WordPress exhibition booth booking plugin: free or BoothMap?
Choosing an exhibition booth booking plugin for WordPress: the free Expo Booth Booking or BoothMap ($39)? What each does, where each stops, which to pick. Both put clickable stands on your hall plan and sell them through WooCommerce, so the difference is not whether they work. It is how you place the stands, what happens while an exhibitor is paying, and how much of the show you can run from one site. The free one is enough more often than you might expect.
What a booth booking plugin has to do
It has to put the stands on top of your hall plan as things a visitor can click, not as a list of stand numbers. Each stand needs at least three states: available, held while someone is paying, and booked. The hold has to expire on its own, or an abandoned cart blocks a stand for days. And the money has to go through a checkout you already trust, which on WordPress means WooCommerce. The longer version of that is in how to sell exhibition stands from a floor plan.
Expo Booth Booking (free, wordpress.org)
Expo Booth Booking is a free plugin by brandjaws. As of October 2026 it is at version 0.1.3, has 10+ active installs and no reviews yet, and was last updated in February 2026, the day after it was first published.
You create an Expo Map, upload the hall image, and describe the stands in JSON: an id, an x and y position as a percentage of the image, a type, and the WooCommerce product the stand sells as. There is no drawing tool; a stand is a marker at a point. Each stand is its own WooCommerce product, and the plugin asks for a simple product with stock set to 1. Variable products are not recommended.
A stand shows as Available, Temporarily Reserved, Booked or Admin Booked. Clicking one asks for a name and email, adds the product to the cart and holds the stand in a WordPress transient for about ten minutes; WooCommerce stock is what makes the booking final. To block a stand for an offline or sponsor deal you set "admin_booked": true in its JSON, which ignores stock. The map goes on a page with a shortcode or an Elementor widget, and the plugin sends no data to outside services.
What is good about it is real: it costs nothing, it is light, and for one event with a modest number of stands and someone who does not mind editing JSON, it does the job.
BoothMap ($39 one-time)
BoothMap, an exhibition booth booking plugin for WordPress, starts from the same hall image but you draw the stands on it in a builder: drag out a rectangle, or click the corners of an odd-shaped stand and close it. No coordinates and no JSON. Each stand gets a label, type, size, price and sponsor tier, and prices can be set per stand or per zone.
A stand in someone’s cart is held for 15 minutes by default, adjustable under Settings → Cart hold, and checkout checks the hold again before the order is created. With multi-select on, one exhibitor can take several adjacent stands in one order, and they are held together or not at all. Bank transfer works too: the stand is held for the order while the money is on its way and confirmed when you mark the order paid. Several plans, halls and shows run side by side on one site, and the exhibitor list exports as CSV. Payment goes through your WooCommerce checkout with no commission; the licence includes a year of updates and the plugin keeps working after it.
What it does not do: show exhibitor names or logos on the public plan, turn the shapes inside an SVG into stands (an SVG is only the background), or handle contracts, badges and lead scanning. And it is not free. Open the demo →
Side by side
| Expo Booth Booking | BoothMap | |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | $39 one-time, one site |
| How stands are placed | JSON with x/y percentages | Drawn in a builder |
| Stand shapes | Point markers | Rectangles and polygons |
| Hold while in the cart | About 10 minutes | 15 minutes, adjustable, re-checked at checkout |
| Price per stand or zone | Per stand (one product each); zones not stated | Per stand or per zone |
| Sponsor tiers | Not stated | Yes |
| Several halls or shows | One Expo Map per plan | Yes, each plan separate |
| Several stands in one order | Not stated | Yes, held together |
| Manual or offline booking | Edit the JSON (admin_booked) | Bank-transfer order holds the stand |
| Exhibitor export | Not stated (name and email in the order) | CSV |
| Page builder | Shortcode, Elementor widget | Shortcode, block |
| Updates | Last updated February 2026 | 1 year included |
Which one should you pick
- One small event, twenty or thirty stands, and someone comfortable with JSON: the free plugin is enough. Set every stand’s stock to 1 and test a booking before you send the link out.
- Several halls or a show that comes back every year, sponsor pricing, odd-shaped stands you would rather draw than measure, or an exhibitor list for the floor manager: BoothMap. The hold that prevents double booking is the part worth testing in the demo.
- Contracts, badges and lead scanning: neither. Both sell the space; that paperwork belongs to a separate tool.