Bookwhen Alternative

The Bookwhen
Alternative
Built for Tables.

Bookwhen sells tickets to attendees, and it does that job very well. A venue sells covers on a table, at different prices per guest, with a deposit against each seat. That is a different shape of problem, and it is the one we built for.

Start For Free Try your booking page

No credit card required. No contracts. Cancel anytime.

Try out what your booking page could look like.

Paste your current booking link. We’ll build a working BookingNinja demo with your venue’s details and branding.

No account or email needed. Your demo stays available for seven days.

Use your venue’s booking link, or the website where guests find it.

Where a booking page can’t be read, we’ll use your website to make an approximate demo.

No Per-Cover Fees
Flat pricing, even on your busiest nights
Free Forever Plan
All features, no card needed
Family-Run Support
Real people, not a call centre
Why Switch

Tickets Sold, or Covers Seated?

Bookwhen's unit is the attendee. Ours is the cover on a specific table. Everything below follows from that one difference.

Capacity Is a Table

In Bookwhen a class holds a number of attendees. In BookingNinja a service holds tables, each with its own minimum and maximum covers, so the availability a guest sees is the room you will actually seat.

Priced by Guest Type

Adults, children and add-ons each carry their own price and their own deposit inside one booking, counted against the table rather than sold as separate tickets.

Booking Volume Is Not Metered

Bookwhen's plans are stepped by how many bookings you take in a month, from the free 50 up through the paid tiers. Our monthly price does not move with your covers. What we take on top is a 1% transaction fee on the payments you collect, plus card processing.

Cover for the Empty Table

Hold a card, take a deposit or charge in full, set per session. A party that never turns up should cost the party, not the venue.

Same Kind of Company, Different Job

Bookwhen is run out of Oxford by its founders with no investors behind it. We work the same way from the UK, with no sales team. We just build for rooms with tables in them, and we set yours up for you in about a day.

Side by Side

BookingNinja vs Bookwhen

Two UK subscription products. Bookwhen takes no commission; BookingNinja adds a 1% transaction fee on payments. The bigger split is tickets against covers.

Table & floor-plan management

BookingNinja
Bookwhen

Automatic table assignment & table joins

BookingNinja
Bookwhen

Guest types priced per cover

BookingNinja
Bookwhen
Per ticket

Order at table (QR ordering)

BookingNinja
Bookwhen

Card-capture no-show cover

BookingNinja
Bookwhen

Parties & group-table bookings

BookingNinja
Bookwhen
Group tickets, no tables

Digital waivers with e-signature

BookingNinja
Bookwhen
Attachment and tick-box

No cap on monthly booking volume

BookingNinja
Bookwhen
Tiered by volume

Deposits & part-payments

BookingNinja
Bookwhen

Prepaid class passes & course prorating

BookingNinja
Bookwhen

Zoom & secure video-lesson integrations

BookingNinja
Bookwhen

We have left Bookwhen's prices off this table on purpose. Its plans step up with monthly booking volume, and the public pricing page changes currency with where you are viewing it from, so we could not confirm the UK figures and quoting numbers here would be guesswork. Bookwhen takes no commission and adds no processing fee of its own: on its Stripe integration you pay Stripe's standard card rates. BookingNinja is a flat monthly fee plus a 1% transaction fee on payments, with card processing by Stripe or Square on top. On waivers, Bookwhen lets you attach a waiver document to the booking form behind a consent tickbox, which is acknowledgement rather than a signature, and its help centre does not describe signature capture. That is what the table reflects. Everything here comes from public sources and was right as far as we could tell; check with Bookwhen for the current position.

BookingNinja floor plan editor showing tables and areas being placed on a venue map
Tables Not Tickets

Build the Room,
Not a Head Count.

A class holds twenty attendees and that is the whole model. A dining room holds twenty covers, but only across a particular set of tables, and a four and a two are not the same as a six. You draw the room once and the maths follows.

Your real floor plan
Place tables and areas as they sit in the building, with min and max covers on each one.
Table chains for big parties
Join named tables into one larger bookable option so a group of ten gets seated together.
Assignment by priority
Best fit by party size and floor order, and you can move anyone by hand at any point.
Sessions shaped like service
Repeating services, one-off events and ticketed dates, all tied to your tables and opening times.
Live floor plan during service showing seated tables, upcoming bookings and tonight's booking list
Service Register

See the Whole
Room, Live.

Bookwhen gives a class an attendee register to tick off on the day. Service needs the same thing in the shape of the room: who is sat down, who is due in twenty minutes, which table has just gone.

Live table statuses
Seated, due and free, colour coded on the map, so front of house can read the room in a glance.
Walk-ins & waitlist
Seat a walk-in straight from the plan, and run a waitlist on the services that fill up.
Any day at a glance
Jump to next Saturday and see the room as it stands, which is how you spot a problem early.
No-shows covered
Deposits, prepayment and card capture are set per session, so a missed table is not simply lost.
Guest choosing their table on a phone during the BookingNinja booking flow
Covers at Checkout

Guests Book,
and Pay Per Cover.

Your booking page sits on your own domain. A guest picks a table, says who is coming, and pays the deposit that applies to those particular guests. Two adults and three children is one booking at one table, not five tickets.

Pick a table
Guests choose where they sit, or leave it to the best-fit rules if you would rather they did not.
Per-guest-type pricing
A separate price and deposit for adults, children and add-ons, all inside one checkout.
Order at the table
Guests scan the code, order and pay from the phone, and it lands with the kitchen.
Memberships & gift cards
Sell recurring member plans and gift cards from the same place the bookings live.

When Bookwhen Might Be the Better Fit

Bookwhen has been going for about a decade out of Oxford, it sits at 4.8 on Trustpilot from more than 500 reviews and its support answers fast. There are plenty of businesses we would send its way.

  • Your capacity really is a head count. Recurring classes, courses and workshops, with prepaid passes, course prorating and early-bird tickets. If nobody is being sat at a table, the ticket model is the right model, and Bookwhen has spent years on it.
  • You teach online or want something small and cheap to run. Zoom meetings created automatically, secure Vimeo and YouTube video, a real free tier, no minimum term and nothing to cancel. A solo instructor is well served by that, and we would be the wrong tool.

Pure classes with no seating plan belong on Bookwhen. Rooms with tables in them, covers to fill, deposits per guest and a floor to run on a Saturday night are what we spend our days on.

FAQ

Bookwhen Alternative Questions, Answered

Is BookingNinja a good alternative to Bookwhen for a restaurant or venue?
If you seat guests at tables, yes. Bookwhen counts capacity in attendees and tickets, which suits classes, courses and events. We count it in covers on named tables, with guest types, a deposit per guest and a floor plan behind it. Both companies are UK based and charge a monthly subscription. Bookwhen takes no commission on top; we add a 1% transaction fee on payments you take. Beyond that it comes down to whether you are selling tickets or filling a dining room.
Does BookingNinja do table management and floor plans?
Yes, and it is the thing Bookwhen has no equivalent for. You lay out the room, set covers on each table, chain tables together for larger parties, and watch it live during service with seated, due and finished all marked up. Best-fit assignment happens automatically and you can override it whenever the room says otherwise.
Can I charge different prices for different guests, like adults and children?
Yes. Guest types each carry their own price and their own deposit, counted against the capacity of the table rather than sold as separate tickets. Two adults, three children and a high chair go through as one booking with the right amount taken up front.
Does BookingNinja limit how many bookings I can take each month?
No. Bookwhen steps its plans by monthly booking volume, so a busier month can push you onto a higher tier. Our monthly fee stays where it is however many covers you do. On top of it sit a 1% transaction fee on payments you take and standard card processing.
Is there a free plan?
There is. Free Forever is £0 a month with the full feature set, and it carries up to 75 bookings a month where no money changes hands. After that a booking has to carry a payment, and the guest pays a small fee at checkout of 2.5% or 50p, whichever is the larger.
Is BookingNinja UK-based?
Yes, and on that we are much the same as Bookwhen: a UK company, run by its founders, with nobody selling your guests to anyone else. Our LetsBookFor.com directory only ever sends guests to your own booking page. The difference is what happens at the start. We build your venue out for you, tables and sessions and all, usually inside a day, and you talk to the people who wrote the software.
More Comparisons

Switching From Something Else?

Weighing up a few booking systems? See how BookingNinja compares to the others.

ResDiary Alternative

Flat monthly pricing without per-cover fees, paid add-on modules or long contracts.

Compare

Beyonk Alternative

How BookingNinja compares to Beyonk on the 4% booking fee, who keeps a fee you pass on to guests, and running sessions and cafe tables together.

Compare

Booked It Alternative

Switch from Booked It, keep charging families the same booking fee, and keep the difference. Plus where your takings land and how the move works.

Compare

BookMyParty Alternative

How BookingNinja compares to BookMyParty for soft play and play centres: booking on your own site, the cafe and waivers in the same system, and how the two bills are built.

Compare

Bookteq Alternative

Bookteq handles facility hire. Here is what changes when your bookings are people at tables.

Compare

ClassForKids Alternative

ClassForKids runs registers. If you run a venue, here is where the two differ.

Compare

Ready to Book
Covers, Not Tickets?

Live this afternoon. £42 a month plus 1% on payments, no contract, and no card needed to start.

Start For Free

Free Forever plan: 50 no-payment bookings a month. Upgrade anytime.