Mydoma alternatives: what the Studio Designer acquisition means for your studio

If you built your studio's workflow on Mydoma, the last couple of years have asked a lot of you. First the "Mydoma Next" rebuild changed the product underneath you. Then, in July 2024, Mydoma joined Studio Designer.

Neither of those things makes Mydoma a bad company. Acquisitions are how this industry consolidates, and rebuilds are how old products try to stay young. But both of them changed the deal you originally signed up for — and if you're weighing your options, you deserve a factual picture rather than a sales pitch. Here it is, including the case for staying.

What has changed, factually

The acquisition. Mydoma became part of Studio Designer in July 2024. Studio Designer's own pricing page now positions the two as a family: Mydoma is the track "for QuickBooks users," Studio Designer the track for firms that want built-in general-ledger accounting. That's a coherent strategy — but it means Mydoma's roadmap now serves a portfolio, not just Mydoma users.

The pricing. Mydoma now runs a single plan at $58/user/month billed yearly, plus a $300 one-time onboarding fee for all new accounts. The onboarding fee buys two 1:1 specialist sessions and a client/vendor address import.

The payment fees. Mydoma Pay runs on Stripe — 2.9% + 30¢ — plus roughly a 1% Mydoma gateway fee on top. That markup isn't on the pricing page; it lives in the help center and the payment-terms page. On a $20,000 invoice, that quiet 1% is $200.

The migration experience. This is the part that broke trust for many long-time users, and it's documented in their own reviews: the transition caused "issues/glitches almost weekly," some designers reported proposals and moodboards lost in the move to Next, and one principal designer wrote that "the new NEXT update way overcomplicated things unnecessarily." Reviewers also report that only paid invoices export to QuickBooks Online, and that there's no data export if you leave.

That last sentence is the whole story, really.

The real lesson: your data has to be portable

Here's the uncomfortable pattern across this category. Mydoma users report they can't export their data. Studio Designer users say it's "almost impossible to leave this company without losing a huge amount of data." DesignFiles clients "lose access to their files if you pause your account." And when Houzz acquired Ivy, Ivy users didn't get a choice — they were migrated.

Every studio evaluating software after an acquisition learns the same thing: the feature that matters most is the one nobody demos — the exit. Your product library, your project history, your client approval records, your vendor data. Years of it.

So whatever you choose next — including us — make the vendor answer three questions in writing first:

1. What exactly can I export, in what format, and does it cost anything?
2. What happens to my clients' access if I pause or cancel?
3. If you're acquired, what's your commitment to the people already on the platform?

If a vendor squirms on question one, you have your answer.

Where Mydoma users are looking

Mortar

Mortar is a visual workspace for design studios — budgets, product selections and procurement, client approvals, and team collaboration, organised around rooms, selections, and procurement. If what drew you to Mydoma was a purpose-built tool with a client portal at its heart, that's Mortar's home ground too: your client sees a live, branded picture of their project — selections, approvals, budget — without learning software.

On the question that matters here, our position is explicit: your data is yours. Spreadsheet import with column mapping when you arrive, and a written commitment that you can take your data with you if you ever leave — no exit tax, no hostage-taking. Ask us the export question before you import a single project; we want to be held to it.

Honest caveats: Mortar is newer than everything else on this page, and it doesn't do built-in accounting — it's designed to run alongside your accounting software, not replace it. Subscription and payment fees are published in full, including Mortar's share: $59 per user, per month; 3.3% + 30¢ on card payments; 0.4% on bank transfers, capped at $15. Unlimited projects, no onboarding fee.

Move here if: you want the purpose-built, client-facing workflow Mydoma promised, from a team staking its reputation on transparency and data portability.

Programa

The strongest modern reviews in the category — 4.8/5 on Capterra across 73 reviews, with consistent praise for an interface that "presents beautifully in meetings." FF&E schedules, pinboards, client dashboards, and invoicing at $71/mo including one seat, +$31 per seat, unlimited projects.

Trade-offs: no native mobile app (and reviewers say the mobile web experience needs work), reported save/sync glitches, multi-currency invoicing problems for some, and payment rates that aren't published on the pricing page. Our research didn't surface documentation of their data-export story either way — ask them question one above.

Move here if: schedules and client presentation are your core workflow and you mostly work at a desk.

DesignFiles

The budget-friendly option: $55/mo (e-design) or $75/mo (full service), +$30/user, month-to-month with a 90-day money-back guarantee. Easy to learn, and a favourite of cost-conscious solos.

Trade-offs: reviewers report glitches in the clipper and floor-planner, boards and floor plans that don't connect to each other, weak cross-project tracking — and clients losing access to files if you pause your account, which is the data-portability question in another costume.

Move here if: you're a solo or e-designer optimising for price and simplicity over procurement depth.

Design Manager

The accounting-first alternative to the family you'd be leaving: $79/user/mo, with reporting that design-industry CPAs praise. The trade-off is data-entry overhead ("data input can take longer to enter") and a very thin public review base — 2.8/5 on G2 from just 2 reviews. Payment rates (3.1% card / 1.2% ACH through your own Stripe account) are published only in a blog post.

Move here if: what you want next is deeper financials than Mydoma, but from a vendor other than Studio Designer.

Houzz Pro

The broadest feature set — 3D floor plans, estimates, CRM, marketing, leads from the Houzz marketplace — but the least transparent commercials: subscription pricing is quote-only, payment rates are published only inside an image file, and ACH fee caps depend on which package you're on. Reviewers report serious billing and support problems, and Houzz sells products directly to your clients, which one designer called a dealbreaker. Given you're reading this page because an acquisition changed your tool, it's worth remembering Houzz absorbed Ivy and migrated its users.

Move here if: you're design-build, you'll use the 3D and estimating tools heavily, and you've read the contract twice.

Staying with Mydoma — or moving up to Studio Designer

Real talk: some studios should stay. If Next has stabilised for you, if your clients like the portal, if the community and education around Mydoma are part of why you're there — those are legitimate reasons, and switching costs are real. And the acquisition has an upside: if your firm is growing toward needing full general-ledger accounting, the path from Mydoma into Studio Designer is now an in-family upgrade rather than a rip-and-replace. Studio Designer's designer-specific ledger is the deepest in the industry, and the CPAs who serve design firms recommend it.

Stay if: the product as it exists today fits you, or Studio Designer's accounting is where you're headed anyway. Just get the export question answered in writing — you should have that answer even if you never use it.

Comparison at a glance

Figures from vendor pages and help documentation as of July 2026; full citations at the end of this page. For the wider field, see our full roundup of interior design project management software — all nine tools we've researched, ranked by who they're best for.

Moving without the mess

The Next migration taught this market what a bad transition feels like. A good one looks like this: your product library imported with you (not re-keyed by hand), your history intact, and a written answer on how you'd get everything back out.

That's the standard we hold ourselves to at Mortar. If you're weighing a move, book a walkthrough and bring your hardest question — we'd suggest the export one.