Comparison
A Acuity Scheduling alternative built for one chair
Acuity Scheduling is built for Any appointment business, not salons specifically. A Squarespace product.
Chairwarden is built for one person renting one chair. That narrower aim is the whole difference, and it cuts both ways — there is a list further down of what Acuity Scheduling does better.
Free to try, up to 15 bookings/month · calendar protection included on every plan
What each one takes from a booking
Acuity Scheduling
No marketplace commission. The $16 Starter plan is the cheapest option we found anywhere — but it has no text reminders, no waitlist and no memberships; those need the $27 Standard plan.
acuityscheduling.com, checked 2026-09-05
Chairwarden
$29 a month, or $23 paid yearly. No percentage and no per-booking fee. When a client pays a deposit it lands in your own Stripe account, and we take nothing out of it.
Stripe Connect Standard, direct charges
The part nobody else does
Chairwarden refuses the booking that would split your best slot.
You have a four-hour opening for a colour appointment. A 30-minute trim books into the middle of it, and the whole block is gone — two unusable stubs instead of $250 of work. Chairwarden simply never offers that slot to a short service. You can relax the rule if you want a quick cut to fit inside the processing time.
What Acuity Scheduling has instead
Acuity's plans list no calendar-protection feature. It is a general-purpose scheduler, so nothing in it knows that a balayage is worth more than a trim.
acuityscheduling.com, checked 2026-09-05
Where Acuity Scheduling is genuinely better
- The cheapest entry price in this comparison, at $16 a month
- Deep customisation of intake forms and booking rules
- Works for any appointment business, not just hair
Choose Acuity Scheduling if price is the deciding factor and you do not need text reminders, or you already run a Squarespace site.
What Chairwarden does not do
- No card terminal or point of sale — deposits online only
- No marketing campaigns
- No staff accounts; one stylist per account
- No marketplace, so it will not find clients for you
- No client-facing app — your clients book on the web
Try it on your own calendar
Free up to 15 bookings a month, no card. Calendar protection is on from the first booking.
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