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Plain-English guide · for small nonprofits
Neon One alternatives, honestly compared
Updated September 2026
Neon One is a broad suite aimed at organizations a size or two above the ones we build for. If you are a small team wondering whether you are paying suite prices for a fraction of a suite, this is the comparison. One disclosure up front: we make Ember, one of the options below.
The main Neon One alternatives for small nonprofits are Little Green Light (from $45 a month), Bloomerang (from $125 a month), DonorPerfect (from $99 a month), Givebutter and Zeffy (free, funded by donor tips), CiviCRM (free, but it needs technical help) and Ember (free under a $50K budget).
Neon CRM (its donor database) starts at $99 a month and prices on your organization's revenue rather than your record count. That is a fairer model than contact-based billing, and it is still a model where a good year raises your bill. Neon One is backed by FTV Capital and was assembled from several companies from 2018 onward.
What revenue-based pricing gets right, and what it costs you
Charging on revenue instead of records is the better of the two common models, and Neon says so on its own pricing page. A database full of lapsed donors does not raise your bill, which is exactly the trap that record-based pricing sets.
The catch is on the other side. A one-time capital gift, a bequest or a single large grant moves your revenue figure without changing anything about how much of the tool you use. Ask, before you sign, how the revenue band is measured and what happens the year it spikes.
Where Neon One fits well
Organizations with a real fundraising operation: multiple campaigns, events, memberships, an actual development staff. The suite is broad and the arts-focused ticketing side is genuinely specialized. If you are running fifty thousand contacts and three annual events, it earns its price.
Where it fits badly is the two-person shop that bought a suite for donation forms and a mailing list, then discovered the setup takes months of somebody's evenings.
Before you switch anything
Export your data first
Contacts, gift history, notes, communications. Do it while everything works and you are calm, not mid-migration.
Price every option on your real numbers
Record count, contact count, annual revenue, seats. Different tools bill on different things, so a headline price tells you almost nothing until you put your own figures in.
Check your renewal date
Migrations take longer than planned. Start well before renewal, not the week of it.
The alternatives
| Tool | Entry price | Bill grows with | Honest fit |
|---|---|---|---|
| Little Green Light | $45/mo to 2,500 records | Record count, in $15 steps | Donor management done simply. Unlimited users, no contracts, founder-owned since 2007. |
| Bloomerang | $125/mo donor database; $242/mo full platform | Contacts | The donor retention specialist. Unlimited users. Private equity owned. |
| Neon One | $99/mo (Neon CRM) | Your organization's revenue | Broad suite, mid-size orientation. Prices on revenue, not records. Backed by FTV Capital since 2018. |
| Aplos (Velora) | $79/mo, 2 users | Tier, extra users, and revenue | Fund accounting first, with fundraising added later. Now sold beside Raisely and Keela. |
| DonorPerfect | From $99/mo | Tier, and a quote keyed to your database size | Long-established and deep. Three published tiers, but the real number comes from a sales conversation. |
| CiviCRM | Free; hosted from $15/mo | Hosting and help | Powerful and free, but it needs someone technical or a paid implementer. |
| Zeffy | $0 | Nothing; funded by donor contributions | Fundraising and donor tracking only. Your donors get asked to add a contribution at checkout. |
| Givebutter | $0; Plus from $29/mo | Contacts, on Plus | Fundraising with a free donor database and unlimited contacts. Donors are asked to tip; turn tips off and it charges a 3% platform fee. |
| Ember (that's us) | $0 under $50K budget; $29/mo billed yearly to $100K | Your annual budget band, never contacts | Donors, volunteers, programs, grants, board and compliance in one place. Newest tool here. |
How to choose between them
If donor management is the whole job and you want it calm and cheap, Little Green Light is hard to beat. If retention analytics are the reason you are shopping, that is Bloomerang's home turf. If your books are the problem and fundraising is secondary, Aplos is built that way round. If you have technical help and no budget, CiviCRM does the most for nothing. If you only need donation forms, Zeffy costs nothing, with the donor contribution prompt as the tradeoff. Givebutter is free on the same terms and adds a donor database with unlimited contacts.
Ember's pitch is different: one place for the whole operation, priced by your budget so a growing list never raises your bill. We are also the newest name on this list. If a decade of track record is what you need, that is Little Green Light or DonorPerfect, not us.
Prices and company facts were read from each vendor's own pages on the date shown above and change often. Nothing here is legal, tax or purchasing advice. Check the vendor's current pricing page before you decide, and read your own contract before you switch.
Where Ember fitsEmber
Simple tools built only for nonprofits, priced by your annual budget, never by contacts or seats. Free under a $50K budget, every app and unlimited users on every tier.
Sources: Prices read from each vendor's own pricing page on 24 September 2026: Little Green Light, Neon One, Bloomerang, Givebutter, CiviCRM Spark, Aplos, DonorPerfect, Zeffy. Pricing changes often; check the vendor's page before you decide.