The True Cost of 7 Salon Booking Platforms — and the One With a No-Commission Booking Link

This complaint shows up in almost every stylist forum and every beauty pro Facebook group: I made the money, and it feels like the platform is taking a big cut of my money. It's a real cost: Booksy and StyleSeat take 30% on new clients booked through their marketplace, Fresha takes 20%, and most stylists don't run the full math until they're already locked in.

If you're trying to pick a booking platform, or questioning whether your current one is worth it, this post breaks down what seven of the most common ones are for beauty professionals and salons, and what they actually charge: subscriptions, marketplace commissions, and card processing fees. One of them works differently. Primzy automatically gives every stylist a shared profile link at setup on their dashboard: for every client who books through it, the stylist pays zero commission, on any appointment, the first visit or the fiftieth.

The table below shows exactly what that difference adds up to over a year.

What platforms actually charge, from their own pages

Before digging in, verify every number yourself from their pricing policies. This post was updated at June 5th, 2026. All links go directly to each platform's own pages:

Booksy

Boost commission: 30%, min $10, max $100

Payment processing rates

How to avoid Boost commission using your profile link

StyleSeat

New Client Connection: 30% commission, max $50

$2.35 client booking fee

Processing fees: 2.5% + $0.30 per transaction

Fresha

Marketplace new client commission: 20%

Marketplace new client fee rules

Vagaro

$0 commission on marketplace bookings

GlossGenius

Plans and pricing

Square Appointments

Free solo plan pricing

Three platforms charge a commission on new clients discovered through their marketplace.

Booksy Boost takes 30% of a new client's first visit, with a floor of $10 and a ceiling of $100. You only pay it when Boost is on and a new client finds you through Booksy's consumer app (not when they book through your shared link). The feature is optional, but it is Booksy's primary client acquisition tool, and most stylists building a book use it.

StyleSeat's New Client Connection runs the same rate: 30% of the first appointment, capped at $50. If a new client books a $160 balayage, StyleSeat keeps $48 of it. A $200 service hits the cap. That's on top of StyleSeat's $35/month subscription and a $2.35 booking fee charged directly to your client every time they book through the platform.

Fresha's marketplace charges 20% on a new client's first booking, with a minimum fee of $6. That's a lower rate than Booksy and StyleSeat, but the same one-time-per-client structure: after the first appointment, repeat bookings from that client cost nothing extra. Worth noting: Fresha's own pricing page states that clients who find you through your own website, Google, or social media channels don't trigger the fee. The 20% only applies when the Fresha marketplace itself makes the introduction.

GlossGenius doesn't charge a marketplace commission, but it also doesn't have marketplace discovery, so the two aren't a direct comparison. For card processing, GlossGenius charges the stylist a flat 2.6% on every transaction.

Vagaro and Square are in the same position: no per-booking commission, no beauty marketplace surfacing your profile to new clients who've never heard of you.

The processing fee most stylists don't think about

Here's the cost that gets less attention than commissions but adds up just as steadily: processing fees.

On Booksy, you pay approximately 2.49%–2.69% + a per-transaction fee on every card payment. On StyleSeat, it's 2.2%–2.5% + $0.30 per transaction. On GlossGenius, it's 2.6% flat. In each case, that fee comes out of your revenue. The platform earns; you pay.

On Primzy, the card processing fee is paid by the client, not the stylist. That shift matters when you run the numbers.

Say you're doing 22 appointments a month at an average service price of $95. That's $2,090 in card revenue. At 2.5%, the stylist-pays model costs you $52 every month in processing fees — $624 a year, just to accept card payments on work you already did.

The math across three months

Now combine commissions and processing. Assume 7 new clients a month through the platform, average first service $110.

Booksy Boost (30% new client commission + 2.5% processing on all revenue):

Commission: $33 per new client × 7 = $231/month

Processing on $2,090 revenue: ~$52

Monthly platform cost: ~$283 (before the $29.99 subscription)

StyleSeat (30% commission capped at $50 + $2.35 client booking fee + 2.35% processing):

Commission: $33 per new client × 7 = $231/month

Processing on $2,090: ~$49

Client booking fees: $2.35 × 22 appointments = $51.70 your clients absorb

Monthly platform cost: ~$280 (before the $35 subscription)

Primzy, all bookings through your shared profile link:

Commission: $0 — the shared link is commission-free on every client, every time

Processing on $2,090 revenue: $0 (your clients pay this, not you)

Monthly platform cost: $0 beyond the $25 subscription

This is the core of how Primzy is designed to work. Every stylist gets a shared profile link at setup. Every client who books through it — new or returning, first visit or fiftieth — costs nothing in commission. Primzy does have a 15% marketplace commission for clients who discover you through platform search without your link, but the shared link is the intended primary booking flow, not a workaround you have to hunt for in the settings.

What it all adds up to — by platform

Say you average 5 bookings a week at $95, and this month 7 new clients booked you at an average of $110 for their first appointment. Here's what each platform costs you — subscriptions, commissions, and processing fees — monthly and annually.

Processing fee calculations:

StyleSeat 2.5% × $2,090 + $0.30 × 22 transactions = $59.

Booksy approximate at 2.5% × $2,090 = $52 (rate varies by payment type).

Fresha approximate at 2.29% × $2,090 = $48.

Vagaro approximate at 2.5% × $2,090 = $52.

GlossGenius 2.6% × $2,090 = $54.

Square 2.6% × $2,090 + $0.15 × 22 = $58.

Primzy processing fee is paid by the client, not the stylist.

StyleSeat also charges clients a $2.35 booking fee on every appointment — $51.70/month ($620/year) — not shown in the stylist cost columns above.

Booksy does allow stylists to share a profile link that also bypasses Boost commission — their own help center explains it. On Primzy, the shared link is how every stylist is set up from day one. On Booksy, avoiding the commission requires knowing to look for it.

One more thing the table doesn't show: on every platform except Primzy, processing fees scale with your revenue. So at $5,000/month in card payments, GlossGenius's 2.6% becomes $130/month (or $1,560/year) just to accept card payments on work you already did. On Primzy, that number stays at zero regardless of how much your business grows.

Where to put your link

The link is only useful if it's where clients can actually find it. A few places it belongs immediately:

Instagram and TikTok bio — one tap from anyone who sees your work. Don't send people to a homepage and make them find the booking button.

Your Google Business Profile — the "Book" button on your profile can point directly to your link.

Text and DMs — when a client asks "can I book with you?", the answer is the link. Nothing else to explain.

The link you share is the booking that doesn't cost you anything extra. Every client who comes through it — existing regulars, referrals, Instagram followers, someone who found your QR code — will stay at 0% commission, permanently.