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Online business essentials for solopreneurs — what's worth paying for in 2026

· Online Business

Running an online business solo is a SaaS subscription minefield. Here's what I actually paid for after 4 years and what I cancelled.

The solopreneur SaaS stack adds up fast. After being burned by 12 different tools, here's the actually-essential list.

The core 6

1. Domain registrar — Cloudflare or Porkbun. $10-15/year.

2. Web hosting — Cloudflare Pages (free) or Webflow if you're non-technical.

3. Email — Cloudflare Email Routing (free, custom domain) + Gmail.

4. Payments — Stripe (no monthly fee, just per-transaction).

5. Accounting — Wave (free) or FreshBooks ($15-30/mo).

6. Project management — Notion free tier.

What I cancelled

Mailchimp ($30/mo). Switched to ConvertKit free tier. Saving the $360/year easy.

Calendly Pro. Switched to free version, no real loss.

Zapier Pro ($30/mo). Switched to Cloudflare Workers (free for small volumes). Saved $360/year.

Hardware that paid for itself

A standing desk ($300-500) — yes, productivity gain real.

Sony WH-1000XM5 ($350) — focus during noisy workdays.

A Stream Deck ($150) for repetitive tasks.

The book that made me cut spending

Profit First by Mike Michalowicz changed how I structure business cash flow.

Honest take

Total essential spending for a solo business: about $40/month. Anyone selling you more than that probably has motives.

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