Start with the part that does not favour us: Square Appointments has a free plan, no employee limit on the calendars, and in the United States a listing in its Square Go app that costs nothing. If the software price is your only question, we are not the answer to it. What Square is, though, is a payments business – its plans are billed per location, and the earnings sit in the card processing that runs underneath. Salon Wizard sells software and nothing else, so your payments stay exactly where they are.
from €7.00 per month
4
Appointment software inside a payment platform No employee limit on the calendars, according to Square
Only additional locations carry a fixed, transparent surcharge.
| Criterion | Salon Wizard | Square Appointments |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | Fair flat price – monthly or yearly | A free entry plan for a single location and paid tiers billed per location, with a processing fee on every card payment |
| Staff | Unlimited – no extra charge | No employee limit on the calendars, according to Square |
| Your own booking website | Yes, under your brand | A booking site is included; in the United States, eligible businesses also get an automatic profile in the Square Go app |
| Data ownership | German servers, GDPR, your data | Bookings and payment history live in one platform account, under its own terms |
| Third-party ads & competition | None – only your business | In the United States, Square's own Square Go app shows nearby businesses in the same search – free of charge, but not only you. Outside it there is no such directory, so this row is a draw |
We take no share of any appointment. Neither does Square's subscription – but a processing fee is charged on top of it whenever a card is used, while cash and cheque are free according to its own fee table. That is not a hidden commission, it is a different business model: on the free tier theirs is paid entirely at the terminal, on the paid tiers monthly per location as well. Ours is paid at the start of the month and nowhere else.
Your guests book on your own page under your brand. Square includes a booking site as well, and in the United States it lists eligible businesses in its Square Go app at no charge – genuine reach, and also a place where the salons around you turn up under the same search. On your own page, nobody else does.
Your client records sit on servers in Germany and belong to you. Square contracts its European sellers through its own EU and UK entities, so this is not a data-protection gap and we will not present it as one. The difference is where the servers stand – and whether your client list lives inside a payment account at all.
Staff are included in the Team plan. Square states no employee limit either, so headcount is not the dividing line between us and we will not pretend it is. Both models price per location; here that surcharge is fixed and printed, and the software price does not depend on where you take payment.
Sign up, name your salon, add your opening hours – no payment details.
Set up treatments with duration and price, then add your staff. Included in the Team plan at no extra cost.
Your page goes live and guests book under your brand – every appointment is yours.
Switching away from a payments platform changes less in your calendar than in what your calendar is attached to.
Booking, client record and invoice sit in one place; the card terminal sits in another. Changing your processor stops being a software migration, because the software has no opinion about it.
After the switch your client data is in Salon Wizard on German servers, and your payment history stays with whoever handles your payments. Two systems, two purposes, and that costs something real: the sale no longer writes itself onto the client record, so takings per client or per service becomes a report you assemble yourself. What you get for it is a much clearer boundary.
This one goes against us and it belongs on the page. A free plan becomes a monthly plan. What you buy for it is a salon-specific product, a booking page under your own name, and no dependency on where the money is processed.
Online booking around the clock, the calendar and staff scheduling, services with duration and price, and client records with history and recurring appointments – plus your own booking page, and the whole team included in the Team plan at no extra cost.
The till itself. Square is a point of sale with hardware and card processing built in; we have no certified till and settle nothing, so a business that rings up cash through the same software will keep needing a till of its own. And the stack that hangs off the payment account goes with it: deposits and no-show fees, gift cards and loyalty, the marketing campaigns, the timecards and shift planning. The ones that need a card on file we cannot replace at all – if you charge for no-shows today, work out how you would do that here before you move. The free plan goes as well, and in the United States so does the Square Go listing, which costs you nothing.
For a solo professional who is happy on Square's processing, that is a fair question and the free plan is a strong answer. We are not cheaper, and pretending otherwise would be an odd way to open. What you get here instead is software that does not tie your appointments to a payment provider, a booking page under your own address, and salon trades as the thing it is designed around.
No commission on the appointment. It charges a processing fee on every card payment, according to its own pricing pages – cash and cheque are listed as free – and on the paid tiers a monthly plan price per location as well. So the comparison is not commission against commission: it is a software price against a software price plus a payment margin.
No. Staff are included in the Team plan at no extra cost, whatever the size of your team. Square states no employee limit either, so this row is a draw. Only additional locations cost a fixed surcharge here, and you can read it in advance.
Yes. Salon Wizard settles nothing and processes nothing, so the terminal on your counter stays your own decision. Nothing in the booking flow changes if you switch processor next year, because the booking flow never knew which one you used.
Square sells a plan per location, from a free tier upwards, and earns on the card processing beneath it. Salon Wizard sells three plans that build on each other, with the whole team inside the Team plan, and earns nothing at your counter: an additional location carries a fixed surcharge you can read before you open it. Which is cheaper depends entirely on how much you take in card payments – that is the question to work out, not one we can answer for you.
Square Go exists only in the United States and only as an iPhone app, so anyone working outside that never had a profile to lose. If you do have one: it belongs to Square Appointments and goes with it. The listing costs nothing today, so leaving it behind is a real loss and not a saving – count how many new clients actually arrive that way before you switch.
Ask for the export while the account is still active. Which fields a platform releases, and in which format, is its own decision and not something we can promise on its behalf. Client records, services and opening hours you then set up here.
That depends on the country you invoice in: ask whether your law requires a certified security device for electronic tills, and from what point it applies. Square is a point of sale and sells the hardware for it – where it is sold at all is set out on its own pages, and it is not every market this page reaches. Salon Wizard deliberately is not a till: we plan appointments, keep the client record and write invoices, and the till stays yours.
A comparison answers the price question. It does not answer the question of fit. What each plan contains is on the pricing page – how Salon Wizard works in the day-to-day of your trade is what the vertical pages beside it show, each with the services, routines and examples that are usual there.