Many teams transitioning from manual methods are on the hunt for free or low-cost booking software. But the truth is, fully free tour operator software doesn’t exist.
There are a few free options for creating custom booking forms, enabling direct bookings, and managing reservations (like Jotform, Setmore, etc.), but these don’t offer the comprehensive tools needed to manage all areas of your business — bookings, sales channels, products, resources, customers, and back-office processes.
What you can find are:
- Free trial plans from established providers to test features before committing.
- Pay-per-booking models with no monthly subscriptions. These options appeal to teams seeking free reservation software, as there’s no upfront or monthly cost, and some brands allow you to pass booking fees to the customer. However, be mindful — fees tend to be higher to offset the lack of monthly subscription costs.
At Bókun, we offer a 14-day free trial and a limited free plan to explore our online booking software. After that, we provide three paid packages to choose from: START (our most popular plan, ideal for small to mid-size teams and growing operations) at $49/month, and enterprise-level plans, PLUS and PREMIUM.
We’ve put together this guide to discuss our solution and compare it with other major brands offering free plans or fee-based pricing.
Best Free Tour Operator Software
Ready to test drive Bókun? Start your 14-day free trial (no credit card required).
1. Bókun
All-in-one tour operator software with a free plan & the industry’s lowest booking fees
Bókun is an all-in-one operating system for tour, activity, and experience providers. As a Tripadvisor brand and Viator partner with over a decade of experience, we offer a vast network of resources to support our customers’ growth.
Our platform includes a comprehensive toolset to manage bookings, resources, finances, and behind-the-scenes operations:
- Online booking engine widgets
- One-click website builder (with advanced custom development tools)
- Centralised booking calendar
- Automated real-time availability management
- Connections with 50+ global OTAs & niche-specific sites
- Channel management
- Bókun Marketplace with 27K+ partners in the travel & tourism industry
- Partner & contract management tools
- Product & resource management
- CRM
- Automated communications & email templates to fuel retargeting and email marketing initiatives
- Customer portals for travellers to view, modify, or cancel reservations
- Fast check-in tools to streamline customer arrivals
- Business intelligence reporting
- Mobile apps for iOS & Android
We strive to make Bókun accessible to tour companies of all sizes, with affordable pricing and user-friendly features. Here’s what you get:
- A 14-day free trial (no credit card required) to explore all features. After the trial, choose a paid plan or continue on a limited free plan that lets you manage Viator and offline bookings.
- The industry’s lowest booking fees — just 1% to 1.5%, depending on your plan. You can absorb the fees or pass them on to customers. As a Viator preferred partner, Bókun waives booking fees on Viator reservations.
- A budget-friendly intro plan (START) with all core features for $49/month. It’s our most popular package, ideal for small and growing teams.
- PLUS and PREMIUM plans for scaling operations, with advanced tools like sub-vendor management, agent portals, deeper Zapier integrations, guided onboarding, and a yearly consultation with a Bókun expert.
We work with thousands of tour operators and experience providers in over 85 countries — from local teams to global brands. Over the years, we’ve refined Bókun with enhanced features, new technologies, and solutions like Channel Manager to meet the evolving needs of our global customer base.
While our full tour operator software isn’t free, customers quickly see ROI after getting started. Our platform offers features that expand your distribution network, simplify online sales, and help you reach new audiences. For example, Bokun users who started selling through the Marketplace saw an average Gross Booking Value (GBV) increase of 43%.
Bókun receives an exceptional 4.8-star rating on software review sites, and we’ve published numerous case studies showcasing our clients’ success.
Start your 14-day free trial to try Bókun. We’ll also review the details of our free and START plans in the following sections so you can get a preview before starting.
Bókun’s free plan
Bókun’s free plan is completely free — with no subscription, booking, or hidden fees.
With this plan, you get access to the Bókun booking calendar and Viator integration, allowing you to manage offline bookings and Viator reservations within our system.
This plan is perfect for teams using Viator to sell tours online while managing in-person or walk-up sales.
Learn more and get started with our free plan.
Bókun’s START plan
Our START plan gives small and growing tour businesses access to Bókun’s core toolset — everything you need to manage bookings, channels, products, resources, customers, and back-office tasks.
Online booking engine widgets & tools for direct bookings
Easily embed our online booking engine widget on any website builder. It’s built to streamline the booking experience, keep travellers in the checkout flow, and increase booking conversions.
Bókun integrates with dozens of payment providers — Apple Pay, Google Pay, PayPal, Klarna, Worldpay, Braintree, Raypd, and more — giving customers secure payment options while reducing drop-offs.
You can install the widget in under a minute and start accepting 24/7 bookings.
If you don’t have a booking website, you can create one with our one-click website builder. Just choose from our gallery of templates to get started, and easily customize the site by designing the plug-and-play fields to fit your brand.
Our website builder doesn’t require coding or technical expertise — most users can design their site in less than an hour. (You can also use our advanced website builder tools to make more in-depth customisations.)
The website builder is included in your Bókun subscription. We also cover the costs of securing your website domain and publishing your site.
Learn more about the benefits of enabling direct website bookings in our case studies:
- How REDRIB Experiences went from startup to 5-star company with 89% direct online bookings
- How Railbiking in Greece doubled bookings in one year by creating a booking website
- How the Diving Centre increased bookings by 40% with Bókun
Bókun’s central booking calendar & real-time availability management
Bookings from your website, partner sites, and connected sales channels are all routed to your Bókun central calendar, so you can view and manage all reservations in one hub.
While aggregating bookings, this calendar also automates availability management — updating all sites and sales channels as you receive new reservations.
No more manual calendar management or the risk of overbookings.
Bókun’s booking calendar also has tools to assign tour guides and modify bookings or availability.
Bókun’s channel management, OTA connections & Marketplace
Bókun equips you with strategic tools to attract new customers, maximise bookings and revenue, and drive continued business in the competitive tourism landscape.
We connect with 50+ global OTAs and niche-specific sites, and have a preferred partnership with Viator. We’re also a GetYourGuide premier connectivity partner and Google Things to do partner.
Our partnerships earn our customers cost-saving perks and additional conveniences when selling on these OTAs:
- We waive Bókun booking fees on Viator reservations. We also offer Viator users several free subscription checks every year (12, 24, or 48, depending on your package).
- Our GetYourGuide partnership offers the most reliable API performance and improved visibility on GYG’s site.
- Bókun’s Google Things to do partnership allows our customers to instantly enrol in Google’s program (skip the lengthy application process) and sell tours across Google’s apps.
In addition to the names above, we also connect with Expedia, Headout, TourRadar, BeMyGuest, Trip.com, Hotelbeds, Klook, Civitatis, Tiqets, TourDesk, and more.
You can browse and connect sales channels from the Sales Tools tab. You can add or remove channels anytime, and we don’t cap the number of channels you can sell on.
Read more: Best channel manager for tour operators
To promote your growth beyond OTAs, we’ve also built Bókun with a native partner network (Marketplace) that houses 27K businesses in the travel and tourism industry: lodging providers like hotels and resorts, car rental companies, attractions, universities, travel agents, destination management companies (DMCs), and other tour operators.
You’re automatically added to this network when you start a Bókun subscription.
We provide all the tools to manage outreach and contract negotiations, including contract management tools to stay on top of renegotiations and renewals.
You can monitor partner performance in Bókun’s reporting dashboard to see who earns you the most bookings and revenue and then use those insights to refine partnership strategies.
There are a few ways to leverage our network. You can:
- Connect with resellers who will promote your tours and experiences to their customer base and win you new bookings.
- Resell suppliers’ experiences or travel services to add revenue streams and earn commissions.
- Create packages with partners. Partner with other tour operators, nearby attractions, hotels, or car rental companies to create unique all-day experiences and comprehensive travel packages that provide more value to customers.
See how our clients use Bókun Marketplace to promote fast growth in our guides below:
- Tour Marbella earns 54% of bookings from Bókun Marketplace
- Mega Zipline Iceland scaled to over 100 partner contracts with Bókun Marketplace
- Venice Tours increased revenue by 400% after joining Bókun Marketplace
Bókun’s product & resource management module
Bókun’s Experiences tab includes all the tools to design stunning product listings and manage the fine details. Our product builder walks you through the steps to create listings, define pricing and availability, specify resources, and offer add-ons or combo experiences. You can also create templates from tour listings to speed up this process when adding to your product line.
Note: Our Viator partnership allows Viator users to one-click import products to Bókun and skip the set-up in our system.
Take a look at the product builder below:
You can see the fields to:
- Add tour details like descriptions, itineraries, durations, locations, drop-off or pick-up details, and what to know for the day of.
- Include pictures and media from past tours.
- Offer add-ons for customers to purchase with tours.
- Connect Tripadvisor to feed reviews between sites.
- Set pricing — you can charge one flat rate, create pricing categories, offer bulk discounts, include rates for private tours, and set dynamic pricing rules.
- Create availability rules — you can choose how customers book with you, specify days and departure times, set booking cut-offs, and select minimum and maximum capacities.
- Specify required resources and set allocation rules to optimise resource utilisation.
- Create combination experiences by combining two or more products.
Bókun CRM, automated emails & customer portals
We built Bókun with a native CRM for three key reasons:
- It allows you to manage customer relationships and communications in the same system you manage bookings and day-of experiences — which is just convenient.
- It assists with retargeting so you can hook more potential bookings and grow your customer base.
- It reduces overall software costs; teams don’t need to purchase and pay for a separate CRM.
Our CRM automatically collects and organises customer information when they contact you or begin booking, creating a comprehensive, easily accessible contact database.
We complement our CRM with an automated communications tool that can dispatch essential emails (like booking confirmations, mobile tickets, reminders before tours, and follow-ups) to free up admin time and ensure nothing slips through the cracks.
Our system includes a gallery of email templates — review requests, abandoned carts emails, discount codes, and more — that you can customise and schedule. You can also add templates to support other email marketing initiatives and manage all communications through our system.
Read more: Best CRM systems for tour operators
We also provide convenient customer portals for travellers to view, modify, or cancel reservations.
Customers can access portals through booking confirmation emails and view:
- Their full booking history
- Upcoming reservations
- Purchase add-ons to enhance experiences
Then, they can reschedule or cancel tours online — quickly and easily, without contacting your team.
Bókun sends another confirmation email when customers change reservations. Bookings automatically update in your calendar to reflect changes. (We also send notifications about changes or cancellations so you’re in the loop.)
Bókun back-office reporting & mobile apps
Bókun’s powerful reporting dashboard transforms booking data into actionable growth insights. It eliminates the need for separate (and expensive) business intelligence tools while providing the learnings necessary to promote sustainable growth.
Our comprehensive reporting suite lets you analyse business performance across multiple categories:
- Sales channel effectiveness — to identify which OTAs drive the most bookings.
- Partner performance — to measure the impacts of your distribution partnerships and refine outreach strategies.
- Product popularity — see which experiences are booked most often by customers.
- Revenue patterns — to track seasonal trends and brainstorm strategies to stay busy or bring in revenue all year.
These insights allow you to make targeted investments where they’ll generate the most significant ROI. For example, you can allocate your marketing budget to top-performing channels, revamp your product line with more of your best-selling experiences, and optimise pricing during peak demand periods.
We also provide the Bókun app store, where you can purchase additional modules to support our core functionality. Our extra modules include an advanced reporting suite, tip management tool, customer SMS messaging, and more.
Getting started with Bókun
You can get started with Bókun’s tour booking system with our 14-day free trial — no credit card required! You can explore our platform, test our features, and make sure we’re the right reservation system for your requirements.
After the trial period, you can:
- Continue in our limited free plan to manage offline and Viator bookings.
- Upgrade to the START plan for $49/month. We charge super-low 1.5% booking fees and waive Bókun booking fees on Viator reservations. Adding offline bookings to Bókun is always free.
- Choose one of our enterprise-level solutions, PLUS or PREMIUM, for more advanced features, Zapier access, and additional customer support. We charge even lower booking fees in these plans (1.25% or 1%, respectively).
Compare packages here, or start your 14-day free trial here.
2. Xola
Xola is a top-rated (4.7 stars) online booking system developed for tour operators and large-scale attractions, offering both booking and ticket management tools.
Xola is appealing for small teams or teams watching their budget because:
- It offers a homegrown online booking engine widget optimised to streamline the booking process and increase direct website bookings — so you can earn more customers without paying OTA fees.
- They offer a website-building service to support teams who haven’t yet brought their business online.
- They operate on a fee-based model and charge low(er) booking fees.
Xola also offers several tools, like an in-built distribution network, to help you earn more business and promote long-term growth.
The one downside to mention with Xola is variable fees. They’re typically low — at 1.9% + 30¢ — but can be as high as 6% (especially for international transactions). Xola’s website also does not disclose all pricing details. If you’re interested in this option, we suggest contacting them to clarify rates and ensure you have all the important information.
Features
- Website building service
- Online booking widgets (for existing sites)
- Channel management & OTA connections
- Distribution network
- Inventory management
- Availability management
- Staff management
- Phone booking system to manage offline reservations
- Native point-of-sale (POS)
- CRM
- Marketing tools to promote your tours & retarget customers
- Digital waiver solution
- Customisable tickets (and ticket scanning tools for convenient check-in)
- Reporting
- Mobile apps
Pricing
Xola charges customers a variable partner fee, typically 1.9% + 30¢, but can be as high as 6% for international transactions.
Read more: Best Xola alternatives comparison guide
3. Checkfront
Checkfront is another popular online booking management software because it:
- Boasts a robust toolset with over 100 features to manage bookings and operations, including strategic growth drivers like customer booking maps and ROI tracking.
- Is highly flexible and configurable to suit small teams and support scalability.
- Is user-friendly, with little to no learning curve, and scores well for its customer service.
Checkfront charges moderate 3% booking fees — a comfortable rate for most business owners. However, it’s worth noting that Checkfront recently merged with Rezdy (another major booking software brand), so features and pricing are subject to change.
Features
- Website builder
- Online booking engine widgets
- Centralised booking calendar
- Availability management
- Channel management & OTA connections
- Partner network
- Custom form builders and waivers to send to customers before their tours
- Marketing tools, including customer booking map, customer outreach & ROI tracking
- Integrations with online payment processors (Checkfront also connects with your POS and lets you send custom invoices)
- 50+ integrations & Checkfront API
- Reporting
Pricing
Checkfront charges 3% booking fees; you can cover this fee or pass it on to the customer.
Read more: Best Checkfront alternatives comparison guide
4. TicketingHub
TicketingHub is another highly-rated booking management platform with simple, transparent, affordable pricing — 3% booking fees (like Checkfront above). The platform earns an impressive 4.9-star rating for its comprehensive toolset, flexibility, scalability, ease of use, and helpful customer experience team.
While the pricing model is the same as Checkfront above, this option appeals more to larger brands or attractions managing high-volume sales. It also supports multiple languages, currencies, and payment options, making it suitable for international businesses.
Potential cons here include limited API integrations and an initial learning curve. Although the platform is generally user-friendly after you learn the ropes, users say features can be puzzling at first.
Check out TicketingHub reviews here.
Features
- Centralised booking calendar & availability management
- Online booking widgets
- Channel management & OTA connections
- Tools to create tour packages
- Options to sell gift cards, vouchers & merchandise
- Upselling & abandoned cart retargeting
- Reseller marketplace
- Native POS
- Online payment integrations
- Multi-currency features
- Inventory management
- Native CRM
- Reporting
- Mobile apps
Pricing
TicketingHub charges 3% booking fees for online reservations; you can cover fees or pass them to travellers.
5. Beyonk
Beyonk is a tour scheduling software popular for UK-based teams. It’s a sister company to BookingHound, another comprehensive booking system with more tools to support high-volume ticketing. Together, Beyonk and BookingHound create the largest booking platform brand in the UK.
Beyonk supports businesses at all growth stages with online booking widgets to enable direct bookings, a native reseller network, dynamic pricing, options to cross-sell products and create packages, and more. Beyonk also offers unique marketing tools and integrations with Meta and Google to help teams explore digital growth strategies.
Beyonk charges 4% booking fees — toeing the line between moderate and expensive. While not the highest in the market, these fees warrant careful consideration. Evaluate how booking fees would affect your tour pricing when deciding if Beyonk could be a good fit.
Features
- Online booking widgets
- Custom checkout workflows
- Connections with OTAs & channel management
- Reseller network
- Inventory management to monitor equipment, facilities & staff
- Tools to manage online or in-person payments
- Options to cross-sell products & offer add-ons
- Options to sell gift cards & issue discount codes
- Dynamic pricing
- Options to offer free events
- Automated customer communications
- Content management system
- Affiliate codes
- Reporting
- Analytics from Meta & Google
- ePOS system
- Staff & schedule management
- Zapier integrations
Pricing
Beyonk charges 4% booking fees; you can cover fees or pass them to the customer.
Read more: Best Beyonk & BookingHound alternatives comparison guide
6. Rezgo
Moving into some of our more expensive options — Rezgo is another comprehensive tour operator software solution, but it charges 4.9% booking fees.
Rezgo earns a 4.7-star rating for its all-in-one toolset, user-friendly functionality, and top-notch customer service team. Rezgo provides tools to appeal to all business sizes:
- Online booking widgets, website builders, and custom booking solutions.
- Tools to manage bookings, track inventory, process payments, and create reports.
- Seamless integrations with dozens of OTAs and a native partner network.
- Multi-currency support and invoice management to support international teams.
- Industry-leading security to protect business and customer data.
Teams that require a digital waiver solution — like outdoor adventure providers, bike tours, boat charters, wineries, and breweries — also like Rezgo for including this feature in its core toolset.
However, as mentioned, Rezgo’s booking fees are expensive. Customer reviews highlight other potential drawbacks: limited API integrations, a steeper initial learning curve, and inadequate support for multi-day bookings.
Features
- Website builder
- Online booking widgets (for WordPress sites)
- Open API to develop custom online booking pages & solutions
- Customisable booking calendar
- Connections with OTAs & channel management
- Reseller network
- Concierge services (to support concierge relationships)
- Live & dynamic availability
- Resource management to monitor equipment availability
- Flexible pricing tools & multi-currency features
- Options to sell gift cards & merchandise
- Integrations with popular payment gateways (e.g., Stripe & PayPal)
- Native POS
- Invoice management
- Guest waivers
- Fast check-in tools, like mobile tickets
- Reporting
Pricing
Rezgo charges 4.9% booking fees for online reservations and 0.9% for POS bookings.
7. FareHarbor
FareHarbor is a well-known booking management software brand because it’s a Booking.com partner and operates globally (in over 90 countries). The platform typically appeals to teams looking for free tour operator software because FareHarbor only charges booking fees and passes them to the customer — it looks and sounds free.
However, FareHarbor charges some of the highest booking fees in the market — variable fees, up to 6% — and pricing is one of the key reasons users leave FareHarbor (and switch to providers like Bókun).
While FareHarbor doesn’t have straightforward monthly subscriptions, they hit you with a maze of hidden fees to use the platform. For example, they charge commissions for bookings through their distribution network, and taking advantage of certain features, like the website builder, comes at a (steep) additional cost.
What appears free quickly becomes death by a thousand financial cuts as you attempt to access the platform’s full capabilities.
Tour operators also report significant conversion challenges with FareHarbor’s expensive fees, watching potential sales drop off at checkout — especially for premium offerings like yacht charters, multi-day adventures, and luxury packages.
This creates a frustrating paradox: operators can reach new audiences but fail to win their business. Defeating the entire purpose of their marketing efforts.
For these reasons, we hesitate to recommend FareHarbor (and put them toward the bottom of our list). However, if this option interests you, consider the pricing of your tours and how fees can impact overall costs. As advised with Rezgo above.
Read more FareHarbor reviews here.
Features
- Website-building services — FareHarbor charges an extra fee for this service
- Online booking widget
- Customisable booking calendar
- Connections with OTAs & channel management
- Reseller network
- Product management
- Availability management
- Staff management
- Native POS
- Integrations with Stripe
- Customer portals
- Fast check-in features & online waiver tools
- Options to sell memberships
- Reporting
- Mobile apps
Pricing
FareHarbor charges travellers a variable booking fee (up to 6%) at checkout.
Read more: Best FareHarbor alternatives comparison guide
8. Peek Pro
The last option on our list, Peek Pro, also charges hefty booking fees (variable, up to 6%, like FareHarbor). However, we include these names on our list because they’re highly rated and brands you’re likely to encounter while comparison shopping.
Peek Pro also has an outstanding 4.7-star rating, and the brand works with tour operators in over 90 countries, offering integrations and tools for international teams.
Scaling teams like the platform because it provides several features to accelerate growth — digital marketing tools, customer retargeting, Peek reseller network, and membership management. It even includes a handy tool (Peek Capital) to apply for business loans and secure financing.
Despite its growth-accelerating features, Peek Pro has some of the highest booking fees (as mentioned above), and customers note complexity during set-up, recurring bugs and glitches, and customer support delays.
Users have reported significant problems with Peek Payments, including delays in deposits, unresolved chargebacks, and poor communication from the payment processing team. Some users also find the platform lacks flexibility for non-standard tour operators or unique business needs.
Check out more Peek Pro reviews here.
Features
- Online booking widgets
- Customisable booking calendar
- Reservation management
- Integrations with OTAs & channel management tools
- Availability & staff management
- Options to sell memberships, add-ons, bundles, gift cards & vouchers
- Marketing tools (including customer retargeting)
- Dynamic pricing
- Fast check-in features, including digital waivers, Kiosk mode & ticket scanning
- Customer portals
- Peek reseller network
- Peek Capital (to apply for loans)
- Inventory management
- Native POS
- Multi-currency support
- Peek Payments, Peek’s online payment processing system
- Integrations with online payment processors
- Reporting
- Mobile apps
Pricing
Peek Pro charges variable booking fees (up to 6%) but does not share all pricing details online. If you’re interested in this solution, you must contact Peek’s team for rates.
Read more: Best Peek Pro alternatives comparison guide
Tour operator software brands Rezdy and Regiondo also offer free trials to explore the software before purchasing a paid package; however, we did not include them in our guide because the paid plans are rather pricey.
Both brands’ subscription rates are more expensive than those of competitors, and they charge (notable) fees in addition to the monthly subscription costs.
You can learn more about these brands in our guides below:
Try Bókun’s free online booking system today!
Finding truly free tour operator software is rare, but Bókun offers a powerful, budget-friendly solution. Our transparent pricing and growth-focused tools strike the right balance, turning your software from an expense into a business partner.
Our free plan provides essential functionality for teams managing offline bookings and Viator reservations, serving as an excellent entry point. For growing operations, our subscriptions quickly pay for themselves through increased bookings, streamlined operations, and expanded market reach.
With an average 43% increase in Gross Booking Value after joining our Marketplace, the ROI is clear.
Ready to move beyond spreadsheets and manual systems? Get started with Bókun and begin scaling your business today.
Related reads:
