The short version: Both are free right now, and the two free offers are not the same kind of thing. Cottage CMS's Free Forever plan is permanent: $0 with no credit card, including Square checkout, pre-orders and weekly schedules, a storefront, a catalog, order forms, and customer records. Bakebug is free through December 31, 2026 only, requires signing up before December 1, 2026, and then becomes $4.99 a month or $49.90 a year, with a 14-day grace period to subscribe. Cottage CMS's paid tier is $200 a year. So from 2027, Bakebug is the cheapest paid option in the category at $49.90 and Cottage CMS is either free or $200 depending on whether you need delivery and a custom domain.
All figures came off each company's own site in July 2026. Both have dated pricing changes, so verify before relying on this.
They are close in spirit: both built for cottage food sellers, both simple by design, both currently free.
Cottage CMS is organized around the drop. Pre-orders and weekly schedules sit on the free tier, alongside a public storefront and a catalog with order forms and customer records. Checkout is Square-powered. It assumes you post what you are making this week and people order it.
Bakebug is organized around speed. A custom branded storefront, a shareable link, order management, email notifications, payment tracking, and quote and presale management, with setup in under five minutes. One plan, everything included.
The real differences:
Same four disclosures on all three columns.
| Cottage CMS Free | Cottage CMS Pro | Bakebug | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Subscription | $0 forever, no credit card | $200/yr, which is $16.67/mo billed annually | $0 through 31 Dec 2026, then $4.99/mo or $49.90/yr |
| Free trial | Not needed, it is free | 30-day money-back guarantee | Not needed until 2027, then a 14-day grace period |
| Platform fee | Not stated | Not stated | Not stated. "One plan. Everything included. No hidden fees." |
| Card processing | Square's rate, not restated | Square's rate | Not stated on the pricing section |
Two things worth pulling out.
Neither states a processing rate next to its plan price. Cottage CMS names Square as the checkout, so your rate is Square's, which is 3.3% plus 30 cents online on Square's free plan and 2.9% plus 30 cents on its paid plans. Bakebug lists payment tracking as a capability without naming a processor at all. Ask both before you build anything on either, because on any real volume the processing rate costs more per year than these subscriptions do.
Bakebug's free window has two dates, not one. Free through December 31, 2026, but you must sign up before December 1, 2026 to get it. From January 1, 2027 there is a 14-day grace period to subscribe before access is interrupted.
Take a baker doing $1,500 a month across 60 orders, a $25 average order and $18,000 a year. Assume a standard 2.9% plus $0.30 processing on both, which is $738 a year, since neither publishes its own rate.
2026, both free
2027 onward
So if the Cottage CMS free tier covers what you do, it stays the cheapest option indefinitely. If you need delivery or a custom domain, Bakebug at $49.90 is $150 a year cheaper than Cottage CMS Pro, and it includes a custom branded storefront in its base plan.
That is the crux: Bakebug's paid tier is cheaper than Cottage CMS's paid tier by a wide margin, and Cottage CMS's free tier is cheaper than both.
They are free in different ways, and the difference matters more than it sounds.
Cottage CMS Free is a business model. A permanent free tier with pre-orders, scheduling, and a working checkout is something the company has chosen to sustain, presumably on the expectation that a share of users move to Pro. You can plan around it.
Bakebug free is a launch period. The company is explicit that it is free while they continue building and improving the platform, with prices taking effect on a stated date. That is honest and clearly communicated, and it is a stage rather than a strategy.
Neither is better in the abstract. What they ask of you is different:
Both have a dated change ahead, which is unusual for two products in the same comparison.
Cottage CMS is launching a Scale tier at $370 a year in August 2026, and its own page states that full-feature access is moving up, encouraging sellers to start Pro before launch to keep today's feature set while their membership stays active. If you were going to buy Pro, the timing genuinely matters.
Bakebug starts charging on January 1, 2027, at $4.99 a month or $49.90 a year, with the December 1, 2026 signup deadline for the free period.
Both companies are telling you these things clearly and in advance, which is more than many do. It does mean any comparison of these two, including this one, is accurate for a specific window and not beyond it.
Our breakdown of what the Cottage CMS free plan leaves out covers the tier boundary in detail.
Our look at Bakebug for home bakers covers the product in more detail.
Both are ordering tools built for bakers, and both leave the same work with you.
Sales tax is the one that costs hours rather than dollars, and it is worth pricing before you optimize a $150 difference in subscription. The SBA's guidance on registering your business covers what you are taking on, and the IRS's self-employed individuals tax center covers the filing side.
For contrast, Homegrown is $10 a month billed annually with 0% commission and 2.9% plus $0.30 processing published up front, which is more than either of these tells you before signup. It calculates, files, and remits sales tax in all 50 states, runs local delivery with a radius and a route, handles pickup at several locations, and hides a home address until purchase. It does not do quotes and presales, digital products, blogs, or text messaging. Different chores removed, and you can test which set matters more in your week inside a 7-day trial without changing anything.
Since both cost nothing today, this is genuinely a low-stakes decision, which is exactly why people overthink it.
Point five is the one worth taking seriously on any free tier. A free plan is an excellent way to test a product and a risky place to accumulate a customer list, because the cost of leaving grows with every month of orders stored there. Confirm you can get the data out while it is a hypothetical.
Point three deserves the same weight and gets skipped even more often. On $18,000 of annual sales, processing is roughly $738 and the largest subscription in this comparison is $200. The payment cost is between three and fifteen times the software cost depending on which plan you are comparing, and it is the number neither company puts on its pricing page. Spending an evening choosing between free and $49.90 while never asking what rate your checkout charges is optimizing the wrong line by an order of magnitude. One support-chat message answers it. You can compare the answer against a storefront that publishes its rate before you commit either way.
For two products this similar and this cheap, price is close to irrelevant and the real differences are elsewhere.
None of those appear in a pricing table, and all of them will affect your week more than $150 a year will. Our guide to taking pre-orders for a food business covers the workflow itself, which is the part that outlives whichever tool you choose.
Yes, permanently. The Free Forever plan is $0 with no credit card and includes Square checkout, pre-orders and weekly schedules, a public storefront, a catalog, order forms, and customer records. Pro is $200 a year and adds delivery, a custom domain, texting, blog posts, and digital products.
Yes, through December 31, 2026, provided you sign up before December 1, 2026. From January 1, 2027 it becomes $4.99 a month or $49.90 a year, and existing users get a 14-day grace period to subscribe.
If Cottage CMS's free tier covers you, it is free indefinitely and nothing beats that. If you need delivery or a custom domain, Bakebug at $49.90 a year is about $150 cheaper than Cottage CMS Pro at $200.
Neither states one next to its plan price. Cottage CMS uses Square, so your rate is Square's, which is 3.3% plus 30 cents online on Square's free plan and 2.9% plus 30 cents on its paid plans. Bakebug does not name a processor. Ask both directly.
Bakebug lists quote and presale management in its base plan, which points at custom work. Cottage CMS is organized around drops and weekly schedules. If most orders start as a question about a specific cake, Bakebug's shape fits better.
Bakebug lists a custom branded storefront in its base plan. On Cottage CMS, a custom domain is a Pro feature at $200 a year; the free tier puts your shop on a cottagecms.com subdomain.
From January 1, 2027, existing users have a 14-day grace period to subscribe and continue uninterrupted access to their account and storefront. Put that date in a calendar when you sign up rather than relying on an email reaching you.
Right now both are free, so the sensible move is to try both rather than reason about them. They take under an hour combined and neither wants a card.
Beyond that, the shapes diverge. Cottage CMS's free tier is permanent and genuinely capable, and its paid tier is the most expensive option here at $200 a year with a repricing due in August 2026. Bakebug's free period ends on a stated date and then becomes the cheapest paid option in the category at $49.90. If you are pickup-only, Cottage CMS free is hard to beat. If you need a custom storefront and quotes, Bakebug is cheaper than Cottage CMS Pro by $150 a year. And on both, ask the processing rate first, because it is the number neither one puts next to its price and the one that will cost you the most.
