What Deltek Ajera really costs a small architecture firm

These are estimates, not quotes. Deltek does not publish Ajera prices. Every dollar figure below comes from a third-party site, is labeled with its source and the date we checked it, and may be out of date. Your invoice and your Deltek rep are the source of truth.

The short answer

At ITQlick’s estimate of $60 to $90 per user per month, a firm of 10 to 40 people would pay $7,200 to $43,200 a year in licenses, before implementation. Where your firm lands depends on how many seats you pay for. We could not find any price published by Deltek itself.

Estimated cost for 10, 20, and 40 people

The math is simple: seats x monthly price x 12. We assume every person who logs time needs a seat. Confirm that with your rep.

Sources and dates:

• $60 to $90 per user per month, $5,000 to $20,000 implementation for small and mid firms: ITQlick, Deltek Ajera pricing, seen in search results on 2026-09-27. The page itself blocked our direct request, so we cite the figures as shown in search.
• “Pricing available upon request”: Software Advice, Deltek Ajera profile, checked 2026-09-27.
• Deltek does not share pricing and charges extra for customization, migration, training, and maintenance: Monograph, Deltek Ajera alternatives, updated 2025-05-12, checked 2026-09-27.

What the table leaves out

• Training, customization, and migration. Monograph says these cost extra. We do not have a sourced number, so ask your rep.
• Price increases at renewal. Check your contract for an annual increase clause.
• Staff time. Hours spent on the timesheet screen, rebuilding reports in spreadsheets, and asking the office manager for help are real costs, even if they never show up on an invoice.

Who in a small firm might use which part

Ajera is Deltek’s project accounting and project management product for architecture and engineering firms: timesheets, project budgets, invoicing from project data, AP and AR, general ledger, and resource dashboards (Deltek, Ajera product page). Deltek does sell it to very small firms. Its own customer story on Osterlund Architects features a 10-person practice.

Our working guess, based on public reviews and not a survey, is that use splits in two:

• The office manager or bookkeeper uses the accounting side: billing, AR, AP, the ledger.
• Everyone else mostly logs time by project and phase, and maybe checks whether a project is over budget.

Check this against your own firm. If most of your seats exist only so people can enter hours, you are paying accounting software prices for a timesheet.

What reviewers complain about

Ajera has 3.6 out of 5 on Capterra across 62 reviews, with 3.4 for ease of use (Capterra reviews, checked 2026-09-27). Some of what reviewers wrote:

• Speed. A civil engineering firm owner: “Incredibly slow. Think 1990’s modem speed.”
• Ease of use. An architecture designer: “Hard to use, ugly, and poor customer service.” A civil engineering HR reviewer: “Basic tasks can be impossible without assistance.”
• Bugs. A real estate COO says it “has bugs in nearly every module.”
• Project management fit. Reviewers say using it for project management and business development is “not ideal” for small firms and staff without accounting training.

To be fair, several reviewers say the accounting side works well.

Your options

1. Keep it as is

Right if most people use more than timesheets, your accountant depends on it, and the cost is a small share of revenue. Still worth a seat count before renewal.

2. Trim seats

Pull the user list. Mark each person as active, time entry only, or inactive. Then check: are any seats held by former staff or finished contractors? Does anyone only view reports? Ask whether Deltek has a cheaper role for time entry only or view only users.

3. Keep Ajera for accounting, move time and budgets to a firm-owned tool

Keep the ledger, billing, and AR in Ajera, where several reviewers say it works well. Move timesheets and project budget tracking into a small tool the firm owns: staff enter hours by project and phase, principals see fee versus hours burned per phase, and a regular export goes to Ajera for invoicing, if your Ajera setup can import it. The goal is fewer paid seats and less training for people who only log time. The catch: you need someone to build and maintain it, and the export into Ajera has to be tested before you drop any seats. To see what this looks like, try our time and budget demo (fake data, runs in your browser).

4. Switch completely

Moving to another A/E product, or to general accounting software with a separate time tool, can make sense if the whole package no longer fits. Plan for exporting historical projects and billing, a period running both systems, and an accountant who knows the new setup. This is the biggest change of the four, so consider testing the smaller ones first.

Questions to ask your Deltek rep

1. How exactly are seats counted? Does someone who only enters time need a full seat?
2. Is there a cheaper role or license for time entry only or view only users?
3. What is our current per-user price, and what is the annual increase in our contract?
4. Which modules are we paying for, and when did anyone last use each one?
5. Can we reduce seats mid-term, or only at renewal? What is the notice period?
6. What does it cost to import hours from an outside timesheet tool? Is there an API or a supported import format?
7. How do we export all project, time, and billing data, and in what format?

Write down each answer with the date and the name of the person who gave it.

Get a second opinion before renewal

Start free: email the tools your firm pays for, with seats paid and people who use each, and within 2 business days you get a one-page Software Cost Snapshot with the yearly cost per tool and 3 questions for renewal. No obligation.

If one workflow looks expensive, the $350 Workflow Ownership Audit is the next step. It looks at one workflow, here your time and budget tracking in Ajera, and what it really costs you. You get a written keep, repair, switch, or build recommendation with the math visible. Sometimes the answer is to keep Ajera exactly as it is. If we later build a tool for you, the $350 is credited toward the build. See how the audit works.