The self-hosted Sling alternative
Rostera — Self-hosted staff shift scheduler — a weekly rota, exact hours, double-booking caught. Own it once, run it on your own server, and stop paying Sling every month.
Stop renting Sling
12 months of Sling equals this one-time price.
Assumption: Per-user - calculator assumes 3 staff x $2.00 = $6.00/mo on Premium (monthly billing; $1.70/user billed annually). Sling is genuinely cheap per head, so the payback is long for a small team and shortens as the roster grows; Rostera is one payment for unlimited staff. Annual billing is a stated 15% off on both paid tiers.
How Sling pricing grows with you
Sling charges per active user on its paid Premium and Business tiers and automatically prorates the bill when a team member is removed.
“If a team member leaves or is deactivated, we’ll prorate your account for the unused spot.” — their own page, read 2026-08-11
What Sling does that we don't
Sling offers a permanently free scheduling plan for teams of up to 30 users, not just a time-limited trial.
“Shift scheduling with Sling is free for up to 30 users.” — their own page
Who should stay with Sling
If you need built-in time-clock attendance tracking with GPS or kiosk clock-ins, stay with Sling — Rostera is NOT a time clock; it only plans shift hours with no clock-in/attendance capture. Full honest limitations are on the product page.
Why owning beats renting Sling
- One payment. No monthly, per-seat, or per-location fees — the license is perpetual.
- Your data stays on your server. It never lives in Sling's cloud.
- No plan ceilings. Records and users are limited by your hosting, not a pricing tier.
- It keeps working if the vendor doesn't. Self-hosted software can't be sunset or price-hiked out from under you.
Fair trade-offs: you host it, back it up, and apply updates yourself — see the product page for honest limitations, and the full Rostera vs Sling comparison.
Sources
- Sling — price checked 2026-09-03 —
source “$ 2.00 1.70 per user per month”
Competitor prices change — always confirm on the linked page. We only print figures we could verify on the date shown. This vendor is tracked in the Price Observatory — every figure verbatim, dated, re-checked quarterly.