Happy HerdSame job. Very different shape.
Prices below were checked on each company's own pricing page in August 2026. There's a section further down on what each of them does better than Happy Herd, because you'll find out anyway and we'd rather you heard it here.
| Feature | Happy Herd | Cozi | FamilyWall | Skylight |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free plan | Generous, and ad-free | Ad-supported | Yes, ad-free | Hardware required |
| Paid plan | $4.99/mo | Gold $39/yr · Max $79/yr | $4.99/mo · $44.99/yr | Display, then $79/yr |
| Hardware to buy | None | None | None | Their screen |
| Ads on the free plan | Never | Yes | No | n/a |
| Chores & rewards | Stars, dollars & screen time | Yes | Basic to-dos | Yes |
| Real allowance banking | Money + screen-time banks, settle up | No | No | Rewards, no banking |
| Photograph a flyer → real events | Yes — plus fees & supply lists | Max tier: email import | No | Yes |
| Email-to-calendar | Free plan | Max tier ($79/yr) | No | Yes |
| Google Calendar sync | Free plan, two-way | Yes | Premium only | Yes |
| Publish your calendar out | Link, QR, busy-only mode | Limited | No | No |
| Carpool claim links | Yes — helper needs no app | No | No | No |
| Ask one neighbour by text | Yes, with YES/NO reply | No | No | No |
| Meal planning & recipes | Family Plan | Free (recipes) · Max (AI planning) | Premium | Yes |
| Assistant that texts you | Included in the Family Plan | No | No | No |
| One-at-a-time mode for a child | Calm Mode — free | No | No | No |
| Duration blocks & transition warnings | Yes, in Calm Mode | No | No | No |
| Whole-family themes | Six, synced to every screen | No | No | Limited |
| Wall display on a tablet you own | Yes, free plan | No | No | Their screen only |
| Kids need accounts | No — a six-character code | Shared login | Accounts | Shared device |
| Family location tracking | No — deliberately | No | Premium | No |
| Family messenger | Per-event threads only | No | Yes | Yes |
| Household budget | No | No | Premium | Chore payouts |
Verified August 2026 from cozi.com/compare-plans, familywall.com/en/premium.html and myskylight.com. If any of this has gone out of date, tell us and we'll fix it: hello@happyherd.app.
We are not the cheapest, and here's why
At $4.99 a month, the Happy Herd Family Plan sits above Cozi Gold, level with FamilyWall Premium's monthly price, and below Cozi Max and Skylight. That's a deliberate position, not an accident.
Cozi Gold — $39/yr
Cheaper, and a fair deal. But Gold is mostly removing limits: month view on mobile, calendar search, more reminders, no ads. The AI features that read your email are in Max at $79/yr. Happy Herd includes email-to-calendar on the free plan.
FamilyWall — $44.99/yr
The best value in the category if location tracking and a family messenger are what you want — both genuinely good, and both things Happy Herd doesn't do. But their premium also gates Google Calendar sync, which is free here, and there's no chore-and-allowance system to speak of.
Skylight — hardware + $79/yr
A lovely screen, and the closest thing to Happy Herd's wall display. You buy the screen, then subscribe. Happy Herd's wall display runs on a tablet you already own and is on the free plan.
What the extra money buys
Three things nobody else in this list has: carpool claim links that let a neighbour take a pickup without installing anything, real allowance banking with money and screen-time banks and a settle-up flow, and an assistant you text rather than another app to open. Plus a photograph-the-flyer path that pulls out fees and supply lists, not just dates — and a wall display that costs nothing.
What they do better
If one of these is the deciding factor for your household, buy theirs. We'd rather you were happy than converted.
FamilyWall: location & messaging
Real-time family location with safe-zone alerts, and a proper private messenger with voice notes and photos. Happy Herd has neither, and isn't planning to — location tracking of children is a bigger decision than a feature checkbox, and we'd rather not be the ones who made it casual.
Cozi: maturity and reach
Cozi has been doing this for well over a decade, with a huge user base, a mature web app and a name your relatives may already recognise. If half your extended family is already on it, that network effect is real and Happy Herd can't match it today.
Skylight: the object itself
A purpose-built screen looks better on a wall than a tablet in a mount, and it arrives working. If you want a beautiful piece of hardware and don't want to think about it, that's a legitimate thing to want.
FamilyWall: household budget
Bills, expenses and shared savings goals. Happy Herd tracks children's allowance, not the household's money, and there's no plan to become a budgeting app.
Cozi & FamilyWall: platform breadth
Both have long-established web apps and years of edge cases smoothed out. Happy Herd is newer, and newer software has newer bugs. When you find one, email and a person will answer.
FamilyWall: document storage
Passports, insurance cards, medical forms in one place. Happy Herd lets you attach a file to an event, which covers the permission slip, but it isn't a document vault.
Five things you can't get elsewhere
Carpool claim links
Mint one link, drop it in your group text, and whoever taps first gets the pickup. They need no app, no account, no password — and the race between two simultaneous claimants is settled properly, so nobody double-books.
Real allowance banking
A money bank and a screen-time bank per child, with payouts and settle-up. Not points that mean nothing outside the app.
An assistant in your texts
Morning brief, add-anything by SMS including a photo of a flyer, Friday wrap-up. Nobody else in this comparison has one at any price.
A free wall display
Everyone's column, tonight's dinner, tomorrow's preview — on a tablet you already own, on the free plan, with kids locked to ticking chores only.
Calm Mode
A different shape of the same board for the child who needs one thing at a time — a sequence instead of a list, durations instead of clock times, a quiet transition warning. Free, per device, and one tap back. Nothing else in this comparison has an equivalent.
Whole-family themes
Six of them, set once for the whole household, plus seasonal snow, leaves and fireflies. Trivial-sounding, and the single most commented-on thing by children.
No child accounts, no ads, no location
Kids are profiles a parent controls. There's no ad network, no advertising profile, no tracking, and nothing for a nine-year-old to be signed into.
Choosing between them
I'm about to buy a Skylight. Should I?
Maybe — a purpose-built screen is a nicer object than a tablet in a mount, and it arrives working. But the thing most people want from one is a calendar the family reads at a glance on the kitchen wall, and you can have that for nothing on a tablet you already own. We've written the honest version of that comparison, including what Skylight does better, on the Skylight alternative page.
We already use Cozi. Is switching worth it?
If Cozi's free tier is working for you and the ads don't bother you, stay. The reasons families move are usually: chores and real allowance for school-age kids, wanting the board on a kitchen wall without buying hardware, or being tired of typing the school flyer in by hand. If none of those is your problem, Cozi is fine.
Why is there no location tracking?
Because it changes what the app is. A shared board that a nine-year-old can use, and a system that reports where that nine-year-old is, are different products with different risks, and bundling them makes the second one feel like a default. If you want location, FamilyWall does it well.
Can I try it without paying?
Yes, and permanently. The free plan isn't a countdown — the board, calendar, lists, wall display, voice, themes and one Magic read a week last forever.
Is the comparison above biased?
We wrote it, so of course it's ours. That's why the prices are attributed to each company's own pricing page and dated, and why there's a section on what they do better. If you find something wrong, tell us and we'll correct it.
Try the free plan before you decide anything.
No card, no ads, no accounts for the kids. Get an email the day Happy Herd is live.
Free forever for the whole family · The Family Plan is $4.99/mo with 7 days free · Nothing for the rest of your family to install