Gold Vision CRM
Gold Vision CRM ships monthly releases on a consistent cadence — changelog details aren't surfaced in the feed.
Comparison · CRM
Groundhogg vs Phorest
A side-by-side editorial comparison of Groundhogg and Phorest — release velocity, themes, recent moves, and the top alternatives to consider.
Groundhogg vs Phorest: at a glance
What is Groundhogg?
Groundhogg keeps refining its flow editor and broadcasts, but the feed has gone quiet.
The visible releases center on the journey/flow editor and email operations: 4.0 rebuilt the flow editor with visual branching and conditions, 4.2.6 added per-contact frequency limits on flow triggers, and 3.6-3.7 improved dynamic broadcast segments, batching, and a personalized dashboard. Adjacent addons (Conditional Logic, Countdown Timers, Companies) got parallel upgrades. The newest entry is October 2025, so the recent picture is dated.
What is Phorest?
Phorest keeps handing salon owners the settings they used to phone support about
Phorest is salon and clinic management software shipping small, well-scoped changes every week or two, written in the voice of the front desk. The recent run is dominated by giving owners control they previously had to request: adding product brands without contacting Phorest, per-staff-per-service pricing, per-staff online booking visibility, and finer permissions on who may edit service versus retail prices. Around that sit operational tools like geofenced clock-in on the mobile app.
Groundhogg vs Phorest: editorial side-by-side
Groundhogg
0.0CRM
Groundhogg keeps refining its flow editor and broadcasts, but the feed has gone quiet.
◆ Current state
The visible releases center on the journey/flow editor and email operations: 4.0 rebuilt the flow editor with visual branching and conditions, 4.2.6 added per-contact frequency limits on flow triggers, and 3.6-3.7 improved dynamic broadcast segments, batching, and a personalized dashboard. Adjacent addons (Conditional Logic, Countdown Timers, Companies) got parallel upgrades. The newest entry is October 2025, so the recent picture is dated.
◆ Where it's heading
Groundhogg is maturing its marketing-automation core (branching journeys, segmentation, deliverability controls) toward parity with hosted platforms rather than staking out new ground. Momentum is steady and incremental across core plus addons.
◆ Prediction
Feed staleness makes a confident call hard; on the visible pattern the next moves would continue flow-editor and broadcast refinements rather than a new capability.
Phorest
5.0CRM
Phorest keeps handing salon owners the settings they used to phone support about
◆ Current state
Phorest is salon and clinic management software shipping small, well-scoped changes every week or two, written in the voice of the front desk. The recent run is dominated by giving owners control they previously had to request: adding product brands without contacting Phorest, per-staff-per-service pricing, per-staff online booking visibility, and finer permissions on who may edit service versus retail prices. Around that sit operational tools like geofenced clock-in on the mobile app.
◆ Where it's heading
The through-line is decentralising configuration to the salon and making the booking model match how these businesses actually run. Nearly every recent release either removes a support ticket or lets one staff member be treated differently from another — different price, different online availability, different qualifications. The multi-service booking flow extends the same thinking to the client-facing side, where a visit involving two practitioners was previously modelled as an edge case.
◆ Prediction
Per-staff settings have now landed for price, online visibility and qualifications separately; the obvious next step is a single staff-level view that shows all three together, since the release notes already admit owners are hopping between screens to check them.
Alternatives to Groundhogg and Phorest
Other CRM products tracked by Sparkpulse, ranked by recent ship velocity. Each card links to a full editorial trajectory and lets you pivot into a head-to-head comparison with either Groundhogg or Phorest.
Twenty
Twenty's sprint through v2.39-v2.40 stabilizes yarn pull and relicenses UI components as MIT.
Close CRM
Close is systematically expanding Chloe from Q&A into an operational CRM layer
Lime Connect
Lime Connect adds time-based workflow triggers and interactive UI elements for its AI Agent, deepening its bet on AI-augmented customer communication.
Easy!Appointments
Easy!Appointments 1.6 lands video conferencing, GDPR tools, and a serious security overhaul across its CalDAV and booking stack.
Streak
Streak wires automations to email and call activity, turning Gmail CRM into an event-driven workflow engine.
See all Groundhogg alternatives → · See all Phorest alternatives →
Recent activity from Groundhogg and Phorest
Latest ship moves from both products, interleaved chronologically. ⚡ = editorial spark.
- 15d agoPhorestBooking multiple services with multiple staff? Now way easier to mix up who's doing what 💇
- 21d agoPhorestChoose which team members show up for online bookings — service by service
- 26d agoPhorestPermissions to change service / retail prices
- 29d agoPhorestAdd New Brands
- 29d agoPhorestPricing just got personal
- 1mo agoPhorestGeofencing Clock In/Out on Phorest Go
- 10mo agoGroundhoggGroundhogg 4.2.6 adds frequency limits to flow triggers
- 1y agoGroundhoggGroundhogg 4.0 adds branching and conditions to the flow editor
- 1y agoGroundhoggA new look for Funnels and Conditional Logic in Groundhogg
- 1y agoGroundhoggGroundhogg 3.7 – Personalized Dashboard, Broadcast Batching, Converting Emails To Posts & More!
- 2y agoGroundhogg⏱️ Countdown timers in Groundhogg are now revamped!
- 2y agoGroundhoggDynamic broadcast segments & re-organized admin in Groundhogg 3.6!
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between Groundhogg and Phorest?
They serve adjacent needs but don't currently overlap on shipped themes. Phorest is currently shipping more aggressively (velocity 5.0 vs 0.0), with 0 editorial sparks in the last 30 days against 0. See the at-a-glance table above for a side-by-side breakdown of velocity, recent sparks, and editorial themes.
Is Groundhogg better than Phorest?
Sparkpulse doesn't pick a winner — we score release velocity, not feature parity. Phorest is currently shipping more aggressively (velocity 5.0 vs 0.0), with 0 editorial sparks in the last 30 days against 0. For your specific use case, the alternatives sections above list other CRM products to evaluate alongside.
What are the best alternatives to Groundhogg?
Top Groundhogg alternatives in CRM are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "Groundhogg alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/groundhogg for the full list with editorial commentary on each.
What are the best alternatives to Phorest?
Top Phorest alternatives in CRM are ranked by recent ship velocity. Browse the "Phorest alternatives" section above for the current picks, or visit /alternatives/phorest for the full list with editorial commentary on each.