Upheal vs SimplePractice: AI Notes, EHR, and Cost Compared

• Upheal if you run a mostly cash-pay therapy practice and want AI notes built into the price. Its EHR starts at $1 a session with no monthly minimum, and a free plan covers basic AI notes.
• SimplePractice if insurance billing is central to your practice or you prescribe. SimplePractice costs $49 to $99 a month for a solo clinician, plus $35 a month for AI notes.
• Insurance claims cost $0.30 each on Upheal and $0.39 each on SimplePractice (from 1 October 2026). Prices as of 27 October 2026.

SimplePractice is an electronic health record (EHR) for therapists and allied health professionals, with a flat monthly fee per clinician and paid AI notes. Upheal is an EHR for therapists built around AI notes. AI notes are included whether you pay by the session or a flat $99 a month. SimplePractice has filed insurance claims for years and offers ePrescribe. Upheal began billing insurance in 2026 and has no e-prescribing.

Try Upheal free for 30 days or start a SimplePractice free trial.

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How do Upheal and SimplePractice compare?

Upheal and SimplePractice are both EHRs, but Upheal charges per session or a flat $99, and SimplePractice charges per clinician. AI notes come with Upheal’s EHR and cost extra on SimplePractice.

Prices and features as of 27 October 2026. Card processing, claim fees, and SimplePractice’s $20 yearly CPT code fee are extra.

Choose Upheal if

Upheal suits a mostly cash-pay therapy practice that wants AI notes without a separate bill. Our full Upheal reviewcovers each plan.

• Most of your clients pay you directly. Upheal’s EHR is $1 per session as of 27 October 2026, with AI notes in the price.
• You want AI notes and custom note templates for under $100 a month. EHR Pro caps a solo clinician’s Upheal subscription at $99. On SimplePractice, custom templates start at Essential, which costs $114 with Note Taker.
• Your group has part-time clinicians. Upheal bills each provider per session held, so part-time clinicians cost less. Group pricing is by quote.
• You use another EHR or Zoom and only want AI notes. Upheal’s AI Notes plan costs $39 a month and captures sessions from any browser tab.
• You practice outside the US. Upheal states PHIPA, PIPEDA, and GDPR compliance.¹ SimplePractice hosts all data in the US.
• If you want to try AI notes before paying. Upheal’s Free plan never expires.

Start Upheal’s free 30-day trial, no card needed

Choose SimplePractice if

SimplePractice suits a practice that bills insurance heavily or needs tools Upheal does not offer. Our SimplePractice review rates it 4.5 out of 5.

• Most of your income comes from insurance. Upheal’s comparison page credits SimplePractice with the longer track record for insurance-based practices.¹
• You prescribe. ePrescribe costs $49 per clinician per month, plus an $89 setup fee. Upheal has no e-prescribing.
• Your organization requires HITRUST. SimplePractice is HITRUST certified, and Upheal says it is not.¹²
• You run group therapy. Group appointments and group telehealth for up to 15 clients come with Plus.
• Your clinic includes allied health staff. SimplePractice serves speech, physical, and occupational therapists. Upheal is built for mental health.
• You want a practice website and directory listing. SimplePractice includes both on every plan.
• You already use SimplePractice Telehealth and want AI notes with no extra step. Note Taker costs $35 a month and drafts the note inside the client record.

Start a SimplePractice free trial: pay within the first 7 days through this link to get 50% off for 4 months

How much do Upheal and SimplePractice cost at your caseload?

As of 27 October 2026, Upheal costs less than any SimplePractice plan with Note Taker for fewer than 84 sessions a month. Upheal’s pay-as-you-go EHR is $1 per session. EHR Pro is $99 a month flat, so it becomes the cheaper Upheal plan above 99 sessions. SimplePractice charges the same fee at any caseload, and Note Taker adds $35.

SimplePractice Starter with note taker costs less than Upheal above 84 sessions a month. But Starter leaves out secure messaging and customizable note templates. Upheal is cheaper than Essential with Note Taker at every caseload. Our Upheal pricing guide breaks down each plan.

Claim and card fees are extra on Upheal and SimplePractice. For 40 insurance claims, Upheal charges $12 and SimplePractice charges $15.60. Card payments cost 2.9% plus $0.30 on Upheal and 3.15% plus $0.30 on SimplePractice.

SimplePractice charges groups per clinician. A three-clinician group on Plus pays 247amonth(99 + 2 × $74). A note taker for all three raises that to $352. Upheal publishes no group price.

How does insurance billing compare?

SimplePractice has offered insurance billing for longer, and Upheal charges less per claim. Both file electronic claims for US practices only.

SimplePractice files primary and secondary claims on every plan, and ERAs cost nothing extra. Since 1 October 2026, every plan pays $0.39 a claim, dropping in steps to $0.33 at high volume. Free claims on Essential and Plus have ended.³ Manual status checks now cost $0.15 on Starter and Essential.³ Current Plus customers keep them free through 31 March 2027.⁴

SimplePractice’s Insurance Navigator is an early-access upgrade at $1.79 a claim. Navigator adds benefits verification and phone access to insurance specialists. SimplePractice also offers free credentialing with up to two payers, done by a partner company called Medallion.

Upheal added insurance billing to its two EHR plans in 2026. Claims cost $0.30, and eligibility checks cost $0.15, with no monthly billing fee and a built-in clearinghouse. It handles primary, secondary, and tertiary claims and drafts appeals for denials, but you need to be credentialed with your payers first. Managed Billing, Upheal’s done-for-you service, works your claims for 5.9% of what it collects and can credential you for a separate, unpublished fee.

How do the AI notes compare?

Upheal’s AI notes take input from more sources and offer more note formats than SimplePractice’s Note Taker. Note Taker works only inside SimplePractice’s own record.

How each tool captures a session

For in-person sessions, Upheal captures audio in a web browser or with the Upheal Recorder app. Online sessions come in through Upheal telehealth, its Zoom app, a Chrome extension, or any browser tab. Upheal offers ten note formats, including SOAP, DAP, and BIRP. You can also build your own template from 170 preset sections or an uploaded PDF form.

Note Taker transcribes live only inside SimplePractice Telehealth. The mobile app records in-person sessions for up to 2.5 hours. Note Taker has no format picker and copies the last template used for that client.

Accuracy and AI training

SimplePractice requires clinicians to review every AI draft before saving. Upheal calls its notes a starting point and warns the AI may fabricate content for sections a session did not cover. In December 2024, Alma’s Note Assist tool, which Upheal helped build, put false content into some notes.⁵ Alma and Upheal said about 1% of Note Assist notes were affected and the fault was fixed within 2 business days.⁵

Upheal shares a clinician’s de-identified session data for AI improvement by default. Only sessions whose clients also opted in are used.⁶ Clinicians can switch this off only on a paid plan; clients can refuse on any plan.⁶ Upheal deletes session recordings by default.

SimplePractice opts clinicians in to transcript retention by default if they enabled Note Taker from 17 June 2026.⁷Retained transcripts are de-identified and used to improve Note Taker.⁷ SimplePractice says retained transcripts are not used to train the underlying AI model.⁷ Audio is deleted once the transcript is made.

Can you use Upheal notes inside SimplePractice?

You can use Upheal notes inside SimplePractice by copying them across with Upheal’s Smart Fill Chrome extension. Smart Fill matches section titles and works with progress notes only. You’ll need to copy intake notes and treatment plans by hand.

SimplePractice Starter plus Upheal AI Notes costs 88amonth(49 + $39). Starter with Note Taker costs $84. For $4 more, you get Zoom capture and more note formats.

You can move fully to Upheal with its free import tool. You export three files from SimplePractice and upload them. Imported sessions are never charged. In the other direction, SimplePractice imports client profiles only.

What do users say about Upheal and SimplePractice?

Users rate Upheal higher on Trustpilot, but SimplePractice’s score comes from far more reviews. Upheal scores 4.6 from 103 reviews as of 27 October 2026.⁸ Reviewers praise note quality and time saved. Complaints include a wait for support. One reviewer was charged a renewal without notice and later refunded. In online discussions, a few users say Upheal’s notes need more editing for complex crisis cases.

SimplePractice scores 2.6 from 1,615 Trustpilot reviews, down from 3.0 in late August 2026.⁹ Recent reviewers most often complain that support is hard to reach. Some reviewers also object to the October claim fee change. The iOS clinician app holds 4.72 from 34,001 ratings.¹⁰ On Capterra, SimplePractice scores 4.6 from 2,828 reviews.¹¹ Practices leaving SimplePractice most often cite rising fees, then support.

What if neither Upheal nor SimplePractice fits?

Jane is a third practice-management system to compare if neither Upheal nor SimplePractice fits as your main EHR. Upheal’s Smart Fill copies notes into Jane too, so a Jane practice can add Upheal’s $39 AI Notes plan. Some clinicians who left SimplePractice for Jane cite wanting more control over their clearinghouse. See Jane’s plans and features, or browse our roundup of mental health EHRs.