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Scheduling & Booking · head to head

Square Appointments vs Tana

Square Appointments logo

Square Appointments

Scheduling & Booking

Free scheduling for beauty businesses

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Tana logo

Tana

Productivity

The everything app for your personal workspace

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Square Appointments the free plan is aimed at solo professionals; booking across multiple staff requires the paid Plus plan; Tana the free plan hosts only 5 meetings a month with AI transcripts and summaries
  • They diverge on capability: Square Appointments covers Online booking, Tana covers Outliner interface.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Square Appointments and Tana actually diverge.

Attributes where Square Appointments and Tana differ
AttributeSquare AppointmentsTana
Pricing modelsubscriptionfreemium
PlatformsWeb, Ios, AndroidWeb, Desktop
CategoryScheduling & BookingProductivity
Founded20092020

Identical on both: starting price (Free), free tier (Yes), user rating (Not yet rated).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Square Appointments

  • Online booking
  • Client management
  • Point of sale
  • Payment processing
  • Automated reminders
  • Instagram booking
  • Google booking
  • Mobile app

Only in Tana

  • Outliner interface
  • Supertags
  • Live queries
  • AI integration
  • Graph views
  • Email capture
  • API
  • Zapier

Both cover

  • Cloud deployment
  • Web support

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Square Appointments

  • Online appointment booking for salons, barbers and personal servicesnot Tana
  • Taking card payments and deposits at the time of bookingnot Tana
  • Managing staff calendars, waitlists and no-show policiesnot Tana

Tana

  • Structured note taking with a graph based supertag data modelnot Square Appointments
  • Automatic meeting capture with AI transcripts and summariesnot Square Appointments
  • Turning notes into queryable structured databasesnot Square Appointments

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Square Appointments

  • The free plan is aimed at solo professionals; booking across multiple staff requires the paid Plus plan
  • Cancellation policies, no-show fees and waitlists require the Plus plan
  • Resource management, service cost tracking and the future bookings report require the Premium plan
  • Custom processing rates are reserved for Square Pro, which is aimed at businesses processing over $250,000 a year
  • Card processing fees are charged on top of the plan fee on every tier including the free one

Tana

  • The free plan hosts only 5 meetings a month with AI transcripts and summaries
  • The free plan connects only 1 calendar and allows 50 AI queries
  • Pro is $30 per user per month at standard price, with $20 shown as an early bird rate
  • Max is $120 per user per month at standard price, with $80 shown as an early bird rate
  • Integrations and full MCP require the Pro plan
  • Dedicated support and onboarding, and unlimited agents, skills and types, require the Max plan
  • The Business plan is custom priced, billed yearly and has no published rate
  • The free trial runs 30 days

Pricing, plan by plan

Square Appointments

Free
  • FreeFree
    • Unlimited appointments
    • Online booking
    • Client management
  • Plus$29/month
    • Everything in Free
    • Multiple staff calendars
    • No-show protection
  • Premium$69/month
    • Everything in Plus
    • Multi-location
    • Staff management

Tana

Free
  • FreeFree
    • Core features
    • Supertags
    • Searches
  • Pro$10/month
    • Advanced AI
    • Priority support
    • Extended history

Which should you pick?

Choose Square Appointments if

  • You need online booking.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Web, Ios, Android.
  • You also want client management.
Square Appointments review

Choose Tana if

  • You need outliner interface.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Web, Desktop.
  • You also want supertags.
Tana review

Questions people ask

Is Square Appointments or Tana better?
Neither clearly leads. Square Appointments starts at Free and Tana at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Square Appointments or Tana?
Square Appointments starts at Free and Tana at Free.
Does Square Appointments or Tana run on more platforms?
Square Appointments runs on Web, Ios, Android. Tana runs on Web, Desktop.
Can I use Square Appointments for free?
Both have a free tier, so you can try either at no cost before committing.
What is Square Appointments best used for?
Square Appointments is most often used for online appointment booking for salons, barbers and personal services, taking card payments and deposits at the time of booking, managing staff calendars, waitlists and no-show policies. Of those, online appointment booking for salons, barbers and personal services and taking card payments and deposits at the time of booking are not what Tana is typically brought in for.
What can Square Appointments do that Tana cannot?
Square Appointments covers Online booking, Client management, Point of sale, Payment processing. Tana covers Outliner interface, Supertags, Live queries, AI integration. Both handle Cloud deployment, Web support.
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