Comparison · Portal Software vs. Custom Portal
When a cheap client portal stops being enough
SuiteDash, Assembly, HoneyBook and Clinked will put a client portal in front of your clients this week. With three people on your side over five years, SuiteDash Start costs far less than a basic custom portal, and SuiteDash Pinnacle, Assembly Professional and HoneyBook Premium cost less. For a lot of businesses, that's the right call. Here's how each one is priced, what five years actually costs, and the point where a portal of your own is worth it.
Five tools, four ways of charging you
Portal tools don't price the same way, so the sticker price only tells you so much. What you pay depends on what each one counts.
| Tool | What it counts | Where the limit bites |
|---|---|---|
| SuiteDash | Nothing. One flat price per plan, from $15/mo billed yearly, with unlimited staff and clients1 | Storage and features by tier, not headcount |
| Assembly | Internal users and active clients. Starter is 1 user and 50 clients, Professional 3 and 500, Advanced 5 and unlimited2 | Your fourth teammate or your 51st client moves you up a tier |
| HoneyBook | Team members per plan: 1, up to 2, or unlimited on Premium ($109/mo billed yearly)3 | Card and bank-transfer fees on every payment you take through it |
| Clinked | Members, meaning every login, yours and your clients'. Standard includes 100, Premium 2504 | A growing client list, since each client login counts |
| Moxo | Not published. Every plan is "Request a quote"5 | You can't compare it until you talk to sales |
The five-year math for a small team
Team size here means internal users, the people on your side. Only Clinked counts your clients toward its member limit, since every login is a member; Assembly caps active clients per plan instead, and SuiteDash doesn't limit clients. HoneyBook's plans are set by team members, not clients. The custom side is a basic portal ($5,500–$10,000: logins, documents and status) plus $60/mo Core hosting for the same period. Change the numbers to see yours.
| Option | How it's priced | Total | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|
| SuiteDash Start1 | $15 / mo (unlimited staff + clients, 100GB) | $900 | Subscription costs less |
| SuiteDash Pinnacle1 | $80 / mo (unlimited staff + clients, 2TB) | $4,800 | Subscription costs less |
| Assembly Professional2 | $99 / mo (500 active clients, 3 internal users) | $5,940 | Subscription costs less |
| Assembly Advanced2 | $499 / mo (unlimited clients, 5 internal users) | $29,940 | Custom costs less |
| HoneyBook Premium3 | $109 / mo (client portal, unlimited team members) | $6,540 | Subscription costs less |
| Clinked Standard4 | $191 / mo (100 members, 1TB) | $11,472 | About even |
| Clinked Premium4 | $479 / mo (250 members, 3TB) | $28,752 | Custom costs less |
| Custom build (ArdinGate) | $5,500–$10,000 once + $60/mo hosting | $9,100–$13,600 | You own it |
Each plan at its cheapest published rate (usually billed annually), plus required onboarding fees. Prices checked October 2026; vendors change them, so confirm on their pricing page. Your quote is fixed after a short discovery call.
With three people on your side, SuiteDash Start comes to $900 over five years, Assembly Professional to $5,940 and HoneyBook Premium to $6,540. A basic custom portal comes to $9,100–$13,600. SuiteDash Start costs far less than a basic custom portal, and SuiteDash Pinnacle, Assembly Professional and HoneyBook Premium cost less. If one of them does what you need, use it and keep the difference.
The higher tiers are a different story. Clinked Standard comes to $11,472, where the two come out about even. Assembly Advanced comes to $29,940 and Clinked Premium to $28,752; against both, a custom build costs less. And the caps move you between tiers: add a fourth person and Assembly Professional is no longer offered at your size.
When portal software is the right call
For many businesses, it is:
- You need files, messages and invoices in one place, and that's it. SuiteDash, Assembly and HoneyBook cover that today.
- Your team is small and your client list fits the caps. SuiteDash has no headcount caps at all; Assembly's lower tiers fit a solo or three-person shop.
- You're still working out what clients need. Run a tool for a year. You'll know exactly what a custom portal should do, or that you don't need one.
- Vendor-hosted branding is fine. SuiteDash white labels from its first plan, Assembly offers custom domains from Professional, and Clinked from Standard.
Where a custom portal earns its cost
Your workflow doesn't fit the tool. Portal tools model a common shape: a client, their files, a few forms, invoices. If your work has its own steps, such as intake that branches by case type, approvals between stages, or records that belong to properties or projects instead of people, you end up bending the tool or running a spreadsheet beside it. A custom portal is built around the steps you actually take.
One system with your CRM and invoicing. Most businesses with a portal also run a CRM and an invoicing tool, each with its own login and its own copy of the client list. A custom portal can share one database with a custom CRM, so a paid invoice or a status change shows up for the client the moment your team records it. See what a custom CRM looks like in practice. A custom CRM on its own runs $6,000–$11,000.
Your brand and domain, end to end. Even on white-labeled plans, your portal runs on the vendor's platform, with its login screens, its email templates and its limits on what you can change. A custom portal is your design on your domain, from the login page to the notification emails.
You own the data and the code. On a subscription, your clients' records live on the vendor's platform under its terms, and its export decides what you can take with you. A custom portal is your database and your code from day one, portable to any host or developer.
No caps on clients or members. Assembly limits active clients by tier, and Clinked counts every client login against your member allowance. A custom portal costs the same with 50 clients or 5,000; only hosting grows with heavy use.
Basic or full custom portal?
A basic portal ($5,500–$10,000) is the like-for-like replacement for the tools above: secure client logins, documents and project status, with an admin side for your team. That's the row in the cost table.
A full portal ($16,000–$30,000) adds multiple roles, invoices, messaging, client uploads and online payments. That's the version that replaces a portal tool plus the invoicing and messaging tools around it, and it's where the one-system argument gets strongest. After launch, Care hosting ($100/mo) adds an hour of content edits a month; new features are quoted separately. See how a custom portal build works →
On HoneyBook? It's more than a portal
HoneyBook bundles a CRM, proposals, contracts, invoicing and scheduling with its client portal, so the closer comparison is a custom CRM with a portal, which costs more than the basic portal above. The payment fees matter as much as the plan price there. Read HoneyBook vs. custom →
Weighing CRMs too? Compare subscription CRMs with a custom one →
The verdict
Bottom line on portal software vs. custom
A basic custom portal comes to $9,100–$13,600 over five years. With three people on your side, SuiteDash Start costs far less than a basic custom portal, and SuiteDash Pinnacle, Assembly Professional and HoneyBook Premium cost less. If one fits your work, use it. Against both, a custom build costs less.
Build when the portal has to work the way your business does: your steps, your brand on your domain, your data, and one system shared with your CRM and invoicing instead of three logins and three copies of every client.
Questions about portal software vs. a custom portal
Is a custom client portal cheaper than portal software?
Usually not. With three people on your side over five years, SuiteDash Start comes to $900, Assembly Professional to $5,940 and HoneyBook Premium to $6,540, against $9,100–$13,600 for a basic custom portal on Core hosting: SuiteDash Start costs far less than a basic custom portal, and SuiteDash Pinnacle, Assembly Professional and HoneyBook Premium cost less. The higher tiers are different. Assembly Advanced comes to $29,940 and Clinked Premium to $28,752; against both, a custom build costs less.
What does a basic custom portal include?
A basic portal ($5,500–$10,000) covers secure client logins, documents and project status, with an admin side for your team. A full portal ($16,000–$30,000) adds multiple roles, invoices, messaging, uploads and online payments. Both run on your domain, with your branding, and you own the code and the database.
Can I bring my data over from SuiteDash, Assembly, HoneyBook or Clinked?
Your client and contact lists come over as CSV exports, which get mapped into the new portal during the build. Documents get downloaded and re-uploaded against the right clients. Automations, forms and templates don't carry over as data; they get rebuilt to match how you work. Check what your current tool lets you export before you plan the switch, since each one handles files and history differently.
Can a client portal share data with my CRM?
Yes, and that's one of the strongest reasons to build. A custom portal can sit on the same database as a custom CRM and invoicing, so a status change or a paid invoice shows up for the client the moment your team records it. No sync, no second login for your staff.
Can AI be added to a custom client portal?
Yes. If you already use an AI service (OpenAI, Claude, Gemini, or any provider with an API), it can be connected to your portal to summarize notes, draft emails and replies, or answer questions about your records. You keep your own account and pay the provider directly for usage, and nothing it suggests changes your data until someone on your team approves it. Adding it runs $2,500–$6,000.
SuiteDash, Assembly, HoneyBook, Moxo and Clinked are trademarks of their owners. ArdinGate isn't affiliated with any of them.
Price sources
- SuiteDash pricing as of October 2026, per suitedash.com/pricing/. ↩
- Assembly pricing as of October 2026, per www.assembly.com/pricing. ↩
- HoneyBook pricing as of October 2026, per www.honeybook.com/pricing. ↩
- Clinked pricing as of October 2026, per www.clinked.com/pricing. ↩
- Moxo pricing as of October 2026, per www.moxo.com/pricing. ↩
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