Top 10 Online Booking Systems for Small Businesses Compared

Are you getting ready to get rid of mish-mash spreadsheets and manual calendars in your daily operations? We are then ready to help you compare and choose the best online booking system for small business. You’ll encounter a lot of well-known brand names, but what makes them different from others? What are the top features that matter to you? Let’s find out.

Before you jump to the list, here is our incredibly detailed checklist for choosing the appointment scheduling software.

BookingPress

The BookingPress online booking system is specifically designed for WordPress sites, hence its flexibility and affordability in one package. It gives you all the essential tools for online bookings, including PayPal. This WordPress booking plugin will help you manage your time more effectively with fully automated emails, client self-bookings, recurring appointments, and awesome mobile-friendly booking experiences.

BookingPress Pros:

• 20+ local gateways across the world, including POS.
• Clients can select the meeting duration.
• SMS, email, and WhatsApp messages.
• Connect Zoom, Google Calendar, and other apps.

BookingPress Cons:

• Works only on WordPress sites. 

OnceHub

OnceHub also enables real-time bookings on your site based on multiple rules. If you need customizable booking pages, live chat, AI-powered conversations, and instant call capabilities, OnceHub has it all. The “Theme Designer” integrated, makes it easy to build branded landing pages and embedded scheduling.

OnceHub Pros:

• Integrations with Zapier, CRM tools, and team communication platforms.
• Advanced scheduling management for both remote and in-office setups.
• Free plan includes group sessions, automatic notifications, and payment processing.

OnceHub Cons:

• Free plan is limited to one user and one booking link.

Checkfront

Checkfront is another type of booking system for small business, which covers items and real estate in addition to appointments and hourly bookings. It’s a cloud-based booking management application and e-commerce platform perfect for tours, activities, and rentals. 

Checkfront Pros:

• Resource management for all types of bookings, from boats to hours and services.
• Works with WordPress, Drupal, Joomla, and more.
• Perfect for schedule-based businesses that sell their services in daily, nightly, or hourly allotments.

Checkfront Cons:

• a 3% online booking fee that you can absorb or pass onto the customer.

Timify

Timify is a well-designed scheduling software for small business. It makes it easy to generate booking links for specific services, resources, or teams. For modern-day interactions, you can make booking even easier by adding QR codes to your marketing materials with Timify.

Timify Pros:

• Individual staff schedules, holidays, and sick days.
• Powerful recourse schedule.
• Integrate booking directly into your Google Business Profile.

Timify Cons:

• Prices differ for single and multiple locations.

Acuity Scheduling

The online booking system by Acuity Scheduling, owned by Squarespace since 2019, is perfect for small businesses like salons or consultants. Accuity enables you to sell appointment booking services directly through their Squarespace site or as a standalone tool for any website (e.g., WordPress). It lets you set appointment reminders, customize triggers, and create reusable email & SMS templates, including employee notifications.

Acuity Scheduling Pros:

• Seamless integration with Squarespace.
• Branded scheduling pages with direct shareable links.
• Great for service businesses, workshops, and group events.

Acuity Scheduling Cons:

• No free plan is available.
• Acuity branding appears on lower-tier plans.
• Potential extra fees for sales tax, payment processing, and text messaging.
• Better alternatives exist for WordPress users (e.g., BookingPress).

Setmore

Setmore is a powerful software for building personalized booking page’s URL and feature your logo, brand colors, reviews, and accept payments through them. Your customers can self-book and make secure card transactions online. For those of small businesses that use Square, Stripe, and PayPal, zero extra charges on top of transaction fees because they are partners of Setmore.

Setmore Pros:

• User-friendly and suits beginners.
• Integrates with Google Calendar, Zoom, Square, and Wiix.
• Free plan includes online booking and email reminders.
• Mobile app for client booking and schedule management.

Setmore Cons:

• Memberships and custom domains require paid plans.
• Setmore branding cannot be fully removed, even in paid plans.

Square Appointments

Square Appointments is most useful for small businesses that want to work with online payments via Square. You may integrate it with any type of website or even without it, using a POS terminal. If you’re just starting a site, Square Appointments offers a free online booking website builder to smoothen your start.

Square Appointments Pros:

• Automated appointment reminders via SMS or email.
• Retail, and inventory management connected to transactions.
• Multi-location and multi-person management.
• Cancellations and no-show fees.

Square Appointments Cons:

• Some clients with older browsers and operating systems couldn’t use Square Appointments.

Calendly

Calendly is one of the top popular booking tools you will definitely consider: it’s already a choice of 20 million users across 230 countries. The software is totally dedicated to user-friendly experiences of managing booking appointments and meetings. Solopreneurs and small businesses appreciate its flexibility in round-robin scheduling and buffer times settings. Calendly’s free plan doesn’t support online payments, and its pricing can be less competitive compared to other tools in our roundup.

Calendly Pros: 

• Strong automation features.
• Easy-to-create scheduling links.
• Extensive integrations with calendars (Google, Outlook, iCloud), CRMs (Salesforce, HubSpot), and video conferencing tools (Zoom, WebEx, GoToMeeting).

Calendly Cons:

• Lacks in-depth analytics and built-in support for in-person meetings (requires a workaround).

Zoho

Zoho Bookings is one more great booking system for scheduling meetings and appointments, letting you build a custom booking page and share your availability. With an AI-powered setup, Zoho significantly simplifies the process of launch for any small business (it’s able to customize your labels for staff, resources, and meeting types in your appointment booking dashboard).

Zoho Pros:

• Easily add your available times and sync your calendars.
• Works for service business and team scheduling alike.
• 10+ gateways to collect upfront payments, deposit, and full.

Zoho Cons:

• Lacks some integrations, e.g. with CRM.

BookWhen

Offering PayPal and Stripe for online payments, BookWhen makes it easy to support small businesses. It functions as simply as follows: build and tailor your personal booking page with logo, header, and images, then share a Bookwhen link with your customers or embed in an existing website.

BookWhen Pros:

• Many tools to edit your booking forms, validate responses, and add attachments. 
• Discount codes, block-booking discounts, passes, and waiting lists.
• Class, course, event, and activity booking system.

BookWhen Cons:

• A free plan is limited to 50 bookings/month and 1 team member.

Concluding Words about Best Online Booking System for Small Business

Looks like it’s hard to choose one that fits your business. Let’s sum up the key areas where these businesses can be suited:

1. WordPress websites: BookingPress is the most affordable choice while it’s built 100% for WP.
2. Squarespace website: Acuity Scheduling.
3. Small businesses with more specific needs: OnceHub (real-time bookings with custom rules, live chat, and integrations), Calendly (great for solopreneurs with round-robin scheduling), Timfy (or resource-heavy businesses).
4. Consultants, salons, and service-based businesses: BookingPress, Acuity Scheduling (hourly reservations and salons), and Setmore (user-friendly with Google Calendar and Zoom integration).
5. Retail or inventory-based businesses: Square Appointments.
6. Event businesses (classes, courses): BookWhen (perfect for event and activity bookings with features like discount codes and waiting lists), Zoho Bookings, BookingPress, and Checkfront.
7. Businesses with multiple staff locations: Checkfront (manages multiple resources like boats or hourly services) Square Appointments (multi-location and person management).

Related articles: 

• Calendly vs Setmore
• Calendly vs OnceHub
• Calendly Alternatives