How to choose
A spreadsheet, a free shared board such as Rizaburo, paid booking software, or a no-signup share URL. For a small room, studio, or clubroom, one of these four is enough. The fit comes first.
As of September 2026. Notes on Rizaburo mix public descriptions with our own look at the product in April 2026. Check the vendor for current behavior.
It covers holding a slot for a room or a piece of equipment: an office meeting room, a rehearsal studio, a clubroom, a rental-space timetable. It does not cover hotels, clinic queues, or businesses whose product is packages, tickets, and revenue reporting.
If the booking itself should take a card payment, or unlock a door, use paid booking software. If one person writes the sheet and the volume is low, a spreadsheet is enough.
If several people need to see open slots and book them, and you do not want a monthly fee, the choice is a free board such as Rizaburo or pencil.in. Stay on Rizaburo when it is already working. Move to pencil.in when you want a phone-first timeline, an iCal feed into Google Calendar or Outlook, or weekly repeating slots.
| Question | Spreadsheet | Rizaburo | Paid booking software | pencil.in |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost | Free | Free, with ads | Monthly fee or a per-booking fee. Some products have a free tier | Free, with ads |
| Who books | Share edit access, or the admin types every booking | A public board, no account required | Often asks for an account or contact details | Only the admin signs in. Guests use a share URL |
| Double booking | Two people can write the same slot | Checked in the app | Depends on the product | The database rejects the same room and time |
| Calendar | Copy by hand | No external calendar sync | Depends on the product | iCal into Google Calendar or Outlook |
| Payments and locks | None | None | Card checkout is the point. Some products talk to smart locks | None |
| Phone | Fine for reading. Awkward for booking | Built around a desktop timeline | Depends on the product | Drag on a timeline to book |
“Paid booking software” means the group that includes STORES Reservation, RESERVA, and freee Reservation. Free tiers and features differ by product, so those cells describe the group, not one vendor.
The most flexible option, and the easiest to break. You can add any column, it costs nothing, and several people can edit at once.
It fits when one person writes the bookings, there are few rooms, and a clash is cheap to fix.
Skip it when members or customers book for themselves. Edit access lets them break the sheet. View access does not let them book. Nothing stops two names in the same cell.
A free meeting-room board. People drag onto a horizontal timeline, and they do not need an account. It does not take card payments or sync an external calendar.
It fits when the current Rizaburo board already works, everyone knows the screen, and you want to keep a free public schedule.
Skip it when you need to book from a phone, push holds into Google Calendar or Outlook, or repeat the same weekly slot.
Products such as STORES Reservation, RESERVA, and freee Reservation. They add a booking site, a customer list, and checkout. Some connect a smart lock for unstaffed spaces. Most charge a monthly fee or a fee when a booking is confirmed.
It fits when guests pay at booking time, you want cancellation fees, you want to stop handing out keys, or you need a visit history.
Skip it for internal rooms, clubrooms, and member slots where money is collected somewhere else. You pay the subscription and still ask guests to create an account.
Only the admin signs in. Everyone else gets a share URL and does not need an account. The database rejects two confirmed bookings for the same room and time. An iCal feed mirrors the board into a normal calendar. Ads are shown.
It fits when several people book from the open slots, you do not want a monthly fee, and payments or a customer database already live somewhere else.
Skip it when you need checkout, a lock, or sales reporting. That is the paid booking software’s job.
Stop at the first one that matches.
Question 1
Then use paid booking software. Neither pencil.in nor Rizaburo takes a payment. If cash, a bank transfer, or club dues are enough, continue.
Question 2
If that person handles a small volume, stay on a spreadsheet. Software only moves the typing into another tab. If several people write, or guests book themselves, continue.
Question 3
If Rizaburo is fine, keep it. If the trouble is the phone UI, retyping into a calendar, weekly repeats, or loading many rooms from a file, pencil.in matches.
If any of these is the real requirement, drop pencil.in from the list.
There is no card payment, deposit, or automatic cancellation fee. You collect money the way you already do.
There is no lock integration. Unstaffed access that unlocks when a booking starts is out of scope.
There is no visit history, punch card, or sales report. The product shares a timetable.
CSV import covers the list of rooms and equipment. It does not import past reservations.
If you need checkout or a lock, pick paid software above. If you only need a shared timetable, a Google account creates the first one in a minute.