Best Church Management Software by Church Size (2026)

For most churches of 200 to 1,000 people, Planning Center is the best church management software in 2026. Its People database is free with no cap, every other app works from that same database, and you add Check-Ins, Giving, Groups, and the rest only as you need them, starting at $15 a month per app. If you’d rather pay one flat bill, Gracely Pro is $49 a month billed annually for unlimited people. Past 1,000 people, look at Realm and Rock RMS. If you run more than one campus, start with the Complete tier of Pushpay ChMS.

A church of 250 and a church of 2,500 need different things from the same database, so I sorted the 12 platforms below by the church size each one fits. Every price comes from the vendor’s own site.

Best Church Management Software by Church Size

How I Chose

Prices verified on each company’s own site on September 25, 2026.

REACHRIGHT doesn’t sell church management software. We build church websites and run church marketing. Several platforms here include or bundle a website (ChurchTrac, Gracely, Servant Keeper Complete, and Tithely’s $119 bundle), and I didn’t move any of them up or down for it. Elvanto and Breeze (now Tithely Church Management) are Tithe.ly products. REACHRIGHT is a Tithe.ly partner and may earn a referral fee when a church signs up through our Tithe.ly links. REACHRIGHT and Spark Development Network, the nonprofit behind Rock RMS, have swapped podcast guest appearances, and we’ve discussed a paid ad sponsorship. No one paid for placement on this page.

I’m the executive pastor of a church of about 300 in Hawaii Kai. I read these pricing pages the way our church office would, asking what each tool will cost after we’ve grown.

Church Management Software Compared

Seven of the 12 platforms publish a paid subscription price. Rock RMS publishes a suggested donation, and Realm, FellowshipOne, Shelby Systems, and Pushpay ChMS price through sales. The numbered sections after these tables follow the size bands, so read each band as its own shortlist.

“None stated” means the vendor’s own pricing page didn’t mention a free plan or trial.

What Each Platform’s Own Page Confirms

This grid shows only what each vendor’s own page listed when I checked it. “Not shown” means the page didn’t cover that feature, which is different from the platform lacking it. Rock’s pricing page is about its donation model, and Elvanto’s says every plan includes all features without listing them, so most of those two rows are empty.

Use this grid to build your demo list. Anything your church needs every Sunday that shows “Not shown” belongs at the top of it.

Best for Churches of 200 to 1,000

Churches between 200 and 1,000 people are where the pricing model starts to matter more than the sticker price. Per-person and per-app plans both step up as you grow, and flat-rate plans hold one price.

1. Planning Center (Best Overall for 200 to 1,000)

Planning Center is the platform I’d hand most churches of 200 to 1,000. People, the core database, is free with no cap on how many people you store, and every other app works from that same database, so there’s nothing to sync between them. A growing staff can turn on Giving, then Check-Ins, then Groups, and each one lands on the same person records.

Other church tools build for it too. Clearstream and Text In Church, the top two picks in our church texting comparison, both integrate with Planning Center, and the giving platforms easyTithe and Kindrid list it as an integration partner. The confirmed features cover a church’s weekly rhythm: check-ins, groups, online giving at 2.15% + $0.30, volunteer scheduling through Services, and the Church Center app for your members.

The main apps each have a free cap: 5 team members in Services, 10 daily check-ins, 10 monthly donations in Giving, 15 members in Groups, and 5 attendees in Registrations. Past the cap, the tiered apps run from $15 to $239 a month. Check-Ins, for example, is $15 for 30 daily check-ins, $69 for 200, and $239 for unlimited. Publishing is $15 or $32, and Music Stand is $5 a month.

Planning Center isn’t the low-cost pick at 200+. As an example with its published tiers, a 500-person church running four apps at mid tiers (200 daily check-ins, 500 monthly donations, 500 group members, and 150 Services team members) pays $276 a month, $69 per app. At 500 people, ChMeetings is $40, Gracely Pro is $49 billed annually, Tithely Church Management is $72, and ChurchTrac is $79. The extra cost buys one connected system you build an app at a time. A church that only needs Services and Check-Ins pays for those two apps and nothing else.

For the full walkthrough of every app, read my Planning Center review.

2. Gracely (Best Flat Rate for 200 to 1,000)

Gracely sells flat tiers with no cap on people at any level, which makes it easy to forecast as your church grows. Pro, the tier a church of 200+ will want, costs $49 a month billed annually or $59 billed monthly, with unlimited people and unlimited admins. It adds child check-in, volunteer scheduling, accounting, and multi-campus support. Standard is $19 a month billed annually ($29 monthly) and is where giving starts, and Gracely includes a website builder.

On price, Gracely is the stronger flat-rate pick on this list. Pro is the lowest published flat price here for a plan that confirms check-in, volunteer scheduling, and accounting, and it costs less than Tithely Church Management’s $72 whether you pay monthly or annually.

The free plan covers unlimited people and member management, with up to 2 admins and 10 emails a month, and you get a 30-day trial of Pro.

3. ChMeetings (Best for Churches Under 1,000 on a Budget)

ChMeetings prices by the number of people, and it stays inexpensive through 1,000. Paid tiers run $12 a month for up to 100 people, $25 for 250, $40 for 500, $50 for 1,000, and $60 for unlimited. It’s also free for up to 50 people, with a cap of 50 donations a month.

The feature list on its own page is long for the price. It confirms check-ins, groups, giving with no platform fee, volunteer scheduling, accounting, a mobile app, and integrations with PayPal, Stripe, Twilio, and Mailchimp. For a church building out staff-led ministries on a small software budget, that covers most of the weekly work for $50 a month at 1,000 people.

4. Tithely Church Management, Formerly Breeze (Flat Price With Text Giving)

Tithely Church Management is the software churches knew as Breeze, now under the Tithe.ly brand. It costs $72 a month flat, with unlimited contacts and unlimited admins, and that price doesn’t change as your church grows. At $72 a month you pay $864 a year whether you have 200 people in your database or 900.

Tithely’s page confirms check-ins, groups, volunteer scheduling, an admin mobile app, and online and text giving. Worship Tools cost $29 a month more. A bundle with Tithely’s apps and Sites, its website product, runs $119 a month. There’s no free plan, but the 30-day free trial gives you time to import your people and run a few Sundays of check-ins before you pay anything.

Tithely costs $13 a month more than Gracely Pro billed monthly and $23 more than Pro billed annually, and its page doesn’t show accounting. It fits a church that wants text giving and an admin app on one flat bill, or one that already gives through Tithe.ly. As I disclosed above, REACHRIGHT is a Tithe.ly partner, and Tithely lands fourth in this band on the same criteria I used for every platform.

5. ChurchTrac (Same Features at Every Tier)

ChurchTrac charges by contact count and gives every tier the same features, so you pay for size alone. Its tiers run $29 a month for up to 75 names, $39 for 125, $59 for 250, $79 for 500, $99 for 1,000, and $119 for unlimited. Its pricing page says every size includes a website and app.

The confirmed feature list is broad: check-ins, groups, giving, volunteer scheduling, fund accounting, and a mobile app. ChurchTrac offers a 30-day free trial with no credit card required.

ChurchTrac no longer has a free plan. Older comparison lists, including an earlier version of ours, still describe one, so trust the current pricing page over older write-ups.

6. Servant Keeper (Best If You Want an App and Livestreaming Bundled)

Servant Keeper sells two flat tiers instead of per-person pricing. Core is $79.99 a month ($73.32 a month billed annually), and Servant Keeper describes it as the plan for smaller ministries. Complete is $159.99 a month for about 8 users, and it adds a website, an app, and livestreaming for what Servant Keeper calls “ministries seeking to become more established.”

Its page confirms check-ins and giving, and the mobile app comes with Complete only. The page lists no free plan or trial.

Complete fits a church of 200+ that wants its database, app, and livestream on one bill. If you already have a website and livestream setup you like, compare Core first. It costs about half as much.

Best for Churches of 1,000+

Churches past 1,000 still have published options. ChMeetings is $50 a month through 1,000 people, Gracely and Tithely stay flat at any size, and ChurchTrac is $99 at 1,000 names. The five platforms below add what a larger church office often shops for: payroll, open-source control, pricing by active adults, or finance tools alongside the database. Realm, FellowshipOne, and Shelby Systems price through a sales conversation, so budget time for demos.

7. Realm (Best for Accounting and Payroll in One System)

Realm, from ACS Technologies, comes in three tiers called Inform, Connect, and Multiply. ACS doesn’t publish a dollar figure for any of them, and the official page states no free plan or trial.

What Realm’s page does confirm is wide. You get check-ins, groups, giving, volunteer scheduling, accounting with payroll, two mobile apps, and API integrations. For a church of 1,000+, keeping accounting and payroll in the same system as your people and giving data means one fewer handoff between the church office and the finance team.

Bring your finance lead to the demo, not only your admin. If your finance team would rather run a separate tool, compare Realm’s accounting against dedicated church accounting software before you decide.

8. Rock RMS (Best for Churches With Developers on Staff)

Rock RMS is free, open-source software supported by donations, with no subscription. Rock asks for a suggested donation of $4.45 per average weekend attendee each year, and it offers grants to churches that can’t afford the suggested amount.

Hosting is the bigger decision. The software costs nothing to download, but someone has to install it, update it, and keep the server running, or you pay a hosting partner to do it. That’s why Rock fits best when someone on your staff or volunteer team is comfortable running open-source software.

Rock says it serves “churches of all sizes, from a single staff member to a multisite team,” and its page states multisite support outright. The donation model scales with attendance, so each added weekend attendee raises the suggested amount by $4.45 instead of bumping you into a new price tier. For features, setup, and what running it takes, read our complete Rock RMS review. As disclosed above, REACHRIGHT and Spark Development Network have swapped podcast appearances and discussed a paid ad sponsorship.

9. Elvanto (Published Prices by Active Adults)

Elvanto prices by the number of active adults and charges a flat $149 setup fee on every tier. It starts at $19 a month for up to 50 active adults ($15.20 billed annually), and its pricing page publishes every level from there: $78 a month at 200 active adults, $234 at 1,000, $375 at 3,000, and $413 for unlimited, billed monthly. Annual billing is 80% of the monthly price. Elvanto says every plan includes all the features, with no add-on modules.

Elvanto merged with Tithe.ly in 2018 and is now a Tithe.ly company, so the Tithe.ly disclosure above applies here too.

The pricing page shows no free plan, and I couldn’t confirm a free trial on Elvanto’s own site. Check how Elvanto counts an active adult before you compare it with plans that count people or names.

10. FellowshipOne (Accounting Built In)

FellowshipOne, a Ministry Brands product, says it serves more than 4,000 churches. Its page confirms check-ins, groups, giving, volunteer scheduling, accounting, and a mobile app, which puts it alongside Realm as a system that covers the finance side of the church office too. Pricing sits behind a demo, there’s no free plan, and the page doesn’t label its plans by church size.

11. Shelby Systems (Free Trial Before You Get a Quote)

Shelby Systems, also a Ministry Brands product, sells ShelbyNext and says it serves more than 3,000 churches in the United States. Its church management page confirms check-ins, groups, and volunteer scheduling. It’s the only quote-only platform on this list whose page offers a free trial, and the 30 days let you test it before the pricing conversation. Online giving (ShelbyNext Online Giving) and accounting (ShelbyNext Financials) are separate products, so price both if you need them.

Best for Multisite Churches

A multisite church needs one database that still lets each campus run its own ministries. Pushpay ChMS and Rock RMS (#8) both market multisite support on their own pages, and Gracely (#2) includes multi-campus support in its Pro tier at $49 a month billed annually.

12. Pushpay ChMS, Formerly Church Community Builder (Best for Large Multisite Churches)

Pushpay ChMS is the church management software once called Church Community Builder. It comes in three tiers, Core, Advanced, and Complete, and Pushpay says Complete is the tier built for multisite churches. None of the three has a published price. The pricing page keeps sending you to talk to an expert, and Pushpay offers a demo but no free plan.

Its pricing page lists groups on Core and adds check-in and volunteer scheduling on Advanced, and its ChMS page lists all three alongside giving. For a large multisite church that wants giving and the database from one vendor, Pushpay belongs on the shortlist. Get the quote in writing with every campus included.

What Church Management Software Does

Church management software, or ChMS, is the database that holds your people and what they do: who attends, who gives, who serves, which group they’re in, and which kids are checked in on Sunday. You’ll also hear it called church membership software, though every platform on this list goes past a membership roll.

The features that show up across these platforms are check-ins, groups, online giving, volunteer scheduling, accounting, a mobile app for staff or members, and multisite support. For a church of 200+, check-in and volunteer scheduling touch the most people every Sunday, so test those two hardest during any trial.

Giving is the feature to look at twice. Some platforms build it in, and Shelby sells it as a separate product. If you already use a giving platform you like, confirm it connects to the ChMS you’re considering before you move your donors. Our online giving platform comparison covers the giving side in detail.

How Church Management Software Is Priced

Five pricing models show up on this list.

ChMeetings, ChurchTrac, and Elvanto charge per-person tiers, by how many people or active adults you track. They start cheap and move you up as you grow.

Gracely, Tithely Church Management, and Servant Keeper charge flat rates. Gracely includes unlimited people on every tier, Tithely’s $72 is the same at any size, and Servant Keeper splits its two tiers by features and users. Planning Center prices per app: its main apps each have a free cap, then paid tiers from $15 to $239 a month, so your bill depends on how many apps you run and how heavily you use each one. Rock RMS is donation-based, with free software, a suggested $4.45 per weekend attendee per year, and hosting on top. Realm, FellowshipOne, Shelby Systems, and Pushpay ChMS are quote only.

Price each option at the size you expect to be in two years. Every system switch costs your staff time in data imports and retraining, so buy for where your church is headed.

How to Pick

Start with the size of your church today and where you expect it to be, then match the tool to the job:

• If you’re 200 to 1,000 and want one connected system you build app by app, start with Planning Center People.
• If you want one flat price with unlimited people, trial Gracely Pro at $49 a month billed annually.
• If budget is the first filter and you’re under 1,000 people, price ChMeetings at your real headcount.
• If you want text giving and an admin app on a flat bill, or you already give through Tithe.ly, trial Tithely Church Management at $72 a month.
• If you’re past 1,000 and want accounting and payroll in the same system, get a Realm quote.
• If you have developers on staff or in your volunteer base, look hard at Rock RMS.
• If you run more than one campus, get a demo of Pushpay ChMS’s Complete tier, and trial Gracely Pro if you’re a smaller multisite church.

If your church is under 200 and money is tight, start free with Planning Center People (no cap) or ChMeetings (free up to 50 people), and see our free church software guide for the rest of a $0 stack. ChurchTrac’s $29 starter tier covers up to 75 names now that its free plan is gone.

During any trial or demo, test four things before you sign: the price at the size you expect to be in two years, how check-in runs with a real Sunday crowd, how you’d export your data if you ever leave, and how fast support answers you.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the best church management software?

For most churches of 200 to 1,000 people, Planning Center. Its People database is free with no cap, every app shares it, and you pay only for the apps you add, starting at $15 a month each. If you want one flat bill, Gracely Pro is $49 a month billed annually for unlimited people. Churches past 1,000 should compare Realm and Rock RMS, and multisite churches should start with the Complete tier of Pushpay ChMS.

How much does church management software cost?

Among the platforms here that publish a subscription price, entry plans run from $12 a month (ChMeetings, up to 100 people) to $79.99 a month (Servant Keeper Core). Planning Center’s paid apps start at $15 a month each, Gracely Standard is $19 billed annually, Elvanto starts at $19 plus a $149 setup fee, ChurchTrac starts at $29, and Tithely Church Management is $72 flat. At 500 people, ChMeetings is $40, Gracely Pro is $49 billed annually, ChurchTrac is $79, and Elvanto is $203 billed monthly. Realm, FellowshipOne, Shelby Systems, and Pushpay ChMS are quote only.

Is there free church management software?

Yes, within limits. Planning Center People is free with no cap on people, and Planning Center’s other apps have small free caps. Gracely’s free plan covers unlimited people with up to 2 admins and 10 emails a month. ChMeetings is free up to 50 people. Rock RMS is free open-source software, though it asks for a suggested donation and you pay for hosting. For a full $0 stack beyond the database, see our free church software guide.

What happened to Breeze ChMS?

Breeze is now Tithely Church Management. It costs $72 a month flat with unlimited contacts and unlimited admins. You can add Worship Tools for $29 a month, or bundle Tithely’s apps and Sites for $119 a month. It has no free plan, but it offers a 30-day free trial. REACHRIGHT is a Tithe.ly partner and may earn a referral fee when a church signs up through our Tithe.ly links.

Does ChurchTrac still have a free plan?

No. ChurchTrac’s pricing page showed no free plan when I checked it on September 25, 2026. Paid plans start at $29 a month for up to 75 names, then run $59 at 250, $79 at 500, $99 at 1,000, and $119 for unlimited names, with the same features at every tier. You can try it free for 30 days with no credit card.

How much does Rock RMS cost?

The software is free and open source. Rock asks for a suggested donation of $4.45 per average weekend attendee each year, which works out to $1,335 for a church averaging 300. You also pay for hosting, either your own server or a bundled fee from one of Rock’s two approved cloud hosting partners. Grants are available for churches that can’t afford the suggested donation.

What is the best church management software for multisite churches?

Pushpay ChMS and Rock RMS both market multisite support on their own pages, and Pushpay says its Complete tier is built for multisite churches. Pushpay is quote only, and Rock is free software with a suggested donation. For a smaller church launching a second campus, Gracely Pro includes multi-campus support at $49 a month billed annually, with a 30-day trial.