Later removed its free plan, which is the single biggest reason people go looking for a replacement. What is left is a 14-day trial and then $25 a month on Starter, or $18.75 billed annually. Growth is $37.50 annually and Scale $82.50.
The other reason people leave is that Starter is tight on accounts, so the moment a second brand or a client appears, the price steps up faster than expected.
Work out what you were actually using
Later has two distinct things going for it. The visual grid planner, which lets you drag posts around a mock Instagram profile to see how the feed will look, is genuinely the best implementation of that idea anywhere. And the media library, which stays organised at a few thousand assets where most tools turn into a folder of filenames.
If you used neither, you were paying for an Instagram-flavoured scheduler and almost anything cheaper will do. If you used the grid daily, your options narrow considerably.
1. Planoly, if you stayed for the grid
Planoly is the closest replacement for the visual planning, aimed at the same creator audience, and cheaper. Starter is $16 a month against Later’s $25, with plans running to about $54. The free tier is thirty uploads total, which is a trial wearing a plan’s clothes.
It is narrower than Later on networks. If Instagram and Pinterest are the whole job, that narrowness costs you nothing.
2. SchedPilot, if you left over price at scale
The specific reason to move here is account count. Later’s tiers step up as you add profiles; SchedPilot Gold is $35 a month for twenty accounts flat. A creator running three brands across five networks each is on Later’s Scale tier at $82.50 and on SchedPilot Gold at $35.
Silver at $21 covers five accounts with analytics, undercutting Later Starter while giving you more networks: Bluesky and Threads are both included, and Later’s coverage there is weaker.
What it does not have is a grid preview. For a creator whose feed aesthetic is the product, that is a real loss and worth weighing against $14 a month.
3. Metricool, if you wanted the free plan back
Metricool free covers one brand, twenty posts a month, thirty days of analytics and five competitor profiles. For someone who was on Later’s old free plan and posts a few times a week, this is the nearest thing to a straight restoration of what was lost.
LinkedIn and X are excluded from the free tier. Starter at around $20 removes that, with X as a $5 add-on per account.
4. Pallyy, for one brand on everything
$25 on Pro gets one brand across every network with unlimited posts, client approvals, and a decent visual planner of its own. Same price as Later Starter, considerably more included. Pallyy also has a free plan, though at one account and fifteen posts a month it is close to token.
5. Buffer, if you want to stop paying
Three channels, ten queued posts each, free, X included. Buffer will not give you a grid planner or a media library worth the name, and for a creator posting to Instagram and TikTok twice a week it is a perfectly adequate landing spot at zero cost.
6. Publer, for volume on a budget
Publer at $5 for the first account and $4 each after does bulk CSV up to 500 rows, which Later does not do well. For someone batching a quarter of content in one sitting, that alone justifies the move. No analytics on the Professional plan, which is the catch.
The short version
Grid planning mattered: Planoly at $16, or Pallyy at $25 if you want more networks with it. You just wanted free again: Metricool or Buffer. Several brands or clients: SchedPilot Gold at $35, because Later’s tiers get steep and flat pricing does not. Batching large volumes: Publer.
What you lose by leaving
Worth being specific, because the replacements above are cheaper and none of them is a straight upgrade.
The media library is the thing people miss and do not anticipate. Later’s stays genuinely usable at a few thousand assets, with tags, collections and search that returns what you meant. Almost every cheaper tool degrades into a scrolling grid of filenames somewhere around the five hundredth upload. If you have three years of shoots in there, budget a weekend for the move and expect to lose your tagging.
The link-in-bio page is the second. Later bundles one, and if you replace Later with a tool that does not, you are adding a separate subscription that eats most of the saving. Planoly and Pallyy both include one; SchedPilot, Buffer and Publer handle it differently or not at all, so check before you count the savings.
A migration that does not lose your queue
Later does not export scheduled posts into a format anything else reads, and neither does anyone else. The queue is the one thing that genuinely does not transfer.
Run both for a fortnight. Stop adding to Later, build the new queue in parallel, and let the old one empty itself. Download your media library while the subscription is still active, because access ends the day it lapses and support will not restore it.
If you are on annual billing, check the renewal date before you start. Most of these subscriptions cannot be cancelled mid-term, so the practical decision window is about two months before renewal rather than whenever you get annoyed.
One last thing that catches creators out: reconnecting Instagram to a new tool requires the account to be Business or Creator and linked to a Facebook page. If that link was set up years ago by someone else, sort it out before migration day rather than during it.
Frequently asked questions
Why did Later remove its free plan?
Later has not explained in detail, and the move fits a broad pattern across the category. Hootsuite did the same in 2023. Free tiers in social scheduling are expensive to run because every connected account costs API overhead whether or not the user pays.
Is there a free alternative with a visual grid planner?
Not a good one. Planoly’s free tier gives thirty uploads total and Pallyy’s gives fifteen posts a month. Both let you see the feature before paying, and neither is usable long term. Grid planning is the thing this category has decided to charge for.
Can I move my Later media library elsewhere?
You can download the assets, but no tool imports them with the tags and captions attached. Budget an afternoon, and do it before you cancel rather than after, because access ends with the subscription.
Does Later still auto-publish Instagram Stories?
To Business accounts, yes. Creator and personal accounts get a notification instead, which is a Meta limitation rather than a Later one, and applies identically to every tool on this page.
Is Planoly or Later better for Instagram?
Later is the better product and Planoly is $9 a month cheaper. The deciding factor is library size. Under a few hundred assets the difference is not worth paying for; past a thousand, Later’s media library stays usable where Planoly’s starts to struggle.
What is the cheapest replacement for Later?
Free, if you can live within the limits: Metricool for one brand, or Buffer for three channels. Cheapest paid is Publer at $5 for the first account. If you want the visual planning that brought you to Later in the first place, Planoly at $16 is the floor.
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