Resource management and capacity planning software for agencies
Resource management and capacity planning overlap, but they answer different questions. Resource management (scheduling) decides who does next week's work. Capacity planning (forecasting) tests whether you can meet future demand and when you need to hire. This guide gives a separate shortlist for each, prices for a 10-person team and a pilot you can run yourself.
The shortlist is based on each vendor's published product and pricing pages, checked October 14, 2026. It is not a hands-on test or a scored ranking. AgencyPro is our product, and the section on it says when to choose something else.
Selection criteria
Use the same criteria for every tool so the comparison is repeatable:
- Job: daily scheduling, forward forecasting, or agency operations with resourcing built in.
- Pricing unit: per scheduled person, per resource seat, per user or quoted, and what 10 people cost.
- Scheduling basics: time off, allocation conflicts, tentative work and non-person resources.
- Forecasting: tentative projects, role or skill demand, placeholders for future hires and scenarios.
- Actuals: whether planned hours can be compared with tracked time.
- Rollout: self-serve trial or sales-led onboarding, and any platform or onboarding fees.
Shortlist 1: daily scheduling
| Tool | Price listed (October 14, 2026) | Strength | Tradeoff |
|---|---|---|---|
| Float | Starter $7, Pro $12 per scheduled person/month | Scheduling with capacity and time-off management on the entry plan | Time tracking needs Pro |
| Resource Guru | Grasshopper $5, Blackbelt $8, Master $12 per person/month | Books people and other resources (rooms, equipment) | Reports and timesheets start on Blackbelt |
| AgencyPro | Pro $79/month with 1 seat, plus $20 per extra seat | Workload board tied to client requests, projects and invoicing | Not an hour-by-hour scheduler for weeks ahead |
Shortlist 2: capacity forecasting
| Tool | Price listed (October 14, 2026) | Strength | Tradeoff |
|---|---|---|---|
| Runn | Lite $7, Standard $11 per resource seat/month; Advanced quoted | Tentative projects, capacity charts and placeholders | Hiring requests for placeholders need Advanced |
| Productive | Essential $9, Professional $24 per user/month billed yearly; 3-seat minimum | Resource planning connected to budgets and profitability | Revenue forecasting and the scenario builder are on Ultimate (quoted) |
| Accelo (includes Forecast) | Quoted | PSA with Forecast's predictive resourcing | Forecast's old prices no longer apply |
| Resource Management by Smartsheet | Quoted, via demo | Capacity, skills and scenario planning in a Smartsheet environment | Sales-led; separate from basic Smartsheet workload views |
| Mosaic | Per seat billed annually, plus a platform fee; not published | Workload, staffing, revenue and headcount planning with an AI assistant | One-time onboarding cost and annual commitment |
What a 10-person team pays per month
| Plan | 10 people | How it is calculated |
|---|---|---|
| Resource Guru Grasshopper | $50 | $5 x 10 people. Blackbelt is $80. Other resources are extra. |
| Float Starter | $70 | $7 x 10 scheduled people. Pro is $120. |
| Runn Lite | $70 | $7 x 10 resource seats. Standard is $110. Lite is sold through Runn's sales team. |
| Productive Essential | $90 | $9 x 10 users, billed yearly. Professional is $240. |
| AgencyPro Pro | $259 | $79 + 9 x $20, monthly. $215.83 a month on annual billing. Includes the client portal, requests and invoicing. |
| Accelo, Smartsheet Resource Management, Mosaic | Quoted | Ask for the total, including onboarding and platform fees. |
Prices are as listed on each vendor's pricing page on October 14, 2026. Float, Runn and Resource Guru offer both monthly and annual billing, so confirm which rate you will pay. A tool that is cheap per seat can still cost more overall if you need a second system for time tracking or billing.
Daily scheduling: Float and Resource Guru
Float lists resource scheduling, capacity and time-off management, project scoping, role suggestions and API access on Starter. Pro adds time tracking, so you can compare scheduled hours with actual hours. Both plans have a 30-day trial. Choose Float when assigning people across several projects each week is the immediate problem.
Resource Guru prices per person and separately for other resources such as meeting rooms or equipment ($2.50, $4 or $6 each by plan). Grasshopper has no reports; Blackbelt adds timesheets, customizable reports and project budgets; Master adds an approval workflow and single sign-on. Choose it when you book shared equipment or studios as well as people. Choose Float or Runn instead if you need forward forecasting more than bookings.
Forecasting demand: Runn and Mosaic
Runn charges per resource seat, meaning each person in the planner, not each login. Lite includes scheduling, tentative projects, capacity and utilization charts, skills and project financials; Standard adds timesheets. Placeholders are free on every plan, but resourcing and hiring requests for placeholders are on Advanced. Standard has a 30-day trial with no card. Model a potential project with an uncertain start date and check that tentative demand is shown separately from signed work.
Mosaic sells two plans with the same features and different levels of rollout support. You pay per seat billed annually, plus an annual platform fee, an optional ERP integration and a one-time onboarding cost. Its pricing page lists SOC 2 Type II and regular penetration testing. It is aimed at firms that plan revenue and headcount from an ERP. A small agency that wants a self-serve trial will find Runn or Float quicker to start.
Broader operations: Productive and Accelo
Productive puts resource planning, budgeting, time tracking and profitability reports on every plan, with a 3-seat minimum and a 14-day trial. Recurring budgets need Professional; revenue forecasting and the scenario builder need Ultimate. Choose it when staffing decisions depend on project margin. Test the path from an estimate through scheduled work to actual cost.
Accelo acquired Forecast in July 2025, and on May 28, 2026 Forecast.app began redirecting to Accelo.com (Accelo's Forecast page). Older Forecast listings and prices are no longer a reliable quote. Ask Accelo to demonstrate the exact planning workflow a new account gets and which Forecast capabilities are included.
Smartsheet teams
Resource Management by Smartsheet is sold through a demo. Its page describes capacity views, workload balancing and resource allocation. Distinguish basic workload tracking inside Smartsheet from the Resource Management offering when you ask for a quote.
Where AgencyPro fits, and when it does not
AgencyPro's capacity workflow is on the Pro and Plus plans. A capacity board shows weekly capacity, open requests, allocated hours, overdue requests and utilization per person. AgencyPro suggests the team member with the most headroom, can auto-assign new client requests and can cap work in progress per client. Because it sits next to the client portal, requests and invoicing, the same system that receives the work shows who can take it.
Choose another tool when:
- You schedule people by the hour weeks ahead. Float or Resource Guru are built for that.
- You plan hiring with scenarios and placeholders. Runn, Productive Ultimate or Mosaic cover forward forecasting in more depth.
- You book rooms or equipment. Resource Guru prices non-person resources separately.
- You only need scheduling and already run delivery elsewhere. 10 people on AgencyPro Pro is $259 a month, against $50 to $120 for a scheduling tool.
Confirm the exact behavior on the plan you would buy in a trial; do not infer feature parity from this list. AgencyPro pricing is the source for our current plans.
Metrics to track in any tool
- Utilization: billable hours divided by available hours, per person and per team.
- Allocation: planned hours divided by available hours. Above 100% means someone is overbooked.
- Forecast versus actual: planned hours against tracked time, so estimates improve each month.
- Committed versus tentative demand: signed work kept separate from pipeline, so a forecast does not count work you have not won.
A tool that shows a schedule grid without these numbers will not help you decide whether to hire.
A repeatable evaluation exercise
We have not run this pilot ourselves for this guide. It is the test we recommend, and you should record your own results:
- Load the same team, working calendars, time off and active projects into each shortlisted tool.
- Assign a specialist to two overlapping deadlines. Check the warning and how you resolve it.
- Move one project by two weeks and add a tentative sale. Compare committed and potential demand.
- Enter actual time and review the difference from the plan.
- Check staff access, exports and the integrations your existing workflow requires.
- Record setup hours, weekly administration and gaps alongside subscription cost.
Compare cost at your actual team size
Request a current quote or use each vendor's pricing page. Compare required users or resource seats, planning seats, add-ons, integrations, onboarding and contract term. A useful worksheet is: recurring plan cost + required add-ons + amortized setup cost + ongoing administration. Historical per-seat figures can be misleading if the vendor has changed plans.
Capacity planning versus resource allocation
Capacity planning tests whether future demand can be met. Allocation assigns particular people or resources to work. A single product can support both; your pilot should still test each separately. See the capacity-planning guide and resource-allocation guide for the operating processes.
Implementation next steps
- Name one owner for estimates, availability and the weekly update.
- Enter time off and working hours before any project work, or every number that follows is wrong.
- Run the schedule in the new tool and your old method side by side for two weeks.
- Review allocation and forecast-versus-actual every week for the first month, then monthly.
Do you need another tool?
A small team with predictable work may be able to maintain a shared plan. Add software when conflicts, changing demand or reporting requirements justify it. Before migrating, decide who owns estimates, availability and weekly updates. Otherwise a more sophisticated tool simply displays stale data in more detail.
Sources and date checked
Prices and plan details above come from these pages, checked October 14, 2026: Float pricing, Resource Guru pricing, Runn pricing, Productive pricing, Mosaic pricing, Accelo Forecast, Smartsheet Resource Management and AgencyPro pricing.