VanlyEvery roundup of trade software says the same thing: here are ten tools, they are all brilliant, here is our affiliate link. This one is different in a boring but useful way. Every price below was checked against the vendor's own pricing page on the day of writing, not copied from another comparison site. Several of the big roundups currently quote prices that are a year out of date or in the wrong currency.
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The shortlist, with real numbers
Prices exclude VAT. Checked September 2026 against each vendor's own page, linked in the sections below.
| Tool | Entry price | Top price | Charged by | Best at |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ServiceM8 | Free, then £25 | £269 | Job volume, unlimited users | Field app and certificates |
| Powered Now | £28 per user | £40 per user | Per user | Certificates and VAT |
| Mucka | Free, then £29 | £39 per user | Per user | Voice and WhatsApp capture |
| Tradify | £34 per user | £44 per user | Per user | Scheduling and quoting |
| Vanly | £39 flat | £39 flat | Flat, no tiers | Answering enquiries |
| Jobber | $49 | $199 | Per user, in USD | Teams and reporting |
Two patterns worth noticing before the detail.
First, everything worth having in this category sits between £28 and £45 a month for one person. Anyone quoting you a lot more is either selling to teams or selling you tiers you will not use.
Second, these numbers move. Check the price on the vendor's own site before you commit. Tiers move, and the aggregator pages go stale. Two clicks settles it, and it is the reason every number above carries a link.
ServiceM8: the best field app, if everyone has an iPhone
ServiceM8's UK pricing is the most unusual model here. You pay by job volume rather than by head: Free covers 30 jobs a month for one user, then £25 for 50 jobs, £59 for 150, £119 for 500, and £269 for 1,500 plus. Every paid plan has unlimited users.
For a team, that is genuinely fair. You pay for the work going through the business, not for how many people log in. The free tier is real too, and a low volume sole trader could run on it for nothing.
The catch is the handset. The full app is iOS only. There is a Lite version for Android that covers schedules, job details and checklists, but the management half wants an iPhone. If your team is on Samsungs, the true cost is the subscription plus a phone each. The detail is in our ServiceM8 comparison.
Also watch the job credits. A sole trader hovering around 50 jobs a month sits exactly on the line between £25 and £59, decided by how busy the month was.
Powered Now: the most British option
Powered Now runs £28 per user for Business, £32 for Professional, £40 for Premium, with two months free on annual billing.
It is the tool built around HMRC rather than adapted to it. Making Tax Digital compliance is in every plan and you can submit VAT returns from inside the product on Professional. Gas Safe and electrical certificates arrive at £32, which is cheaper than anyone else charges for the same thing.
Unlimited customer texts from £32 matters more than it sounds. Tradify charges 10p a message, and a firm confirming every appointment by SMS notices that.
Weaker on scheduling and interface polish than Tradify. Our full write up is in the Powered Now comparison.
Mucka: the closest thing to a different shape
Mucka is the newest name here and the most interesting. Free forever for jobs, clients and diary with 30 typed AI replies a month. Solo is £29 a month and adds WhatsApp job capture, online quotes customers can accept and pay, and automatic payment chasing. Team is £39 per user. Fourteen day trial, no card.
It is the only other tool on this list that starts from voice and WhatsApp rather than a dashboard, and at £29 it is the cheapest way to try that shape. The AI receptionist is metered at 60 minutes a month on Solo and Team, so check that against how many calls you actually miss.
Worth a proper look if the dashboard model is what has failed you before. Our comparison is in the Mucka write up.
Tradify: the safe default
Tradify is £34 per user for Lite and £44 for Plus, with a fourteen day trial that includes every feature, which is the most honest trial on this list.
It is the cleanest interface in UK trade software and the one most tradespeople get running in a weekend. Scheduling syncs with Google Calendar, subcontractors appear on the same scheduler, and email tracking tells you exactly when a customer opened your quote and how many times. Xero, Sage and QuickBooks all sync.
Costs are metered where rivals include them: 10p per text message, £10 a month for the website add on. Compliance certificates only arrive on the £44 Plus plan, which is the main reason a gas engineer would choose Powered Now instead. We put the two head to head in Tradify vs Powered Now.
Jobber: excellent, and priced for another country
Jobber is the most polished product in the category and the most awkward purchase for a British buyer. Core is $49 a month, Connect $139, Grow $199, dropping to $29, $99 and $149 if you pay a year up front. Their page states it plainly: all prices in USD.
The reporting, the client portal and the automation are genuinely a class above. But the features a solo trade actually wants, the automatic reminders and follow ups, live in Connect at $139 a month billed monthly, which is over £100 for one user in a currency your bank converts every time. Detail in the Jobber comparison.
Right answer for a crew with a dispatcher. Hard to justify for one van.
Vanly: not a job management app at all
Ours, so read it with that in mind.
Vanly is £39 a month flat with no tiers and no per user pricing, fourteen days free, no card. It does not do certificates, team scheduling or job cards, and it is not trying to. It lives in WhatsApp instead of a dashboard: new enquiries get answered within 30 seconds, missed calls get texted back, a voice note becomes a quote PDF, and invoices chase themselves.
Which brings up the thing every tool above has in common.
The gap all six share, and five of them do not fill
A job management app manages work you have already won. The job card exists because somebody answered the enquiry, qualified it and typed it in. In a firm with an office, that somebody is the office.
In a one or two person business, that somebody is you, up a ladder. The customer messages three tradespeople at nine in the morning and picks one by lunchtime. You see it at half twelve. No job card is ever created, because the job went to whoever replied first. The arithmetic on what that costs is in why UK tradies lose leads to slow replies.
Tradify, ServiceM8, Powered Now and Jobber all automate the stages after capture: reminders, follow ups, chasing. All useful. None of them answer a stranger at nine in the morning. Mucka and Vanly are the two that start earlier, from the enquiry rather than the job.
That is the real choice in this category in 2026. Not which dashboard, but whether you need a dashboard or an answering machine that writes quotes.
Pick by what your week actually looks like
Gas engineer or electrician, certificates weekly. Powered Now Professional at £32. Nothing else does UK compliance that well for the money.
Builder or firm running subbies. Tradify Plus at £44 for the scheduler, or ServiceM8 if everyone is already on iPhones and the volume is high.
Team of five or more with someone in the office. ServiceM8 on job volume, or Jobber if you want the reporting and can live with dollars.
Sole trader who wants to pay nothing while starting out. ServiceM8 Free if you are under 30 jobs and on an iPhone, or Mucka Free.
Sole trader losing work to slow replies rather than to disorganisation. Mucka Solo at £29 or Vanly at £39. Different problem, different tool.
Anyone on Android. Rules out full ServiceM8. Everything else is fine.
FAQ
What is the cheapest job management software for UK trades?
ServiceM8 and Mucka both have genuinely usable free tiers. Among paid plans, Powered Now Business at £28 per user is the cheapest full featured option, with Mucka Solo just above it at £29.
Which trade software is best for Gas Safe certificates?
Powered Now, with forms and certificates from the £32 Professional plan. ServiceM8 handles certificates well through its Forms add on. Tradify includes them only on the £44 Plus plan.
Do any of these answer customer enquiries for me?
Only Mucka and Vanly attempt it. Jobber sells an AI receptionist as a paid add on. The others automate reminders and chasing after a job exists, but will not reply to a new enquiry while you are working.
Is free trade software any good?
The free tiers from ServiceM8 and Mucka are real rather than crippled demos, and a low volume sole trader can genuinely run on either. The limits are job counts and single logins, so they stop fitting once you get busy, which is the point.
Which works properly on Android?
All of them except ServiceM8, whose full app is iOS only. If your team is on Android, budget for handsets or choose something else.
How do I stop paying for features I never use?
Start on the trial, run one real week of jobs through it, then buy the tier that covers what you actually did rather than what you hope to do. Every tool here lets you move up later, and most let you move down.
The bottom line
For most UK trade firms the honest answer is Tradify if you want polish, Powered Now if certificates and VAT run your life, and ServiceM8 if you are on iPhones with the volume to justify it.
But if what is actually costing you money is the enquiry that went unanswered at nine in the morning and the quote you wrote at ten at night, no dashboard fixes that. Try Vanly free for 14 days. No card needed to start.