Comparison
AirStaff vs Hubstaff: one payment against a per-user subscription
The difference that matters is the pricing model. Here is the maths, and here is where the two products genuinely differ by design.
The short answer
Hubstaff is sold as a per-user monthly subscription; AirStaff is sold as a one-off lifetime licence. Hubstaff publishes plans at US$4.99 (Starter), US$7.50 (Grow), US$10 (Team) and US$25 (Enterprise) per user per month on annual billing, with a two-seat minimum and optional paid add-ons. AirStaff charges $99, $198, $297 or $396 once, for 5, 15, 30 or 50 staff seats. For a 15-person team on a $10-per-user plan, three years costs $5,400; the equivalent AirStaff tier costs $198, once.
Hubstaff pricing checked on hubstaff.com, 10 August 2026. Plans and features change — check theirs before you decide. Hubstaff is a trademark of its owner; AirStaff is not affiliated with or endorsed by them.
Three-year cost, 15 staff
| Plan | Per user / month | Year 1 | 3 years |
|---|---|---|---|
| AirStaff Tier 2 (lifetime) | — | $198 once | $198 |
| Hubstaff Starter | $4.99 | $898 | $2,695 |
| Hubstaff Grow | $7.50 | $1,350 | $4,050 |
| Hubstaff Team | $10.00 | $1,800 | $5,400 |
| Hubstaff Enterprise | $25.00 | $4,500 | $13,500 |
- $5,202
- Saved over three years versus a 15-user Team plan at list price
- $0
- What AirStaff costs in year two and year three
- 27x
- Hubstaff Team three-year cost divided by AirStaff Tier 2, at 15 users
Where the products differ by design
Both products track time, take screenshots, measure activity and produce timesheets and reports — that is table stakes. These are the choices AirStaff made deliberately, stated as our choices rather than as claims about anyone else’s roadmap.
- Pricing model
- AirStaff: one payment for a seat allowance, for the life of the product. No renewal and no price rise, because there is nothing to renew.
- Screenshots
- Detailed (low-res) by default, so you can see the screen: readable, shrunk to 1024px and compressed to roughly 50–90 KB, never full resolution. Switch to Blurred and the readable frame is never written to disk. Staff always see which mode is on.
- Consent
- AirStaff blocks tracking at the server until the staff member accepts a monitoring notice, and enforces jurisdiction notice periods. There is no employer setting that bypasses it.
- Retention
- AirStaff caps screenshots at 60 days by default and deletes nightly. Keeping data longer is the thing that costs extra, not the thing that happens automatically.
- What staff see
- Every AirStaff staff member gets the same records their employer sees, plus a one-click download of everything held about them.
- Scope
- AirStaff v1 deliberately leaves out GPS and mobile tracking, per-tab URL capture and screen video. If you need field-workforce GPS, a subscription tracker built for it is the better tool.
When Hubstaff is the better choice
We would rather you buy the right thing than churn. Choose a per-seat subscription product over AirStaff if you need GPS or mobile workforce tracking, deep integrations with a specific project-management or payroll stack, per-tab URL capture, or an enterprise procurement process with a vendor that has a decade of compliance paperwork behind it. AirStaff v1 covers desktop time tracking for remote and offshore office work, and it is honest about the edges.
Questions people actually ask
What is the cheapest alternative to Hubstaff for a small remote team?
On three-year total cost, a lifetime licence beats any per-user monthly plan for a stable team. AirStaff Tier 1 covers 5 staff seats for $99 once; the same 5 people on a $4.99-per-user plan cost about $299 a year, or roughly $898 over three years, at published annual-billing prices checked in August 2026.
Does AirStaff do everything that Hubstaff does for a remote team?
No, and we would rather say so. AirStaff version 1 covers desktop time tracking, screenshots, activity, app and site usage, timesheets and the reports suite for Windows and macOS. It deliberately leaves out GPS and mobile workforce tracking, screen video, per-tab URL capture and integrations beyond Slack webhooks and CSV export.
How much does a 15-person team save switching from a $10 per user plan?
At list price, 15 users at US$10 per user per month is $1,800 a year, or $5,400 over three years. AirStaff Tier 2 covers 15 seats for $198, once — a difference of $5,202 over the same three years, and the gap keeps widening after that.
Can I import my existing Hubstaff data into AirStaff?
Not automatically in version 1. AirStaff starts tracking from the day your team installs the agent. Historical timesheets exported from another tool can be kept alongside as CSV, but there is no migration importer yet.
Is a lifetime deal risky if the company disappears?
It is a fair question to ask any lifetime-deal vendor. A lifetime licence covers the product for as long as we commercially operate it, which we state plainly in the terms rather than implying it is forever. AirStaff is built to run at under five cents per seat per month in infrastructure, specifically so that operating it does not depend on constant new revenue, and every organisation can self-serve a full export of its own data at any time.
Why is AirStaff so much cheaper if it does the same core job?
Because of how it is built and sold, not because of what it leaves out of the core. Screenshots are compressed to roughly 35KB blurred or 50–90KB detailed and deleted after 60 days, raw slots roll up after 90 days, and the whole system is designed to run under five cents per seat per month. That makes a one-off price viable where a subscription would otherwise be funding storage nobody needs.
Do the maths on your own team.
Multiply your headcount by the monthly fee, then by 36. Compare it with $198.