Is AppClose still free? What changed in 2026

No. AppClose ended its free plan on 1 January 2026, after nearly a decade of being free. It now sells one all-inclusive plan: USD $7.99 per parent per month on the web, or $8.99 per parent per month if you subscribe inside the app. Paying up front works out cheaper, at $83.88 a year ($6.99 a month) or $143.76 for two years ($5.99 a month). Each parent pays separately. New users get a 60-day free trial.

If money is the problem, read the waiver part first. AppClose gives free accounts to parents in financial hardship and to survivors of domestic violence, and says it has issued over 23,800 of them since 1 January 2026. That is a real option, not a token one.

If you do want a free app instead, this guide covers what is left, including the reasons to stay where you are. Pricing checked 4 September 2026 against AppClose’s own pricing page. Prices change, so check before you decide.

What actually changed

AppClose was, for years, the answer people gave when another parent asked for a co-parenting app that did not cost anything. That is what made the change land hard. It was not a price rise. It was the removal of a free tier that a lot of separated parents had built their routine around.

If you are reading this because your app started asking for a card, you are not imagining it, and you are not the only one.

AppClose gave 60 days’ notice and framed the change as part of a wider platform upgrade, including certified electronic business records and expanded features. Existing users were not grandfathered onto the old free plan.

Two things are worth doing before anything else.

Your records are yours

Before you move anywhere, export what you have. Message history, expense records and calendar entries can matter later, particularly if you are in or near a court process. Do that first, while you still have access, whatever you decide afterwards.

Check whether you qualify for a waiver

AppClose gives free accounts to parents in financial hardship and to survivors of domestic violence. An approved waiver gives full access to all features. You request one by emailing [email protected] with the primary email address on your account, and a survivor’s lawyer or a legal services organisation can request it on their behalf. AppClose says requests are handled confidentially.

If you qualify, you keep the app you already know, with your history intact, for nothing. That is very likely a better outcome than migrating, and we would rather tell you that than not.

Should you switch at all?

Not necessarily. Switching a co-parenting app is not like switching a music app. Both parents have to agree, both have to actually install it, and your shared history does not come with you. That cost is real, and it is worth weighing honestly.

Staying on AppClose probably makes sense if:

• You qualify for a hardship or domestic violence fee waiver.
• You are in an active court matter and your existing record is being relied on.
• Your co-parent will not move, and a shared app that one parent uses is not a shared app at all.
• The cost is manageable for you and the app is working.

Looking at alternatives probably makes sense if:

• The cost is genuinely a problem, which for a lot of separated parents already paying legal fees and running two households, it is.
• You were not using much of what you were paying for.
• Your set-up is fairly new and there is not much history to lose.
• You want something free that both parents can join without a conversation about money.

There is no shame in either answer.

What the free options actually look like in 2026

The honest picture: the free tier is getting rarer. AppClose closed theirs in January 2026. TalkingParents closed theirs on 30 March 2026. If you are hunting for a straight swap, the list is shorter than it was two years ago.

App	Free plan in 2026	Strongest at	Worth knowing
KidsFirst	Yes. Every feature, both parents, with no paid tier	The full set the paid apps charge for, messaging, calendar, expenses and documents, free for both of you, plus an AI Conflict Filter that rewrites a hostile message before it reaches the other parent rather than warning the sender. Topic-based threads. Messages cannot be edited or deleted once sent, and a full thread exports as a timestamped PDF	Newer than the others. No call recording. Available in Australia, New Zealand and Singapore
BestInterest	Yes, with limits	A free tier covering messaging, calendar, tasks, expenses, journal and exports	Free, but its message-tone features (Tone Guardian, Message Shield) are paid-only, from USD $9.99 a month
Cozi	Yes, ad-supported	A shared family calendar and lists	Built for families under one roof, not separated ones. No conflict tooling, no separate parent accounts, no expense splitting. Cozi Gold is USD $39 a year and removes ads
AppClose	No, ended 1 Jan 2026	Long track record, broad feature set, familiar to many parents	USD $7.99 per parent per month on web, $8.99 in-app. 60-day trial. Free accounts for hardship and DV survivors
TalkingParents	No, ended 30 Mar 2026	Accountable Calling, which no free option matches	USD $7 / $16 / $32 per parent per month. Limited, temporary fee waivers with documentation
OurFamilyWizard	No	Long-established, widely used by courts and legal professionals	AUD $199.99 to $399.99 per parent per year by tier. Financial hardship program
2houses	No, 14-day trial only	One subscription covering both parents, rather than each paying	USD $169.99 a year for the whole family ($14.17 a month), not per parent. Only one parent needs to subscribe

All prices checked 4 September 2026 against each company’s own pricing page.

What we would tell you if you were a friend

If cost is the whole problem, and you want the nearest free thing to what you had: look at what a free plan actually includes before you move. Some “free” co-parenting apps are a free calendar with everything useful behind a wall. Ask: can both parents message, can we both see the calendar, can we log expenses, can we store documents, and can we get our records out again. If any of those is paid, it is not really the free plan you are looking for.

If the reason you wanted a co-parenting app in the first place was that ordinary texting was going badly: the feature to look for is not storage or a calendar. Every app has those. It is what happens to a message written at eleven at night after a bad handover.

That is the part we built KidsFirst around, so treat the next section as us telling you what we do, not as a neutral verdict.

Where KidsFirst fits, plainly

Everything AppClose now charges for, free for both parents, plus the one thing it does not do: a hostile message is rewritten before it reaches you, not flagged for the sender to send anyway. That is the whole pitch. This is our website, so weigh it accordingly, and here is the detail behind it.

Messaging, a shared calendar, expense tracking and document storage are the category standard, and we are not claiming all-in-one as our invention. AppClose has all of that, and it had it before we existed. What is different is that you get the complete set with nothing held back and no second bill, so “free” here does not mean the stripped version.

Every feature is free, for both parents. No trial, no credit card, no ads, no paid tier. We are not run to make a profit, so there is no business reason to put anything behind a paywall, and the core co-parenting tools will stay free, always.

“Both parents” is doing more work there than “free” is

AppClose, like most paid apps in this category, bills per parent, which is why the number you saw when it went paid is only half of what your family actually pays. 2houses is the exception worth knowing about, one subscription covers both of you. Everywhere else, per-parent pricing creates the failure that sinks a lot of these apps: one parent subscribes, the other refuses, and you are back to text messages. Either the tool half-works, or you end up paying for your ex’s account to make your own usable. We do not have a second-parent problem, because there is no second bill.

The AI Conflict Filter

What we do that is different: an AI Conflict Filter that rewrites a hostile message before it reaches the other parent, rather than warning the sender and letting them send it anyway. Other apps with a tone feature detect the problem and advise the person typing, who is free to dismiss the suggestion. We do not do that. If a message is hostile, the rewrite is required, only the rewritten version is delivered, and the filter cannot be switched off.

What lands in your inbox has already been through the filter. You do not see what the other parent typed at eleven at night after a bad handover.

It does not change your facts. The pickup time, the date and the request come through unchanged. What it takes out is the part that starts the next fight.

Alongside it, topic-based threads, so school, health, handovers and expenses each have their own conversation instead of one endless scroll. That is a deliberate position rather than a filing feature. We are not trying to get the two of you to reconnect, and we do not think an app can do that. We organise the conversation around the child’s logistics, because that is the part that has to work whether or not you are ever on good terms.

Then a shared calendar, expense tracking, and document storage.

On the record, since you are about to lose access to one

Messages cannot be edited or deleted once sent, by either parent, and you can export a full message thread as a timestamped PDF, on the free plan. A record neither parent can quietly alter, and a way to get it out with the timestamps attached, is what an Australian family lawyer asked us for on behalf of her high-conflict clients, and it is why we built the export. Whether a given record suits your matter is a question for your lawyer, not for us.

Built with our community

A lot of what is in the app arrived because a parent using it asked for it. PDF conversation export shipped that way, and so did email notifications, repeating calendar events, and letting you pick your child’s colour. Parents tell us what is not working and we build it, then we say so in the release notes. If you switch to us and something is missing, tell us. That is genuinely how this app has been built.

What we do not have, and you should know before you move

• No call recording: TalkingParents has this, we do not.
• We are newer: AppClose and OurFamilyWizard have been around far longer. If a long track record is what makes you comfortable, that is a fair thing to weigh.
• We do not process payments: expense tracking is a shared record of who owes what. Money does not move through the app.

On your data

We are asking you to put a record of your family life into an app and to let an AI read your messages, so we would rather be specific than reassuring:

• No one on our team can read your private records. That is enforced by how the app is built, not promised in a policy.
• Personal details such as names and contact information are removed before a message reaches the AI, so the filter works on the tone of a message rather than on who your family is. That removal is automated and best-effort rather than perfect, and we would rather tell you that than claim otherwise.
• Your data is stored in Australia, on AWS, and your messages are processed within AWS. We never train AI on your private messages, we do not sell or trade your data, and we do not run ads.
• We comply with the Privacy Act 1988 in Australia, the Privacy Act 2020 in New Zealand, and the PDPA 2012 in Singapore.

None of that is exclusive to us, and we are not going to pretend it is. Plenty of the paid apps encrypt your data too. We just think you should be told exactly what happens to it rather than left to assume. The full detail, including encryption and what happens to the location data on photos you share, is in our Privacy & Disclaimer Statement, and how we are funded is in Why is KidsFirst free?

KidsFirst is available in Australia, New Zealand and Singapore.

If you decide to move, do it in this order

1. Export from AppClose first: messages, expenses, calendar. Do this before anything lapses.
2. Check the waiver: if you qualify, you may not need to move at all.
3. Talk to your co-parent before you install anything: a co-parenting app only works if both of you are in it. Keep the message logistical, the app we use is changing to paid, here is a free one, are you willing to try it. Not a negotiation about anything else.
4. Keep the old account open for a while: do not delete a history you might need.
5. Start the new app with the next thing that comes up: a school date, a handover change. Small and practical beats a fresh start conversation.

If you are in an active court matter, ask your lawyer before you change anything. This guide is general information, not legal advice, and family law differs by state and by country.

Common questions

Is AppClose still free in 2026?

No. AppClose ended its free plan on 1 January 2026. It now costs USD $7.99 per parent per month on the web, or $8.99 per parent per month if you subscribe in the app. Annual billing is $83.88 ($6.99 a month) and two-year billing is $143.76 ($5.99 a month). New users get a 60-day free trial. Fee waivers giving free accounts are available for financial hardship and for domestic violence survivors. Checked 4 September 2026.

Why did AppClose start charging?

AppClose moved to a single all-inclusive paid plan from 1 January 2026, after nearly a decade of offering the service free. It gave 60 days’ notice and presented the change as part of a broader platform upgrade, including certified electronic business records and expanded features. Existing users were not kept on the old free plan.

Can I get AppClose for free if I cannot afford it?

Very possibly. AppClose gives free accounts to parents in financial hardship and to survivors of domestic violence, and says it has issued over 23,800 since 1 January 2026. Email [email protected] from the address on your account to request one. A lawyer or legal services organisation can request it on a survivor’s behalf. Checked 4 September 2026.

What is the best free co-parenting app now that AppClose is paid?

It depends on what went wrong with your co-parenting communication. KidsFirst gives both parents the full set, messaging, topic-based threads, a shared calendar, expense tracking and document storage, free with no paid tier, and adds what the paid apps do not: its AI Conflict Filter rewrites a hostile message before it reaches the other parent rather than flagging it for the sender to ignore. Messages cannot be edited or deleted once sent, and a full thread exports as a timestamped PDF. If the problem is that messages escalate, check what any app you are considering actually does about a hostile message, because most of them warn the sender and then send it anyway if the sender insists. If you rely on recorded calls, TalkingParents is the only real answer and it is not free.

Will my AppClose records transfer to another app?

No. Co-parenting apps do not transfer records between each other. Export your history from AppClose before you leave, and keep it somewhere safe.

Do both parents have to pay for AppClose?

Yes. AppClose charges per parent, so each parent has their own subscription. Checked 4 September 2026.

The bottom line

Three things, in order. Export your AppClose history today, before anything lapses. Email [email protected] and ask about a fee waiver, because if you qualify you keep the app you know for nothing. And if you do want to move, agree it with your co-parent before either of you installs anything, because an app one parent uses is not a co-parenting app.

If you want the wider picture, we have written about what happened to the TalkingParents free plan and a fuller comparison of the free co-parenting apps in Australia.