There’s now a Free plan. Every account starts with a full 14-day trial of everything except MCP access (which needs a paid plan), then continues free forever — 2 platforms, 10 posts a month, no card, no expiry. The paid tiers differ in one thing: whose AI you use. MCP Scheduler ($8/mo) gives you all 8 platforms, unlimited scheduling and the calendar in the desktop app and in your browser (laptop or phone) — bring your own AI. Studio (from $11/mo) adds our Writing Studio that writes natively in 50+ languages (300 generations a month) and Sol, the planner you talk to — plans a month from your Library and speaks 20 languages. No per-channel fees, no per-seat maths, no watermarks — and every plan includes the desktop app AND the web app.
If Smart Post Studio doesn't work for you within the first 30 days of your first paid charge, email support@smartpoststudio.com and we'll refund it. No questions, no hoop-jumping.Applies to subscription charges. AI top-up credits are one-time purchases and non-refundable except where required by law.
All five tools below let you schedule to Instagram, Facebook, Threads, X, TikTok and YouTube. Here's what 6 connected channels actually cost — LinkedIn pricing varies by tool.
| Smart Post Studio | Buffer Essentials | Later Starter | Metricool Starter | Hootsuite Standard | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost for 6 channels | $11–19/mo | $36/mo $6 × 6 channels |
$25/mo 1 social set |
$20/mo 5 profiles max |
$99/mo per user · Professional $199, Advanced $399 (annual billing) |
| Pricing model | Flat — everything included | Per channel | Per social set | Profile caps | Per user |
| Platforms included | All 8 (incl. LinkedIn + Company Pages) | Pay per channel | 1 social set / 8 profiles | 5 profiles | 10 channels |
| Media stays on your machine (desktop app) | Yes | No | No | No | No |
| Native quality (no transcoding) | Yes | 1080p cap | Compresses | Compresses | Compresses |
| Built-in AI writing | Studio plans from $11/mo not in the $8 MCP Scheduler plan | AI Assistant included on all plans | Add-on | Add-on | Wisdom AI included on every plan |
| Bring your own AI (MCP) | Yes — every paid plan, from $8/mo | Yes — official Buffer MCP, every plan incl. Free (3 channels) | No first-party MCP | Yes — official MCP, any plan incl. free | Yes — Wisdom MCP connectors, from $99/user/mo |
| Free trial | 14 days | 14 days | 14 days | 15 days | 30 days |
Full head-to-heads: vs Buffer · vs Later · vs Hootsuite · all comparisons
Competitor prices verified against public pricing pages on 6 August 2026 (agency tiers re-checked 29 October 2026). All comparisons are per single user / single workspace. Enterprise tiers excluded.
No. The trial starts with no card on file. You only enter payment when you decide to keep going — pick a plan, pay, the app keeps working. If you don't pick a plan, your account continues on the Free plan (2 platforms, 10 posts a month, no expiry). Your data stays put either way.
Why MCP isn’t in the free trial. MCP lets an AI assistant create and schedule posts on its own, with nobody clicking. On a trial with no card that’s an open door for automated spam — and spam from our app gets real customers’ accounts flagged by the platforms. So MCP unlocks on any paid plan, from $8/month. Everything else — all 8 platforms, Writing Studio, Sol — is in the trial.
Studio plans include 300 AI generations per month — one generation is one AI request (a caption draft, a rewrite, a translation, or one post in a plan Sol writes for you; she shows the count before writing). The $8 MCP Scheduler plan has no built-in AI generations — you bring your own AI over MCP. The free trial includes 50. Need more? One-time top-up packs ($19) add +800 generations that never expire, roll over month to month, and are spent before your monthly allowance. There are no overage charges, ever: if you run out, the AI features simply pause until you top up or the month resets. Scheduling and publishing are never metered.
30-day money-back guarantee on every paid plan. If Smart Post Studio doesn't work for you within 30 days of your first paid charge, email support@smartpoststudio.com and we refund it. No questions, no hoop-jumping. Applies to subscription charges; AI top-up credits are one-time purchases and non-refundable except where required by law.
It depends on which app you use. In the desktop app, your posts, drafts, brand profile and connected accounts live on your computer; cancel and they stay there, and reactivating later (same email) picks them up. In the web app, they live in your account on our servers, which is what lets posts fire with your computer off; cancelling moves you to the Free plan and keeps them. Deleting your account erases everything within 30 days.
Two answers, because there are two apps. Desktop app: on your computer. It publishes media from your machine at posting time — no cloud storage, no compression, no "your video is processing." A few platform APIs need a brief pass-through relay, deleted within 24 hours at most, and YouTube uploads go fully direct. Web app (posts show a CLOUD badge): media is uploaded to our servers when you schedule and published from there, which is what lets your computer be off; it's deleted within about 15 minutes of posting, and anything you keep in the web app's Library stays until you delete it. Neither app re-encodes your video, which is the part that differs from Buffer / Later / Hootsuite.
Yes. Cancel your current plan, start a new one on the period you want. A one-click upgrade flow is on the roadmap. Until then, the manual swap takes about 90 seconds.
Yes, priced as workspace packs rather than a separate agency tier. Every paid plan includes one workspace (a full set of all 8 platforms with its own connected accounts, brand voice, queue and email list). Add 5 more for $5/month or 10 more for $10/month on MCP Scheduler or any Studio plan, inside the web app or at buy.smartpoststudio.com. One login, one-click switcher, and MCP reaches every workspace. Studio's 300 generations are one pool across all of them. Still single-user: team seats with roles are on the roadmap — email us if you need them.
✓ Approved by Meta ✓ TikTok-verified Direct Post ✓ EV-signed Windows installer ✓ 14-day trial, no card
If it doesn’t save you an afternoon a week, walk away — we never asked for a card.
All prices in USD · 30-day money-back guarantee · cancel any time
Character counter, Instagram line-break generator, video specs checker, image sizes, resizer, post-time planner, engagement calculator, UTM builder, X character limit, Instagram bio generator, grid maker. All run in your browser.
Try our Free Tools