--- title: "BarTender Reviews, Pros and Cons - 2026 Software Advice" description: "Reviews of BarTender. Learn how real users rate this software's ease-of-use, functionality, overall quality and customer support. Talk to our advisors to see if BarTender is a good fit for you!" source_url: "https://www.softwareadvice.com/label-printing/bartender-profile/reviews/" page_type: "reviews" language: "en" --- 1 million+ businesses helped. Get advice Get Free Advice [Home](https://www.softwareadvice.com/) / [Barcoding Software](https://www.softwareadvice.com/inventory-management/barcode-comparison/) / [BarTender](https://www.softwareadvice.com/label-printing/bartender-profile/) / BarTender Reviews Software Advice offers objective insights based on verified user reviews and independent product and market research. When our advisors match you to a software provider, we may earn a referral fee. [Overview](https://www.softwareadvice.com/label-printing/bartender-profile/) Reviews [Alternatives](https://www.softwareadvice.com/label-printing/bartender-profile/alternatives/) # BarTender User Reviews ## Reviews summary - Overall rating: 4.4/5 - Total reviews: 61 ### Secondary ratings - Ease of use: 4/5 - Customer support: 3.8/5 - Value for money: 4.1/5 - Functionality: 4.3/5 ### Rating distribution - 5 stars: 35 reviews (57%) - 4 stars: 20 reviews (33%) - 3 stars: 4 reviews (7%) - 2 stars: 1 reviews (2%) - 1 star: 1 reviews (2%) ### Most mentioned pros - Bartender could be more user friendly by simplifying its interface, but it’s also a very powerful tool with lots of capabilities - I love the ability to create and automate labels. - Ease of use and setup is user friendly. ### Most mentioned cons - Sometimes I need to add tables and using them as a cell is very hard. Besides blank cells are also a bit trouble. Because when you delete a cell it says "BLANK" and that changes the table length if it hits the wall. - The only issue I have is their support, because they are impossible to deal with. - The labeling software we were using back then didn't link fields for variable data, resulting in our label operators entering lot and date information in multiple locations in different formats for a single label. ## BarTender customer reviews Showing reviews 1-25 of 61 (page 1). ### Easy-to-learn and offers diverse options for barcoding including serialization. - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Banking - Company size: 10000+ employees - Product usage: Used weekly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: August 2018 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 4/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros It’s so easy to get around the user interface, even for people who have no experience working with code. There’s not much of a learning curve to this application. Anyone can create labels with great ease and diversity. The integration builder provides an avenue for automation and makes it easy to select an action we want duplicated. The program also works very well with zebra printers. It also has a the serialization feature which is pretty cool. Their website’s got a ton information that help you maximize the program like webinars,training videos, and other guides #### Cons The only downside I can think of is that they don’t have a live chat feature on their website, which would really help if you’re already on there and looking for specific information. --- ### BarTender makes business more comfortable. - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Internet - Company size: 201-500 employees - Product usage: Used monthly for less than 2 years - Reviewed: January 2019 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. Good solution for our business. This is very Fast and easier for train person in barTender. I have got high-quality custom labels. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 3/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros I have been using BarTender since 2017.It is really good and easy to use. I really like to work with it. Creating labels is easy and fast and I had design more than 1k labels. Setting up the fields that I need to delivered the data is easy to settings up. BitTender web site helps a lot to get the information such as video tutorials and other guides. First time I got the trial version. It is really good 30 days trail version. If I purchase for first time, I don’t know software is good or bad. Trail version save the money. 😊 #### Cons First time I started with BarTender version 9.0, I guess which is oldest version. I was good for me until I start to work on version 10.1. That is much better update. When I want to figure out some problems there is no online QA or technical support team. There are no more cons I found. --- ### Bad - Overall rating: 2/5 - Reviewer: Jonathan D. - Industry: Information Technology and Services - Company size: 10000+ employees - Product usage: Used daily for less than 12 months - Reviewed: March 2018 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered I get a paycheck for working with it twice a month #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 2/5 - Value for money: 1/5 - Customer support: 1/5 - Functionality: 3/5 #### Pros I didn't pay for the software or the license. The software download is free, and has a 30 day free trial. #### Cons Very disappointed in the new 2016 version. The new 2016 version crashes anytime I attempt to update a database connection from one of our old XML source that worked seamlessly in 10.4. (They will still work so long as you don't touch them). Bartender then restarts and attempts to recover the bad information (which will in turn crash bartender.) Was this product actually run by QA before release? I suspect there was nothing but plug and play sceanrios tested. Very little insight into customer service. Have a lot of difficulty getting answers from the tech team. This is what happens when a company cuts back on 'costs' by elimiating quality assurance and customer support. SOme of the new 'features' have absolutely destroyed Database/setup connections. After upgrading from 10.4, all tables from our XML payloads now crash bartender when you try to do ANYTHING with them (Great coding guys). As a result, the text file source has become quite useless unless you are using a csv. Field Alias for Named database connections don't store with the named connection which makes it pointless as you will need to re-alias these things every time you change datasource. This defeats the purpose of naming/reusing a datasource if you have to re-alias all fields everytime you use it. Again, I am not convinced that this was even tested before release. Perhaps I missed something about Alpha in the whitepapers... #### Vendor response Hi Jonathan, I apologize for the issues you're experiencing. They are as unacceptable to all of us as here they are to you. We've brought this to the attention of BarTender's VP of Technical Services, and he's reviewing your support tickets to see how we can help. I'd also like to offer reassurance that we haven't had any reductions to our QA or technical support teams. We recognize how important these functions are, and are, in fact, investing in their growth. I understand Capterra is providing my contact information to you. Please don't hesitate to get in touch with me. I'd like to know how this turns out. Replied March 2018 --- ### A very useful tool! - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Higher Education - Company size: 10000+ employees - Product usage: Used weekly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: January 2019 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros It is very effective in doing what it promises and it looks really like a native application. It is not intrusive as well with its icon. #### Cons Sometimes it lacks slightly but it doesn't affect its usage. --- ### Great label generator - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Cosmetics - Company size: 11-50 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: July 2019 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros Professional software for creating industrial labels, bar codes etc. Perfect match with Thermal Transfer printers. #### Cons I'd love to be able to increase printing speed a little bit more --- ### It's Just OK - Overall rating: 3/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Food Production - Company size: 11-50 employees - Product usage: Used daily for less than 12 months - Reviewed: January 2019 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 2/5 - Functionality: 3/5 #### Pros Can create a full product label complete with UPC code Has the option of only being able to change the lot code and best before date (for product labels) #### Cons Hard to edit texts as it often takes you to a separate window Text formatting is strange, size of text increases as you change the text box so it's difficult to control the text size Not easy to make a label from scratch Hard to make a table format ex. for nutritional facts table - must insert all the lines by yourself #### Vendor response Good news! We have simple solutions to your issues. BarTender's auto size feature has been turned on in your system. To return to the default setting of static text size: - Right click on the text object - Choose "Properties" - In the new window, choose "Text format" - Uncheck the Auto Size box Text will now remain a consistent size. BarTender offers pre-formatted new FDA nutrition labels for both the one- and two-column format, and the present FDA nutrition label is included in the BarTender documents folder of your software. These templates include business rules to meet FDA's font size and spacing requirements, and you'll be able to use the labels' variable data fields to autopopulate the nutrition info directly from your database. I'd like to send the new label file to you. Contact me via the email address Capterra provides. You should never have to insert all those lines by yourself!! More help here: https://support.seagullscientific.com/hc/en-us Replied February 2019 --- ### BarTender Label Creation Software - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Plastics - Company size: 201-500 employees - Product usage: Used monthly for less than 12 months - Reviewed: October 2019 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. We are able to create quick labels for production where we don't have a need to automate from ERP. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros This software is very easy to use. It took a bit to figure out how to add fields and define where they come from in a data source, but other than that, it's very functional for our need. I understand you can also automate labels from our ERP System which is SyteLine (CloudSuite Industrial). This software can be licensed by printer and that is beneficial for us. #### Cons The thing I liked least about BarTender was trying to figure out how to get the fields added and defined by a datasource. I also had a bit of trouble setting the page format based on the printer. Once you choose a printer it's hard to change it from my experience, I ended up creating a new label altogether. #### Reasons for choosing BarTender Most easy to use in my opinion. --- ### Great program once you figure out how it works - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Warehousing - Company size: 1001-5000 employees - Product usage: Used monthly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: February 2019 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 3/5 - Functionality: 3/5 #### Pros We use BarTender for customer labels and it does a great job. #### Cons It takes time to learn how to set it up and use it. --- ### BarTender Print Labels Like A Pro - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Consumer Goods - Company size: 1001-5000 employees - Product usage: Used monthly for less than 12 months - Reviewed: January 2019 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 3/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros I really like that I can easily print labels for packaging, and integration with SAP. #### Cons I haven't really used other bar code software so I don't think I have any complaints. --- ### Laser Etching Tool - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Chris W. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Information Technology and Services - Company size: 201-500 employees - Product usage: Used monthly for less than 6 months - Reviewed: June 2019 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 3/5 - Functionality: 3/5 #### Pros A few quick clicks and this system can make a template to use on the selected laser etching machine. #### Cons Sometimes when the software does not connect to the license server, it blocks any attempt for the software to print. --- ### Bartender visto da chi lo usa per lavoro. - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Valerio P. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Information Technology and Services - Company size: 2-10 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: February 2023 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 3/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros Il prodotto ha un'immenso quantitativo di funzionalità e di potenzialità. Può letteralmente permettere di fare tutto, e di gestire in modo organizzato qualsiasi cosa sia in relazione al magazzino, spedizione, ed etichette di prodotto. E' un software completo ed esaustivo per l'ambiente di produzione e organizzazione di un'azienda. #### Cons Il software risulta essere a volte complesso, e in molti casi serve un'esperto al fianco di chi lo utilizza per sciogliere dubbi e risolvere problemi.Inoltre ha un costo non irrilevante, e a volte esistono soluzioni intermedie molto più efficienti, a meno o gratuite.Delle volte l'assistenza non è proprio delle migliori. --- ### BarTender Regular user - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Nazlin S. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Information Services - Company size: Self-Employed - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: November 2020 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered BarTender is my best label printing solutions partner for the companies I worked using Microsoft Dynamics Navisiona, LS Retail and locally developed software solutions. I have been using BarTender for many years and I could not found any alternate product. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 3/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros I am very happy with BarTender software. It gives us the ability to design the Barcode label on our own customization format even without a programing/coding knowledge to print a single label or thousands at a single click. #### Cons I would like to see in new update a better online help center specially online chat system or at least online submitting. It will be more convenience if the label printing comes in the order on which we send. --- ### Used for all kinds of labels within our organisation - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Paul K. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Glass, Ceramics & Concrete - Company size: 201-500 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: April 2018 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 4/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros ease of use. Particularly like the serialisation feature for barcoding labels. It has the options to use many different types of barcode #### Cons Although it still works without, it has to link up to the internet for licence checking. This can slow down the opening of the application. --- ### Great Barcode Label product have used it for many years on multiple versions - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Darin W. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Computer Software - Company size: 501-1000 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: March 2018 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. Enables two of our high volume distribution centers to print high quality labels as needed, without concern of quality control issues #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros I really like the Online Activation and network label printer license server, this helps tremendously managing the Active users / printers on the network. #### Cons Older versions had issues with activating the license keys, but this has been eliminated on Newer versions. The most recent versions of the software have proven to be very stable. --- ### Not sure why you would use this - Overall rating: 3/5 - Reviewer: Michael O. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Consumer Goods - Company size: 501-1000 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: January 2020 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. Bartender is ok but we can get the same functionality from free alternatives. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 3/5 - Value for money: 3/5 - Customer support: 3/5 - Functionality: 3/5 #### Pros It does indeed make barcodes and labels and the learning curve isn't too intense. I can usually yeah a new operator in 30 minutes #### Cons You can do the same thing with Open Office, Google Docs or Microsoft Word with a barcode font. Also it crashes routinely on our system. --- ### Best label customization software ever - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Winston H. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Wholesale - Company size: 201-500 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 2 years - Reviewed: July 2017 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 3/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros It is so easy to customize whatever we want on bartender. We use barterder to meet our clients' requirements on labels #### Cons Sometimes it will be very time consuming to drag for the layout(alignment) I still remember how painful and stressful when we tried to come up something that has very strick requirements. --- ### Bartender software is very easy for the user. The GUI is very intuitive and easy to train new users - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Rana D. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 2 years - Reviewed: August 2017 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 3/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros I like that it is intuitive and easy to use. I like that changes can be easily made to the program. #### Cons There isn't really anything that I don't like about the software, but it would be nice if there was a way to incorporate special characters into the labels. --- ### Pay for Customer service? - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: brian h. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Medical Devices - Company size: 51-200 employees - Product usage: Used monthly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: October 2019 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered If you don't have the maintenance contract you email your question into the CS team and they get to it when they get to it. If you don't mind the fee then you are fine. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Customer support: 1/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros I like the design capabilities and user interface #### Cons Customer has to be enrolled in an annual maintenance agreement to use customer service. --- ### Bar Tender Software - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Matthew R. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Logistics and Supply Chain - Company size: 10000+ employees - Product usage: Used other for less than 12 months - Reviewed: October 2019 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 4/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros Program is good for printing special labels #### Cons Program printing settings have to be checked each time before printing --- ### Very easy to use which is great for someone like me who has little patience. - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Joe L. - Industry: Chemicals - Company size: 51-200 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for less than 6 months - Reviewed: August 2017 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. Benefits were being able to make my own label on how I wanted it to look and not having to order from someone else and settling for their design. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros I am a Safety Lead and I am in charge of labeling all in house chemicals. This program helped greatly in that it had everything I needed. #### Cons sometimes it prints outside the label. Takes a bit of fidangling but once you figure it out your good to go. --- ### Do not recommend - Overall rating: 1/5 - Reviewer: Lisa S. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Food Production - Company size: 11-50 employees - Product usage: Used daily for less than 2 years - Reviewed: March 2026 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered Frustrating and disappointing. Their support team is not efficient. They are in no hurry to help resolve your issues. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 1/5 - Value for money: 1/5 - Customer support: 1/5 - Functionality: 1/5 #### Pros I don't like anything about Bartender. Based on my experience, it doesn’t provide any meaningful advantages over the free alternatives offered by other companies. My time with Bartender has been frustrating, and their support team has been anything but supportive. I rely on their software to print labels, yet it hasn’t worked on my computer for nearly two months, and they still haven’t identified the issue. In the meantime, I’ve been able to print labels without any problems using a free program from another company, which makes the situation even more disappointing. I recently renewed my support agreement with Bartender, but over the past two months all I’ve received is a long chain of back‑and‑forth troubleshooting emails. They simply refuse to pick up the phone and have a real conversation to help resolve the problem. #### Cons They don’t provide the level of support needed for a business to confidently rely on their software. I can’t understand why they haven’t simply picked up the phone to troubleshoot the issues instead of dragging things out over email. It takes them a day or two just to respond, which is ridiculous. #### Reasons for switching to BarTender Because I thought Bartender had a lot more functionality and good support team, but was proven wrong. --- ### Use BarTender Daily - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Verified Reviewer - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Textiles - Company size: 11-50 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: September 2025 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered Bartender could be more user friendly by simplifying its interface, but it’s also a very powerful tool with lots of capabilities #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros BarTender designer and print station are integral at my company. We use it for label creation, barcodes, and shipping #### Cons Sometimes it can be frustrating to deal with all the ins and outs of formatting correctly to get the label I want --- ### Great labelling program! - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Tyler H. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Retail - Company size: 11-50 employees - Product usage: Used daily for more than 2 years - Reviewed: October 2025 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. Use it extensively with ERP systems to print customized labels and also use it for printing from a PVC card printer. I don't even think i've scratched the surface of how powerful the application can be! #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 5/5 - Value for money: 5/5 - Customer support: 5/5 - Functionality: 5/5 #### Pros database conncectivity, programming customizations, and magnetic stip encoding capability, the application is intuitive and easy to use, automarions are a plus! #### Cons not much, it's actually a pretty excellent label printing application. The driver interfaces could be updated #### Reasons for choosing BarTender compatibility with ERP system was a primary reason --- ### Could be cheaper - Overall rating: 4/5 - Reviewer: Engin M. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Textiles - Company size: 2-10 employees - Product usage: Used weekly for more than 2 years - Reviewed: February 2024 - Review source details: This reviewer was invited by us to submit an honest review and offered a nominal incentive as a thank you. Generally, I think the price of the software is huge. It doesn't seem reachable. When I compare any other programs I use, I cannot say it deserves it. I'm afraid it's because of the necessity. I mean if you have a barcode printer, you have to have a software too otherwise, it's too hard to use the machine. #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 1/5 - Customer support: 4/5 - Functionality: 3/5 #### Pros This is a program that I can use easily. There are too many tools that I can add to my stickers. #### Cons I didn't like the table issue. Sometimes I need to add tables and using them as a cell is very hard. Besides blank cells are also a bit trouble. Because when you delete a cell it says "BLANK" and that changes the table length if it hits the wall. --- ### Great product to give you control of your systems - Overall rating: 5/5 - Reviewer: Joshua S. - Verified reviewer: Yes - Industry: Wholesale - Company size: 51-200 employees - Product usage: Used daily for less than 2 years - Reviewed: October 2023 - Review source details: This review was submitted organically. No incentive was offered I love working with BarTender. I use this daily and constantly recommend this service. This is a problem solver for me, and if there is no other way to accomplish what I need, I turn to BarTender #### Ratings breakdown - Ease of use: 4/5 - Value for money: 3/5 - Customer support: 1/5 - Functionality: 4/5 #### Pros I love the ability to create and automate labels. This has been key for my company when we have some customers who have several different labels and types., We built and integration that allows this to be an automated process. #### Cons The only issue I have is their support, because they are impossible to deal with. Other than that they are great. ## More reviews [Next reviews](https://www.softwareadvice.com/label-printing/bartender-profile/reviews/?page=2) --- BarTender Reviews, Pros and Cons - 2026 Software Advice