Availy vs Acuity Scheduling — A Tutoring-First Alternative
Acuity Scheduling (by Squarespace) is polished, general-purpose appointment scheduling. Availy is built specifically for tutors and studios: rosters, lesson credits, parent accounts, lesson notes, and memberships that grant credits — the things a recurring-student business needs that generic scheduling leaves out.
| Feature | Availy | Acuity Scheduling |
|---|---|---|
| Built for recurring students | Rosters, lesson credits, parent links, lesson notes — a tutoring studio in one place | General appointment scheduling — polished, but not tutoring-specific |
| Student & roster management | Full student roster with attendance, history, and private + shared lesson notes | Client list with a single notes field |
| Parent & family accounts | Parents get their own accounts — per-child booking, balances, and notification controls | Not built for this |
| Lesson credits & packages | Account-level credit ledger — manual grants, package purchases, parent-visible balances | Package codes that track remaining sessions (Standard plan and up) |
| Learning plans & homework | Goals and homework tasks per student, shared with parents and pulled into lesson reminders | Not built for this |
| Email & SMS reminders | Email + SMS included on every plan, for students and parents | Email on all plans; one SMS reminder per appointment on Standard ($34/mo) and up |
| Online payments | Stripe card payments (USD & CAD), invoicing, no Availy markup | Stripe, Square, or PayPal with no added fees; simple invoicing included |
| Calendar sync & invites | Instructors connect Google Calendar: lessons push into it and their Google busy times block availability. Plus a personal feed for every user (Google, Apple & Outlook) and an invite on every booking email | Two-way availability sync with Google, iCloud & Outlook; add-to-calendar buttons in client emails |
| Recurring memberships | Native recurring memberships that grant lesson credits automatically | Subscriptions via Stripe or Square (Standard plan and up) |
| White-label branding | Your own branded studio subdomain | 'Powered by Acuity' removable on Premium ($61/mo) |
Comparison based on each product's publicly published features and pricing as of July 2026. Acuity Scheduling is a trademark of its respective owner and is not affiliated with Availy. Details change — check their site for the latest.
When Acuity Scheduling is the better fit
Acuity is the better fit if you want two decades of scheduling polish with native mobile apps, true two-way calendar sync across Google, iCloud and Outlook, a huge integration ecosystem (Zapier, a public API, video-call integrations), or HIPAA compliance — and you don't need tutoring-specific tools like parent accounts or a credit ledger.
Common questions
- Is Availy cheaper than Acuity Scheduling?
- Often, once you need SMS reminders or your own branding. Acuity's SMS reminders start on its Standard plan at $34 per month and removing Acuity branding requires the Premium plan at $61 per month, whereas Availy includes SMS reminders on every plan from $29 per month and offers a branded subdomain on the $99 per month Studio plan. On Acuity's entry tier, though, Acuity is the cheaper starting point.
- Why would a tutor choose Availy over Acuity?
- Acuity is general appointment scheduling that works for any kind of business. Availy is specific to teaching: it keeps a student roster, runs lessons on prepaid credits, gives students and parents their own logins, records lesson notes, and keeps a learning plan per student. Those concepts do not exist in a general scheduling tool.
- When is Acuity the better choice?
- If you run a business with many different appointment types and services beyond teaching, or you need deep integrations with a wider Squarespace website and marketing stack, Acuity is the more flexible general-purpose scheduler and a well-established product.
When to choose Availy
Choose Availy if you want a platform built specifically for tutors and studios: parent accounts, a credit ledger, lesson notes, learning plans with goals and homework, memberships that grant credits automatically, and SMS reminders included on every plan — not a general scheduler you have to bend into a teaching tool.
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