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Synergist alternatives: Summary & key takeaways
The real choice: Synergist alternatives trade some finance depth for a platform delivery teams use every day, so margin stays current.
Pick by job, not feature list: Map each Synergist module to where it lands next: the new platform, your accounting package, or nowhere.
Timing matters: Synergist runs on a 12-month term with 3 months' notice, so the decision has to land well before renewal.
Top pick: Teamwork.com suits agencies that want live retainer margin, with purchase orders and the ledger staying in Xero or QuickBooks.
Agencies look for Synergist alternatives when they're paying for deep finance features but still can't see a project's margin until it's finished. The fix is to choose by the Synergist job you need replaced, then decide where everything else goes. I moved to Teamwork.com from agency account management, where the real strain was the same few people staying late while the utilization average looked fine. So the first test for any replacement is whether it shows who's overloaded on which account this week, not what a closed job cost.
Two changes make your next renewal worth a closer look. In March 2026, Banyan Software announced it had acquired Synergist and its sales partner Agency Works, with plans to combine them into one platform. If AI shortens the work behind your retainer deliverables, every hour it saves is one you can't invoice by the hour. That makes it worth more to see each retainer's margin during delivery than to report it afterward.
We make Teamwork.com, which is why it opens this list. Unlike our wider agency software roundup, every tool here is matched to the Synergist job it replaces best. Those jobs are planning and resourcing, time and cost, purchasing and invoicing, or the full finance stack. Name the job you can't do without, and you'll know which reviews to read first.
What is Synergist, and what does an alternative need to replace?
Synergist is UK agency management software for quotes, job costing, timesheets, resourcing, purchasing and invoicing, and an alternative must cover or hand off each one. Its modules fall into four groups: winning and quoting work, planning and resourcing people, tracking time and cost, and purchasing, invoicing and recognizing revenue. That last group goes deeper than a typical project tool, with purchase orders, supplier invoice processing and revenue recognition on the Advanced plan.
The commercial terms shape any switch. Synergist's pricing page lists Core at £55 and Advanced at £65 per full user per month. Contracts renew for 12 months unless you give 3 months' notice.
Reviewers rate the product well, on a small sample: Synergist holds 4.6 out of 5 on G2 from 33 reviews as of November 2026. G2's AI-generated review summary lists learning curve, complexity and onboarding among the cons, each raised by 3 to 8 reviewers. Ease of use and ease of learning appear among the pros, so the real issue is fit, and fit turns on these points:
Where will purchase orders and supplier bills live after the switch?
Will your account and delivery teams log time in the new tool every day?
How will it sync with Xero, QuickBooks or Sage?
Can clients see progress without you paying for a seat?
If your agency buys print, media or freelance time in volume, I'd make purchasing the first question in every demo, not the last. A PSA, or professional services automation platform, connects projects, resources and financials in one system. Our PSA guide for agencies covers how that works day to day. Most tools here sit in that category, though they split sharply on purchasing.
How we selected these Synergist alternatives
We scored each tool on seven criteria built from those points, using public product pages, pricing pages, documentation and verified reviews, not hands-on testing.
Job costing and margin: Does it show budget burn and margin per job and per retainer while delivery is underway?
Delivery adoption: Will account and delivery teams log time in it without chasing, so the numbers are real?
Resourcing horizon: Can you plan capacity against the pipeline, including tentative work, beyond the next few weeks?
Purchasing and supplier costs: Are purchase orders and supplier bills native, an add-on, or left to your accounting package?
Accounting sync: Which of Xero, QuickBooks and Sage does it connect to, and what actually syncs?
Client access: Can clients view progress, approve work or check retainer usage, and at what cost?
Commercial terms: What are the minimum users, contract length and trial options?
Quick glance: 7 best Synergist alternatives
Applied to seven tools, the criteria show each one covering a different slice of Synergist, with pricing models as varied as the features. Prices are starting points from each vendor's own pricing page, checked in November 2026.
Tool
Teamwork.com
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Teamwork.com is the agentic PSA (professional services automation platform) for agencies that want live job and retainer margin in a platform their delivery teams use. It covers planning, time and cost, retainers and profitability, and hands invoices to Xero or QuickBooks so the ledger stays with finance.
Best features
See who's overloaded before you say yes to the next brief. The Workload Planner plots each person's booked hours against capacity by day and week, so an overbooked account lead stands out from the team average. Resource Scheduler with Tentative Projects extends that view to pipeline work months ahead. You can rebalance a busy account before anyone stays late, and check there's room for a pitch before you win it.
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Get time logged where the work happens. A job margin is only as accurate as the timesheets behind it, so where people log time matters as much as the report. Time tracking in Teamwork.com sits on the task itself, with a built-in timer, billable and cost rates by person or role, and time approvals. Every logged hour carries its cost and its billable value, so budget burn updates as people work.
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Catch retainer over-servicing in the week it starts. Retainers drift when nobody tracks how one month's overspend eats into the next. The Retainers budget type tracks each period against its allowance and carries any over- or underspend into the next period automatically. Budget notifications alert the account lead at a threshold you set, so you can have the scope conversation while the account is still running hot.
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Report margin without rebuilding the ledger. If your finance team already closes the month in Xero or QuickBooks, moving the ledger is the last thing a switch should ask of them. The Profitability report shows cost, revenue and profit by project and client from logged time and expenses. Invoices export through QuickBooks Online: Advanced or Xero Online, so delivery data drives the margin view and your accounts team keeps its close process.
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Invanity, a UK digital marketing agency, had Synergist on its shortlist before choosing Teamwork.com. It set daily capacity targets in the Workload Planner and moved retainers onto recurring budgets, then cut project planning time by 50%. Weekly workload management dropped by 80%, and on-time delivery improved by 20%.
Where it fits best
Pick Teamwork.com if your account and delivery teams avoid your current system and your margin problems live in retainers and resourcing rather than purchasing. It also suits finance teams that would rather keep invoicing and the ledger in Xero or QuickBooks. Clients join projects as Client Users, unlimited and at no extra cost, so they can review and approve work without a paid seat.
Limitations
Teamwork.com doesn't replace Synergist's purchasing module, supplier invoice processing or revenue recognition. If you run purchase orders through Synergist today, move them into Xero or QuickBooks before the switch, not after.
Pricing
Teamwork.com's pricing page lists five plans, with a 14-day free trial on Basics and Accelerate and no credit card required. Annual plans are prepaid for the full term.
Pricing:
Free: $0 per user/month (up to 5 users and 5 projects)
Basics: $9.99 per user/month (billed yearly, minimum 3 users)
Accelerate: $24.99 per user/month (billed yearly, minimum 5 users)
Optimize: Let's talk (contact sales / book a demo; billed yearly)
Enterprise: Let's talk (contact sales / book a demo)
Ratings and reviews
Teamwork.com is rated 4.4 out of 5 from 1,218 G2 reviews as of November 2026. G2's page also lists a learning curve and complexity among the cons, so treat setup effort as something to test during your trial.
"Our monthly retainer clients are entered as projects with monthly budgets that are directly connected to estimated times for tasks and actual logged and billable time entered by our team." — Chris H., Chief of Customer Operations, G2
To test the fit, run one live retainer in Teamwork.com alongside Synergist before your notice date. Watch whether the budget view stays current without anyone chasing timesheets.
Scoro
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Scoro is the closest match to Synergist's finance depth, built for agencies and consultancies that want quoting, purchasing and invoicing inside one system. Its Spend app handles purchase orders and supplier bills, including in the supplier's currency, tracked against the project's cost budget.
Scoro also handles multiple entities and currencies and syncs with Xero, QuickBooks and Sage Intacct, which suits agency groups. The catch is how the price builds: the client portal, multi-currency, revenue recognition and extra entities are all paid extras. If you're weighing it seriously, our Scoro alternatives guide covers where it fits and where it doesn't.
Pricing:
Time-billing: $17/user/month (£13 in GBP; billing period not stated, with a 13 to 17% discount for annual billing)
Projects & Resources: $29/user/month (£22 in GBP)
Quote to Cash: $29/user/month (£22 in GBP)
End-to-end: $57/user/month (£43 in GBP)
Minimum: 5 users on every combination, with a 14-day free trial
Productive
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Productive suits agencies whose biggest gap is planning people months ahead against budgets. Tentative bookings and placeholders for future hires sit next to budgets and profitability, and clients can be added free of charge.
It connects to Xero, QuickBooks and Sage on the Professional plan and above, so UK agencies on any of the three are covered. The trade-off for Synergist users is where the finance extras sit. Purchase orders, multiple subsidiaries and the HubSpot integration are on the Ultimate plan, which has no published price. Our Productive alternatives comparison goes further into that plan split.
Pricing:
Essential: $10/user/month (billed yearly) or $12/user/month (billed monthly)
Professional: $25/user/month (billed yearly) or $29/user/month (billed monthly)
Ultimate: Let's talk (book a demo)
Minimum: 3 seats, with a 14-day free trial
Workamajig
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Workamajig is built for creative agencies, in-house creative teams and marketing firms, and it goes further than Synergist on accounting. It runs a general ledger inside the product, with payables, receivables and work-in-progress reporting. An approved estimate carries through to a purchase order and the vendor invoice.
Media buying integrations and unlimited client and vendor logins make it a fit for agencies that buy media at volume. The flip side is that your books move into Workamajig, since it doesn't list a Xero, QuickBooks or Sage sync. Workamajig's pricing page puts typical implementation at two to three months, and it's demo-only.
Pricing:
Agencies, 10+ users: $49/user/month (billed monthly; one month free with annual payment)
Agencies, 25+ users: $47/user/month (billed monthly; one month free with annual payment)
Agencies, 50+ users: $45/user/month (billed monthly; one month free with annual payment)
Enterprise (100–10,000+ users): Let's Talk (custom plans for large enterprises)
Function Point
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Function Point is built for small and mid-sized creative agencies that bill in volume. Batch invoicing, retainers, expense markup and purchase orders cover the estimate-to-invoice cycle, and a client portal lets clients submit requests and approve estimates.
UK agencies hit an accounting constraint: Function Point syncs only with QuickBooks Online and Desktop, on its Optimize tier, with no Xero or Sage connector. Plans run on a one-year term, new customers pay an onboarding fee, and there's no free trial.
Pricing:
Standardize: $53/user/month (billed annually) or $58/user/month (billed monthly on a 1-year term)
Optimize: $62/user/month (billed annually) or $68/user/month (billed monthly on a 1-year term)
Streamtime
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Streamtime is project software for creative teams and studios that want lighter time capture. Scheduled to-dos become time entries, a heat map shows availability by role, person or branch, and jobs carry quotes, purchase orders and invoices.
Its Xero connection is the strongest of its accounting links, syncing invoices, expenses and purchase orders. QuickBooks Online and MYOB receive invoices only, and Sage isn't supported. Plans are fixed-price rather than per user, with no contract and onboarding included. Retainer tracking is lighter than Synergist's, though, and there's no CRM integration beyond a pipeline board.
Pricing:
Custom fixed-price plans: Pricing available on request
Accelo
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Accelo fits retainer-heavy agencies that want clients to see their own retainer usage. Retainers and fixed-fee projects run side by side, and a branded client portal shows quotes, retainer balances and invoices, with online payment.
Its connectors cover HubSpot, Salesforce and Pipedrive on the CRM side, plus Xero, QuickBooks and Sage Intacct for accounting. Accelo requires a minimum of 15 users, publishes no pricing, offers demos rather than a trial, and limits multi-currency to its upper tiers. Our Accelo alternatives guide compares it with tools that have lower minimums.
Pricing:
Custom plans by team size: Pricing available on request
Where each Synergist module goes after you switch
Across all seven Synergist alternatives, every module lands in one of three places: the new platform, your accounting package, or nowhere. Knowing which before you sign is the difference between a planned handoff and a gap you find after cutover.
The Synergist module map, tool by tool
Side by side, purchasing is the sharpest split: five tools run purchase orders natively, Teamwork.com hands them to accounting, and Productive limits them to Ultimate.
Synergist job
The margin signal sits mainly in the timesheet and scheduling rows, not the purchase order row. Purchasing depth protects cost control, but daily time and capacity data is what tells you whether a retainer is profitable this month.
Choose by how your agency makes money
Your billing model tells you which row of that map matters most. Most of the scope creep I dealt with on retainers started at the pitch, with a price set low enough to win. That's why comparing what you sold with what the team logged beats purchase order depth: it shows whether the price was ever going to hold. Use these rules to narrow your Synergist alternatives to two:
Choose Teamwork.com when delivery teams avoid your current system, margin leaks in retainers and resourcing, and finance will keep purchasing in Xero or QuickBooks.
Choose Scoro when purchase orders, supplier bills and multiple entities must stay in one system, and paid extras fit your budget.
Choose Productive when forward resourcing and free client access matter more than purchasing, which sits on its top plan.
Choose Workamajig when you want the general ledger inside the platform and can give implementation two to three months.
Choose Function Point when you're a smaller creative agency on QuickBooks that bills in volume.
Choose Streamtime when fixed-price plans and to-do-based time capture suit a smaller studio on Xero.
Choose Accelo when retainers, a client portal and Salesforce or HubSpot matter, and you have at least 15 users.
If two tools still tie, run the same live retainer through each trial or demo, and keep the one that flags the overrun first. That's the view your account leads will act on each week. For the resourcing side of that test, the weekly routine we set out for agency resource management works in any of them. Whatever you pick, write down where each Synergist job will live before you give notice, and have finance sign off the purchasing row.
Count back from your renewal date
Switching agency software is a real project, and it's fair to be wary of starting one with live retainers to protect. Synergist renews for 12 months unless you give 3 months' notice, so count back from your renewal date. Say your term renews on September 1: notice has to land by June 1, so your shortlist and trial belong in spring. Use the trial to rebuild your main job templates from the Teamwork.com templates library and move open purchase orders into accounting before cutover.
When staying on Synergist is the better call
Stay on Synergist if your finance team runs purchase orders, supplier invoices, revenue recognition or several trading companies through it. The case gets stronger if your delivery teams already log time there without chasing. In that position, rebuilding finance processes elsewhere likely costs more than the switch gains, so tighten how retainers are scoped instead.
The other reason to wait is timing. If you're mid-term with no notice window coming up, use the time to fill in your module map and trial an alternative on one account. The decision is then ready when the window opens. For very small studios, minimums matter more than features, so price each option case by case against Synergist's 5-full-user floor.
Why Teamwork.com stands out for agencies leaving Synergist
Teamwork.com stands out because it runs the module map's margin rows natively: time, capacity and retainers, kept current by the account teams doing the work. Quotes and invoicing sit in the same platform, with invoices exported to Xero or QuickBooks and purchase orders left with finance.
Scheduling tools keep delivery moving but have no view of what it costs. Traditional PSAs hold the financials, yet delivery teams avoid logging in, so the numbers going in are patchy. Teamwork.com puts PSA-grade financials in a platform your account teams will actually log time in.
That adoption is what makes the margin numbers usable. New wins arrive ready to plan, too: Teamwork.com for HubSpot turns a closed deal into a project from a template, so resourcing starts before kickoff. For an agency leaving Synergist, that puts retainer margin in front of the account lead who can still change the scope.
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