Directify vs Wild Apricot A Wild Apricot alternative built for directory websites

Looking for a Wild Apricot alternative? Start here

Wild Apricot is the veteran of small-association software. For 20+ years it has bundled the whole membership operation — member database, automated dues and renewals, event registration with payments, donations, email — into one system with a website builder attached, and every tier includes every feature. The 60-day no-card trial is one of the most generous in any software category. If your organization's core job is collecting dues and running events, Wild Apricot earns its reputation.

So why are you here? The recent reviews tell a consistent story, and it maps to three things. Price: the contact-count ladder starts at $66/mo for just 100 contacts and climbs as your list grows — success literally raises your bill, and prices have risen through three ownership changes (Personify in 2017, Pamlico Capital, and Momentive Software in January 2026). Payments: reviewers report a monthly surcharge — around 20% — for staying with an outside payment provider like Stripe or PayPal instead of the in-house Personify Payments. In John L.'s words from an April 2025 Capterra review: "There was also an increased monthly surcharge because we chose to stay with our current payment provider." Support: the loudest post-acquisition complaint — "Since purchased by Personify, the support is HORRIBLE and lends itself only to electronic communications."

Directify comes at the problem from the other direction. It's a modern, directory-first builder: describe your organization and AI generates the member directory — categories, typed profile fields, sample listings — in about a minute, with server-rendered SEO pages, a live visual theme editor, and monetization through your own Stripe account with no surcharge and no platform cut. Flat plans, unlimited listings from $39/mo, and the bill doesn't move when your member list grows.

What Wild Apricot actually is in 2026

Wild Apricot is association-management software (an AMS), not a website builder. That framing explains both its strengths and the frustration that brings people to this page.

What it genuinely does well:

• The membership machine. Applications, approvals, membership levels, automated invoices, renewal reminders, lapsed-member handling. If a volunteer treasurer currently chases dues by spreadsheet, this machinery pays for itself.
• Events with registration. Paid event registration wired to the same member database — early-bird pricing, member-only rates, attendance tracking.
• Donations. Native donation processing for nonprofits.
• All features on every tier. You never pay to unlock a feature; you pay for contact capacity.
• The 60-day trial. Two months, no card. Genuinely generous, and we say so even though our own trial is shorter.
• Ecosystem. Two decades of help-center content, a large user base among associations, and consultants who specialize in the platform.

And the patterns in recent reviews:

• The pricing ladder. $66/mo buys 100 contacts. Note that contacts includes lapsed members, event attendees, and newsletter subscribers — not just active members — so lists grow faster than membership does, and each tier jump is a real price jump. Reviewers describe the price as incrementing "rapidly with the growth in the number of contacts."
• The payment-provider surcharge. Keeping your existing Stripe, PayPal, or Authorize.Net account instead of moving to Personify Payments draws a monthly surcharge that reviewers put at around 20% of the subscription. For an organization that already reconciles its books through Stripe, that's a recurring tax on not switching.
• Support since the acquisitions. Multiple 2025 reviews describe electronic-only support with responses taking "way over 5 business days... if it's answered at all."
• The website builder. Functional, but the themes and editing experience are widely described as dated. For organizations where the public directory is the storefront, that matters.

Where Directify is the right call

Directify is shaped for the case where the public member directory is the product:

• Modern member profiles that rank. The Members template ships profile pages with typed custom fields, categories, filters, and search — all server-rendered with Schema.org markup, so member pages show up in Google. Real customer example: a healthcare practitioners directory in the Netherlands runs on it.
• Your Stripe, your money. Connect your own Stripe, Creem, or Lemon Squeezy on any paid plan. Charge for listings, featured placement, or leads — no surcharge for using your own provider, no platform cut beyond normal processor fees.
• Flat pricing. $12/mo Starter with a custom domain; $39/mo Professional with unlimited listings. A directory that grows from 100 to 10,000 members costs the same.
• Speed and design. AI builds the first version in about a minute; the visual theme editor handles colors, fonts, sections, and layout with zero HTML/CSS.
• Private when needed. Password-protected directories cover the members-only use case for directories that shouldn't be fully public.

If you read that list and thought "but who invoices the members?" — that's the real boundary. Directify doesn't do dues billing, event registration, or donations. Read on.

Where Wild Apricot is the right call

Being specific, because sending the wrong people to Directify helps nobody:

• You collect recurring dues. Automated invoicing, renewals, and lapsed-member handling are Wild Apricot's reason to exist. Directify has no equivalent — you'd be wiring up Stripe subscriptions and spreadsheets yourself.
• You run paid events monthly. Registration, member pricing, and payments tied to the member database beat any listing-only events page.
• You take donations. Native donation processing matters for nonprofits; Directify doesn't offer it.
• You need membership-level content gating. Wild Apricot gates pages by membership level; Directify's password-protected directories are a simpler, blunter tool.
• Your team leans on consultants and a deep knowledge base. Twenty years of ecosystem is worth real money to a volunteer-run organization.

If two or more of those describe you, stay on Wild Apricot (or evaluate a full AMS competitor) — the directory-builder trade isn't worth losing the machinery.

On total cost — a real comparison

The comparison depends entirely on your contact count, which is exactly the point.

• At 100 contacts: Wild Apricot is $66/mo ($59.40 pre-paid annually). Directify Professional — unlimited listings, paid submissions, lead capture, ads — is $39/mo ($33/mo yearly). Directify is roughly 40% cheaper before the surcharge question even comes up.
• As you grow: Wild Apricot moves you up the tier ladder (250 → 500 → 2,000 → 5,000 contacts...), with reviewers describing costs that climb quickly. Directify's price doesn't change with directory size — 10,000 listings on Professional costs what 50 listings costs.
• The payments tax: if you keep your own Stripe on Wild Apricot, reviewers report a ~20% monthly surcharge on the subscription. On Directify, your own Stripe is the default and costs nothing extra.

What the Wild Apricot price buys that Directify's doesn't: the dues engine, event registration, and donations. If you use that machinery, it's fair value. If you don't, you're paying association-management prices for a directory website.

Migration: typical path from Wild Apricot to Directify

1. Export your contacts/members to CSV from Wild Apricot's admin (Contacts → Export).
2. Spin up a free Directify account and import the CSV — the import preview maps columns to member-profile fields before committing.
3. Convert fields to typed fields — specialties to an enum, phone to a phone field, headshot URLs to image uploads.
4. Pick the Members template and adjust design in the theme editor.
5. Connect your own Stripe (no surcharge here) if you charge for listings or featured placement.
6. Set up 301 redirects from old member-page URLs to preserve any search rankings.
7. Repoint your domain when ready.

Keep Wild Apricot (or move to a dedicated AMS) for dues and events if you need them — some organizations run Directify as the public directory and keep billing elsewhere. The 60-day Wild Apricot trial and Directify's free plan mean you can test both sides of that split without spending anything.

Final recommendation: is Directify the right Wild Apricot alternative?

Wild Apricot is a real association-management system with two decades of membership machinery — and recent-vintage complaints about climbing prices, a payment-provider surcharge, and post-acquisition support.

Directify is the modern directory-first builder: flat pricing that ignores your contact count, your own Stripe with no penalty, templates designed this decade, and AI that gets you live in about a minute.

If dues, events, and donations are your operation's core, stay with an AMS. If the public member directory is the product — and the AMS machinery is the part you never really used — Directify is the cleaner, cheaper fit. Start on the free plan below (10 listings, no time limit); every paid plan adds a 7-day free trial with full access, cancel any time before day 7.