Grow vs Carta
A Carta alternative that doesn’t bill by shareholder.
Issue SAFEs, model the round and track every share — then run the raise beside it, in the same system, with every seat included.
Free forever · Unlimited seats · No stakeholder ceiling · Data room + e-sign included
In short
Grow as a Carta alternative
Grow is a Carta alternative for early-stage startups: a free cap table that issues SAFEs and notes, models priced rounds and exit waterfalls, and tracks option pools and vesting — bundled with the data room, investor CRM and e-signatures a raise needs. Every plan has unlimited seats, so adding a lawyer, an advisor or an investor never changes the bill.
Why founders switch
Three reasons teams leave Carta.
The price stops tracking your stakeholder count
Cap-table tools are commonly priced by how many stakeholders you have, so a clean round or a big option grant quietly raises your bill. Grow’s cap table is free to start and seats are unlimited on every plan, including the paid ones.
The raise lives next to the table
An investor on your cap table is the same record as the investor in your pipeline, the one reading your data room and the one signing the SAFE. Nothing is re-keyed between four tools, and the numbers an investor sees come from the table itself rather than a slide you updated last quarter.
Everyone who needs a seat gets one
Your lawyer, your accountant, your board and your investors can all have access without a per-seat conversation. That is the difference between a cap table people actually look at and one that lives in a PDF someone exported in March.
Side by side
Grow and Carta, row by row.
Not every row goes our way, and the ones that don’t are in the table rather than left out of it.
| Grow | Carta | |
|---|---|---|
| Price to start | Free, unlimited seats | Paid tiers, commonly priced by stakeholder count |
| SAFEs, notes and priced rounds | Included | Included |
| Option pools, vesting and 83(b) tracking | Included | Included |
| Scenario and exit-waterfall modeling | Included | Included |
| Data room and deck tracking | Built in | Separate tool |
| E-signatures | Built in | Separate tool or add-on |
| Investor CRM and outreach | Same records as the table | Separate tool |
| Seats for lawyers, advisors and investors | Unlimited, free | Often per seat |
| 409A valuation | AI-drafted | Prepared by Carta’s valuation team, with audit support |
| Fund administration | Not offered | Offered |
| Secondaries and tender offers | Not offered | Offered |
Comparison reflects publicly documented capabilities and commonly offered plans; specific features and pricing vary by plan and change over time — check Carta’s own site for their current terms. Carta is a trademark of its respective owner, used here for identification and comparison only. Grow by Webel is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Carta.
The honest part
When Carta is the better choice
Carta does three things Grow does not, and they are not small. It administers venture funds, it runs secondary sales and tender offers, and its 409A valuations are prepared by its own valuation team with support if an auditor challenges them. Grow drafts a 409A with AI, which is a fast and inexpensive starting point, not an independent appraisal. If your board or your auditors require a valuation from a licensed appraisal firm, if you are running a fund, or if you are organising employee liquidity, Carta is the right tool and you should stay on it.
Switching
What moving actually involves.
Keep Carta running until the last step. Nothing here needs a migration project or a call with sales.
- 1
Export your cap table from Carta as a spreadsheet — shareholders, share classes, grants and SAFEs.
- 2
Import it into Grow and reconcile the totals against your latest signed documents, not against the export.
- 3
Upload the underlying paper into the data room so each position points at the document that created it.
- 4
Invite your lawyer and accountant to check it before you switch off the old subscription.
Keep reading
It isn’t one feature, it’s one platform.
Cap table
Cap table
A world-class cap table, free forever, with unlimited seats. Shares, SAFEs, notes and ownership that updates itself, so the table you show an investor is always right — not last quarter’s spreadsheet.
ExploreGrow vs DocSend
DocSend alternative for fundraising
Share the deck as a link, see which slides they actually read, and have that engagement land on the investor’s record instead of in a separate dashboard.
CompareGrow vs DocuSign
DocuSign alternative for startups
Send a SAFE, an NDA or an offer letter for legally binding signature — and have the executed document land against the cap table without anyone re-uploading it.
CompareFAQ
Common questions.
- Is there a free alternative to Carta?
- Yes. Grow’s cap table is free to start, with unlimited seats on every plan. It issues SAFEs and notes, models priced rounds and exit waterfalls, and tracks option pools, vesting and 83(b) elections — alongside a data room, investor CRM and e-signatures at no extra cost.
- Can I move my cap table from Carta to Grow?
- Yes. Export your shareholders, share classes, grants and SAFEs from Carta as a spreadsheet and import them into Grow, then reconcile against your signed documents. Keep both open until your lawyer or accountant has checked the new table.
- Does Grow do 409A valuations like Carta?
- Grow drafts a 409A with AI, which is a fast starting point for an early-stage company. Carta’s valuations are prepared by its own valuation team and come with audit support. If your board or auditors require an independent appraisal firm, that is a reason to stay with Carta.
- What does Grow include that a cap-table tool doesn’t?
- The rest of the raise. A data room with per-document analytics, deck tracking, an investor CRM with email sync, investor updates drafted from your real numbers, e-signatures, and a branded investor portal — all reading from the same cap table, with unlimited seats.
Try it before you cancel anything.
Grow is free to start and every plan has unlimited seats. Set it up beside Carta and switch only once it holds up.
Free forever to start. No credit card. No seat fees.