The best appointment scheduling apps in Costa Rica: 7 compared, honestly

A barber in Sámara put it like this: "I tried three booking apps and all three fell over for the same reason". The first one charged in dollars, so his monthly bill was never the same twice. The second sent reminders by text message, which nobody reads. The third wanted a cut of every new client. None of them was a bad app. None of them was built for a business that earns in colones and talks on WhatsApp.

Here are seven, with the prices showing on each one's official page today and what each is genuinely good at. Fair warning before we start: rezervaya is one of the seven, and it's ours. Which is why the rest of the list is written with their numbers, not with our adjectives.

Before the list: four filters that actually matter here

• Does it price in colones or dollars? A dollar price moves with the exchange rate, so your monthly bill is never the same two months running.
• Which channel do the reminders use? In Costa Rica the message people read is the WhatsApp one. Email gets lost under the promotions, and SMS sometimes doesn't arrive at all.
• Is there a commission on new clients? A marketplace brings you people and takes a percentage of that first visit in return. It can be worth it. What it can't be is a surprise.
• Is there an activation fee? Some charge a one-off when you open the account, and that number changes the first-year maths completely.

The prices and features below were checked in August 2026 on each app's own official page (Agendé's again in September 2026, after it changed its prices). These things move: once you have your two favourites, confirm the number on their page before you pay.

Fresha

It's the biggest in the world at this, and its Costa Rica pricing page already shows colones, which is more than almost anyone else does. The interesting part of Fresha is the marketplace: someone who has never heard of you searches for a service nearby and finds you. In exchange, that first visit has a one-time fee built in, which today shows as free on both plans; clients who were already yours cost nothing.

• Price: ₡4,500 a month for a single person, or ₡3,000 a month per team member. A 7 day trial, no free plan.
• Reminders: email free, and WhatsApp with 20 free messages a month, then between ₡38 and ₡150 per message.
• Worth knowing: taking payment inside the app isn't wired up for Costa Rica, so SINPE Móvil stays something you handle outside it.

Booksy

It's the name you hear most in barbershops, and its client app is one of the best built. If your bet is that new people discover you inside a directory, Booksy is one of the best at that. The cost of the bet is right there on their own pricing page, which is fair enough.

• Price: $29.99 a month plus tax, and $20 a month for each extra team member. In dollars.
• Commission: a one-time 30% fee on the first visit of every client who arrives through its marketplace, when you switch on its Boost promotion.
• Reminders: email and text message. WhatsApp appears nowhere in their plans.

Setmore

If this month's budget is zero, this is the honest answer. Setmore has a real free plan, not a demo in disguise: up to four users, unlimited appointments, and email confirmations and reminders. For a one or two person business finally putting its diary in order, it's plenty.

• Price: free for up to four users. The Pro plan is $12 per user a month, or $5 per user a month paid annually.
• Reminders: email on the free plan. SMS reminders are the paid plan's headline feature, and here is the big catch: Setmore's own policy says its SMS reminders cannot be sent to clients in Costa Rica.
• Worth knowing: there's no WhatsApp channel, and online payment runs through Square, Stripe or PayPal.

Noona HQ

It's built specifically for barbershops and salons, and you can feel it in how the calendar is put together: it thinks in chairs, in chained services and in the rhythm of a working day, not in "meetings". It also carries its own client marketplace, like Fresha and Booksy.

• Price: no free plan. A 14 day trial with full access and no card, then from $15 a month for one person, or $10 a month per seat for teams. In dollars.
• Reminders: email and app notifications on every plan, and SMS from the Professional plan up, with 40 messages a month per seat.
• Worth knowing: WhatsApp appears nowhere in their plans.

AgendaPro

It's the most mature of the regional options: years in the market, an enormous feature list, and real use in large chains across several countries. If you run several locations and a lot of staff, it's the one that most resembles a complete management system.

• Price: in Chilean pesos plus tax, rising with how many professionals you have. The individual plan starts at 15,900 Chilean pesos a month.
• WhatsApp: a separate add-on, from 5,000 Chilean pesos a month for 50 messages.
• Worth knowing: their plans page is built for Chile, and Costa Rica doesn't appear on it. You'd be paying in a currency that isn't yours, and online payment is the first question to put to them.

Agendé

The Costa Rican option on the list (agende.site). It prices in colones, it's entirely in Spanish, and it packs a lot into one app: invoicing, expenses and product sales from its cheapest plan. There's one detail worth seeing before you compare monthly prices with anyone else: which plan WhatsApp starts on.

• Price: ₡9,900 a month for Starter (2 employees, 100 appointments a month), ₡19,900 for Pro (6 employees, unlimited appointments) and ₡34,900 for Business (unlimited employees and appointments), after a free 7 day trial with no card. No activation fee.
• WhatsApp: WhatsApp reminders start on the Pro plan; the ₡9,900 Starter doesn't include them. If WhatsApp is what you're after, the real number starts at ₡19,900 (though that plan already covers 6 employees).
• Worth knowing: everything is in Spanish. If you serve tourists where you are, an English booking page is a separate conversation.

rezervaya

Ours, so the uncomfortable part goes first: we're the newest and the smallest on this list, and we have no marketplace. Nobody is going to discover you inside rezervaya; the traffic to your page comes from you, from your Instagram, your Google profile and your WhatsApp link. What we did do was build it for this country instead of translating it: colones, WhatsApp and SINPE Móvil from day one.

• Price: three plans by active stations (chairs, bays or people): Essential ₡9,900 a month (1 to 2), Pro ₡19,900 (up to 6) and Unlimited ₡34,900 (7 or more), with unlimited bookings on all of them. No activation fee and no per-client commission.
• Reminders: on WhatsApp, included in full and at no cost for the whole 14 day trial. After that they're included on Pro (about 1,000 messages a month) and Unlimited (about 2,500), or an optional ₡4,900 a month add-on on Essential, with about 500 messages.
• Worth knowing: the trial doesn't ask for a card, the booking page is in Spanish, English and French, and deposits are collected over SINPE Móvil.

Which one suits you, in one line

• You want new clients to discover you inside an app: Fresha or Booksy (Booksy takes 30% of that first visit if you switch on its Boost promotion).
• This month's budget is zero: Setmore's free plan, accepting that reminders go by email.
• You run a barbershop or salon and working in dollars is no trouble: Noona HQ.
• You run several locations and a lot of staff: AgendaPro is the most complete, currency question aside.
• You want something Costa Rican, all in Spanish, with invoicing and expenses in the same app: Agendé (WhatsApp from its Pro plan).
• You want colones, WhatsApp and SINPE with no commission and no entry fee: rezervaya.

One last piece of advice, the kind that saves money: pick two, not seven. Open the trial on the two that best match how you work, put one real week of appointments through each, and keep the one that makes you click less. The good app is the one you forget is there.