HoneyBook got expensive. The 89% price increase in 2025 pushed a lot of freelancers to look elsewhere, and for good reason. What used to be a $39/month tool is now $8/month on a stripped-down starter plan or $66/month for the features most people actually need. If you're one of the freelancers reevaluating your stack, here's what's actually out there.
This isn't a list of twelve tools you'll never try. It's four real options, what each one does well, and where each one falls short.
What to Look for in a HoneyBook Alternative
Before jumping to a new platform, it helps to know what you're actually replacing. HoneyBook bundles proposals, contracts, invoicing, scheduling, and a client-facing experience into one product. Most freelancers use three or four of those features. Some use all of them.
Here's what matters when you're comparing alternatives:
Proposals and contracts. Can you create, send, and get a contract signed without leaving the platform? Does it support electronic signatures that hold up legally?
Invoicing. Can you send an invoice, track payment status, and follow up on late payments in one place? Does the platform charge transaction fees on top of Stripe or payment processor fees?
Client portal. Does your client get a clean experience where they can view documents, approve work, and pay, or do they get a wall of email attachments?
Pricing transparency. Is the pricing straightforward, or are core features locked behind higher tiers? Will the price change again next year?
Geography. HoneyBook is built almost entirely for US-based creatives. If you work with international clients or operate from outside the US, you need a tool that actually supports that.
TAV
$49/month flat. No tiers. No transaction fees.
TAV was built specifically for independent professionals who need proposals, contracts, invoicing, and a client portal in one place. There's one plan. You get everything.
The biggest difference between TAV and HoneyBook is how documents work. TAV auto-generates contracts and invoices based on the project details you've already entered. You fill in the scope, rate, and timeline once. TAV produces the proposal, the contract with e-signature, and the invoices from that same data. No copy-pasting between templates.
Your clients get a live portal where they can view every document, sign contracts, and pay invoices. It's not a branded email with a PDF attached. It's a real interface that stays updated as the project moves forward.
TAV works in both the US and the EU. Contracts adapt to the relevant legal framework, invoices handle VAT and multi-currency, and everything is formatted for the jurisdiction you're operating in. If you've been on HoneyBook and ever needed to invoice a client in euros, you know how painful that gap is.
What TAV does well: single source of truth for project data, no re-entry across documents, clean client experience, flat pricing that doesn't penalize growth, US and EU legal compliance out of the box.
Where TAV is newer: TAV doesn't have HoneyBook's scheduling tool or its built-in marketing automations. If you rely on meeting booking or drip email sequences inside your client management platform, you'll need a separate tool for those.
Bonsai
$24/month (Starter) to $79/month (Business). Transaction fees on lower tiers.
Bonsai has been around since 2016 and covers a lot of ground: proposals, contracts, invoicing, time tracking, accounting, tax prep, and even a basic CRM. It's one of the most full-featured toolkits available for freelancers in the US.
Bonsai's templates are its strength. The contract templates are well-written, the proposal templates look professional, and you can customize them without starting from scratch. If you like working from pre-built starting points and adjusting from there, Bonsai delivers on that.
The challenge with Bonsai in 2026 is direction. The company has been moving upmarket toward agencies and small teams. Pricing reflects that, and recent feature development has focused on team collaboration, subcontractor management, and workflow tools that solo freelancers don't need. You can still use it as an individual, but the product roadmap isn't centered on you anymore.
Bonsai also charges a transaction fee (varies by plan) on payments processed through the platform, on top of Stripe's processing fees. On the Starter plan, those costs add up quickly.
What Bonsai does well: wide feature set, strong templates, built-in accounting and tax estimates for US freelancers.
Where Bonsai falls short: growing focus on agencies, transaction fees on lower plans, limited international support outside the US.
Dubsado
$24/month (Starter) to $44/month (Premier). Annual discounts available.
Dubsado is the power-user's choice. It's a workflow automation platform that lets you build custom pipelines for leads, onboarding, invoicing, and follow-ups. If you want granular control over every step of your client process, Dubsado gives you the tools to build it.
The customization is genuinely impressive. You can create multi-step workflows that trigger emails, generate invoices, update project statuses, and move clients through stages automatically. Photographers, wedding planners, and event professionals who handle dozens of similar projects per year love Dubsado for exactly this reason.
The tradeoff is setup time. Dubsado has a steep learning curve. Building your first set of workflows can take hours, and the interface isn't always intuitive. There's a reason Dubsado has an active community of "Dubsado setup specialists" who charge $500 or more to configure the platform for new users. If you want something that works well out of the box, this probably isn't it.
Dubsado also doesn't offer a dedicated client portal. Clients interact through branded forms and email links, which works fine but doesn't give them a single place to see everything related to their project.
What Dubsado does well: deep workflow automation, highly customizable forms and emails, strong for high-volume service businesses.
Where Dubsado falls short: steep learning curve, no unified client portal, dated interface in places, US-focused.
Wave
Free for invoicing and accounting. Paid add-ons for payroll and payments.
Wave is the free option, and it's genuinely free. No trial period, no feature gates on the core product. You can send invoices, track expenses, run basic financial reports, and connect your bank account without paying anything.
If your only problem with HoneyBook was the price, and you only used it for invoicing, Wave is worth a look. The invoice builder is clean, payment reminders are built in, and the accounting side is surprisingly capable for a free tool.
But Wave is not a client management platform. There are no proposals, no contracts, no e-signatures, no client portal. It's an accounting and invoicing tool, and it does that well, but it doesn't replace the rest of what HoneyBook offers. You'll need separate tools for contracts, proposals, and anything client-facing beyond the invoice itself.
Wave was acquired by H&R Block in 2019, and the product has been stable since then. It hasn't changed much, which is both a strength (reliable, predictable) and a limitation (don't expect major new features).
What Wave does well: free invoicing and bookkeeping, solid accounting reports, no cost to get started.
Where Wave falls short: no contracts, no proposals, no client portal, no project management. It's a finance tool, not a client management tool.
How to Decide
The right tool depends on what you actually use daily, not what sounds good on a features page.
If you want one tool that handles proposals, contracts, invoicing, and client communication without charging you more as you grow: TAV is the most direct HoneyBook replacement, with better international support and simpler pricing.
If you want a broad toolkit with accounting and tax features built in, and you're US-based: Bonsai covers the most ground, as long as you're comfortable with the transaction fees and the shift toward agency features.
If you run a high-volume service business and want full control over every workflow: Dubsado gives you the deepest customization, but plan for real setup time.
If you only need invoicing and bookkeeping, and budget is the priority: Wave does that for free, no strings attached.
One more thing worth mentioning. Switching platforms is easier than it feels. Most of these tools can import your client list, and you don't need to migrate old invoices. Start fresh with new projects on the new platform and let old records live where they are.
Ready to Switch?
TAV gives you proposals, contracts with e-signature, invoicing, and a client portal in one place. One plan, $49/month, no transaction fees. It works in the US and the EU.
Start your free trial and see how it compares to what you're using now.