NaillyHere is the straight answer for 2026, in US dollars, for the United States and Canada: a basic gel manicure on your natural nails runs $35–60. Gel extensions — gel-X, hard gel over forms, builder with tips — run $55–90. Nail art sits on top of either: simple accents from about $5 per nail, intricate hand-painted work anywhere from $10 to $25 per nail. A full set with real art therefore lands most often between $70 and $150, and in Manhattan, Toronto, LA or Vancouver the whole scale shifts up by roughly 20–40%, while a suburban or small-city chair can sit 20% below it.
Those are the numbers you came for. The more useful thing this article can do is explain why the range is that wide — because once you understand what you are actually buying, the difference between a $45 set and a $110 set stops looking like a markup and starts looking like two different products.
What you are paying for (it is mostly time)
A gel appointment has three cost inputs, and only one of them is polish. Product is the smallest: even premium Japanese gel adds a few dollars a set. The second is skill — years of training expressed as prep that prevents lifting, an apex that prevents breaking, lines that do not wobble. The third, and by far the largest, is time. A plain one-colour gel mani is about an hour of a professional's day. A long coffin set with chrome, 3D flowers and a hand-painted tortoise accent is three hours, sometimes four. When an artist quotes $130 for that set, she is not charging $130 for nails; she is charging roughly $40–45 an hour for skilled labour, which is less than your plumber.
This is why describing your design precisely before you sit down matters financially, not just aesthetically. An artist quoting a screenshot is guessing at hours; an artist quoting an exact per-finger spec can price the real work. Vague requests get padded quotes — the padding is the artist insuring herself against the version of the design she cannot see yet.
The line items, decoded
When a quote surprises you, it is usually one of these:
Removal ($10–20). Soaking off an old set safely takes 15–30 minutes. Salons that fold it into the price have simply hidden it; salons that line-item it are being transparent, not greedy.
Length and shape ($5–15). Longer nails need more structure and more filing time. Sculpted stiletto and ballerina cost more than short round because they take genuinely longer to build and refine.
Finish work ($5–10 per effect). Chrome powder, cat-eye magnets, aura airbrushing — each is a separate process with its own materials and minutes.
French tips ($10–20 per set). The most deceptively expensive "simple" look in nails. Ten perfect smile lines are slow, and everyone can see the one that is not perfect.
Fills change the math entirely
Here is where gel budgeting actually gets decided. A new set is the expensive event; a fill — where the artist works the grow-out gap and refreshes the set — typically costs $40–65, roughly 60–70% of the new-set price, and takes less time. A client who gets a fresh $90 set every visit spends very differently from one who gets a $90 set, then two $50 fills, then resets. Over twelve weeks that is $270 versus $190 for hands that look done the entire time. The rhythm matters more than the sticker price: most sets hit their refill window at about three weeks, and that three-week clock is the real unit of gel economics.
The cheapest chair is often the most expensive
The $30 walk-in special is real, and sometimes it is exactly what you need. But price a set the way you price shoes — per wear, not per purchase. A $35 set that lifts at day six cost you about $5.80 per day of good nails. An $80 set from a meticulous artist that wears cleanly for 21 days cost $3.80. The cheap set was 50% more expensive, and that is before you count the emergency repair visit, the peeled layers of natural nail, or the set you paid to remove early because you could not stand looking at it. Rushed prep is the usual culprit — invisible at checkout, unmistakable by week two.
How to actually budget for your nails
Work in cost-per-week-worn, not cost-per-visit. Take the quote, add expected fills, divide by the weeks the cycle covers. A $75 set plus a $50 fill carrying you six weeks is about $21 a week. Decide what weekly number you are comfortable with — for most regulars it lands between $15 and $30 — and design to it. This is also the honest way to compare systems: gel, acrylic, BIAB and press-ons have wildly different sticker prices but surprisingly close per-week costs once lifespan is counted.
And design to it before the chair, not in it. The most expensive moment in any appointment is the improvised upgrade — "actually, could we also…" — priced mid-service with no chance to think. When you arrive with the full set specified finger by finger, the quote comes first and complete. This is, incidentally, the quiet financial argument for designing your set in a proper studio tool like Nailly first: artists quote the exact layered design you send, so the number you agree to is the number you pay.
One number this article deliberately left out
The tip. It is not included in any figure above, it should be in your budget, and it has enough etiquette attached — percentages, cash versus app, the owner question — that it earned its own article. Short version: plan for roughly another fifth on top of everything here, and read the long version before your next appointment.