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Planning Center as a ChMS
Equip your team, connect your church
Planning Center for Children's Ministry
Care for families, support volunteers
Planning Center for Church Planters
Set the culture for a growing church
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A roadmap to transition
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Calendar
Event & Facility Scheduling
Check-Ins
Child & Volunteer Attendance
Giving
Donation Processing & Reporting
Groups
Community Organization & Communication
People
Membership Management
Included free with all apps
Publishing
Custom Web & App Content
Registrations
Event Signups & Payments
Services
Service Planning & Volunteer Scheduling
Music Stand
Mobile Music Reader
Church Center
A Mobile App for Your Congregants
Support
Helpful responses in ~1 hour
Getting Started
A roadmap to transition
Integrations
Tools that work with our products
About Us
Our story and our values
Training
Become a Planning Center scholar
Planning Center as a ChMS
Equip your team, connect your church
Planning Center for Children's Ministry
Care for families, support volunteers
Planning Center for Church Planters
Set the culture for a growing church
PricingBlog
Sign upLog in

Planning Center for Church Planters

Set the culture for a healthy, growing church

Whether you’re a house church or launching a new building—Planning Center can help you build relationships, create space for community, receive donations, and prevent burnout.

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Customer quotes

Make Planning Center a part of your language and culture from the beginning. It's so much easier to set the culture than change the culture.

Craig Curtis

Executive Pastor and Church Planter
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Planning Center is free for all church plants for 6 months.

Lay a foundation of communication and organization without worrying about another bill. Then, as your church grows, we’ll grow with you—you can scale your paid plan up or down based on what your church needs.

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Keep people from falling through the cracks

Build a foundation for community by investing in strong relationships from the start.

Remember important details.

Save people’s contact information and important details, like spiritual gifts; and other private notes you want to follow up on later, like prayer requests.

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Follow up with people.

Connect with people after you meet them by creating a step-by-step workflow for how you want to reach out.

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Spread the word.

Let people know what’s going on at your church—whether it’s launch events, community gatherings, or last-minute location changes—via email, text, or push notifications.

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Customer quotes

Planning Center is a game-changing tool that enlarges a pastor's capacity to care for others and builds teams.

Nick Volkening

Lead Pastor and Church Planter

Create a connected community

Give people a way to engage with Church Center—a free mobile app and website where congregants can connect.

Church Planter

Small group chat.

Whether your house church is small enough to literally be a small group, or you have a few break out groups, people can chat with each other throughout the week, and leaders can take attendance and share resources.

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Simple event signups.

Who is bringing what to the potluck? Can we get a headcount for the number of chairs we need on Sunday? Signups can be quick and easy, and you’ll have all the information you need to plan!

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A directory for finding new friends.

Everyone can remember names by seeing each other’s approved contact information and family photo. People can always edit their own profiles and adjust their privacy settings.

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Save money by accepting online donations with low processing fees

You can organize funds, create reports, and accept donations easily and inexpensively.

Accept donations at low cost.

Planning Center charges a flat monthly subscription based on the number of donations you receive—and we don't take any percentage of those donations as they come in. Credit card and ACH donations are processed through Stripe at a low rate.

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Planning Center Discounted Rate

  • 2.15% + $0.30/donation for credit and debit card donations
  • 0% + $0.30 per ACH bank transfer donation

Manage funds and run pledge campaigns.

Organize donations based on separate funds, and then accept pledges for specific projects—like a building fund.

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Simple reporting dashboard for all types of reports.

Filter donations based on the kind of data you want to see and share with others (based on their permissions) or print out anonymized data for elders, sending churches, etc.

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Minimize burnout by maximizing your time

You are likely short-staffed, volunteer-led, bi-vocational, and semi-nocturnal—you need tools to optimize.

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Plan services and events in detail, in advance.

Create an order of service of what is happening when and who is doing what. Even if you’re a house church—who’s bringing donuts? Who’s playing guitar, and which family is responsible for the kids this week?

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Empower volunteers to create and own their systems.

Planning Center has tools for every area of ministry. Give your team access to what they need to get organized, whether it’s prayer group, children’s check-in, set-up, leading worship, and more.

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Protect your people’s sanity (and yours) by scheduling around availability.

Sometimes it’s all-hands-on-deck but, when you can, ask everyone to set their preferences and then automate the schedule, rather than trying to piece things together yourself.

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Reassure families by creating a safe and secure environment for children

Your church might be small now, but it’s never too soon to invest in safety systems.

Require background checks for volunteers.

Even if you only have a few volunteers at the start, verifying their history can add a layer of protection and build trust.

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Create a process for secure check-in/check-out.

Check children into events quickly and safely, then match the code on children’s name labels to their parents’ security label for check out.

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Planning Center is free for all church plants for 6 months.

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We know that no matter what comes, Planning Center can help us grow into the next stage. It’s like having a closet full of coats of the next size.

Hardison Moles

Media Outreach Ministers and Church Planter
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Core Features

We have thousands of features across all of our products, but these are the features most helpful for church plants.

Use the technology you already have to do ministry

Desktop/Tablet

Run Planning Center from the web browser on most internet-connected devices.

Mobile

Manage your database, plan services, and check people in from an app.

Printers

Print custom name labels from Citizen, Brother, Dymo, and Zebra printers.

Track donations and make it easy for people to give

Flexible Donation Options

Accept donations online and in the mobile app via ACH bank transfer, credit card, or Apple pay; by text, cash, and check.

Reporting Dashboard

View donation reports and filter by campus, fund, and donation type.

Statements

Generate complete giving statements and deliver to people digitally or by mail.

Manage events from signup to check-in

Simple Signups

Create online event signups, accept payments, and organize details.

Room/Resource Booking

Track requests/approvals for who is using what in which room, and when!

Fast Check-In

Use any internet-connected device to check people in and print labels.

See the big picture through comprehensive reporting

Engagement Dashboard

Analyze attendance, donations, and more from a metrics dashboard.

Custom Reports (Lists)

Filter your database by profile data and activity to create lists of people.

Activity Feed

View participation—events, check-in, small group attendance, donations.

Communicate with your congregation

Push Notifications

Make announcements with the Church Center mobile app and website.

Email

Send emails out to lists of people, or design full campaigns in MailChimp.

Text

Purchase credits to send out mass texts to lists of people.

See participation across every ministry

Event Attendance

Take attendance, offer self-serve check-in, and track who checked in to which locations.

Group and Class Attendance

Take group attendance so you can follow up and track church-wide trends.

General Attendance

Count people as they arrive at services and larger events to get a headcount.

Protect yourself and volunteers from burnout with balanced scheduling

All-Team Scheduling

Create positions for your teams and assign them to services and events.

Blockout Dates

Ask people to set their availability and so you don’t have to scramble.

Monthly Scheduling

Send schedule requests months in advance and set auto-reminders.

Connect your congregation with the life of your church

Events

Let people know about events and give them a way to sign up and pay.

Group Chat and Directory

Give people ways to keep in touch with each other throughout the week.

Online Church

Broadcast services live, create a sermon library, and share links to content.

Equip your worship team to plan and rehearse

Worship Planning

Create a comprehensive plan including an order of service, roles, and songs.

Sheet Music

Customize sheet music and step through with a pedal as you play.

Rehearsal Tools

Organize your song library, transpose chord charts or audio files, and listen to audio.

Keep information private and all processes secure

Permissions

Protect your data, and your congregants' privacy, with powerful permissions.

Check-In/Check-Out

Security labels help verify who is authorized to pick up children.

Background Checks

Order detailed background checks through Checkr and schedule renewals.

Planning Center is free for all church plants for 6 months.

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