Build vs. buy med spa software, priced across 1, 3 or 5 years
Pick your locations, staff count and platform. The calculator sets Boulevard, Mangomint or Vagaro at its own published starting price against a Zee Palm build at our published prices, totals both, and shows the month the build breaks even, if it does.
3-year total, 1 location
Own it (custom build)
$50,298
Rent it (Boulevard)
$6,336
Boulevard at this scope costs about the same as our own maintenance retainer alone, so this comparison never crosses over on price. Renting is the cheaper call unless you value owning the platform outright.
- MVP build floor
- $12,000
- Dashboards & reporting
- $799
- AI front desk
- $1,499
- Maintenance, 3 years at $1,000/mo
- $36,000
Boulevard, $176/mo
$176 × 36 mo
This comparison excludes
- Payment-processing fees either path may charge
- Migration effort moving clients, packages and history off your current system
- Vendor feature updates you would stop receiving automatically after a custom build
- Support and account-management time, which a SaaS subscription bundles in
An estimate, not a quote. Vendor prices are each company’s own published starting price and can change without notice. Our numbers come from a five-day planning sprint at $1,500, credited in full toward the build.
Before you decide
What the break-even month leaves out
Four things to weigh alongside it, especially if you plan to add providers or locations.
Locations and staff both change the shape of the build
One location is a bounded booking-and-front-desk MVP. Add a second and the floor becomes a full platform, since staff schedules, packages, deposits and reporting no longer fit in one calendar and have to reconcile across sites.
Per-staff fees compound as you hire
A platform priced per staff member costs more each time you add a provider, so the bill climbs fastest while you are growing. That gap only shows up over several years, which is why the calculator projects the whole window.
Upkeep is yours after launch
Once the platform is yours, so are security patches, maintenance and each new feature, whether your own team handles them or a retainer does. The build total here includes that ongoing cost.
A single spa usually rents
If you're one location still filling the calendar, a $30–$176/mo platform will very likely cost less and carry less risk than a build.
Methodology
How the calculator reaches a break-even month
On the build side we add the published floor for your location count, any add-ons you picked, and our $1,000/mo maintenance retainer for each month of the window. A single location starts at the $12,000 MVP floor and two or more start at the $25,000 full-platform floor. That is the same tier break as the equivalent gym-software build, because a med spa’s booking, staff scheduling and front desk need the same kind of software.
For the rental side, the vendor’s published monthly price is multiplied by your location count if the vendor charges per location, a per-staff charge is added where one applies, and otherwise the price stays flat. Boulevard, Mangomint and Vagaro’s figures come from their own pricing pages on 8 Sep 2026. Vendors change prices without notice, so check that date before you rely on them.
The break-even month is the first month in which the rental total, which keeps growing, passes the one-time build cost plus the maintenance paid so far. When your rental bill is no higher than our maintenance retainer alone, that month never comes, and the result tells you so.
A single location still filling its calendar should usually stay on Boulevard, Mangomint or Vagaro. If the calculator puts break-even years out, or never, take that over any sales pitch to build, including ours.
FAQ
Med spa software: common questions
Is it cheaper to build custom med spa software?
Only once you pass the break-even month the calculator shows for your locations and staff count. A single-location spa on a $30/mo starter plan rarely clears the $12,000 MVP floor within a few years. A multi-location group paying per-location fees plus per-staff charges can cross over inside a couple of years. The math depends on locations, staff count, the platform you're renting and how many years you run it.
Why don't you include Pabau or AestheticsPro in the comparison?
Neither publishes a price beyond its smallest single-user tier; anything larger means booking a demo call. We only use figures a vendor prints on its own pricing page, so both are left out. If you run either today, read the demo-call requirement as a hint about what multi-provider pricing looks like.
What does a SaaS platform give you that a custom build doesn't?
Continuous feature updates you don't pay for individually, a support team, and no engineering risk if something breaks on a Saturday booking rush. For a single location still building its client base, that trade is usually the right one. Custom software makes sense once per-location and per-staff fees start compounding across sites, or once you're paying for a platform's booking and payments engine but building your own automation around its edges anyway.
Does the custom build number include ongoing costs?
Yes. Every projected year carries our $1,000/mo maintenance retainer, the closest match to the Boulevard, Mangomint or Vagaro bill you pay each month. Payment-processing fees, the work of migrating off your current platform and the account management a SaaS plan includes are not counted; the exclusions are listed under the result.
Is this a quote?
No, it's a planning estimate from our published floors and each vendor's published starting price. The firm price for a med spa build comes from our five-day MVP Planning Sprint, which costs $1,500 and is credited in full if you go ahead with the build.
Related
More for med spa owners
Work with us
Thinking of leaving Boulevard, Mangomint or Vagaro?
Send your calculator result and staff count. We normally reply within one business day with whether a build pays off for you, and a fixed price and date if it does.