Both are marketplace-plus-software platforms, and the feature lists barely differ. The decision is about how each one charges you, and how much of it you can avoid. Figures below are quoted from their own pricing pages.
Booksy charges a flat UK subscription of £40 a month and only takes commission if you opt into its Boost marketing feature. Fresha charges per bookable team member and takes a one-time fee on clients who find you through its marketplace. If you bring your own clients, Booksy is the more predictable bill; if you need discovery, Fresha carries more of that work.
| Booksy | Fresha | |
|---|---|---|
| Shape of the bill | Mostly fixed: a monthly subscription | Mostly variable: fees on new marketplace clients |
| Commission if you bring your own clients | None, with Boost off | None — the fee applies to marketplace discoveries |
| Commission if the marketplace finds them | 30% of the first visit, minimum £5, only via Boost | A one-time fee on the first appointment; rate published per country |
| How cost scales | With staff count (£5 each) | With bookable team members, and with marketplace-driven growth |
| Card processing | 0.99%–1.29% + 20p + VAT | Published separately by country |
| Who owns the client relationship | Shared — your page plus a Booksy listing | Shared, and the marketplace is the front door by design |
| Best fit | An established chair or small team with its own following | A newer business that needs to be found |
Salon software with an attached marketplace, sold on subscription
Marketplace-first platform with software attached, sold on fees
Quoted from each company's own published pages, on the dates below. Pricing changes and some of it varies by country — check the source before you decide, and tell us if you spot something out of date.
Almost every "Booksy vs Fresha" page compares feature checklists, and it is a waste of everyone's time — both do bookings, deposits, reminders, client records, payments and reports, and have for years. Nobody switches because one has a better calendar.
The real difference is where each company makes its money, because that determines what the product is optimised for. Booksy sells you software and charges you for it monthly; the marketplace is a bonus, and Boost is an opt-in you can decline forever. Fresha keeps the entry cost low and earns when the marketplace delivers you someone new; discovery is the product.
That makes the choice mostly a question about your own business rather than about theirs. Count what fraction of last month's new clients you found yourself. If it is most of them, a fixed subscription is the cheaper structure and the fee-based one is charging you for something you are already doing. If it is few of them, the marketplace is doing real work and taking a cut of the result is a fair trade.
Work it out on your actual numbers before you switch either way. A 30% one-time fee on a £60 first visit is £18 — trivial if that client rebooks for five years, expensive if they never come back.
Both platforms are built around the appointment. Neither is built around the client who stopped booking.
The regular who came every six weeks and has not been in since March is worth more than any new lead, costs nothing to reach, and sits in both systems entirely unflagged. That is the gap Aasure was built for: it watches the pattern, spots the drift and runs the win-back, alongside the bookings, deposits, invoicing and reminders — on a flat monthly fee with no commission on any booking and no marketplace at all.
The honest trade: because there is no marketplace, Aasure will not find you new clients. You still do that yourself. If discovery is the thing you actually need, one of the two above is the better answer and we would rather say so.
It depends entirely on where your clients come from. Booksy publishes £40 a month plus £5 per extra user, which is the whole bill if you leave Boost switched off. Fresha keeps the subscription low and charges a one-time fee on each new client who finds you through its marketplace. For a salon whose diary fills on regulars and referrals, the fixed subscription usually costs less; for a salon relying on marketplace discovery, the fee model can be cheaper because you only pay when it works.
Only through Boost, its optional marketing feature. Booksy states a one-time 30% fee on a brand-new Boost client's first visit, with a £5 minimum. Boost is opt-in — with it switched off, the subscription is the cost.
No. The marketplace fee applies to brand-new clients who discover the business through Fresha, charged once on their first completed appointment. Clients you bring yourself do not trigger it. The complaint you will read online is usually about how "new" gets classified rather than about the rate.
Technically yes, and some salons do use one marketplace purely for discovery while running regulars elsewhere. In practice two calendars for one diary is how double-bookings happen. If you try it, keep one system as the source of truth for availability.
If you already have a following, Booksy — the bill is fixed and per-user pricing does not apply at one. If you are newly opened with no client list, Fresha, because at that stage discovery is worth more than margin and per-team-member pricing is at its cheapest.
Ask both before you sign up rather than after, and ask for the export format, not just whether an export exists. Under UK GDPR you have rights over personal data held on your behalf, but a right of access and a usable spreadsheet are not the same convenience. This is the single most important question on this page and almost nobody asks it in time.
Aasure is a flat monthly subscription with no commission on any booking and no marketplace. The first 200 sign-ups lock in £29, £59 or £89 a month for as long as they stay subscribed.
Join the waitlist → Or work out your real bill first →