10 Python Scripts That Replace Paid SaaS Tools

I know what you’re thinking: every other SaaS tool promises to “save you time” but ends up draining your wallet instead. $29/month here, $59/month there — before you know it, you’re paying more for tools than Netflix, Spotify, and your gym membership combined.

The good news? Python can quietly replace half of those tools in less than 30 lines of code. No subscriptions. No “Pro Plan.” Just pure Python magic. Let’s get into it.

1. Send Beautiful Reports via Email (Goodbye Mailchimp’s $13/mo) You don’t need fancy automation software to send daily/weekly email reports. Here’s a Python script that does it for free.

import smtplib
from email.mime.text import MIMEText
from email.mime.multipart import MIMEMultipart

def send_report(subject, body, to_email):
    msg = MIMEMultipart()
    msg['From'] = "[email protected]"
    msg['To'] = to_email
    msg['Subject'] = subject
    msg.attach(MIMEText(body, 'html'))

    with smtplib.SMTP('smtp.gmail.com', 587) as server:
        server.starttls()
        server.login("[email protected]", "your_password")
        server.send_message(msg)

send_report("Weekly Report", "<h1>Your Data</h1><p>Everything looks good ✅</p>", "[email protected]")

👉 If you’re paying Mailchimp just to send templated emails, this is your exit strategy.

2. Auto-Schedule Social Media Posts (Buffer at $6/mo → Python at $0)

Schedule tweets or LinkedIn posts without Buffer or Hootsuite.

import schedule, time
import requests

def post_tweet(content):
    url = "https://api.twitter.com/2/tweets"
    headers = {"Authorization": "Bearer YOUR_ACCESS_TOKEN"}
    requests.post(url, headers=headers, json={"text": content})

schedule.every().day.at("09:00").do(post_tweet, "Automated post via Python 🚀")

while True:
    schedule.run_pending()
    time.sleep(60)

💡 Fun Fact: Twitter’s API is free for small projects. So why pay Buffer $72/year?

3. Expense Tracker with Graphs (Mint at $5/mo? Nope.) Track your spending and visualize it in a chart.

import pandas as pd
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

data = {
    'Category': ['Food', 'Rent', 'Utilities', 'Subscriptions'],
    'Amount': [250, 1000, 200, 75]
}

df = pd.DataFrame(data)
df.plot(kind='bar', x='Category', y='Amount', legend=False)
plt.title("Monthly Expenses")
plt.show()

This isn’t just Mint-lite. You control the data, the categories, the insights.

4. Automated Meeting Transcription (Otter.ai at $16/mo) Otter is great. But Python + OpenAI’s Whisper model is free.

import whisper

model = whisper.load_model("base")
result = model.transcribe("meeting.mp3")
print(result["text"])

🎤 Upload a Zoom recording → get instant transcription without paying Otter.

5. Website Analytics Dashboard (Google Analytics Alternative) Track visitors on your site with just Python.

from flask import Flask, request
import json

app = Flask(__name__)
logs = []

@app.route('/')
def home():
    logs.append({'ip': request.remote_addr})
    return "Hello Visitor!"

@app.route('/analytics')
def analytics():
    return json.dumps(logs)

app.run(port=5000)

Run this, and you’ve built a mini Google Analytics. No creepy tracking cookies, no dashboards that look like airplane cockpits.

Quick Pause

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6. Simple Helpdesk Ticketing (Zendesk at $49/mo) Turn incoming emails into “tickets.”

import imaplib, email

mail = imaplib.IMAP4_SSL("imap.gmail.com")
mail.login("[email protected]", "your_password")
mail.select("inbox")
status, messages = mail.search(None, "UNSEEN")

for num in messages[0].split():
    typ, msg_data = mail.fetch(num, "(RFC822)")
    msg = email.message_from_bytes(msg_data[0][1])
    print(f"New Ticket: {msg['subject']}")

👀 If all you need is a way to keep track of customer requests, this beats Zendesk’s pricing.

7. Real-Time Team Chatbot (Slack Bot Without Slack) Who needs Slack when Python + Telegram does the job?

import requests

TOKEN = "YOUR_BOT_TOKEN"
CHAT_ID = "YOUR_CHAT_ID"

def send_message(text):
    url = f"https://api.telegram.org/bot{TOKEN}/sendMessage"
    requests.post(url, data={"chat_id": CHAT_ID, "text": text})

send_message("Hello team, update complete ✅")

That’s a Slack replacement in 8 lines.

8. Generate Invoices (Freshbooks at $15/mo) Automate invoice creation with PDFs.

from reportlab.lib.pagesizes import letter
from reportlab.pdfgen import canvas
def create_invoice(filename, client, amount):
    c = canvas.Canvas(filename, pagesize=letter)
    c.drawString(100, 750, f"Invoice for {client}")
    c.drawString(100, 730, f"Amount: ${amount}")
    c.save()

create_invoice("invoice.pdf", "Acme Corp", 1200)

No need for Freshbooks unless you enjoy subscription charges.

9. Personal Knowledge Base (Notion Alternative) Turn Markdown files into a searchable knowledge base.

import os

def search_notes(query, folder="notes"):
    for file in os.listdir(folder):
        if file.endswith(".md"):
            with open(os.path.join(folder, file)) as f:
                if query.lower() in f.read().lower():
                    print(f"Match found in: {file}")

search_notes("python decorators")

Because sometimes Notion feels like using a rocket launcher to open a peanut.

10. Automated Newsletter Scraper (Feedly at $6/mo) Pull the latest articles and email them to yourself.

import feedparser, smtplib

feed = feedparser.parse("https://news.ycombinator.com/rss")
articles = [entry.title for entry in feed.entries[:5]]
msg = "\n".join(articles)

server = smtplib.SMTP("smtp.gmail.com", 587)
server.starttls()
server.login("[email protected]", "your_password")
server.sendmail("[email protected]", "[email protected]", msg)
server.quit()

That’s Feedly, Medium Digest, and Substack rolled into one.

Read the full article here: https://medium.com/@abdur.rahman12/10-python-scripts-that-replace-paid-saas-tools-1dd87befd3f3