The SaaSpocalypse is real
You don't need to pay for that anymore.
You use 10% of the features. It costs a fortune. It was built for ten thousand other companies. Give an AI coding tool a good spec and you'll have a version that fits how you work by the end of the afternoon.
Pick something you're overpaying for
9 teardowns · more coming
Issue tracking
Like Linear
A fast issue list with keyboard shortcuts, a kanban board, and a GitHub hook that closes issues on merge. Linear charges per seat for it.
You pay
$1,920 per year
Shared inbox
Like Help Scout
A shared inbox for support@ with assignment, statuses, tags, and saved replies. Help Scout charges $25 to $75 per user per month for it.
You pay
$1,500 per year
Scheduling
Like Calendly
A page that shows when you're free and books a meeting. Calendly charges per seat, per month, forever, for a feature Google Calendar nearly has built in.
You pay
$1,920 per year
E-signature
Like DocuSign
Upload a PDF, drop a signature box, email it, get it back signed with an audit trail. DocuSign meters that by the envelope and charges per user on top.
You pay
$2,700 per year
Error monitoring
Like BugSnag
Catch errors from your apps, group them by stack trace, and get a Slack message when something new breaks. BugSnag bills you per event for that.
You pay
$1,524 per year
Uptime monitoring
Like UptimeRobot
A scheduled job that fetches your URLs from two places and pings Slack when they fail. UptimeRobot sells that by the monitor, the second, and the seat.
You pay
$663 per year
Voice dictation
Like Wispr Flow
Hold a key, talk, and clean text shows up in whatever app you're in. Wispr Flow charges $15 a month per person for a speech API plus a cleanup prompt.
You pay
$720 per year
Automation
Like IFTTT
When X happens, do Y. IFTTT caps you at 2 applets for free and charges monthly for filter code, multi-step applets, and faster polling. It's a job queue.
You pay
$108 per year
Maps API
Like Mapbox
Mapbox meters every map load, geocode, and route. MapLibre, PMTiles on R2, Photon, and Valhalla give you the same stack with no per-request bill.
You pay
$10,800 per year
Why the SaaSpocalypse is real
01
You barely use it
Most teams touch a handful of features and pay for hundreds. The rest exists to justify the tier above yours.
02
It costs too much
Per-seat pricing, annual contracts, onboarding fees, add-ons. The bill grows every year and the product doesn't.
03
It wasn't built for you
The vendor built it for the average of thousands of customers. So every workflow is a compromise and every setting is a workaround.
04
You can build better
Hand an AI coding tool a clear spec and it builds the 10% you need, the way you'd want it. We wrote the specs.
How it works
01
Read the teardown
What it really does, what it really costs, which features matter.
02
Copy one line
Each page has a one-line command that points an agent at the full spec: data model, screens, integrations, acceptance criteria.
03
Paste it into a builder
Claude Code, Codex, Replit, ChatGPT, Lovable, Cursor. Whichever you already have.
04
Run the test plan
A checklist and a test-generation prompt so you know it actually works.