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

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

For what it is worth, the same approach works with the PMPro adapter — the membership side is identical from here.

Strong agree. Good defaults beat a wall of toggles every single time.

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

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

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

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