How does the trial work?
You trial the plan you are actually considering. One trial per account, 7 days, no card, started from inside the app with one tap. It licenses the plan that matches the workspace you are in: your own workspace gets Pro features, a household workspace gets Family, a team workspace gets Team. When it ends you drop back to Free. Nothing is charged and nothing is deleted. If you subscribe, that is a normal paid plan from day one, card details handled by Stripe.
Can I really use it free forever?
Yes. The free plan is the real app with real limits: 5 boards, 100 notes, 10 habits, 25 recipes, plus a taste of the assistant. You can invite one other person into your workspace. Money in, out and owed, chat and the break room have no paywall. Whenever you want the whole of a plan, start its 7 free days from inside the app. One tap, no card.
Can I share with my partner on Free?
Yes. Invite one other person into your workspace and you both see its notes, checklists, expenses, habits and the shared shopping list (30 items at a time on Free), and the boards you add them to. Open invitations count, so a free workspace holds two people in all. A third person is where Family starts (your household, up to six, with chores, allowances, points, the meal plan and the wall display) or Team (people you work with). Their own workspace stays free too, with its own invite.
What does Family add that Pro doesn't have?
The parts of a household that only work when everyone can see them. Chores with verification, pocket money and allowances, a family ledger and savings goals, house points and seasons, a weekly meal plan that fills the shopping list for you, as many lists as you like, and a kiosk mode for the screen on the kitchen wall. Up to six people on one price, no per-seat maths.
Do I need to pay to keep recipes?
No. The recipe box is on every plan, free included, capped at 25 recipes there and lifted on the paid ones. The shopping list is on every plan too: one list on Free with up to 30 items on it at a time (ticked-off items don't count), as many as you like on Pro, Family and Team. Import recipes from a URL or a Markdown file, export the lot as JSON whenever you like. What Family adds is the weekly meal plan that fills the list for you.
What counts as an AI action?
One typical request to the assistant is about one action. The meter follows what a request really costs to run, so a quick question is one and a piece of work that has the assistant read, decide and write across several steps is a few. Your meter always shows where you stand.
How do founding prices work?
Founding prices are offered to a limited number of early members during launch, from October 1 to November 6, 2026, and end early once those places are taken. They are billed annually. You keep the founding price for 12 months. After that your plan moves to the list price of the day. We tell you 90 days before and again 30 days before, and you keep 20% off list for as long as your subscription runs without a break. A failed card payment is not a break while we retry it. Cancelling ends both. A new subscription started after November 6, or after the places run out, is at list price, founding member or not. The price is what the terms fix. Allowances, limits and features are the current plan's, and those can change.
What if I run out of AI actions?
You top up, or you wait for the month to turn over. Packs are $5 for 150 actions and $20 for 800, bought inside the app under Settings, then Billing. They never expire, so whatever you do not use is still there next month. You can also connect your own MCP client and keep working at no cost to your allowance at all.
Why do I pay on the web rather than in the app?
Because your subscription is then between you and us, with nobody in the middle. That is why we can refund you without asking permission, move you between plans on the day you ask, and keep the founding terms we sold you. Cancelling never deletes anything, and your export works on every plan including Free, because it runs in your browser against the copy already on your device.
What happens to my data if I downgrade?
Nothing is deleted, ever. Your data stays on your devices and in your account, and everything you've already made stays fully editable. Past the free limits you can't add new items until you're back under them or upgrade again.
How does the Team plan bill?
Per seat, starting from one. A seat is a person, counted across the team workspaces one owner holds, and an open invitation holds a seat until it is answered. The owner adds or removes seats in Billing whenever they like. A change is prorated: added seats are charged for the rest of the period on your next invoice and removed seats come back as a credit on it, so nothing is taken at the moment you click. Removing a member does not lower the bill on its own; lower the seat count for that. The AI actions, weave credits and cloud voice minutes are per seat.
What's the difference between Family and Team?
Family is for one household: up to 6 people, with chores, allowances and the meal plan. Team is for working with people outside your household. It adds the admin console, workload and timeline, AI caps an admin can set per person, and free guests, so a client can see the one board you share without taking a seat. Family can still share a single board or note with up to 10 people outside the house, like a grandparent or a sitter, but it has no admin console, workload or caps.
What is a guest?
Someone outside your workspace who can open a board, note, whiteboard or checklist you shared with them, and nothing else. You choose whether they can edit it or only view it. Guests don't take a seat and can't invite anyone. A Team workspace can have up to 50. Owners and admins see every guest on the Access page and can take someone's access away in one step.
How does the Family plan bill?
One price for the household, up to six people, no per-seat maths. Kids' accounts are included.
What if our household is bigger than six?
Add people one at a time from Billing: $3 a month each on annual billing ($36 a year per person), or $4 a month each on monthly, up to six more. Founding Family members pay the same. It is prorated like any plan change and shows up on your next invoice. A free trial stays at six.
What can other people in my workspace see?
A workspace is a shared room. Everyone in it sees its notes, whiteboards, checklists, expenses and habits. Boards are the exception, because access is per board, so you only see the ones you've been added to. Nobody joins without accepting an invitation. The Vault hides what you seal in it from the screen and from the AI until you unlock it, but sealed items still sync to everyone in the workspace, so it is not a lock against co-members. For anything only you should have, use your personal workspace or make a separate one.
Where is our data kept, and who can see it?
On a server in Ashburn, Virginia, in the United States, with files and nightly backups in Cloudflare R2, and on each of your own devices. In a team, owners and admins see members, roles, guests, AI usage and the security log, and can export the team workspace. They cannot open anyone's personal workspace or read their conversations with Margin Intelligence. The trust page has the whole picture, including every outside company that handles data and what we do not encrypt.
Read the trust pageDoes Team have SAML single sign-on?
No. SAML is planned for a later enterprise plan. Today a Team owner or admin can require every member to sign in with Google on the team's own domain, and to use two-factor sign-in with an authenticator app.
How do I get help, and how fast?
Email hello@themarginapp.com or use Report a problem inside the app. On Team, a person replies within two business days. On every other plan we aim to reply within two business days. Business days are Monday to Friday. These are targets, not a contract: no service credits, no phone line and no 24/7 cover.
Can my own assistant really use it?
Yes. Pro and above expose 333 MCP tools over OAuth to any MCP client: your editor, your desktop assistant, an automation runner, an agent you wrote yourself. Tokens are scoped to one workspace and you can revoke them from Settings. The app itself, the Mind and the Vault work on Free; what needs a paid plan is letting an outside agent in.
How can it work offline AND let an agent drive it remotely?
Because they touch different copies of the same record. The app on your device holds a real database, not a cache: everything you do is written there first and works with no signal at all, then syncs when there is one. An agent connecting over MCP talks to the server's copy, and whatever it changes arrives on your devices the same way your own edits do. That is also why the two never queue behind each other: a flight with no wifi does not stop your assistant from filing something, and it does not stop you from writing either.