Vagaro

Name: Vagaro
Brand: Vagaro
Price: 3023.99 USD

The deepest small-business booking platform, sold as a cheap base plus a long menu of add-ons

Vagaro is an appointment booking and business management platform for salons, spas, fitness studios, and wellness businesses, priced per bookable calendar from around $30 a month for one person up to about $90 a month for seven or more, with classes and memberships, packages, payroll, inventory, marketing, forms, and a branded consumer app available as separately priced add-ons, plus its own consumer marketplace and card processing.

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Overview

Vagaro is the most feature-complete product a small service business can buy without entering enterprise procurement. It runs salons, but it also runs yoga studios, gyms, medical spas, massage clinics, and pet groomers, and it does so with class scheduling, memberships, class packs, payroll, inventory, SOAP notes and forms, a website builder, and a branded mobile app in the catalogue. Very little else in this category covers that spread.

The pricing model is a base subscription scaled by the number of bookable calendars: roughly $30 a month for one, rising by about $10 per additional calendar up to a ceiling around $90 at seven or more, with promotional entry pricing frequently advertised around $23.99. Additional locations are about $10 a month each. That is a comparatively cheap base for a business with several staff, and cheaper than Booksy at $20 per extra head.

The catch is the add-on catalogue. Text marketing from around $20 a month, website builder $20, forms and SOAP notes $10, online shopping cart $10, payroll $34 plus $5 per employee, branded app around $100. A mature multi-service business assembling the stack it actually wants routinely lands well above the base price, and honest third-party analyses put real-world total cost for a small salon or studio somewhere between $150 and $650 a month once staff calendars, add-ons, and processing are included. Vagaro is cheap to start and expensive to finish.

The company is credible: founded in 2009 by Fred Helou, headquartered in Pleasanton, California, employing somewhere in the 500 to 1,000 range, roughly $163M raised including a $100M private equity round in 2021 from FTV Capital, and it acquired the competing platform Schedulicity in January 2025. This is a consolidator, not a startup, and its roadmap reflects that: broad, steady, and add-on shaped.

Best for

Multi-service businesses that need both appointments and classes under one roof, especially spas, medi-spas, fitness and yoga studios, and salons that sell memberships and prepaid packages and want payroll, inventory, and forms in the same system.

Not the right fit for

Anyone booking meetings or sales calls; this is a service-business operating system with a merchant account and a payroll module, and it is comically oversized for a 30-minute Zoom.
Buyers who want an all-in price, because the base subscription is a fraction of the real bill once text marketing, forms, the shopping cart, payroll, and the branded app are added.
Very small solo operators on a tight budget, where Square Appointments gives a working calendar for $0 and Booksy gives everything unlocked for $29.99.
Businesses that want a clean, opinionated interface; Vagaro's breadth shows as density, and it is one of the busier admin experiences in the category.
Anyone needing inbound lead routing, round-robin distribution, or CRM qualification, none of which exist here in any form.

How it works

1
You choose how many bookable calendars you need, which is the billing unit. Each calendar belongs to a service provider, and the base subscription steps up with the count until it flattens at seven or more.
2
You build the service menu, the class schedule, and the resource list. Vagaro treats one-to-one appointments and capacity-limited classes as first-class equals, which is unusual: most salon platforms bolt classes on and most fitness platforms cannot handle a stylist's colour appointment.
3
Clients book through your own booking page, an embed on your website, the Vagaro consumer marketplace, Google, or Instagram. New clients who find you through the marketplace trigger a one-time 20 percent fee on the first appointment; clients you bring yourself never do.
4
The appointment closes into the Vagaro point of sale, which handles retail products, tips, memberships, packages, gift cards, and commission. Payment processing runs at published rates that differ by merchant volume: broadly 2.6 percent plus 10 cents card present for smaller merchants, and 2.29 percent plus 19 cents with a $10 monthly fee for merchants over $4,000 a month, with keyed transactions at 3.5 percent plus 19 cents.

Feature breakdown

28 features in 5 modules

Appointments and classes

The reason Vagaro covers more industries than its competitors.

Per-calendar appointment booking: Each bookable calendar is a service provider with their own hours, services, and pricing. The base subscription steps up with calendar count and flattens at seven or more.
Class and course scheduling: Capacity-limited classes, recurring series, and multi-week courses are native, with waitlists and roll call, which is what makes Vagaro viable for a fitness or yoga studio rather than only a salon.
Memberships: Recurring membership billing with entitlements that redeem against classes or services automatically, the core revenue mechanic for studios.
Packages and prepaid series: Sell a course of treatments or a ten-class pack and have it draw down against bookings without manual tracking.
Resources and rooms: Treatment rooms, equipment, and chairs modelled as constrained assets so a booking cannot be taken when the room is occupied.
Multiple locations: Additional locations at roughly $10 a month each, with shared client records and per-site staffing and menus.
Waitlist and cancellation recovery: Automatic notification of freed slots to waitlisted clients for both appointments and classes.

Getting booked

Owned channels plus a marketplace that costs 20 percent once.

Vagaro consumer marketplace: A public directory and app where clients search local businesses. A one-time 20 percent fee applies to the first appointment of a genuinely new client acquired this way; your own clients are never charged.
Own booking page and website embed: A hosted booking page plus widgets for an existing site, both commission free.
Website builder add-on: A full business website with booking built in, at around $20 a month, which for many small operators replaces a separate web presence entirely.
Branded mobile app: Your own app in the App Store and Play Store under your brand, at around $100 a month. Expensive, but the only way in this price range to keep the client relationship out of a platform's app.
Google and social booking: Reserve with Google and social profile booking entry points feeding the same availability.

Payments and commerce

Real retail operations, not just a card charge.

Integrated point of sale: Checkout with retail products, tips, discounts, split tender, gift cards, and commission tracking, on desktop or Vagaro hardware.
Published processing rates by volume: Broadly 2.6 percent plus 10 cents card present for merchants under $4,000 a month, and 2.29 percent plus 19 cents with a $10 monthly fee above that; keyed transactions 3.5 percent plus 19 cents. Rates improve as you grow rather than being fixed.
Deposits, prepayment, and no-show fees: Card on file, deposits, and enforced cancellation policies with automatic charging, included rather than gated behind a higher tier.
Inventory and stock control: Retail and professional product inventory with suppliers, purchase orders, and stock counts reconciled against sales.
Online shopping cart: An add-on at around $10 a month for selling product online rather than only at the counter.
Payroll: A payroll add-on at around $34 a month plus $5 per employee, running off the same timecards and commission data, which almost nothing else in this category offers.

Client management and clinical records

Where medi-spas and clinics separate from hair salons.

Forms and SOAP notes: Digital intake forms, consent forms, and clinical SOAP notes at around $10 a month, which is what makes Vagaro usable for massage, physiotherapy, and aesthetics practices.
Client profiles with photos and history: Visit history, formulas, before-and-after images, preferences, and spend attached to a single record across locations.
Automated reminders: Email reminders included; SMS reminders and text marketing sit in the text add-on priced from around $20 a month.
Reviews and ratings: Post-visit review collection feeding both your profile and marketplace ranking.
Text and email marketing: Campaigns, automated win-backs, and promotions, with text marketing charged as a paid add-on rather than included.

Operations and reporting

The owner's back office.

Reporting suite: Revenue by service, provider, class, and location, retail versus service split, occupancy, rebooking, and membership churn.
Staff scheduling and time clock: Shift scheduling, clock in and out, and hours feeding directly into commission and payroll.
Role-based permissions: Granular access control so providers see their own book and owners see the money.
Vagaro Pro mobile apps: iOS and Android apps for running the book, checking out, and managing classes from the floor.
Hardware: Card readers, terminals, and a Vagaro-branded POS hardware line, with a free reader typically offered on signing up for merchant services.

Use cases

4 documented

Yoga studio with class packs and memberships

Twenty classes a week, a mix of drop-ins, ten-class packs, and monthly members, all tracked in a spreadsheet nobody trusts.

Native classes, memberships, and packages redeem automatically against bookings, waitlists fill cancelled spots, and recurring membership billing runs itself.

Medi-spa needing consent forms and clinical notes

Injectables require signed consent and documented notes, currently on paper and stored in a filing cabinet.

The forms and SOAP notes add-on at around $10 a month attaches digital consent and clinical records to the client file, tied to the appointment that generated them.

Six-chair salon with retail shelves and payroll

Product stock, staff commission, and payroll are three separate manual processes, reconciled monthly by the owner at the kitchen table.

One system holds inventory, sales, timecards, commission, and payroll, at a base subscription of around $80 a month for six calendars plus the payroll add-on.

Independent massage therapist wanting her own app

Clients keep rebooking through a platform app that also shows them competitors two streets away.

The branded app add-on at around $100 a month puts her own booking app on clients' phones, which is expensive but is the only route to owning that relationship at this price point.

Pricing

from About $30 per month for one bookable calendar (promotional pricing around $23.99 frequently advertised)

Base subscription scaled by number of bookable calendars, plus roughly $10 per additional location, plus a large catalogue of separately priced add-ons, plus volume-tiered card processing. A one-time 20 percent fee applies to new clients acquired through the Vagaro marketplace.

Plan	Price	Includes
1 bookable calendar	About $30 per month	Full appointment and class booking Point of sale, inventory, and client records Own booking page and website embed Deposits, cancellation policies, and no-show fees Marketplace listing Promotional entry pricing around $23.99 is commonly advertised.
2 to 6 bookable calendars	About $40 to $80 per month, rising roughly $10 per calendar	Everything in the single-calendar plan Per-provider hours, services, and permissions Staff scheduling and time clock Commission tracking Reporting by provider At $10 per extra head this is half Booksy's per-staff rate.
7 or more bookable calendars	About $90 per month	Price flattens, so additional calendars beyond seven do not increase the base subscription Full multi-provider operations Consolidated reporting Suits larger salons, spas, and studios The flat ceiling makes Vagaro one of the cheapest base subscriptions in the category for a large single site.
Additional locations	About $10 per location per month	Shared client records across sites Per-location menus and staffing Consolidated reporting Far cheaper per site than Square Appointments, which charges the full plan price per location.

Add-ons

Text marketing (From about $20 per month)
Website builder (About $20 per month)
Forms and SOAP notes (About $10 per month): Effectively mandatory for clinical and aesthetic practices.
Online shopping cart (About $10 per month)
Branded mobile app (About $100 per month)
Payroll (About $34 per month plus $5 per employee)
Marketplace new client fee (One-time 20 percent of the first appointment): Applies only to genuinely new clients acquired through the Vagaro marketplace.

Billing notes

The base price is a poor predictor of the bill. Independent analyses put realistic all-in monthly cost for a small salon, spa, or studio between roughly $150 and $650 once calendars, add-ons, and card processing are counted.
Card processing rates improve with volume rather than being fixed: roughly 2.6 percent plus 10 cents card present under $4,000 a month, and 2.29 percent plus 19 cents with a $10 monthly fee above it.
The seven-calendar ceiling is genuinely valuable. A twelve-provider salon pays the same base as a seven-provider one, which no per-seat competitor matches.
Additional locations at around $10 a month are dramatically cheaper than Square Appointments, where a second location costs another $49 to $149.
The 30-day trial excludes email marketing, text marketing, and the branded app, so the three most expensive add-ons cannot be evaluated before purchase.
There is no contract and cancellation is advertised as free and without penalty at any time.
Promotional base pricing is frequently advertised, so the $30 figure may present as around $23.99 at signup and revert later.

Value assessment: On base subscription alone Vagaro is excellent value for a multi-provider business: $10 per additional calendar with a ceiling at seven, and $10 per extra location, is the cheapest way to run a large single-site team in this category. The add-on catalogue is where it gets expensive, and the pattern is deliberate: the features a specific vertical cannot operate without (forms for a clinic, text marketing for a salon, the shopping cart for a retailer) are each a separate line. Assemble the stack you genuinely need before comparing, because a spa that requires forms, text marketing, and payroll is paying roughly $145 a month on top of the base, at which point Fresha's bundled offer becomes competitive. Vagaro earns its price for businesses that run classes and memberships, where nothing else at this price does the job at all.

Strengths & limitations

Strengths

The broadest feature coverage available to a small business without enterprise procurement: appointments, classes, memberships, packages, inventory, payroll, forms, and a branded app under one roof.
Appointments and capacity-limited classes are equal citizens, so a business that does both (a spa with yoga, a gym with massage) does not need two systems.
Base pricing flattens at seven bookable calendars, so large single-site teams pay far less per head than on any per-seat competitor.
Additional locations at around $10 a month make multi-site expansion cheap, in stark contrast to Square's per-location plan pricing.
Card processing rates improve with volume, and the sub-$4,000 rate of about 2.6 percent plus 10 cents is competitive from the start.
Payroll and clinical forms are available at all, which almost no direct competitor offers, making Vagaro viable for medi-spas and multi-employee businesses.
Established and consolidating: founded 2009, roughly $163M raised including $100M from FTV Capital, and it acquired Schedulicity in January 2025.

Limitations

The add-on model means the advertised price is misleading. A realistic monthly bill for a fitted-out small business is several times the base subscription.
The 30-day trial excludes email marketing, text marketing, and the branded app, so you cannot evaluate the most expensive add-ons before committing to them.
The interface is dense. Breadth has a cost in clarity, and Vagaro is not the product to choose if a clean experience matters to you.
SMS reminders sit inside a paid text add-on rather than being included, unlike Booksy where messaging is in the flat fee.
The branded app at around $100 a month is priced well above what most single-location businesses can justify.
The consumer marketplace is weaker than Booksy's or Fresha's in terms of client mindshare, so the 20 percent new client fee buys less traffic.
No meeting scheduling capability whatsoever: no round-robin, no collective events, no routing forms, no CRM integration for sales teams.

Head-to-head comparisons

5 alternatives

Vagaro vs Fresha

from $19.95 per month (Independent, one bookable calendar)

Fresha bundles more into the subscription at $14.95 per bookable member and leans on a stronger marketplace with a 20 percent uncapped new client fee. Vagaro has a cheaper base for larger teams (flat at about $90 from seven calendars) but charges separately for forms, text marketing, payroll, and the shopping cart. Vagaro is the better answer for fitness and clinical businesses; Fresha for a salon or spa that wants fewer line items and more inbound demand.

Full Vagaro vs Fresha comparison

Vagaro vs Booksy

from $29.99 per month plus tax

Booksy is one flat $29.99 plus $20 per extra staff member with every feature unlocked, and the strongest consumer app in barbering. Vagaro adds calendars at roughly $10 each and caps at seven, so a large team is much cheaper, but you pay separately for the things Booksy includes. Under four people cutting hair, Booksy. Over six people running classes, memberships, and clinical notes, Vagaro without much argument.

Full Vagaro vs Booksy comparison

Vagaro vs Square Appointments

from $0 per month plus 2.6 percent and 15 cents per in-person card transaction

Square gives the calendar away free for unlimited staff and takes no commission, but is far shallower: no memberships, no class packs, no payroll, no clinical forms, and resource management only at $149 per location. Vagaro costs money from day one and does considerably more. Take Square if you need a book and a till; take Vagaro if you need an operating system.

Full Vagaro vs Square Appointments comparison

Vagaro vs Acuity Scheduling

from $16 per month billed annually ($20 month to month)

Acuity is a polished self-serve appointment scheduler with strong intake forms, packages, and a better client-facing experience, aimed at consultants, coaches, and small practices. It is not a point of sale and does not do classes, memberships, inventory, or payroll. Acuity wins on elegance and on selling appointments; Vagaro wins on running a physical business with staff, stock, and a payroll run.

Full Vagaro vs Acuity Scheduling comparison

Vagaro vs Trafft

from $0 (Free Forever, 1 user and 100 appointments a month), then $29 per month

Trafft is a flat-fee booking platform from $29 a month with multi-location support, custom domains, and your choice of payment processor, and it never takes a marketplace cut. It has no POS, no inventory, no memberships, and no payroll. Trafft suits an operator who wants clean booking and control of payments; Vagaro suits one who wants the whole business in one system and will pay per module for it.

Full Vagaro vs Trafft comparison

Implementation & onboarding

Setup time: Several days to a couple of weeks for a fitted-out business. The calendar and service menu are quick; classes, memberships, packages, inventory, forms, and payroll each add configuration. Payments onboarding requires identity and bank verification.
Learning curve: Moderate to steep, and the steepest in this batch. Vagaro's breadth produces a dense interface with many settings, and owners typically need a week of deliberate configuration plus staff training before the system runs cleanly.
Onboarding: Fully self-serve with a 30-day trial, supported by an unusually large library of help articles and video training. There is no mandatory sales call at any tier.
Migration notes: Client lists, and often service menus and appointment history, can be imported, and Vagaro runs an assisted migration process because it competes for switchers (it acquired Schedulicity in 2025 and migrated that base). The genuinely hard parts are memberships and packages with outstanding balances, and stored cards for recurring membership billing, which have to be re-collected on a processor change. Plan a membership migration deliberately rather than switching mid-cycle.

Platform, API & security

Platforms: Web dashboardVagaro Pro iOS and Android appsConsumer Vagaro app and marketplaceOptional branded client appVagaro POS hardware and card readers
API: Vagaro provides integrations and partner connections plus Zapier for wider automation; it is not positioned as a developer platform and the public API surface is limited compared with Cronofy or Cal.com.
Compliance: PCI DSS for paymentsHIPAA considerations for clinical forms and SOAP notes in supported configurationsGDPRCCPA
Data residency: Operated from the United States (Pleasanton, California) with international availability in selected markets.
SSO: Role-based staff accounts and granular permissions rather than enterprise SSO.
Security notes: Card handling sits inside Vagaro's payments environment. Granular role-based permissions matter here more than in simpler tools, because payroll, commission, and clinical records live in the same system as the appointment book.

Support & resources

Channels: Phone supportLive chatEmail supportAssisted migration for switchers
Documentation: Large support centre at support.vagaro.com with detailed plan, pricing, and feature documentation, plus extensive video training.
Community: Active user community across salon, spa, and fitness verticals, plus a substantial base inherited from the Schedulicity acquisition.

Company

Founded: 2009
Headquarters: Pleasanton, California, United States
Ownership: Private equity backed
Founders: Fred Helou
Employees: Approximately 500 to 1,000
Funding: Approximately $163M raised across two rounds, most notably a $100M private equity investment from FTV Capital in 2021, with a reported valuation around $1B.

Funding history

Round	Amount	Year	Notes
Growth equity	$63M	2020	From FTV Capital, funding expansion beyond the salon vertical.
Private equity	$100M	2021	Reported valuation of approximately $1B.

Timeline

2009Founded by Fred Helou in Pleasanton, California, initially serving salons and spas.
2015Expands into fitness with native class, membership, and package management, broadening the addressable market well beyond beauty.
2020Takes growth investment from FTV Capital and accelerates the add-on catalogue, including payroll, forms, and the branded app.
2021Raises a $100M private equity round at a reported valuation of around $1B.
2025Acquires the competing booking platform Schedulicity in January, consolidating its position among small service businesses.
2026Pricing sits at roughly $30 for one bookable calendar rising to about $90 at seven or more, plus around $10 per additional location and a long add-on menu.

Integrations

Vagaro consumer marketplace
Reserve with Google
Instagram and Facebook booking
Google, Outlook, and Apple calendar sync
Vagaro Payments and card reader hardware
Vagaro Payroll
QuickBooks accounting export
Zoom for virtual classes and appointments
Zapier
Website builder and online shopping cart add-ons

Frequently asked questions

10 questions

What is Vagaro?

Vagaro is an appointment booking and business management platform for salons, spas, fitness studios, and wellness businesses. It handles one-to-one appointments and capacity-limited classes equally, plus memberships, packages, inventory, point of sale, payroll, clinical forms, marketing, and a consumer marketplace.

How much does Vagaro cost?

The base subscription scales with bookable calendars: around $30 a month for one, rising about $10 per additional calendar, and flattening at roughly $90 for seven or more. Additional locations are about $10 a month each. Promotional entry pricing around $23.99 is frequently advertised. Add-ons and card processing are extra, and realistic all-in cost for a fitted-out small business runs from roughly $150 to $650 a month.

What do the Vagaro add-ons cost?

Text marketing from about $20 a month, website builder about $20, forms and SOAP notes about $10, online shopping cart about $10, payroll about $34 plus $5 per employee, and a branded mobile app about $100. The base price is not a useful budget on its own; price the specific modules your business cannot operate without.

Does Vagaro charge commission on bookings?

Only on genuinely new clients acquired through the Vagaro consumer marketplace, where a one-time 20 percent fee applies to the first appointment. Clients who book through your own page, website, Google profile, or the marketplace after their first visit carry no commission at all.

Is Vagaro good for fitness studios and classes?

Yes, and this is its clearest advantage. Capacity-limited classes, recurring series, waitlists, roll call, class packs, and recurring memberships are native rather than bolted on. Most salon-first platforms handle classes badly and most fitness platforms handle appointments badly; Vagaro does both.

What are Vagaro's payment processing rates?

Rates are tiered by volume. Merchants under about $4,000 a month pay roughly 2.6 percent plus 10 cents card present; above that the rate is about 2.29 percent plus 19 cents with a $10 monthly fee. Keyed transactions are about 3.5 percent plus 19 cents, and tap payments add around 6 cents.

How does Vagaro pricing compare for a large team?

Very favourably on base subscription. Because the price flattens at seven bookable calendars, a twelve-provider salon pays roughly $90 a month for the base, where Booksy at $20 per extra head would be $249.99 and Fresha at $14.95 per member would be around $180. The add-ons are what close that gap, so compare fitted-out totals rather than headline prices.

Can Vagaro handle clinical notes and consent forms?

Yes, through the forms and SOAP notes add-on at around $10 a month. That module is what makes Vagaro workable for massage therapy, physiotherapy, and medical spa practices that need documented consent and treatment records tied to the appointment.

Is there a free trial or free plan?

There is a 30-day free trial and no free plan. The trial excludes email marketing, text marketing, and the branded app, which are three of the most expensive add-ons, so you cannot fully evaluate the stack before paying for it.

Can Vagaro be used to book sales meetings?

No. There is no round-robin distribution, no collective scheduling, no routing forms, and no CRM lead handling. It books services delivered by named providers at a place of business. Calendly, OnceHub, or Cal.com are the right category for inbound demo booking.

Editorial verdict

Vagaro is the most capable small-business booking platform on the market and the one whose pricing you have to model most carefully. The base subscription is genuinely cheap for a multi-provider business, flattening at around $90 a month from seven calendars and adding locations at about $10 each, which nothing else matches. But the modules a real business needs (text marketing, forms, the shopping cart, payroll, a branded app) are each separately priced, and the honest all-in figure lands between roughly $150 and $650 a month. Buy it if you run classes and appointments together, sell memberships or packages, or need clinical forms and payroll in the same system, because in those cases the competition does not seriously exist at this price. Do not buy it for a two-chair barbershop, where Booksy's flat $29.99 or Square's free plan will do the same job with far less setup and a much clearer bill.

Written by the SaaSTracker editorial team. Awards, when shown, are judged against the published criteria in our methodology.