As of October 2026, Dabble Writer's Writer, Author and Bestseller plans cost $15, $23 or $39 a month billed annually ($180, $276 or $468 a year). Billed monthly, they cost $19, $29 or $49. Dabble also sells Lifetime Author for $699 and Lifetime Bestseller for $899 as one-time payments. Every plan starts with a 14-day free trial, with no card needed.
All prices here are in US dollars, before tax, from dabblewriter.com and Dabble Help, read on 20 October 2026. Dabble also bills in EUR, GBP, CAD, AUD and NZD.
Dabble plans and prices
| Plan | Billed annually | Billed monthly | What it adds |
|---|---|---|---|
| Writer | $15 a month ($180 a year) | $19 a month | Unlimited manuscripts, cloud backup and sync, goals and stats, spell check, focus mode, Plot Grid, story notebook, character profiles, co-authoring, sharing, versioning |
| Author | $23 a month ($276 a year) | $29 a month | Everything in Writer, plus comments, track changes, sticky notes, advanced grammar and style checks, Read to Me, beta-reader and editor support, priority support |
| Bestseller | $39 a month ($468 a year) | $49 a month | Everything in Author, plus monthly workshops, live office hours, the Academy course library and community |
| Lifetime Author | $699 once | Every Author feature "now and in the future" | |
| Lifetime Bestseller | $899 once | Dabble Writer and Academy access, plus future Bestseller features |
The pricing page labels annual billing "Save 20%". Writer works out at about 21% less billed annually ($15 against $19).
Is Dabble Writer free?
No. Dabble has no free plan. It has a free trial: "Every plan starts with 14 days free," and "All fourteen days include every feature from every plan," with no credit card required.
When a trial ends without a subscription, the account becomes "Inactive / No Active Plan." Dabble Help says "You can still sign in, read, and export everything you've written." Sharing is turned off without an active plan.
Students and teachers get 30% off any plan through the Student App Centre. A referral code gives $20 off at signup, and only one percent-off coupon can be active at a time.
Dabble Writer lifetime: what it covers
Dabble Help describes a lifetime plan as "Pay once. No renewal." Lifetime Author gives "every feature available in Author now and in the future." The pricing page describes it as "Every future Author update for the same cost as two years of an Author subscription." Lifetime Bestseller adds the Academy and future Bestseller features. A lifetime account has no renewals or billing actions to manage.
Lifetime plans cover Author or Bestseller features. Dabble sells no lifetime version of the Writer plan.
What Dabble costs over three years
These totals use list prices, before tax, discounts or price changes.
| Plan | 1 year | 2 years | 3 years | 5 years |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Writer, annual | $180 | $360 | $540 | $900 |
| Writer, monthly | $228 | $456 | $684 | $1,140 |
| Author, annual | $276 | $552 | $828 | $1,380 |
| Author, monthly | $348 | $696 | $1,044 | $1,740 |
| Lifetime Author | $699 | $699 | $699 | $699 |
| Bestseller, annual | $468 | $936 | $1,404 | $2,340 |
| Bestseller, monthly | $588 | $1,176 | $1,764 | $2,940 |
| Lifetime Bestseller | $899 | $899 | $899 | $899 |
Against Author billed annually, Lifetime Author costs less from the third year. Against Author billed monthly, it costs less from the 25th month. Lifetime Bestseller costs less than Bestseller billed annually from the second year.
The table compares Dabble with itself. Whether it is worth the money depends on how much you use sync, co-authoring and the Plot Grid.
Why Dabble is a subscription
Dabble's help gives its own reasons. The subscription pays for the servers behind "Cloud Backup, Cloud Sync, co-authoring," so "your writing stays backed up and in sync for as long as you keep writing." Updates arrive with "No upgrade fee, no 'Dabble 4.0' box to buy." The pricing page adds: "If you'd rather pay once, Lifetime Author Access is exactly that."
Those are real running costs. A desktop app with no cloud service, such as Scrivener or Deckle, does not have them, and does not give you real-time sync either.
How to cancel a Dabble subscription
Dabble Help says cancelling "takes about a minute."
- Open Billing from your avatar menu.
- Under Current Plan, open the … menu beside Change Plan.
- Click Cancel Subscription, choose a reason and confirm.
"Cancelling is not deleting." By default the plan cancels at the end of the current billing period, so you keep full access until then. Before that date, Undo Cancellation in Billing reverses it. After it, the account "moves to a free, read-only state."
Pausing instead. "Pause holds your plan for 1, 2, or 3 months rather than ending it." Pausing "only works on monthly plans," so a yearly plan has to switch to monthly billing through Change Plan first.
Refunds. The pricing page lists a money-back guarantee: "If Dabble isn't right for you, tell us and we'll refund you." It does not state a time window.
What happens to your books if you stop paying
Your manuscripts stay in your account. The pricing page says "Your manuscripts remain readable and exportable forever" and that an expired subscription "only switches off editing." Dabble Help adds that "Full editing comes back the moment your plan is active again."
Export to Word, Google Docs or Markdown before you rely on read-only access. A Word .docx is the safest copy to hold: the Library of Congress lists it as an "international open standard", ISO/IEC 29500. Dabble exports one book at a time, and it "does not export PDF or ePub directly."
Dabble subscription vs a one-time purchase
- Dabble's subscription buys a service: real-time sync on every device, browser and phone access, live co-authoring and cloud backups.
- A one-time desktop app buys a program that runs on your own computer. Scrivener costs $59.99 per platform (the same on the Mac App Store), Atticus $147, and Deckle is a one-time purchase. Scrivener and Deckle run no sync service of their own, and Atticus is designed for "ideally only one device at one time".
If you write on several devices or with a co-author, the subscription pays for something you use. If you write on one or two computers, a one-time app may cover what you need. One-time apps differ on upgrades: Literature & Latte's FAQ says minor updates are free, but it "occasionally" releases major updates that are paid for. More options are compared in writing software with a one-time purchase and Dabble Writer alternatives.
Deckle's price model
Deckle is our app, so weigh this section accordingly.
Deckle is a one-time purchase with every update included, not a subscription. A licence covers 2 devices in any mix of Windows, Mac and Linux, and there is a 30-day full refund with no reason needed. It is a desktop app with no cloud sync, phone app or co-authoring, so it does not replace those parts of Dabble. Unlike Dabble, it exports EPUB and a print PDF. The two are compared in Dabble vs Deckle.
Moving a licence to a new computer: deactivate it here first
To try it, click Take Deckle for a Spin on the screen Deckle opens to. There is no card, no account and no time limit. It opens a sample novel with every screen open to explore, and you can restyle it and export real EPUB, PDF and DOCX files. New writing is capped at about 500 words, and new documents and imports are blocked.
FAQ
How much does Dabble Writer cost?
$15, $23 or $39 a month billed annually, or $19, $29 or $49 billed monthly, as of October 2026. Lifetime plans cost $699 and $899.
Is Dabble Writer free?
No. It has a 14-day free trial with every feature and no card. After it ends, you can still read and export your work.
Does Dabble have a lifetime plan?
Yes. Lifetime Author costs $699 and Lifetime Bestseller $899, each paid once with no renewal.
Is Dabble a subscription?
Yes, billed monthly or annually. The lifetime plans are its only one-time option.
How do I cancel my Dabble subscription?
Open Billing, open the … menu beside Change Plan, and click Cancel Subscription. Access continues to the end of the billing period.
What happens to my writing if I cancel Dabble?
The account moves to "a free, read-only state", as of October 2026. Dabble says your manuscripts "remain readable and exportable forever."
Is there a Dabble Writer coupon or student discount?
Students and teachers get 30% off through the Student App Centre. Referral codes give $20 off at signup.
Is Dabble Writer worth it?
It depends on whether you use Dabble's sync, phone access and co-authoring; the full answer is in Is Dabble worth it?.
Sources
All retrieved 20 October 2026. Prices change, so check the vendor page before buying.
- Dabble pricing: plan prices billed annually and monthly, plan contents, lifetime plans, trial, student discount, money-back guarantee, work after cancelling
- Plans and pricing, Dabble Help: billing intervals, lifetime, trial, coupons, currencies
- Understanding your subscription, Dabble Help: inactive accounts, export after lapse, renewals
- Why Dabble is a subscription, Dabble Help: the vendor's reasons
- Cancel your subscription, Dabble Help: steps, undo, pause, read-only state
- Export your manuscript, Dabble Help: export formats, no PDF or EPUB
- Scrivener store and Scrivener FAQ, Literature & Latte: price, upgrade terms
- Atticus: one-time price
- Scrivener 3 on the Mac App Store, Apple: $59.99
- DOCX Transitional (Office Open XML), Library of Congress: DOCX as an open ISO/IEC standard
- Literature & Latte, Cross-grading: "Scrivener for macOS or Windows is $59.99" (the store page loads its prices from the checkout, so this page shows the figure in its text), retrieved 21 October 2026
Dabble and every other product name here belong to their owners. Scrivener is a trademark of Literature & Latte. Deckle is not affiliated with or endorsed by any product named here.