How do I upgrade from free to Pro mid-cycle?

Great point. I had not considered the angle you raised in the second paragraph — it reframes the whole thing for me.

I respectfully disagree on one detail. In my setup the opposite held true, though I suspect it comes down to community size.

One caveat for larger communities: keep an eye on the indexes. At a few thousand rows the difference is night and day.

We ran into the same situation last quarter. What worked for us was starting small and only adding complexity when a real need showed up.

Solid breakdown. The only thing I would add is to back up before making the change — better safe than sorry.

Adding a small note: the same idea applies on mobile, just with a bit more attention to tap targets.

Tried this on a staging copy first and it behaved exactly as described. Confident enough to roll it to production now.

This matches my experience exactly. The hard part is staying consistent once the initial novelty wears off.