Acuity Scheduling vs Square Appointments Comparison 2026
Square Appointments costs nothing a month for one location and earns through the card processing rate instead, 2.6% plus 15 cents in person. Acuity Scheduling charges a flat $16 a month and up, with intake forms and deposits built into every tier. One is a subscription price. The other is a percentage of what you process, and that only matters once real money is moving through the booking.
Booking pages with intake forms
Booking and payments in one account
At a glance
- Acuity Scheduling starts cheaper, at $16.
- Only Square Appointments has a free tier.
Side by side
Acuity Scheduling | Square Appointments | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price (they differ) | From $16 | From $49 |
| Pricing model (they differ) | Free trial, then paid | Free plan, paid tiers |
| Free tier (they differ) | No | Yes |
| Billing | Monthly or annual | Monthly or annual |
| Free trial (they differ) | 7 days | 30 days |
Acuity Scheduling
Booking pages with intake forms
Acuity handles the part of booking that Calendly leaves out: intake forms, packages, deposits and paid appointments, with the money taken before anybody shows up. Squarespace owns it now and the two share an account. There is no free plan, so it is bought by people whose calendar already earns.
Our note
No free plan at all is the clearest difference from everything else here. Setmore and Cal.com take bookings for nothing, so the $16 is worth paying only when the intake form and the payment at booking are the point.
Square Appointments
Booking and payments in one account
Square Appointments runs a booking site, staff calendars and reminders, and takes the payment through Square rather than through a separate processor. The free plan covers one location with no monthly fee at all, and the processing rate is where Square earns instead. Paying lowers that rate and adds the scheduling controls a team needs. Anybody who only wants a calendar link and never takes a payment is paying attention to the wrong half of this product.
Why people weigh these two
- Square Appointments instead of Acuity Scheduling
- Square Appointments ties booking to the same account you already take card payments through, from $49 a month with a free tier.
- Acuity Scheduling instead of Square Appointments
- Acuity adds intake forms and packages around the booking, starting at $16 with no free tier, for a business that wants those specifics but processes payment separately from the scheduler.
Which one should you pick
Square Appointments is free for a solo operator at one location, and the free plan is not thin: booking site, reminders and unlimited staff calendars are all included at $0. The cost instead is the card rate, 2.6% plus 15 cents in person or 3.3% plus 30 cents online. Do the arithmetic on your own volume first. Plus at $49 a month lowers those rates and roughly breaks even around $12,000 a month in online bookings.
Acuity Scheduling is the better fit when payment processing is not the point, or when intake forms matter more than a lower card rate. At $16 a month it has no free tier, but the price is fixed. It never moves with how much money passes through it. Choose Acuity over Square once the paperwork before the appointment matters as much as taking the payment itself.
Common questions
- Is Square Appointments really free?
- Yes, for one location, with no monthly fee. Square instead charges 2.6% plus 15 cents per in-person payment and 3.3% plus 30 cents online. Acuity Scheduling has no free plan at all and starts at $16 a month instead of taking a cut of payments.
- When does Square's paid Plus plan pay for itself?
- Around $12,000 a month in online bookings, where the lower 2.9% plus 30 cent rate saves more than the $49 monthly fee costs. Below that volume, the free plan and its higher rate work out cheaper.
- Does Acuity Scheduling take a cut of payments the way Square does?
- No. Acuity charges a flat subscription instead, from $16 to $49 a month, for deposits and payments taken at booking. Square skips the subscription for a single location and earns through the card processing rate on every transaction instead.
- Which is better for a business with several staff members?
- Both scale to staff, but differently. Square Appointments includes unlimited staff calendars even on the free plan. Acuity raises the price to $27 and $49 a month as more calendars and staff are added.
Ratings are the average of reviews readers left. The facts are stated by each tool’s own listing and are not verified by CloutStack. How we make money.