Phorest is software for salons, spas and aesthetic clinics. It started in Ireland, where its founder was working on the reception desk of a busy Dublin salon, and it celebrated its 20th anniversary in 2024.
More than 12,000 salons, spas and clinics use it across Ireland, the UK, the US, Canada, Australia and Europe. A quarter of the company is owned by its own people.
What it covers
Phorest’s features run the whole day: online booking and the appointment book, client records with consultation forms and patch tests, point of sale and stock, staff rotas and commission. Automated texts and emails handle reminders and marketing, and Treatcard runs loyalty.
PhorestPay, powered by Stripe, takes payments, deposits and buy now, pay later. Each business can have its own branded app, and review requests go out automatically after each visit, ready to share to Google or Facebook.
AI on the front desk
In May 2026, Phorest introduced Front Desk AI, which handles booking requests and common questions by text and WhatsApp. On Trustpilot, Phorest rates 4.1.
Phorest’s partner integrations
Phorest lists partner integrations including Xero, which receives the day’s financial data each night, QuickBooks, Klarna, and Reserve with Google, which lets clients book from Google Search and Maps.
Getting each day’s takings into Xero or QuickBooks
The accounting integration sends one journal a night, at 1am local time, holding the previous day’s transactions. It runs one way, so nothing in Xero or QuickBooks flows back into Phorest. Setup maps each Phorest total, by payment type, tax rate and item sold, to an account in the business’s own chart of accounts. Each location is mapped on its own, and QuickBooks classes and location tracking aren’t used, so branches that need reporting apart get separate accounts. It works with QuickBooks Online, and with Xero plans above Starter, Early and Ignite.
A failed night is usually an unmapped payment type or tax rate, or an account archived in Xero. A resync from the sync history sends that day again, and in Xero it arrives as a draft for someone to post by hand.
Card takings travel separately. PhorestPay batches sales daily and pays out the next working day, and weekend sales usually join Monday’s batch, so one deposit in the Xero bank feed can cover three nightly journals. The PhorestPay report lists every transaction, fee and payout, and can be scheduled to land in a bookkeeper’s inbox.
Retail stock across Phorest and Shopify
PhorestSync links Phorest’s retail stock to a Shopify store, in Ireland, the UK and Australia. Products are matched by barcode, so one without the same barcode in both systems stays unlinked, and only items set to the Retail type take part. Quantities sync every 15 minutes, and Shopify orders can be created as sales in Phorest, with its stock updated to match.
Client lists for email marketing
For an outside platform such as Mailchimp, the client export produces a CSV of names and email addresses, limited to clients who have opted in to email marketing. The live alternative is the API: a sign-up form on the salon’s own website can add new clients straight to Phorest, tagged with a client category for later campaigns.
The Phorest API
Phorest’s API is opened up on request through its support team. It covers clients, appointments, branches, staff, services, purchases, stock, vouchers, reviews and loyalty points, with separate servers for Europe and North America. It allows up to 100 requests a second.
Integrations check Phorest for changes on a schedule. For owners who don’t have a developer, Phorest also introduces them to trusted partners who build on the API.
Beyond the appointment book
Phorest’s API and built-in links leave plenty of room to fit it around how a salon already works. Each PhorestPay deposit can be matched to the nights it covers, new clients can flow to Mailchimp without a weekly CSV, and online sign-ups can land in Phorest tagged for their first campaign.
Re-entering bookings or sales into another system each week is money leaking quietly, and an ROI walk-through shows whether a link pays for itself. Before adding AI on top, it’s worth checking the basics.