HoneyBook Pricing: What a Small Studio Pays in a Year

I checked every HoneyBook price and fee below against HoneyBook's pricing page and its payment fees guide on 2026-10-23. Prices change and HoneyBook runs promotions, so confirm the numbers on the page before you sign up. This post is about how to add the numbers up for a studio your size, not about telling you which tool to buy.

What do HoneyBook's plans cost today?

HoneyBook sells three plans. The pricing page leads with the yearly rate, and the monthly rate is higher. The monthly figures here come from HoneyBook's own payment fees guide, which states them next to the yearly ones.

Plan	Billed yearly	Billed monthly	Per year, yearly billing	Per year, monthly billing
Starter	$29/mo	$36/mo	$348	$432
Essentials	$49/mo	$59/mo	$588	$708
Premium	$109/mo	$129/mo	$1,308	$1,548

Paying yearly saves you $84 on Starter, $120 on Essentials, and $240 on Premium compared with paying month to month. If you are sure you will still be using it in twelve months, yearly billing is the cheaper way in. If you are not sure, the trial is the better first step: HoneyBook says you can try virtually every feature free for 30 days with no credit card, and it advertises a 60-day money-back guarantee on paid plans.

What each plan includes, per the pricing page:

• Starter: unlimited clients and projects, invoices and payments, proposals and contracts, calendar, templates, client portal, basic reports, and up to 2 live lead forms.
• Essentials: everything in Starter plus the scheduler, automations, QuickBooks Online integration, up to 2 team members, up to 10 live lead forms, SMS reminders, removal of the "Powered by HoneyBook" label, and standard reports.
• Premium: everything in Essentials plus unlimited team members, priority support, multiple companies, advanced reports, and unlimited live lead forms.

The pricing page was also showing percentage-off promotions on the day I read it. Those come and go, so the model below uses the list prices.

How much do payment processing fees add?

HoneyBook is also your payment processor, and it charges per transaction on top of the plan. From its payment fees guide:

• Card entered by you or your client: 2.9% plus $0.25 for Visa and Mastercard.
• Amex, Discover, and any card saved on file: 3.4% plus $0.09.
• Bank transfer (ACH): 1.5% of the payment, with no fixed amount.
• Instant deposit: an extra 1% if you want funds in about 30 minutes instead of two to three business days.
• Cash or check taken outside HoneyBook: no fee.

One wrinkle to know about. The pricing page headline says card fees "start at 2.7% + 10¢", while its feature table and the fees guide list 2.9% plus 25 cents. I used 2.9% plus 25 cents as the standard rate because that is the figure both pages state in full, and I did not model the 2.7% plus 10 cents headline rate, because I could not find the conditions for it. HoneyBook also says that if you process over $500,000 a year on Premium you may be eligible for discounted card fees, which is not a studio-sized number.

The fixed 9 cents on a saved card sounds cheap, but the percentage is higher. On a $900 payment, a saved card costs $30.69 and a typed-in card costs $26.35. Autopay is convenient and it costs a little more.

What does a year of HoneyBook cost at 15, 40, and 80 bookings?

Here is the worked example. These are assumptions, not data about your studio, so swap in your own:

• A photographer whose average booking is $1,800.
• Each booking is paid in two payments: a deposit and a final balance of $900 each.
• All payments are typed-in cards at 2.9% plus $0.25 (the base case). The ACH and saved-card cases follow.
• Plan chosen to match the volume: Starter at 15 bookings, Essentials at 40 and 80, billed yearly.

Card fees per booking: 2.9% of $1,800 is $52.20, plus two 25-cent charges is $0.50, so $52.70 per booking.

	15 bookings	40 bookings	80 bookings
Booked revenue	$27,000	$72,000	$144,000
Plan (yearly billing)	Starter $348	Essentials $588	Essentials $588
Card fees at 2.9% + $0.25	$790.50	$2,108.00	$4,216.00
Total for the year	$1,138.50	$2,696.00	$4,804.00
Total as a share of revenue	4.2%	3.7%	3.3%
Subscription as a share of the total	31%	22%	12%

The pattern is the point. The subscription is the small number once you are busy, and the fee line is what scales with every booking. At 80 bookings the plan is only 12% of what you pay HoneyBook all year.

Now the same volumes if you shift how clients pay:

	15 bookings	40 bookings	80 bookings
All by ACH at 1.5%	$405.00	$1,080.00	$2,160.00
Deposit by card, balance on saved card	$855.60	$2,281.60	$4,563.20
Card-only (base case)	$790.50	$2,108.00	$4,216.00

Moving every payment to bank transfer would save about $2,056 a year at 80 bookings. The catch is HoneyBook's own warning: ACH deposits take 7 to 8 business days and can fail on insufficient funds or closed accounts. A wedding client paying a final balance by bank transfer is fine. A last-minute portrait client paying the morning of the shoot is not.

At 80 bookings, check whether you need Premium. Essentials covers up to 2 team members. If you have a second shooter and an assistant on the system, Premium's $1,308 a year changes the 80-booking total to $5,524, which is still about 3.8% of revenue.

What did the recent price change alter for existing users?

HoneyBook changed its plan lineup and prices, and it published a plans article explaining it. In that article it says its new pricing plans would not affect existing members at that time, and that most current members keep the features of the Essentials plan. If a feature you want is Premium-only, you upgrade to get it.

I could not verify a newer change, and I would rather say so than guess. What I can say is that the list prices on the page today ($29, $49, $109 yearly) match what wedding videographers were quoting in a December 2024 Reddit thread about the price change, and that the thread mentioned a payment limit on Starter. I did not find any such limit stated on the current pricing page, so if payment caps matter to you, ask HoneyBook support to confirm in writing before you commit.

The practical advice is the same either way: write down the plan name and rate on the day you subscribe. If your renewal price differs, you will know it.

Which features does a small studio actually use?

Most one-person studios use four things: a contract, an invoice with a payment link, a place to see who has paid, and a lead form. Those are all on Starter. The features that are easy to pay for and not use:

• Automations. Essentials adds them, and they are worth it only if you have written down a repeatable workflow, like inquiry received, proposal sent, follow-up in three days. If you have not written that workflow, the automation has nothing to run.
• The scheduler. Useful if clients book consultations or mini sessions themselves. If you schedule over email anyway, you are paying $240 a year more (Essentials versus Starter) for a calendar link.
• Team members. Starter has none. Essentials allows 2. Premium is unlimited. A solo photographer should not be on Premium for the team features.
• Multiple companies. Premium only. It matters if you run a photography brand and a separate planning brand, and not otherwise.
• Removing the "Powered by HoneyBook" label. Essentials and up. This is a branding choice with a price tag.

A useful test: look at the last 20 clients you served and count how many used each feature. Cut the plan to the highest tier that has a feature more than a handful of them touched.

What does the same workflow cost as separate tools?

HoneyBook's pricing page claims the product replaces five or more platforms and saves over $2,000 a year. That claim comes from the vendor, and it assumes you would otherwise pay for a form tool, a scheduler, e-signature, bookkeeping, and project management at their list prices. Most solo studios would not.

A realistic split for a one-person studio looks like this:

• Scheduling: Calendly's pricing page lists a free plan with one event type, and a Standard plan at $10 per seat per month billed yearly (checked 2026-10-23).
• Invoices and payments: your payment processor's invoicing, which charges its own per-transaction fee. Compare that rate to HoneyBook's before assuming either is cheaper.
• Clients, bookings, and who has paid: a customer list and a money log. The SMBDashboard free tier keeps up to 25 customers and 200 money entries, and Pro at $48 every six months (about $8 a month) or $149 lifetime removes the caps. Your data stays in your browser unless you turn on Pro sync.
• Contracts and e-signatures: this is the gap. SMBDashboard does not do contracts or signatures, and HoneyBook's built-in contract flow is one of the things a separate setup does worse. You would use a signature tool or a PDF contract with a signed copy returned by email.

The honest summary: separate tools cost less in subscriptions and more in your time. HoneyBook is a bundle, and bundles are worth it when the time saved is worth more than the difference.

For a studio that mostly needs to know who the clients are, which bookings are confirmed, and who has paid, the client tracking basics in our CRM guide and the unpaid invoice routine cover that without a subscription. Which numbers to look at once you have records is covered in photography business numbers worth tracking.

When is HoneyBook worth it?

It earns its price when most of these are true:

• You take 25 or more bookings a year and each one involves a proposal, a contract, and payments in two or more pieces.
• You lose time or leads to manual follow-up and you will actually build the automations.
• You want clients to sign, pay, and message in one portal, and you value that more than the fee difference.
• You are comfortable with the processing fee as a cost of doing business, because you would pay a similar rate on any card processor.

It is probably early if you take a dozen bookings a year, collect by bank transfer or check, and already have a contract template. In that case the 30-day trial on real clients is the right test, followed by a look at whether Starter alone does the job.

Whatever you choose, keep a record of income by client and date. The IRS covers recordkeeping basics in Publication 334, Tax Guide for Small Business, and an accountant can tell you what applies to your situation. This post is a cost explainer, not tax or financial advice.

If you mostly need clients, bookings, and who has paid, try the dashboard free before starting a subscription. If you outgrow the caps, see SMBDashboard Pro.

FAQ

How much does HoneyBook cost per month?

When billed yearly, Starter is $29, Essentials is $49, and Premium is $109 a month. When billed monthly, they are $36, $59, and $129. Card payments add 2.9% plus $0.25 (typed-in card), 3.4% plus $0.09 (saved card or Amex and Discover), or 1.5% for a bank transfer. All figures were checked on HoneyBook's pages on 2026-10-23.

Does HoneyBook charge transaction fees?

Yes. HoneyBook is the payment processor, so card and bank payments made through it carry a fee on top of the plan price. Payments you receive outside HoneyBook, such as a check, carry no HoneyBook fee, though you then lose the automatic payment tracking.

Is there a free version of HoneyBook?

No free plan. HoneyBook offers a 30-day free trial with no credit card on every plan, plus a 60-day money-back guarantee on paid plans, per its pricing page on 2026-10-23. After the trial you pay for a plan or stop using it.

Is HoneyBook worth it for a new photographer?

Often not at the start. With fewer than about 15 bookings a year, the plan itself is a modest cost, but the main benefit is saved admin time, and a new photographer has less admin to save. Use the free trial on your first real inquiries, and start on Starter rather than Essentials unless you need the scheduler or automations on day one.