If you’re still going back and forth over email to find a meeting time, a scheduling tool pays for itself in the first week. Clients pick a slot that works, your calendar updates automatically, and no-shows drop once reminders are automated.

We compared two of the most widely used options for service businesses: Calendly and Acuity Scheduling.

This post contains affiliate links. See our Affiliate Disclosure for details.

Where we mention hands-on testing, that reflects our own use of the tool. Everything else is based on researched pricing, features, and publicly available information.

Quick Comparison

Tool	Starting Price	Free Plan?	Best For
Calendly	$10/seat/mo (Standard, annual)	Yes — real free tier, 1 event type	Simple booking links, low setup effort
Acuity Scheduling	$16/mo (Starter, annual)	No — 7-day trial only	Businesses that take payments, packages, or memberships at booking

Calendly

Calendly is the most recognizable name in scheduling, and its free plan is genuinely usable, not just a stripped-down teaser. You get one active event type, calendar sync, and a shareable booking link at no cost, which is often enough for a solo consultant who only offers one kind of meeting (like a 30-minute discovery call).

Once you need more than one event type, automated reminders, or the ability to collect payment at booking, the Standard plan runs $10/seat/month billed annually ($12 monthly). Teams, at $16/seat/month annually, adds round-robin routing and admin controls, but that’s built for multi-person teams rather than solo businesses.

Best fit: solo consultants and coaches who want the simplest possible booking link and don’t need packages, memberships, or complex intake forms.

Acuity Scheduling

Acuity Scheduling (owned by Squarespace) is built with service businesses in mind from the ground up — think coaches, therapists, and consultants who sell packages, subscriptions, or multi-session bundles rather than one-off meetings. It handles intake forms, deposits, and recurring appointments more natively than Calendly does.

There’s no free tier, only a 7-day trial. Pricing starts at $16/month (Starter, annual billing; $20 monthly) for one calendar with email-only reminders. Standard, at $27/month annually, adds SMS reminders, packages, and memberships. Premium, at $49/month annually, adds HIPAA compliance for businesses handling protected health information. Payment processing (Stripe, Square, or PayPal) runs standard rates on top, around 2.9% + 30¢ per transaction.

Best fit: service businesses selling packages or recurring sessions, or anyone who wants scheduling and payment collection tightly integrated in one booking flow.

Our Recommendation

Just need clients to book a single type of call without any cost? Start with Calendly’s free plan — it genuinely holds up for that use case. Selling packages, running memberships, or collecting deposits at the time of booking? Acuity’s higher price reflects real functionality Calendly doesn’t offer at any tier.

FAQ

Can I use scheduling software without connecting a payment processor?
Yes, both tools work fine for scheduling alone. Payment collection is optional on either platform.

Do these tools integrate with my CRM?
Both integrate with popular CRMs and offer Zapier connections. HoneyBook, Dubsado, and 17hats (covered in our CRM roundup) each have some native scheduling built in too, which may reduce the need for a separate tool depending on your setup.

Is the free Calendly plan actually usable long-term?
For a business with one consistent meeting type, yes. The moment you need a second event type (say, a follow-up call that’s shorter than your intro call), you’ll need to upgrade.

Pricing reflects publicly listed rates as of publication and may change — check each provider’s site for current pricing before subscribing.