Fresha Alternative: Why Atenda Is the Better Booking Software in 2026

Fresha is the biggest name in beauty and wellness booking, trusted by 120,000+ businesses. It's polished, feature-rich, and well known. But it's also built around a model that quietly works against you: you pay per team member, you pay a 20% commission on new clients who find you through its marketplace, and many of the tools you'll actually want are paid add-ons.

If you've been searching for a Fresha alternative, this is the comparison you want. We put Atenda vs Fresha side by side — focused on price, commission and transparency — so you can see what each really costs and who keeps the upside of your hard work.

The real cost of Fresha

Fresha markets itself as low-cost and transparent. Read the pricing page closely and a different picture emerges.

You pay per team member. The Independent plan is £14.95/mo for a single person. The Team plan is £9.95 per bookable team member, per month. So a three-chair barbershop pays roughly £29.85/mo in subscription alone — and every stylist you add raises the bill again. (Note: all Fresha prices are "exclusive of 20% sales tax," so the number you see isn't the number you pay.)

You pay commission on new clients. This is the one that stings. When a new client discovers you through the Fresha marketplace, Fresha takes a 20% one-time commission on that booking, with a minimum fee of £4 per client. The marketplace is also where your competitors are listed right next to you — so you're paying to be discovered on a platform that actively promotes other shops to your potential clients.

You pay to take payments. Online payments cost 1.40% + £0.25 per transaction, in-person 1.19% + £0.20 (plus £0.07 per Tap to Pay), manual card entry 2.20% + £0.20, and card terminals are £99 per device.

You pay for the growth tools. Many of the features that grow a shop aren't in the plan — they're paid add-ons stacked on top:

Put it together for a typical three-person shop that wants loyalty, insights and review boosting: roughly £29.85 (subscription) + £49.95 (loyalty) + £23.85 (insights ×3) + £12.95 (Google boost) ≈ £117/mo + VAT — before payment processing fees and before any 20% marketplace commissions. The "transparent, low-cost" platform is anything but.

How Atenda is different

Atenda charges one flat price, includes the growth tools, and never takes a cut of your bookings.

Flat price, unlimited team

Atenda's Starter is £9.99/mo for one shop — full calendar and online booking, your own branded booking website, unlimited team members, one location, and free data migration. There's no per-stylist charge, so adding chairs never raises your subscription. Growth is £29/mo and adds three locations, marketing campaigns and automations, advanced analytics, 24/7 priority support and more booking-page templates.

Compare that to Fresha's per-seat model: a five-person team on Fresha is about £49.75/mo + VAT in subscription alone (5 × £9.95). On Atenda, five team members — or fifty — is still £29 flat on Growth.

Zero commission, and no marketplace

This is the heart of it. Atenda runs no marketplace, so we never list competitors next to your name and we never charge a commission on a booking — new client or returning. Every client you win is yours, and the full value of every booking stays with you. Fresha's marketplace can bring new faces, but it charges 20% (min £4) to do it, on a platform built to show those same clients other options.

Your price is locked for life

Three months free to try it

Atenda is in early access and giving the first 1,000 businesses three months free, no credit card. Fresha offers a 7-day trial. Three months is enough to migrate, run a full booking cycle, and be sure before you pay.

Feature for feature, you don't lose out

Fresha is genuinely capable, and Atenda matches it where it counts: 24/7 online booking, a free branded booking website, no-show protection with deposits, client management with history and notes, Google review automation, marketing campaigns, loyalty and gift cards, and direct booking links for Instagram, Google and walk-in QR codes.

Where Atenda stands out is in what's bundled in at no extra cost — and in keeping your business yours. You get all pay models in one dashboard (hourly, chair rental and revenue split, auto-calculated), real-time analytics by location, staff and period, a full client CRM with result photos, and a unified inbox pulling WhatsApp, Instagram and SMS into one thread. None of it sits behind a separate per-location or per-seat add-on fee.

One honest note: Fresha offers some things Atenda doesn't lead with today — a large consumer marketplace with 25M+ shoppers, business capital/financing, and HIPAA/ISO certifications aimed at larger health practices. If a discovery marketplace or financing is central to your plan, weigh that up. For most barbershops and salons, the trade — paying 20% commission and per-seat fees for marketplace exposure — isn't worth it when a strong branded booking page brings clients in commission-free.

Built for salons, barbershops and beyond

Atenda is built for barbershops, salons, nail studios, spas, medspas and massage therapists on one platform — the same breadth Fresha covers, without the per-seat pricing and marketplace cut.

Switching from Fresha takes minutes, not days

Atenda imports your clients, history and bookings with automatic field-matching, and the team handles the heavy lifting — from Fresha, other booking systems, spreadsheets, CSV/Excel, Google Calendar and more. Combined with three months free, there's no risk and no downtime in trying it.

Atenda vs Fresha: the bottom line

If your priorities are a predictable flat price, keeping 100% of every booking, and growth tools included rather than billed à la carte, Atenda is the better choice. You pay £9.99–£29/mo, all in, with unlimited team — versus Fresha's per-member subscription that climbs with every stylist. You pay no commission on any client, where Fresha takes 20% (min £4) on new marketplace clients. Marketing, loyalty, analytics and reviews are included, not stacked on as £8–£50/mo add-ons. And your price is locked for life.

Fresha is a powerful platform with a huge marketplace. But that marketplace lists your rivals beside you and charges to send clients your way, the subscription scales per seat, and the useful extras cost more. With Atenda, what you see is what you pay — and your clients stay yours.

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