One job, not the whole back office.
Bonsai runs your entire freelance business. If today's job is to send an invoice and get paid, you are renting a back office to do it.
$6/mo
Drupd
$25/seat/mo
Bonsai
Free plan, no card
The tally · 15 things that matter for billing
10
/ 15Drupd pulls ahead
2
/ 15Both hold their own
3
/ 15Left out, on purpose
Not a feature count for its own sake. Drupd wins where billing speed and the finished invoice matter, and steps aside where Bonsai is doing a different, heavier job.
Bonsai is a whole operating system for freelancers, projects, time, contracts, taxes, banking, priced per seat, and Drupd is not trying to be. Drupd makes one bet: a beautiful invoice, sent in under three minutes, paid on the rail your client prefers.
Every template is hand-typeset and server-rendered at true A4, so what lands in your client's inbox looks designed, not generated by a business suite. And to send an invoice at all, Bonsai puts you on its Essentials plan; Drupd does it free, then $6 a month flat.
The same work, two very different tools.
An ember check marks the side that leads; a dash means that tool leaves it to the other, on purpose.
Four reasons the switch pays off.
01 / Speed
Sent before the coffee cools
A five-step wizard with a live preview, ⌘S to save and ⌘↵ to send. No projects to spin up, no plan to upgrade into first. The fastest path from finished work to a sent invoice.
02 / The artifact
An invoice that looks like you charge what you charge
Five handcrafted templates, typeset to the millimetre and server-rendered at true A4, carry your brand color, your logo, and even your crypto wallet icons. The PDF a client opens is a beautiful, professional document, not a form generated by a business suite.
03 / No gate
Invoicing is the product, not an upsell
Bonsai's $9 Basic plan cannot send a single invoice; that is gated to Essentials and up. In Drupd, sending invoices is the whole point, free from the first one, never a feature you upgrade into.
04 / Focus
An invoice, not an operating system
Projects, contracts, time, taxes, banking: real work, and a lot to carry when all you need is to bill the job. Drupd does invoicing and getting paid, and keeps the screen calm so the work goes out fast.
04 · The price
One flat price, not $25 per seat to unlock invoicing, and no 1% skimmed off what you collect.
The invoice is the part your client sees.
Every other screen serves this one document, so we treat it as a thing worth crafting. Drupd hand-typesets each template and renders it server-side at true A4 — your brand color, logo, and payment details set with a designer’s care — so the invoice landing in your client’s inbox looks deliberate, polished, and unmistakably professional. Not generated. Made.
Invoice
INV-0042
From
Studio North
Billed to
Halberd & Co.
Ready when you are
Send your next invoice in Drupd.
Keep Bonsai for everything around the work if you want it. Let Drupd handle the part your client actually opens.
- Drupd
- $6/mo
- Bonsai
- $25/seat/mo
- Free plan
- No card
Fair questions.
The honest answers, including the ones where Bonsai is the better fit.
Can Drupd replace Bonsai?
Only if invoicing is the part of Bonsai you actually use. Drupd handles invoices, payments, and follow-ups beautifully and fast. If you lean on Bonsai's projects, contracts, time tracking, or tax tools, those are jobs Drupd deliberately does not do.
Does Drupd do contracts, proposals, or time tracking?
No, and that is deliberate. Drupd starts at the invoice. You can add hourly line items and attach notes, but there is no contract, proposal, or timer flow. If those run your business, keep Bonsai for them and let Drupd own the invoice.
Bonsai has a $9 plan. Is Drupd really cheaper?
For invoicing, yes. Bonsai's $9 Basic plan cannot send invoices; that starts at Essentials, $25/seat/mo ($19 billed annually), and the price climbs with every seat. Drupd is one flat $6/mo, with a genuinely free plan and no per-seat math.
Does Drupd take a cut of my payments like Bonsai's platform fee?
No. Bonsai adds a 1% platform fee on top of the processor when you collect through a connected Stripe or PayPal account. Drupd takes nothing; you pay only your own processor's fee on cards, or nothing at all on bank transfer and crypto.