Healthie vs Upheal: which EHR is right for therapists?

Both Healthie and Upheal are EHRs. The difference is who they were built for, and whether the AI is part of the product or a paid attachment to it.

Healthie is a multi-specialty platform serving nutrition, wellness and coaching providers alongside behavioral health. It handles scheduling, billing, documentation and telehealth. Its AI documentation, sold as the AI Charting add-on, is available on Plus plans and above for $35 per month.

Upheal is an AI-native EHR built specifically for mental health practitioners. The AI is not bolted on: notes connect to treatment plans and the client's full clinical history, the compliance checker audits documentation against behavioral health payer standards before you sign, and the Assistant is conversational and agentic. You ask it in your own words, about any client, at any time, and it runs workflows on your behalf. Upheal is $1 per session, so a 50-session month is $50, or $99 a month for unlimited sessions with Assistant Pro.

Healthie vs Upheal at a glance

Two EHRs, different foundations

Healthie was built for nutrition and wellness providers. The platform handles meal planning, supplement protocols and outcome tracking across wellness disciplines, and its AI Scribe was announced at a nutrition conference. Therapists can use it, but the documentation templates, clinical workflows and feature set reflect a different kind of practice.

Upheal was built for behavioral health from day one. Therapy-specific note formats, modality-aware documentation, compliance checking against behavioral health payer standards, and treatment plans that automatically link to session notes. The platform knows the difference between a progress note and a SOAP note, between a treatment goal and a care plan, and between what a therapist needs and what a dietitian needs.

How the AI compares

There are three tiers of AI in this market, and it is worth knowing which one you are buying.

Fixed-point generators run at a defined moment in the workflow. You finish a session, and a note appears. Healthie's AI Scribe sits here. It captures telehealth, in-person and phone sessions, produces a structured editable chart note and an instant transcript, and does it well. Healthie's own documentation lists what is in the AI Charting suite today: AI Scribe and instant transcripts. AI Encounter Summaries, AI Tasks and AI Chart Summaries are all filed under Coming Soon on that same page, with Encounter Summaries marked as in beta.

Conversational AI answers questions. Upheal's Assistant sits here on its free tier. You ask it in plain language, about any client, at any point between sessions, and it answers from your session history rather than from a generic model.

Agentic AI does the work. Assistant Pro, $39 a month or included in the $99 plan, runs routines on your behalf without a monthly cap: pulling a client's open goals and what has not shifted before your next session, handling scheduling changes, drafting client messages and moving billing admin along.

Nobody else in this comparison set reaches the third tier. That is the durable difference, and it is not a pricing argument.

Where Upheal goes further

Golden Thread treatment planning

Upheal's Golden Thread connects every part of client care into one narrative. The system links session notes to treatment goals automatically, tracks intervention effectiveness, and generates case snapshots that show progress over time. Every session builds toward the therapeutic outcome, which makes progress easier to demonstrate to clients, supervisors and payers.

Healthie offers traditional EHR treatment planning with outcome measures and timeline charts. It is functional for basic treatment planning, but there is no automated link between what happened in a session and the goals the plan is tracking.

Smart Sections and customization

Upheal's Smart Sections let therapists create custom AI-powered template sections using their own prompts. You can instruct the AI to capture a specific therapeutic approach: tracking window of tolerance in trauma work, documenting co-regulation techniques, or monitoring family systems dynamics. Section-level customization produces templates that reflect your actual clinical expertise, not a dropdown of presets.

Healthie provides customizable charting templates, and AI Scribe will follow the structure of whichever template you choose, including SOAP and ADIME. Customization stops at template selection and field arrangement rather than extending to the prompts the AI works from.

Compliance Checker for audit readiness

Upheal's Compliance Checker analyzes notes against real payer standards from Aetna and Optum, identifying gaps in medical necessity justification, progress measurement, risk assessment completeness and diagnostic consistency. It returns line-by-line compliance reports, so you can find the documentation elements that would trigger a claim review before you submit rather than after.

Healthie maintains HIPAA compliance and security standards across its EHR. Its AI Charting suite covers note generation and transcripts; compliance review against specific payer requirements is not part of it.

Pricing comparison

Healthie charges a flat monthly subscription. Core is $19.99 per month but covers only 10 active clients, which is too few for most practices. Essentials is $49.99 for up to 250 clients. Plus is $129.99 for unlimited clients. Group is $149.99 plus $50 per clinician. Every plan is 10% cheaper if you pay annually. Verified 5 September 2026; Plus re-checked 30 September 2026.

AI documentation is a separate line. AI Charting is available on Plus plans and above at $35 per month, which includes 40 hours of AI Scribe shared across everyone on the account, with $0.85 per hour after that. So the cheapest Healthie configuration that includes AI notes is $164.99 per month billed monthly, or about $152 billed annually. A solo therapist running 50 fifty-minute sessions would also edge past the 40 included hours. Healthie does offer a 14-day trial of the platform with no credit card required, but their support documentation states that AI Charting is not included in it.

Upheal is $1 per session. You pay for what you use, with no seat fee, and the bill scales down in a quieter month. A 50-session month is $50. The Assistant has a free tier included, and Assistant Pro is $39 a month. For a full caseload, the $99 plan covers unlimited sessions and includes Assistant Pro. There is also a free plan with AI notes and telehealth, and a 30-day full-access trial of the paid plans.

At the caseload most solo therapists run, 40 to 60 sessions a month, that is $40 to $60 on Upheal against $164.99 on Healthie, or about $152 if you commit to a year, for a comparable AI-documented setup. The gap holds at a full caseload too. Upheal's $99 plan covers unlimited sessions and includes Assistant Pro, while Healthie stays at $164.99, or about $152 billed annually, before AI Scribe overage: a hundred fifty-minute sessions use about 83 hours against the 40 included. Healthie's subscription is flat whether you see twenty clients or two hundred, but its AI hours are not.

Group practices are quoted separately. Pricing for group practices depends on the size of the practice, and associates are discounted, so talk to sales for a quote.

Insurance billing and payments

Insurance billing is live on the Upheal EHR plan. Upheal charges $0.30 per claim and $0.15 per eligibility check. There is no monthly fee for billing, and resubmitting a claim is not charged again.

Healthie does not process claims natively. Claims run through a ClaimMD integration available on Essentials plans and above, starting at $30 per month plus a setup fee of $50 to $100. The per-claim fee is ClaimMD's rather than Healthie's and is not published.

Card processing is the same on both platforms at 2.9% plus $0.30 per transaction.

Security and compliance

Upheal is HIPAA, PHIPA, PIPEDA, GDPR, and DPA compliant, has completed a SOC 2 Type II audit, and is continuously externally tested. Upheal signs a BAA with every practice. Session audio is deleted by default. Upheal does not train models on your data without consent. Control status is published publicly at trust.upheal.io.

Healthie is HIPAA compliant, encrypts data in transit and at rest, and states that it does not use customer data to train AI models. Its help centre also lists SOC 2 Type II and HITRUST R2 certification, ONC Certified Health IT status, and PIPEDA and GDPR compliance. On independent certification Healthie holds more than Upheal: if your organization requires HITRUST or ONC certification, Healthie meets that requirement and Upheal does not.

Switching from Healthie

Migration works from any EHR, not just Healthie, and it is free. The Assistant recreates clients, notes, session history, contracts, note templates, and intake and consent forms. If you would rather not do it alone, we will walk you through the move on a call, also free.

Who it's for

Healthie makes sense if you run a multi-disciplinary wellness practice where therapists work alongside dietitians, health coaches or other wellness providers who are already on the platform. Single-platform consistency across specialties is a real operational benefit in those settings, and AI Scribe is a capable scribe.

Upheal makes sense if you run a therapy practice and want an EHR built for behavioral health: AI that understands therapy documentation, compliance checking against mental health payer standards, native insurance billing, and an Assistant that answers questions and runs workflows rather than only producing notes at the end of a session.

Frequently asked questions

Is Healthie built for therapists?

Not specifically. Healthie is a multi-specialty platform serving nutrition, wellness and coaching providers alongside behavioral health. Upheal is built only for mental health practitioners.

Does Healthie have AI notes?

Yes. Healthie's AI Scribe has been generally available since October 2025 and now works across telehealth, in-person and phone sessions. It is sold as part of the AI Charting add-on, available on Plus plans and above at $35 per month with 40 hours included and $0.85 per hour after that. Verified 5 September 2026.

How does Healthie pricing compare to Upheal?

Healthie charges a flat monthly subscription: Core $19.99 for up to 10 active clients, Essentials $49.99 for up to 250, Plus $129.99 for unlimited clients, and Group $149.99 plus $50 per clinician, with 10% off if you pay annually. AI notes need Plus or above plus the $35 add-on, so the cheapest Healthie configuration that includes AI documentation is $164.99 billed monthly, or about $152 billed annually. Upheal is $1 per session, so a 50-session month is $50, and the $99 plan covers unlimited sessions with Assistant Pro included.

Does Upheal have a free plan?

Yes. Upheal has a free plan that includes AI notes and telehealth. The paid plans also come with a 30-day full-access trial. Healthie has no free tier, but it does offer a 14-day trial of the platform with no credit card required. AI Charting is not included in that trial.

Does Healthie have an AI assistant?

Not in the way Upheal does. Healthie's AI Charting suite generates a note and a transcript at the end of a session. Upheal's Assistant is conversational and agentic: you ask it in your own words, about any client, at any time, and it answers from your session history and runs workflows on your behalf. A free tier is included, and Assistant Pro is $39 a month, or included in the $99 plan.

Does Upheal have insurance billing?

Yes. Insurance billing is live on the Upheal EHR plan at $0.30 per claim and $0.15 per eligibility check, with no monthly billing fee, and resubmitting a claim is not charged again. Healthie does not process claims natively; it integrates with ClaimMD on Essentials plans and above, starting at $30 per month plus a $50 to $100 setup fee.

How do Upheal and Healthie compare on compliance and security?

Upheal is HIPAA, PHIPA, PIPEDA, GDPR, and DPA compliant, has completed a SOC 2 Type II audit, and is continuously externally tested, and it signs a BAA with every practice. Healthie states HIPAA, PIPEDA and GDPR compliance, SOC 2 Type II and HITRUST R2 certification, and ONC Certified Health IT status. If your organization requires HITRUST or ONC certification, Healthie meets that requirement and Upheal does not.

Can I move my data from Healthie to Upheal?

Yes, and migration is free. It works from any EHR. The Assistant recreates clients, notes, session history, contracts, note templates, intake and consent forms, and chart files, each filed to the right client. You can also book a guided migration call at no cost.