Setmore Review 2026: Is It the Right Fit for Coaches?

This Setmore review comes down to one sentence: Setmore is a strong, low-cost appointment scheduler with an unusually generous Free plan and a very high public rating, but it stops at the booking. If you sell sessions, it may be all you need. If you deliver programs and your clients need something from you between calls, you will still have to buy or build everything around it.

The verdict in short

• Who it suits: session-based coaches and small practices who want booking, reminders and payments at a low cost per user, especially those who also meet clients in person.
• Who should skip it: coaches running multi-week programs, cohorts or courses, and anyone trying to cut the number of tools they pay for.
• Public rating: 4.9 on Trustpilot from 3,274 reviews, seen on October 25, 2026. Those reviews come from every kind of appointment business, not coaches specifically.
• Price: Free for up to 4 users. Pro is $12 per user per month, or $5 per user per month billed annually. Enterprise is custom. All as listed in October 2026.
• Our recommendation for most coaches: Coachful, if your work continues between sessions. Setmore, if it truly does not.

We make Coachful, so weigh our recommendation with that in mind. Everything below about Setmore comes from what the company documents on its pricing page and from its public rating. We have not run a hands-on test, and we say where the public record runs out.

What is Setmore?

Setmore is appointment scheduling software: a booking page, a calendar, reminders and payments, with mobile and desktop apps. Its industry list reaches from barber shops and dentists to tutors, gyms, personal trainers and consulting, which tells you who it was designed for: any business that sells time slots.

That breadth is both its appeal and its limit. A coach gets a mature, inexpensive scheduler. The coach does not get anything shaped around a coaching relationship, such as a program, a habit, a weekly check-in or a coaching agreement. Setmore's own tagline on the pricing page is "Get Booked. Get Paid." and that is a fair summary of the scope.

Two things stand out about the company's positioning. It sells on human support, listing 24/7 chat, email and phone on both Free and Pro. It also sells a staffed add-on, Live Receptionist, where real people answer your calls for $99 a month (US only). Both deserve credit.

What does Setmore do for each part of a coaching business?

Setmore covers selling sessions very well, covers basic client admin, and leaves marketing and program delivery to other tools. The table below sums up what the pricing page's feature comparison documents, job by job. Details follow.

Marketing: strong on booking channels, absent on the rest

Setmore gives you a custom booking page with its own URL, a team booking page, class and service links, a custom QR code and Book Now buttons for Facebook, Instagram and your website. A customizable widget works with Wix, Weebly and WordPress, and Reserve with Google is on both plans. Pro adds Google review requests, and Google Analytics 4 is available on both.

The honest note: all of this moves someone who already wants to book. Setmore's listed plans do not include a website builder, funnels, lead magnets or email sequences. A Mailchimp integration exists, so email lives in another subscription. Pro does include 1:1 calls with growth and SEO guidance.

Selling: more payment options than most coaches will use

Setmore connects to Square, Stripe, PayPal and LawPay and takes online payments, in-person payments and Tap to Pay on both plans. Deposits require Pro. No Setmore transaction fee is shown, so plan on your processor's rates, and confirm the fee in your own account before relying on that.

The gap for coaches is what you sell, not how you collect. The pricing page shows no coaching packages, payment plans, or contract and invoicing workflow. If your offer is a six-month engagement with a signed agreement, you would handle the agreement and the billing structure elsewhere. For more on costs, see our Setmore pricing breakdown.

Delivery: the meeting, and only the meeting

Setmore books 1-on-1 services and group classes on both plans, with custom booking and cancellation policies. Recurring appointments, video appointments and per-service availability are Pro features.

Nothing is documented beyond the appointment itself. There are no client programs, weekly goals, habits, check-ins, courses or community. If you coach by the hour and clients do their work alone between calls, that may be fine. If the change you promise happens between calls, this is the deciding limit of the product.

Client experience: tidy, and over quickly

Clients get a booking page in your branding, customer login, email confirmations, reminders and a "branded mobile app", which Setmore describes as adding your booking page to the phone's home screen so it behaves like an app. That is a sensible low-effort touch, but it is a shortcut to booking and not a client portal.

Free clients get 1 email reminder. Pro lifts this to 2 reminders plus SMS, with 500 SMS credits per user per month, more available in the app, and availability that varies by country. Free accounts also keep Setmore's branding on the page, which only matters if a polished premium image is part of what you sell.

Admin: better than you would expect at the price

Customer profiles, appointment history, notes and labels, and contact import and export are all on the Free plan. So are team calendars, vacation tracking, working hours, permission levels, in-app team messaging, reports, a HubSpot integration and Zapier. Pro adds customer blocking, API access and priority support.

For a small practice this is a real strength. A coach can keep short session notes against each client without paying anything. What you will not find is goal tracking, client status, intake answers tied to progress, or anything that tells you which client has gone quiet. The only export documented on the pricing page is contacts, so ask support about notes and history if data portability matters to you.

HIPAA: a genuine advantage for some health coaches

Pro includes a signed Business Associate Agreement under "Setmore Health"; Free does not. If you work in or alongside a covered healthcare setting, that matters. The US Department of Health and Human Services explains the rules in its HIPAA guidance for professionals, and an attorney can tell you whether they apply to you.

Coaching is not medical treatment. Health and wellness coaches should stay within their scope, refer clients to a licensed clinician for diagnosis, treatment or medication questions, and keep clinical records in a clinical system. A BAA on the scheduler covers the scheduler only, not everything else in your stack.

How much does Setmore cost?

Setmore has a Free plan for up to 4 users, a Pro plan at $12 per user per month or $5 billed annually, and custom Enterprise pricing. The $12 figure is not explicitly labelled as monthly billing on the page, but the footnote ties $5 to annual billing, so that is the natural reading. The table below shows Coachful first for comparison, since the two are priced on different logic: Setmore per user, Coachful as flat monthly plans.

Three details affect the real bill:

• What counts as a user. Setmore charges for each staff member with a profile, and each staff calendar counts as a user even if that person has no login.
• Add-ons. Live Receptionist costs $99 per month (US only). Extra SMS credits are sold in the app; the price is not shown on the pricing page.
• The refund window. You can try Pro "risk-free for 30 days" and request a refund if you are not satisfied. Billing starts the day you sign up for Pro, and the page does not describe a separate no-charge trial.

As an illustration, using list prices only: one coach on Pro pays $60 a year on annual billing or $144 on monthly billing. Three coaches on Pro pay $180 a year on annual billing or $432 on monthly billing. Add your processor's fees, any extra SMS credits, and the cost of whatever else you need to run the business.

Is Setmore's Free plan enough for a coach?

It can be for a coach with a light, irregular calendar, but most working coaches will hit its limits quickly. Free is generous on quantity, with unlimited appointments and up to 4 users, but it holds back several things a recurring coaching calendar depends on.

The practical reading: an online coach with weekly clients should budget for Pro from the start. At $5 per user on annual billing that is a small cost, and it is why we would not treat the Free plan as the deciding factor in either direction.

What do public reviewers say about Setmore?

The headline number is excellent: 4.9 on Trustpilot from 3,274 reviews, seen on October 25, 2026. That is both the highest score and the largest review count among the booking tools in this article, and a volume that large is hard to dismiss.

Here is the limit of what we can report. Individual reviews on Trustpilot did not load when we checked for this article, so we are not going to paraphrase themes we have not read. We would rather tell you that than invent a tidy list of complaints. What we can offer is the one customer statement Setmore itself displays on its pricing page, which is chosen by the vendor and should be read that way:

It has simplified scheduling, kept my business organized, and supported growth.

That quote, attributed to a customer named Deborah, fits the product's pitch of simple, organized scheduling. Three cautions apply when you read the rating:

• The reviewers are mostly not you. Setmore serves salons, barbers, dentists, tutors and many more. A high score says the scheduler satisfies appointment businesses, and says little about running a coaching program.
• A score measures fit with expectations. Someone who wanted a booking tool and got a good one leaves five stars. It tells you nothing about features that person never looked for.
• Sample sizes differ. Coachful's own Trustpilot profile shows 4.5 from 21 reviews. Setmore's public record is much larger and higher, and that is a fair point in its favor.

To get the signal you need in ten minutes, open Setmore's Trustpilot profile, filter to 1-star and 2-star reviews from the last 12 months, and search for the words that matter to your business: "reminder", "SMS", "sync", "refund" and "coach". Then read a few 5-star reviews from solo service providers rather than multi-chair salons. Check whether the problems described would actually affect how you work.

What are Setmore's pros and cons?

Setmore's strengths are price, payment flexibility and documented human support. Its weakness is scope: it is a scheduler, and a coach's business is wider than the calendar. This table draws only on what Setmore documents and on its public rating, not on hands-on use.

Who is Setmore best for?

Setmore is best for coaches whose business is the session itself and whose other tools already work. These are the people we would point to it without hesitation:

• Hybrid and in-person coaches. Tap to Pay, a cash register and in-person payments are built in. A fitness coach running a small studio with walk-in sales gets real use from these.
• Small teams on a tight budget. Free covers up to 4 users, with team calendars and permissions included.
• Coaches who want a person on the phone. Listed 24/7 phone support is a real comfort if you dislike troubleshooting alone.
• Coaches who must collect through PayPal or LawPay. Some clients and some practices require these.
• Health-adjacent practices that need a BAA on their scheduler. Pro includes one at a low price, with the scope cautions above.

Setmore is a weaker fit for:

• Program-based coaches. Your clients need weekly goals and check-ins, and those live somewhere else.
• Group coaches running cohorts. You can book a class, but there is no cohort space, group chat or shared program.
• New coaches with no website or funnel. A booking link assumes someone is already on their way to it. See our guide for new coaches.
• Coaches working toward a credential. Setmore documents nothing like ICF hour tracking.

How does Coachful compare to Setmore?

Coachful covers booking as one part of a complete coaching platform, so the real comparison is one scheduler plus other tools versus one membership. If you only need a calendar, Setmore costs less and has features Coachful lacks. If you deliver programs, Coachful does the work Setmore leaves to you.

What Coachful is. Coachful is a coaching platform. One subscription covers booking, payments, contracts, program delivery with habits and check-ins, courses, a community, a website with funnels and email, and an AI assistant, with one login for the coach and one branded app for the client.

Who it is for. Coaches who deliver programs, not just sessions; solo coaches growing into a small team; coaches replacing 4 to 6 tools. See our pages on coaching software and scheduling software for a closer look.

What it does not do. Coachful is not HIPAA-certified and offers no BAA, so it is not for clinical record-keeping or insurance billing. It does not support PayPal. It has no permanent free plan. The client app ships under the Coachful listing with your branding, not under your own App Store account. It does not sync with Garmin, Fitbit, Whoop or Oura.

How to start. Begin with a free trial, then ask the team to build what you need, using the service below.

On scheduling alone, Coachful offers booking pages with availability rules, buffers, minimum notice and time-zone detection; two-way Google, Apple/iCloud and Outlook calendar sync; built-in video or auto-created Zoom, Meet and Teams links; and paid sessions with session credits. Intake questions on booking feed into the client record, along with goals, notes, payments and an AI briefing before each session. Here is how the scheduling side works:

The bigger difference starts when the call ends. A client in Coachful opens a branded home with their next session, program, habits, daily tasks, morning and evening check-ins and goals with progress bars. The coach sees each client's status as thriving, active, quiet or at risk, so a slipping client is easier to spot.

Payments run through your own Stripe Connect or Razorpay account, with subscriptions, payment plans, order bumps, coupons, refunds and Stripe Tax. Coaching agreements with e-signature go out before the first call and stay on the client record, which is the workflow Setmore's pricing page does not show. Michelle, the built-in AI assistant, works from your live practice data to build programs, draft emails and brief you before sessions. Questions and planning are included in your membership, while confirmed builds and changes use AI credits.

Why Coachful stands out: a free white-glove service. On every plan, you can describe what you want built from Create, under "We'll build it for you", and the Coachful team builds it inside your own account, usually within about 24 hours. That can be a website, funnel, sales page, program, course outline, email sequence or form, and you can attach up to 8 reference links and 10 files. Nothing gets invented: no fake credentials, testimonials or prices, and gaps are left for you to fill. It does not include recording videos, logo design, ad management or ongoing marketing. As one anonymized example, a leadership coach with a Squarespace renewal days away got one clean homepage with a repeated "talk with me" button. Read how the service works.

Setmore does beat Coachful on several points, and we would rather you hear it from us. It has a free plan, PayPal, LawPay, Square, Tap to Pay, a signed BAA, a staffed receptionist add-on and a much larger public review base. If any of those is a hard requirement, choose accordingly.

What are the best Setmore alternatives for coaches?

Coachful is our top pick for coaches delivering programs; among pure schedulers, Calendly and Acuity are the closest comparisons. Ranking criteria: one login for the whole client journey, between-session delivery, total stack cost, and setup effort with the free white-glove build. Vendor prices are as listed in October 2026, and ratings are Trustpilot scores seen in late October 2026.

1. Coachful

The full platform described above, and the only tool in this list where the client's work between sessions lives alongside booking and payment. It suits coaches who want to replace a stack rather than add to one. Pick Setmore over Coachful if you need PayPal, in-person payment hardware or a signed BAA, or if a calendar is genuinely all you need.

2. Calendly

Calendly is a scheduling tool with a Free plan limited to 1 event type and 1 calendar connection and paid plans from $10 per seat on annual billing. No Calendly fee on payments is documented; you connect your own Stripe or PayPal. Unlike Setmore, it keeps no client records or notes, and like Setmore it has no programs. Read our Calendly review or the direct Calendly vs Setmore comparison. Pick it over Coachful if your calls are mostly with other businesses and you only need scheduling.

3. Acuity Scheduling

Owned by Squarespace, Acuity adds intake forms, packages and memberships to scheduling. Starter is $20 per month ($16 annually), with a 7-day free trial and no card required. Text reminders start on Standard, and a HIPAA BAA only comes with Premium at $69 per month ($55 annually), well above Setmore's Pro. See our Acuity review and Acuity vs Setmore. Pick it over Coachful if you sell packages by the session and already have a site and email tool you like.

4. YouCanBookMe

YouCanBookMe books directly from your calendar, with a Free plan and paid plans from $9 per month. It takes a 1% commission on every Stripe payment on top of Stripe's fees, and SMS costs 7 cents each, so paid bookings cost more than the list price suggests. It makes no HIPAA claim and offers no BAA. Pick it over Coachful if you want a simple calendar-led booking page and do not need client records.

5. TidyCal

TidyCal is a low-cost booking tool with paid bookings and packages. The Free plan covers unlimited booking types and bookings but takes a 1% platform fee on Stripe payments, as do lifetime plans; Pro at $12 per month ($8.25 annually) removes that fee and adds unlimited SMS reminders. Its Trustpilot score is the lowest on this list. Pick it over Coachful if the absolute lowest cost matters more than anything beyond booking.

6. Calendon

Calendon is a simple booking-link tool whose Pro plan targets coaches, freelancers and professionals, with 0% commission on Stripe bookings. Payments, reminder emails and Zoom are Pro-only, and booking links do not work for guests until Google Calendar is connected. More in our Calendon review. Pick it over Coachful if you only sell paid sessions and want the smallest possible tool.

7. TimeTuna

TimeTuna is a branded booking-page scheduler that names coaches first in its audience tabs. Its Free plan includes unlimited booking pages and two-way Google, Microsoft and iCal sync, which Setmore reserves for Pro. Charging for sessions requires the Executive plan at $23 per month ($11.67 annually), and its USD prices were read from the site's own table rather than seen at checkout. See our TimeTuna review. Pick it over Coachful if you want a polished no-cost booking page with full calendar sync and nothing else.

For more comparisons, browse our reviews hub or compare page.

How should a coach decide between Setmore and a coaching platform?

Decide by what happens between sessions, because that is where the two kinds of product part ways. Run through these questions with your current offer in mind:

1. Does your promised result depend on what clients do between calls? If yes, a scheduler alone will not hold that work, and you will end up in spreadsheets and message threads.
2. How many tools do you pay for now? List the website, email, contracts, course host, community and payment links. Add the real monthly total. That number, not Setmore's price, is the one to compare against a platform.
3. Do you need PayPal, in-person payments or a BAA? If so, those are hard requirements and Coachful cannot meet them.
4. Are you adding coaches? Setmore's cost rises per user, including staff calendars without logins. Coachful's team plans add seats instead.
5. Do you have a website and a way to get leads? A booking link alone will not create demand. If you are starting from nothing, setup help is worth more than a lower price.

If most of your answers point toward delivery and fewer tools, start with Coachful. Its entry point is Lite: $29/month for up to 5 clients, and a coach with 15 clients would look at Solo: $49/month for up to 20 clients. If your answers point toward low-cost booking and in-person sales, Setmore is a sensible choice and you can stop reading here.

Our verdict: is Setmore good for coaches?

Setmore is good at what it claims to do. On the public record, it is an inexpensive scheduler with wide payment support, listed 24/7 human support and the strongest rating among the tools in this article. We would not talk anyone out of it who only needs clients to book and pay.

It is not a coaching platform, and it does not pretend to be. A coach running programs on Setmore still needs a home for contracts, content, check-ins, habits, community, email and a website. Each of those is another login, another bill, and another place for a client to get lost. That is why our recommendation for most coaches is Coachful, with Setmore as the right answer for session-only and in-person practices.

Frequently asked questions about Setmore

Is Setmore really free?

Yes. As listed in October 2026, the Free plan costs $0 for up to 4 users and includes unlimited appointments, a booking page and payments. It leaves out SMS reminders, 2-way calendar sync, recurring and video appointments, and it keeps Setmore's branding. Your payment processor's rates still apply.

How much is Setmore Pro?

Pro is $12 per user per month, or $5 per user per month on annual billing. It includes unlimited users and 500 SMS credits per user per month. You can request a refund within 30 days if you are not satisfied.

What is Setmore's Trustpilot rating?

Setmore showed 4.9 on Trustpilot from 3,274 reviews on October 25, 2026. That score covers all kinds of appointment businesses, so read reviews from similar solo service providers before assuming it applies to coaching.

Is Setmore HIPAA compliant?

Setmore lists a signed BAA on Pro under Setmore Health, and none on Free. Whether that is enough depends on your setting, so check with an attorney if you handle protected health information. Coachful is not HIPAA-certified, so clinical records belong in a clinical system.

Does Setmore have client programs or check-ins?

No such features are documented. Setmore keeps customer profiles, appointment history, notes and labels, but it does not list programs, habits, check-ins, courses or community. Coaches who need those will have to add other tools or use a platform like Coachful's coaching CRM.

Does Setmore handle coaching contracts?

No contract or invoicing workflow appears on Setmore's pricing page. You would use a separate e-signature tool and store agreements elsewhere. Have a lawyer review your agreement, since requirements vary by location.

Can I take PayPal with Setmore?

Yes. Setmore lists Square, Stripe, PayPal and LawPay on both plans. Coachful does not support PayPal; it runs on your own Stripe Connect or Razorpay account, as covered on our coaching payment software page.

What is the best Setmore alternative for coaches?

For coaches delivering programs, we recommend Coachful, because booking, payments, contracts, delivery and marketing sit under one login. For booking alone, Calendly and Acuity are the closest options. We make Coachful, so compare the tables above against your own needs.

What is Coachful's white-glove service?

It is a free build service on every plan. You describe what you want, such as a website, funnel, program or email sequence, and the Coachful team builds it inside your account, usually within about 24 hours. It does not cover video recording, logo design, ads or ongoing marketing.

Can I move from Setmore to Coachful?

Yes. Setmore lists contact export on both plans, and clients, programs and content are imported for you during Coachful onboarding. Confirm with Setmore's support what else can be exported, such as notes and appointment history, before you switch.