August vs Hammock: which fits your portfolio in 2026?
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August vs Hammock: a comparison guide A comprehensive comparison to help you choose the right property management platform for your property portfolio.
Free for up to 2 tenancies, no credit card required.
The comparison at a glance
Hammock prices are exclusive of VAT, as stated on their pricing page. Confirm current plans with each provider before deciding.
UK compliance built in (England and Wales)
Guided checklist covering gas safety, EICR, EPC, Right to Rent, deposit prescribed information, with plain-English guidance
AI suggests reminders from your documents
MTD for Income Tax
HMRC-recognised
Quarterly submissions built in on every paid plan
Rent tracking
Open banking feed with automatic payment matching through an FCA-regulated Plaid connection
Tenants pay in-app with no fees
Free tier and entry price
Free for up to 2 tenancies
Paid plans £8.99 to £29.99/mo, VAT-inclusive
Price at scale
£14.99/mo (Portfolio) rising to
£29.99/mo unlimited
Learning curve
Set up in under 5 minutes
Built for non-accountants
Mobile
Purpose-built native iOS and Android apps with full parity
Tenant experience
Free native tenant app, including in-app rent payments, maintenance with photos, in-platform communications, secure documents
Accounting depth
AI assistance
August Intelligence on every plan, including free
Property insights
Auto-pulls valuations, council tax bands, EPC ratings and expiry dates
HMO and room-level reporting
Supported
Multi-user and team access
Workspaces: invite members by email or join code, Admin and Member roles, and property groups to organise the portfolio.
Data portability on exit
CSV and Excel export of your data
Pricing: per-plan versus per-property, and VAT
August starts free for up to 2 tenancies and scales through paid plans from £8.99 to £29.99 per month for unlimited tenancies, VAT-inclusive as displayed. Hammock has no free tier: it prices per property band, plus VAT, with Basic at £8 per month for 1 to 3 properties, Standard at £15 for 4 to 10, Plus at £25 for 11 to 20 and Beyond at £31.50 for 21 or more, each with a 30-day full-feature trial and 20% off on annual billing.
Two honest caveats before the table. First, Hammock's prices exclude VAT, so unless you can reclaim it, add 20% to compare what actually leaves your account: £9.60, £18.00, £30.00 and £37.80 per month against August's £8.99, £14.99 and £29.99. Second, because Hammock charges per property rather than per tenancy, an HMO landlord with many tenants in few buildings gets unusually good value from its model, and rent is reconciled per individual tenant; if that is your portfolio, run the numbers both ways.
Tenancies
August
Hammock (inc VAT)
1 to 2
Free
£9.60 (Basic)
3 to 4
£8.99 (Growth)
£9.60 to £18.00
15
£14.99 (Portfolio)
£30.00 (Plus)
25
£29.99 (unlimited)
£37.80 (Beyond)
Standard monthly rates published on each provider's website as of 17 July 2026, excluding promotional offers and annual discounts. Hammock bands are by property count; the tenancy mapping above assumes one tenancy per property. Full August pricing is on our pricing page.
Where Hammock genuinely wins
A comparison you can trust has to say where the other product is better, so here it is plainly.
Tax-workflow depth
Hammock includes MTD quarterly updates and the final declaration on every plan, keeps an SA105-mapped tax statement live all year with a running estimate of your bill, and gives your accountant direct access plus a dedicated accountant product, with a limited company add-on for incorporated landlords. If your accountant wants to work inside your software, Hammock is the stronger tax tool today. If your accountant works in Xero rather than inside your landlord software, August's direct Xero integration covers that handover on every plan.
User management today
Every Hammock plan includes unlimited users. August now has Workspaces, so a partner, assistant or property manager can have their own sign-in with Admin or Member access, but it has two roles rather than finer-grained permissions.
Per-property pricing and investment analytics
Where August wins
Compliance that guides rather than reminds
Hammock keeps you informed with notifications and alerts when documents and certificates approach expiry. August goes further with a guided checklist that explains what each requirement is, why it applies and what to do next, covering gas safety, EICR, EPC, Right to Rent and deposit prescribed information in plain English, reflecting the Renters' Rights Act 2025, with August Intelligence suggesting reminders straight from your uploaded documents.
A free way to start
August is free for up to 2 tenancies with Open Banking rent tracking, the compliance checklist and the tenant app included. Hammock offers a 30-day trial in place of a free tier, so with August you can run a small portfolio at no cost indefinitely.
A tenant app tenants actually use
August includes a free native tenant app for paying rent, reporting maintenance with photos and accessing documents securely. Hammock does not offer a tenant-facing app or portal; it is built as the landlord's finance layer, so the tenant relationship stays outside the software.
Cheaper at every band once VAT is included
Comparing what actually leaves your account, August is £8.99 against Hammock's £9.60 at the entry band, £14.99 against £18.00 or £30.00 in the middle bands, and £29.99 against £37.80 at 21 or more properties, and August's plans include the compliance guidance, tenant app and AI that Hammock does not attempt.
AI on every plan
August Intelligence is included from the free tier: it scans tenancy agreements, suggests reminders and answers questions about your own portfolio. Hammock is deliberately not an AI-led platform.
Making Tax Digital: both are ready
MTD for Income Tax went live in April 2026 for landlords with qualifying income above £50,000. Both products clear the bar. Hammock is HMRC-recognised, describes itself as the first landlord software to be, and includes quarterly updates and the final declaration on all plans, with real-time SA105 statements and accountant access. August is HMRC-recognised for MTD for Income Tax, with quarterly submissions built into every paid plan alongside the rest of its feature set. The honest summary: on pure tax-workflow depth Hammock has the edge; on getting MTD included in a cheaper subscription that also runs the rest of your landlord life, August does. For the full market picture including bridging tools, see our Making Tax Digital hub explains the deadlines and thresholds in full.
Switching: the three questions that matter
How hard is migration?
With August you add your properties and tenancies, connect your bank, and open banking backfills rent history so the current tax year arrives with you. Smart contract scanning reads your tenancy agreements and does the data entry. Most landlords are set up in under five minutes, rather than a configuration project.
Am I locked in?
Not with August: monthly billing if you want it, cancel anytime, a 14-day money-back guarantee, and CSV and Excel export whenever you ask. Hammock also offers monthly billing, with 20% off if you commit annually, and a 30-day free trial. Its statements and reports can be exported, but its public pages do not set out the full scope of a data export, so confirm that with the provider before committing.
Can I trust the smaller product?
August is used by more than 3,000 UK landlords and tenants, is HMRC-recognised for MTD for Income Tax, and runs its rent feed through an FCA-regulated Plaid connection. You can start free and judge it on your own portfolio before paying anything.
The verdict
Choose August if you want the whole job in one web platform and app at a lower VAT-inclusive price at every portfolio size, including automated Open Banking rent tracking, guided England and Wales compliance, Making Tax Digital included on every paid plan, AI assistance, in-app tenant payments and a free tenant app, from free to £29.99 per month. Choose Hammock if your landlord admin is a finance and tax problem first. You want the deepest MTD workflow with the final declaration on every plan, real-time SA105 statements your accountant can work in directly, investment analytics, user management today, or per-property pricing for an HMO-heavy portfolio, and you are happy running compliance, tenants and maintenance elsewhere. August is not the right tool for landlords whose accountant must log into the landlord software itself rather than work from Xero. Hammock serves those landlords better today.
Cross-shopping the bookkeeping-led tools as well? See how August compares with Landlord Studio or August compares with Latch. If deep double-entry accounting is the deciding factor, our comparison of August and Landlord Vision covers that heavier option. And if you are evaluating a broader range of tools, our guide to the best property management software for UK landlords covers the leading options side by side.
Start for free. Free for up to 2 tenancies, no credit card required.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between August and Hammock?
Hammock is an accounting-first platform: automated bookkeeping across unlimited bank feeds, SA105 tax statements, MTD quarterly updates and the final declaration on every plan, and investment analytics, priced per property band from £8 per month excluding VAT. August is a whole-workflow platform for self-managing UK landlords. The same automated rent tracking plus guided compliance, MTD on every paid plan, AI assistance and a free tenant app, from free to £29.99 per month VAT-inclusive. Facts verified 17 July 2026.
How does August's pricing compare to Hammock's?
August is free for up to 2 tenancies, with paid plans from £8.99 to £29.99 per month including VAT. Hammock's bands work out at £9.60, £18.00, £30.00 and £37.80 per month once VAT is added, so August is the cheaper subscription at every band, with the gap widest for portfolios of 11 or more properties. Hammock's per-property model can favour HMO landlords with many tenants in few buildings. Prices verified 17 July 2026; confirm current rates with each provider.
Does Hammock support Making Tax Digital?
Yes. Hammock is HMRC-recognised and includes quarterly updates and the final declaration on all plans, and describes itself as the first landlord software recognised for MTD. August is also HMRC-recognised, with MTD quarterly submissions included on every paid plan. Both meet the requirement that applies to landlords with qualifying income above £50,000 from April 2026.
Does Hammock have a tenant app?
No. Hammock does not offer a tenant-facing app or portal or in-app rent payments. It is built as the landlord's finance layer. August includes a free native tenant app for payments, maintenance reporting with photos and documents.
Which is better for HMOs?
It depends what you need. Hammock's per-property pricing with rent reconciled per individual tenant is excellent value for HMO-heavy portfolios on the finance side. August handles HMOs within its compliance journey, document store and tenant app, covering the operational side Hammock does not attempt.
Does August integrate with Xero?
Yes. August connects to one Xero organisation from Finances in the web app, on every plan including free. You push rent invoices and property expenses into Xero, and pull expenses recorded in Xero back into August against the right property, so nothing is keyed twice. The sync runs when you trigger it rather than on a schedule, and you can disconnect at any time. August stays your property system of record; Xero stays your accounting system.
