HOW WE COMPARE

Calisto Pro vs Dubsado & Bonsai

Dubsado and Bonsai are freelancer paperwork tools: a form, a contract, an invoice. Calisto runs the studio around them, with brief intake, deliverable versioning, retainer billing, a portfolio site and a print store across 71 products. Core carries no additional cost. Commerce is a 1% revenue share. Every other suite is priced per app in the Marketplace.

Grafikdesigner & Künstler

Feature by feature

Calisto Pro beside Dubsado

18 Only in Calisto Pro
4 In both

Calisto Pro beside Dubsado, feature by feature
22 features	Calisto Pro	Dubsado
Lead Capture Forms	Ja	Ja
Structured Creative Brief Intake	Ja	Nein
Proposals with Line-Item Scope	Ja	Ja
Contracts with E-Signature	Ja	Ja
Work-for-Hire & IP Transfer Clauses	Ja	Nein
Invoicing & Payment Plans	Ja	Ja
Bring Your Own Payment Processor	Ja	Nein
Deliverable Gallery with Version History	Ja	Nein
Client Comments on a Specific Revision	Ja	Nein
Retainer Billing with Scope-Creep Alerts	Ja	Nein
Time Tracking Against the Agreed Scope	Ja	Nein
Capacity Planning & Utilization	Ja	Nein
Portfolio Site with Case Studies	Ja	Nein
Print & Fine-Art Storefront	Ja	Nein
Font & Asset License Archive	Ja	Nein
Brand Asset Library with Client Access	Ja	Nein
Branded Slide Presentations	Ja	Nein
Workshop & Gallery Event Ticketing	Ja	Nein
Course & Masterclass Hosting	Ja	Nein
Newsletter to Past Clients	Ja	Nein
Multi-Currency Invoicing	Ja	Nein
VoIP Calling from the Client Record	Ja	Nein

What replaces it

What runs graphic designers & artists on Calisto

The apps that take over from Dubsado, each in the words graphic designers & artists businesses use.

Freelancer invoicing vs. a studio platform

	The Old Way	The Calisto Way
Brief intake	Generic questionnaire	Forms, structured per service
Proposals & contracts	Included	Proposals + Sign, IP clauses
Invoicing	Their processor only	75 gateways, you choose
Deliverable handoff	Dropbox link	Depot gallery with comments
Version history	Not modelled	Every revision kept
Retainer billing	Flat recurring invoice	Registry, with usage tracked
Scope-creep tracking	Not available	Hours against the agreed scope
Portfolio site	Template microsite	Sites, your domain
Print & art sales	Not available	Catalog + Pulse checkout
Source-file archive	Your own drive	Depot, licensed and searchable

What moves

Bringing your data from Dubsado

Your data is read in your own browser and sent to your Calisto account. Calisto never sees your login for the old system.

From an export file

Export your data from Dubsado and drop the file in. It is read in your browser and mapped onto Calisto.

Any spreadsheet you export from Dubsado can be mapped onto Calisto, column by column.

The Dubsado migration guide Move my data

PRICING TRANSPARENCY

1% of revenue on Commerce. Core is included.

Dubsado charges an annual subscription per user. Bonsai charges a monthly plan and gates the useful parts behind the higher tier. Calisto charges nothing to set up and never charges per client or per project. Core carries no additional cost. Commerce is a 1% revenue share. Every other suite is priced per app in the Marketplace.

Calisto Pro

1%of revenue

Revenue share on Commerce

Dubsado

Per-user subscription

Annual or monthly per user · Feature gating by tier · No deliverable versioning, no store

Bonsai

Tiered monthly plans

Monthly plan per user · Client and project caps on lower tiers · Their payment rails only

WHAT THEY CANNOT DO

The gaps a freelancer invoicing tool leaves

Dubsado and Bonsai end at the invoice. A design studio also has to take a brief, ship versioned deliverables, bill a retainer without absorbing scope creep, and sell the work. None of that lives in either tool.

Deliverables: Versions, Not a Dropbox Link
Neither tool ships work. Designers send a Dropbox link, the client comments in email, and three rounds later nobody can say which file was approved. Calisto delivers from Depot into the client portal that already holds the brief and the contract: every revision kept and the approved one marked, comments attached to the revision they refer to, source files and licences archived beside the exports, and an approval that is recorded rather than remembered.
Retainers: Scope Creep You Can See
A retainer invoiced as a flat recurring line hides the month where the client asked for twice the work. Calisto bills retainers in Registry and tracks hours against the agreed scope rather than a running total, so the overage is visible while there is still time to talk about it rather than at renewal. Utilization per designer falls out of the same numbers, which is what capacity planning actually needs.
Selling the Work: A Store, Not a Portfolio
Illustrators and fine artists sell prints, licences and originals. Dubsado and Bonsai sell nothing. Calisto publishes the portfolio in Sites on your own domain and turns it into a storefront: prints, licences and workshop or gallery-opening tickets priced in Catalog, checked out through Pulse, paid through your own processor, with the order landing on the same customer record as the commission work.

Invoice in their currency. Get paid in yours.

Dubsado and Bonsai route you to their processor at their rate. Calisto connects to 75 payment gateways across 11 global regions, so a studio in Santo Domingo can invoice a client in Berlin and settle where it banks. Your merchant account. Your rates.

See every payment gateway

Honest answers

Switching questions

Can I bring my clients and projects across?

Yes. Export your contacts and projects from Dubsado or Bonsai as a CSV and upload it in the Switch portal. You review the column mapping before anything is written, and you can import contacts first and projects later.

Do my clients need a login to review deliverables?

No. The portal opens from the link you send. They see the brief, the contract, every delivered revision, their comments and their invoices in one place, from any browser.

How does retainer billing handle scope creep?

A retainer is billed against a defined scope, and hours book against that scope rather than a running total. When the month goes over, you see it while the month is still running. Nothing is auto-invoiced above the agreed amount without you approving it.

Can I sell prints and licences from my portfolio?

Yes. The portfolio site and the store are the same site. Prints, licences and originals are priced in Catalog and checked out through Pulse using your own payment processor, and the order attaches to the same customer record as your commission work.

What does it cost to start?

Setup costs nothing and there is no credit card required. Core carries no additional cost. Commerce is a 1% revenue share. Every other suite is priced per app in the Marketplace.

Mehr erfahren

Everything Calisto does here

The pages behind this comparison: the sector, the apps and the guides.