself on a phone, with a deposit, from your Instagram link.
• Move the booking, then cancel it late, and see what the client receives.
• Add a client card with a colour formula and a patch-test date.
• Price a full year with every stylist, the texts you send and your card fees.
• Ask each vendor in writing how marketplace clients are counted and whether other software can write bookings.

Then choose the one your front desk finds quickest on a busy Saturday. If you later want a chatbot or reminders connected to it, see booking chatbot for how requests reach your diary, and booking automation for reminders and rebooking messages.