One of the most exciting chapters in church history is the church growth movement. According to Wikipedia, this movement first took root in the 1970s. It was pioneered by Howard G. Hendricks and Harold R. McCloud among others who were influenced by the writings of Donald McGavran and Robert K. Greenleaf (who may not be as well known but wrote a book called The Servant Leader). This period gave rise to numerous other authors who continue to be influential among today’s church leaders including, John Maxwell, Bill Hybels, and Rick Warren who continue to write about church revival. They all have one thing in common: they know you need software for church revival for your ministry to succeed.
Best church management software
Our shortlist of the best church management tools:
- Wild Apricot – Best free ChMS for small churches
- Elvanto – Best all-inclusive ChMS
- Breeze – Best for ease of use
- Chmeetings – Best for price
- TouchPoint – Best mobile app experience
- Blackbaud – Best for managing people, ministries, and payments, all in one place
- Excellerate Church Management – Best for on-site local network installation
- Fellowship One – Best all-in-one solution
- Shelby Systems – Best CHMs for larger churches
- Servant Keeper – Best for expandability
What is Church Management Software?
Church Management software (sometimes referred to as ChMS) is a suite of online tools that helps churches organize, automate and manage their daily church operations.
Now you’ve seen the eclectic mix of church management software in our list, you’ll see it’s a wide range of software and SaaS tools that make running a thriving and growing church more effective, easier, and better. It does this by providing a combination of tools that support and in many ways, automate, church administration.
Related Read: What Every Lead Pastor Needs To Know About Church Metrics.
What can Church Management Software do for my Church?
Church Management software is designed to streamline church administration, providing functionality for a host of different needs that churches have including communication, membership management, small groups and event registration, mass communication, check-in, and donor management. Below we break down the functionality you can expect and look out for in the tools listed below.
Church Management Software Functionality
Church management software (ChMS) features typically include:
- Membership management – maintain an up-to-date member directory including family and contact information for your congregation.
- Attendance tracking – Keep track of your congregation’s involvement and facilitate Covid-19 contact tracing.
- Donor & Giving management – provides a secure channel of collection and management of tithes, donations, online giving, and other contributions from church members.
- Financial accounting – assists in the management of resources, tracking of expenses, and reporting.
- Communication tools – Send mass emails and/or text messages to all members
- Events management – easily organize events for social activities and outreach opportunities
- Volunteer management – Scheduling tools to manage large groups of volunteers to make running your church services as smooth as possible.
- Check-in and child security management – a vital tool to ensure the safety of all minors placed in the care of church leaders during Sunday School or other activities.
- Website builder – Tools to allow you to create and deploy your church website.
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The 10 Best Church Management Software Overviews
In this post, we’ve tried to cover a broad spectrum of software, considering the complexity, price points, and functionality. But as much as anything, it’ll come down to your church and what features and functionality you need to make it function better. Have a look and sign up for some trials to test-drive and find the best church management software for your case.
1. Wild Apricot – Best free church management software for small churches
- Price: Free for up to 50 contacts
- Trial: Free 30 day trial (no credit card required)
Wild Apricot is a powerful, easy-to-use, web-based church management system for churches and non-profits to help manage administrative tasks, membership, website, event registration, and other activities.
Wild Apricot is a complete membership management system. Easily manage your contacts, process payments, send out emails, and register event attendees. You can also build a website for your organization using professionally designed and mobile-friendly templates.
Wild Apricot is designed for volunteer-run and small staff organizations with a user-friendly interface that doesn’t require a lot of technical knowledge. You will also have access to the user community of peers and experts to get support and share knowledge of best practices.
Pros
- Easy to use
- Competitive pricing
- Highly customizable
Cons
- Limited choice of website templates
2. Elvanto – Best all-inclusive ChMS
- Price: $50/month
- Trial: Demo call available
Elvanto is an all-in-one cloud-based solution with many innovative features. Elvanto streamlines pastoral and administrative duties. Plan worship activities, manage finances and engage with church members.
Elvanto has an all-inclusive range of tools with no add-on modules and no extra charges. Some of the main features include access control, customizable forms, custom reports, mobile apps, event management, group management, email and SMS messaging, volunteer scheduling, and attendance tracking.
Elvanto makes the planning of worship services and managing volunteers simple. Create run sheets, schedule your volunteers, access your song database, lyrics, and chords. It has a simple drag and drop interface that makes quickly creating service plans for your team a breeze.
Child check-in, privacy, and safety are some of the key features integrated into Elvanto, vital for children and youth leaders to ensure all in their care are accounted for.
Elvanto also has powerful features for accessing financial data, contribution management, and has the ability to connect with various online giving providers.
Pros
- Great integration with 3rd party financial partners
Cons
- Some features like check-in don’t always work reliably.
3. Breeze – Best for ease of use
- Price: Starting at $50/month
- Trial: Instant Demo available
Breeze is an easy-to-use web-based church management system designed with small churches to mid-sized churches in mind. With Breeze, you can easily add new data, send mass emails and text messages, track attendance and check-in children securely, and process donations online and by text message. Breeze requires no contract or set up fee and offers a data migration service to get you started quickly.
Breeze makes it easy to manage your church’s database, communicate with your members via email or text message, offer online and text giving, safely check-in children, manage events and volunteers, run reports, and much more!
Pros
- easy data transfer from other systems
- responsive customer support
Cons
- Some features are quite basic
4. CHMeetings – Best for price
- Price: Free for 100 people. Starting at $10/month for up to 250 people.
- Trial: Not available
CHMeetings is a powerful church management system designed for churches of all sizes and denominations. Easily manage church membership, groups, events, follow-up, and broadcasts.
CHMeetings transforms your workflow by doing it all online. You can create registration forms, see who already submitted theirs, and view attendance data of all events. Check-in is easy for leaders and members via the app. You can also offer your members an easy option to manage their online giving and event fees and easily generate up-to-date financial reports.
Managing the legal, security, and privacy aspects of your data are made easy, and with account restriction settings you have total control over which data individuals can access. CHMeetings include state-of-the-art security features and firewall technology. No matter what device you access data from, it will be secure. CHMeetings also makes daily backups of your data.
Pros
- Very affordable, tiered pricing based on church size
- Up-to-date security and firewall features
Cons
- The mobile app could use some improvements
5. TouchPoint – Best mobile app experience
- Price: $300/year (based on a 100-member church)
- Trial: Not available
TouchPoint is a substantial cloud-based church management software solution that equips church leaders and administrators of mid-sized churches to large churches looking for an off the shelf ChMS which is also highly customizable. A fully-integrated mobile app helps you with membership management, volunteer management, child check-in, discipleship groups, ministry engagement, tithes, events, media, and more.
Pros
- Responsive tech support
- Best-in-class mobile app
Cons
- Initial setup has a steep learning curve
- Slow to implement updates
6. Blackbaud – Best for managing people, ministries, and payments, all in one place
- Price: Contact Blackbaud for a quote
- Trial: Not available
Blackbaud Church Management Software is a cloud-based tool that can effectively manage your people, gifts, communications, events, and volunteers all in one place.
Better understand how your congregation is engaging with your church through a single source of data. With connected Financial Management, Payments, and more, on one digital platform. Simplify tithes and online giving for your congregation with one-time and recurring giving options via a connected giving app. With Faith Journey tracking you can get a better understanding of your members using comprehensive member and family profiles.VISIT WEBSITE
7. Excellerate Church Management – Best for on-site local network installation
- Price: Free for 50 members. Starting at $145 for 100 members (some features omitted).
- Trial: Not available
Excellerate Church Management Software is a comprehensive and flexible solution that is highly adaptable to your church needs, including membership management, visitor follow-up, small groups, fundraising, child check-In, volunteer scheduling, and more.
Pros
- A choice between cloud-based or on-site installation.
- No monthly subscription for on-site installations and cost varies based on church size
Cons
- Accessing technical support costs extra
- Some knowledge of SQL is helpful.
8. Fellowship One – Best all-in-one solution
- Price: Starting at $19.60 per month
- Trial: Not offered
Fellowship One’s church management software suite of tools allows for easily accessible and automated management of member data. Rapidly assimilate new visitors and reduce the workload of your staff. Members can access and update their own data and stay connected to the community through a central, online environment.
You can automate communication with mass email, using attractive newsletter templates and easily target specific demographics or groups, and maintain quality personal connections with all your members as your church grows in size
Pros
- All-in-one solution
Cons
- Not so user friendly
- Outdated Interface
9. Shelby Systems – Best CHMs for larger churches
- Price: Starting at $35.13/month
- Trial: Not offered
Shelby Arena is a full church management software solution with strong, ministry-oriented tools and seamless integration with Shelby Financials and ShelbyNext Giving. Shelby Systems can help you increase your outreach in many ways to both current and potential new members.
Designed for mid-size to large Churches, it is a cloud-based membership management tool that helps with child check-ins, attendance tracking, room reservations, and more.
Pros
- Unlimited access to technical support and training resources
- Competitive monthly pricing based on church size
Cons
- The desktop app is Windows only
- The complex interface requires some technical knowledge
- The software is not updated regularly
10. Servant Keeper – Best for expandability
- Price: Starting at $10/month + app licenses
- Trial: Free demo available
Powerful, easy-to-use church management system for attendance tracking, donor management, mass communication via email or text, child check-in, custom financial reporting, and much more! Available across multiple platforms, including Windows/Mac and iOS/Android. Servant Keeper offers a cloud-based solution or an on-site solution that runs on your church’s network.
Pros
- Choose between an on-site or cloud-based solution
Cons
- The desktop app requires an expensive license for every computer it’s run on.
Church Management Software Comparison Criteria
It’s worth thinking about what makes a good church management software solution. To be featured on this list, I evaluated the church management tools based on the following criteria:
- Value for money: How appropriate is the price for its features, capabilities, and use case? Is pricing clear, transparent, and flexible?
- User Interface (UI): How well-designed is it? Does it offer clear displays and intuitive navigation?
- Usability: Is this resources management system easy to learn and master? Are there tutorials and training? Does the company offer good tech and user support?
- Features & Functionality: How many of the key features and functions does it provide, and how powerful are they?
- Integrations: Is it easy to connect with other tools? Any pre-built integrations?
- Customizable: Can you customize and adapt the software to your church and team’s specific needs?
It’s worth comparing different tools as they’re set at different price points, different functionalities (such as timesheets, expenses, approval workflows, task management), and different 3rd party integrations.
Conclusion
Church Revival is a tool that uses software to help churches. Since the religious industry is worth billions of dollars, software like Church Revival can be a great way for individuals to start their own businesses and make money. One of the biggest advantages to using software instead of hiring someone else to do it for you, for example, is cost efficiency.