TachTab vs HobbsMate

Short version: HobbsMate is the better aircraft app. TachTab is the better partnership ledger. They record what the aeroplane has cost you. We accrue what it's going to cost you, show every partner whether that money actually exists, and then collect it.

If you want one app that does scheduling, maintenance, ADs and cost splitting with a camera-first workflow on your phone — that's them, and it isn't close.

Choose HobbsMate if…

• You want one app for the whole aeroplane. Flight log, maintenance, inspections, squawks, AD tracking, scheduling and cost splits in a single place. We do one of those things.
• You fly with your phone. They ship native iOS and Android. TachTab is web only — an installable web app that works offline in a hangar, but not in the App Store.
• The photo capture appeals. Snap the Hobbs, the tach and the fuel receipt; HobbsMate drafts the flight and you verify it. It's their wedge, it's patent pending, and we have nothing like it.
• You're a two-person partnership and the money side is simple. Who paid, who owes whom, net it out, settle up. Their ledger does that well.
• You're a solo owner. We don't serve you at all. They have a free tier and a $10/mo Plus tier, and you should use one of them.

Their cost splitting is genuinely good — split by ownership share or custom rules, a shared expense ledger with "Paid By / Your Share", running balances, "all settled" netting, cost-per-hour analytics broken into fixed, variable and maintenance, CSV export. That is most of the spreadsheet-replacement pitch, and they got there first.

Choose TachTab if…

• Someone has asked how much is in the engine fund, and the answer took more than five seconds.
• You want partners to actually pay, inside the app, rather than get a number and a nudge toward Venmo.
• A partner is going to leave one day and their share has to be worked out from books that survive scrutiny.
• Partners buy fuel out of pocket at different airports and crediting it back correctly is a monthly argument.
• Your dues should split by ownership share, not equally — a 40/30/30 group shouldn't split the hangar bill in thirds.
• You run more than one aeroplane as one group with one set of books.

Where the difference actually bites

The engine reserve — this is the whole argument.

HobbsMate tracks what the aircraft has cost. TachTab accrues what it will cost. Those sound similar and they are not the same thing at all.

As of 17 August 2026, the words "reserve", "overhaul" and "TBO" appear nowhere on hobbsmate.com — not in their marketing, not on the features page, not in the FAQ, not in the multi-owner demo. The only match anywhere on the site is "All rights reserved" in the footer. That isn't an oversight on their part; it's a different product philosophy. They are a superb rear-view mirror.

The problem is that an overhaul is a $30–50k bill that arrives on a schedule everybody can see coming and nobody has budgeted for. Knowing your all-in cost was $237/hour last year does not tell you whether $28,000 exists when the engine comes due. TachTab accrues a per-hour reserve into a tracked fund, shows hours flown against TBO next to the cash actually accrued, and makes that visible to every partner all the time.

Partnerships rarely break up over maintenance schedules. They break up over money nobody can see.

Money actually moves.

HobbsMate nets balances and tells you who owes whom. Then you settle by Venmo or bank transfer, outside the app. Their own copy sells against "Venmo chases" — and, as far as we can tell from their public marketing, still requires one.

TachTab issues real invoices and takes card payments through Stripe Connect, into your group's own Stripe account. We never touch your money; we're a subscription you pay, not a place your money sits. For a group deciding whether to trust new software with the club account, that distinction tends to be the entire conversation.

Corrections that survive an audit.

Correct a flight in TachTab and it issues a credit memo plus a replacement invoice. The wrong number is never silently overwritten — it's voided, on the record, with the right one beside it, and every money action carries a required reason. This matters exactly once: the day a partner leaves and their share has to be reconstructed from the books. It matters enormously that day.

Flying clubs specifically. HobbsMate's flying-club product is listed as early access as of 17 August 2026 — you can request access, not buy it. If you're a club rather than a two-person partnership, that's a real difference in what you can actually run on today.

Where HobbsMate beats us, plainly

• Native iOS and Android apps. We're web only.
• AI photo capture of meters and receipts. We have none.
• Maintenance, inspections, squawks and AD tracking. We have none, by choice.
• Shared scheduling. Both of us have it now. Theirs is part of an app that also does maintenance and ADs; ours closes a loop theirs doesn't — open your own booking after landing and the meter start is already there.
• A free tier, and a solo-owner tier — a much bigger market than partnerships.
• Track record. They claim bootstrapped profitability and hundreds of pilots. We're new, and you should weigh that.

Running both is a perfectly sensible answer: HobbsMate for the aeroplane, TachTab for the money. We won't argue you out of it.

Money

Compare per partner, not per aircraft. Both products charge per aircraft for partnership features, so what a partnership actually feels is the per-head number.

Three honest notes on that table.

Compare annual with annual, not annual with monthly. Their yearly rate used to be the honest answer to our monthly one, and it closed most of the gap: our $14.50 a head against their $16.67 is about 13%, which is a discount, not a different price bracket. We now have a yearly rate too — $290 per aircraft, two months free — so the like-for-like figure is $12.08 a head against $16.67, about 27% cheaper. Both of us are asking for a year up front to get there. It is a real gap, but it is still the same order of money, and if price is the whole decision you should also read "Where HobbsMate beats us, plainly" above, because it lists what they include that we don't.

"Unlimited owners" means unlimited owners on one aircraft. Their paid tiers are priced per aircraft — their own words are "Per-aircraft pricing" — the same as us. That is not a point against them and we're not going to pretend it is.

They do offer unlimited aircraft, on the free Basic tier, and say so plainly: "staying organized isn't gated behind another subscription tier." That is genuinely generous. It just isn't available to a partnership. Basic and Plus are "1 owner + 1 viewer per aircraft", and Plus states outright that it "does not include scheduling, ownership splits, or settlements". The moment a second owner needs to be billed, you're on Multi-owner at $40 per aircraft.

The honest summary

Two partners, one aeroplane, who want maintenance tracking and a phone app and whose money question is just "who owes whom" — use HobbsMate. They're better at that today, and a few dollars a head is not worth the argument.

A group that has been burned by an unfunded engine fund, or that is tired of chasing partners for money the app already calculated — that's us, and it's the specific thing we built.

Not sure? Email hello@tachtab.com and describe your group. If HobbsMate is the better answer we'll say so — we'd rather lose a trial than gain a customer who churns in six weeks.

HobbsMate details verified against hobbsmate.com on 17 August 2026; their pricing and features may have changed since. HobbsMate® and HobbsMate Intelligence® are registered trademarks of HobbsMate, LLC, referenced here for comparison only.