Time To Pet is a genuinely good product — it's the most established name in pet sitting software for a reason. But it's not the right fit for everyone, and the two most common reasons sitters look elsewhere are price as the team grows ($40/month Team plan plus $16 per active user) and more capability than a solo operator needs.
This guide covers the strongest Time To Pet alternatives in 2026, with real costs. Prices are published rates as of mid-2026 — verify with vendors, as pricing changes often. (We make PetAmigo, and we've included ourselves with the same scrutiny as everyone else.)
Why sitters leave Time To Pet
From reviews and community discussions, three reasons come up again and again:
- Per-seat costs. The Solo plan is $50/month for one user; the Lite plan at $25/month is limited. A growing team pays $40 + $16/user — a three-person team is at ~$72/month, five people at ~$104. The cost climbs with every hire.
- Solo operators feel stuck between tiers — Lite can be too basic, Solo is priced for a business with real revenue.
- Migration effort — once you're in, moving clients, pets, and history out is work, which makes the per-seat math harder to escape later.
The alternatives
1. PetAmigo — flat rate + a client portal clients actually open
$19/mo solo · $49/mo for 3 seats. No per-user fees.
PetAmigo handles all pet care business types (sitting, grooming, walking, daycare, training, boarding, vet transport) with service-specific visit logs. The differentiator is the consumer side: your clients get a free Circle account that doubles as their portal — pet profiles, your visit updates, and their own care coordination with family. Adoption friction is low because the free product is useful to them even without you.
Choose this if: you're solo or a small team, price-sensitive, and want clients to actually use the portal. Know before you switch: PetAmigo is newer than Time To Pet — if you need deep facility modules today, see Gingr below.
2. Nuzzo — mobile-first, flat tiers
$29/mo solo · $79/mo team. Nuzzo focuses on a modern mobile experience: recurring visits, photo updates, and invoices with one-tap pay buttons for Venmo, Zelle, PayPal, and Cash App — money flows directly to you.
Choose this if: you run a mobile-heavy sitting or walking business in the US and want flat pricing. Watch out for: it's US-payment-centric; not built for facility operations.
3. PetExec — the established all-in-one
~$29–99/mo tiered by size. PetExec has been around for years with a deep feature set — scheduling, client management, QuickBooks sync.
Choose this if: you want a mature platform and your needs fit a tier cleanly. Watch out for: tier gates — confirm your must-have features are in the tier you're pricing.
4. MoeGo — for groomers specifically
$49–159/mo mobile (per van) · $79–239/mo salon (per location). If your business is grooming, MoeGo's automation, reminders, and route optimization are strong. But the pricing is per van/location, SMS caps push higher tiers, and reviews frequently mention the forced move to MoeGo Payments.
Choose this if: you're a busy grooming salon doing 5+ dogs/day. Watch out for: two-van operations pay double the advertised number. See our MoeGo alternatives breakdown for detail.
5. Trotter — lifetime license, no per-staff fees
$69 one-time (solo) · lifetime tiers up to 5 sitters. A one-time payment instead of a subscription, built by a sitter's tech friend rather than a VC. Scheduling, invoicing, Stripe payments, CSV export.
Choose this if: you hate subscriptions and your needs are simple. Watch out for: lifetime tools live or die on ongoing development; check update cadence before committing.
6. SitterEase — solo sitter specialist
Solo-focused, 0% commission. Branded self-booking links, digital intake forms clients fill by text or email, calendar sync, and you configure which direct-payment methods clients see.
Choose this if: you're a one-person operation that wants branded booking without commission. Watch out for: built for solo — teams will outgrow it.
7. Gingr — for boarding and daycare facilities
~$199–299/mo at scale. If "pet sitting software" for you means runs, occupancy boards, check-in/check-out, and per-night billing, Gingr is the deep facility tool.
Choose this if: you operate a facility, not a mobile round. Watch out for: priced and built for facilities — solo operators pay for a lot they won't use.
How to decide
Three questions settle most decisions:
- What does your next hire cost? If the answer isn't $0, model your cost at 2× your current team.
- Do your clients need to adopt anything? If yes, pick the tool where the client side is a real product (free), not a paywalled portal.
- Subscription or lifetime? Lifetime (Trotter) is cheap if it fits forever; subscriptions buy you ongoing development.
For the full landscape including per-van and SMS-cap math, see pet sitting software prices compared. If you're still deciding whether you need software at all, start with how to start a pet sitting business.