SpidNums vs Notion: an honest comparison for Canadian firms

What Notion does well

This section comes first deliberately. Notion is a serious product with real customers, and a comparison that pretends otherwise is not worth reading.

• The best docs-plus-databases combination in general software — procedures, wikis and structured records live in one searchable place.
• Relational databases that non-developers can genuinely build: relations, rollups, filtered views.
• Excellent as a firm knowledge base — SOPs, onboarding notes and checklists sit next to the work they describe.
• A huge template ecosystem, so most internal systems start from something rather than nothing.

Where the fit differs

These are differences in model rather than claims about missing features. Where a capability is not listed for Notion, that means we did not verify it — not that it is absent.

• Build versus receive the schema: in Notion the firm designs its client database — properties, relations, views — and maintains it forever. SpidNums ships the schema: client records with fiscal year-ends and contacts, a Services catalogue, deadlines that follow.
• Deadline logic: SpidNums generates deadlines from Canadian rules — GST/HST by each client's cadence, the T2 six-month clock and earlier balance-due date, year-end reminders. Notion is a general-purpose workspace where dates are whatever the firm enters and keeps current.
• Pricing model: Notion prices per member. SpidNums is a flat USD $1,200 per firm per year — the workspace does not get more expensive as the team grows.
• Client-facing layer: SpidNums ships a white-label client portal and e-signed engagement letters. Notion is a general-purpose workspace where client-facing sharing typically happens through pages the firm publishes and manages itself.

Pricing

Notion does not publish pricing we could verify, so this page does not state a number for it — ask the vendor for a current quote. SpidNums is a flat USD $1,200 per firm per year with every feature included, including white-label branding.

What SpidNums is, plainly

SpidNums is practice management for Canadian accounting firms: the client list, the services each client buys, the deadlines those services generate, the person who owns each one, and the engagement letter that defined the scope. It is not a general ledger, it does not prepare or transmit returns, and it does not calculate payroll — those stay in the tools your firm already files with.

The list below is the complete set of claims this site makes about the product. If a capability is not on it, we do not claim it.

• Multi-tenant white-label branding per firm — name, logo, colours, emails and letterhead
• Colour-coded SLA deadline dashboard ranked by proximity
• Aggregated reminders across tasks, service cadences and fiscal year-ends
• E-signed engagement letters with a public, no-login client portal
• Per-tenant Google Workspace integration
• Client portal
• Staff roles with confidential-client gating
• Canadian-hosted data (Supabase ca-central-1)
• Flat USD $1,200 per firm per year, all inclusive
• CSV/XLSX client import and export

Questions worth asking both vendors

Comparison grids converge because feature names converge. These six questions separate products that look identical on paper, and they are worth asking of Notion and of SpidNums alike.

• How is a deadline generated — from a rule tied to the client's fiscal year-end and reporting period, or from a recurring task somebody configured by hand?
• When a client's filing cadence changes, is that one field or a rewrite of every future date?
• Whose brand does the client see on emails, on the portal and on a signed engagement letter — and on which plan does that become true?
• Where is client data hosted, and is tenant isolation enforced in the database or only in the application? Get the answer in writing.
• What is the total annual cost at three seats and at ten? Ask for the total, not the per-user figure.
• What comes across on migration, and what does not? Clients usually move; documents, notes and completed work usually do not.

Who should choose Notion

A firm whose real gap is documentation — SOPs, onboarding, internal knowledge — should keep Notion; it is better at that job than any practice-management tool, including ours. And a firm content to hand-maintain its client database in Notion, and to pay per member for it, has no urgent reason to move.

If that describes your firm, take the other product seriously. If it does not, the practice management overview covers what SpidNums does in full.

Switching

Export the Notion client database to CSV, align the columns with SpidNums' CSV/XLSX import template, and import. There is no direct connector. Linked pages, relations and documents stay in Notion — many firms keep the workspace running as the internal wiki and move only the client list, services and deadlines.

SpidNums imports and exports clients as CSV or XLSX. There is no direct migration connector, so historical documents, notes and completed work do not come across automatically — plan the cutover around a period boundary rather than mid-season.