Bonsai vs Lumin

Bonsai (often called Hello Bonsai after its domain) is an all-in-one business management app for freelancers, consultants and small client-service agencies. Instead of stitching together a proposal tool, an e-signature service, a time tracker and an invoicing app, Bonsai covers the whole client lifecycle in one place: win the work, sign the contract, deliver the project, bill and get paid.

The product starts with a lightweight CRM and proposal builder, then turns accepted proposals into contracts with legally reviewed templates and built-in e-signatures. Projects, tasks and a time tracker feed directly into invoices, which clients can pay online by card or bank transfer, with automatic reminders and recurring billing for retainers. A client portal collects files, invoices and messages in one branded space, and higher plans add scheduling, expense tracking, basic bookkeeping and team members. Pricing is per user per month across several tiers (Basic, Essentials, Premium and Elite), with discounts for annual billing; invoicing, contracts and the client portal start from Essentials.

Bonsai is best for solo professionals and agencies of a few people who want professional paperwork without administrative overhead. Its breadth means each module is simpler than a specialist: accounting is basic compared with QuickBooks or Xero, and project management is lighter than Asana. HoneyBook is the closest competitor, particularly for creative businesses in the US, while Moxie and Dubsado offer similar bundles with more workflow automation. Larger agencies that need resource planning and utilization reports should look at professional services tools such as Productive or Scoro.

Lumin is a cloud PDF editor and e-signature tool from Christchurch, New Zealand. Max Ferguson, who studied civil engineering at the University of Canterbury, started it in 2014 in his university flat and grew it largely through the Google Drive app marketplace into a product the company says is used by tens of millions of people. Its core job is opening, editing, annotating and signing PDFs straight from cloud storage without installing Acrobat.

Lumin edits PDF text, annotates, redacts, merges, splits, compresses and converts PDFs to and from Word, Excel, PowerPoint and images, with OCR for scans. Lumin Sign adds e-signatures, verified signing with ID checks and an eSign API. Lumin AI summarizes documents, answers questions about a PDF and generates agreements such as NDAs and leases. It runs on the web, Mac, Windows, iOS and Android. Plans move from a free tier with three documents a month to Starter, then team plans (Pro and Business) priced per workspace rather than per seat.

Lumin fits Google Workspace teams and small businesses that edit and sign PDFs occasionally and want flat team pricing. Adobe Acrobat remains stronger for print production, accessibility and advanced forms, Smallpdf is simpler for quick conversions, and Foxit is a cheaper desktop-first Acrobat alternative. Heavy e-signature senders may prefer Dropbox Sign or DocuSign.

Buying tip: Pro and Business are priced per team, so adding colleagues does not raise the bill, but documents are pooled at 200 per month. Every paid plan has a 7-day free trial.