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Planning Center vs. Realm Church Management

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    Overview
    ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price

    Planning Center

    Score9.1 out of 10
    N/APlanning Center in Carlsbad offers modular church management applications, providing CRM, tithe management, event registration and attendance, and volunteer resource scheduling.

    $14

    per month

    Realm Church Management

    Score8 out of 10
    N/ARealm is a church management system from ACS Technologies, designed to create real ministry opportunities by making it easier for your church family to connect with each other throughout the week.N/A
    Pricing
    Planning CenterRealm Church Management
    Editions & Modules
    Calendar
    14+
    per month
    Check-ins
    14+
    per month
    Giving
    14+
    per month
    Groups
    14+
    per month
    Registration
    14+
    per month
    Services
    14+
    per month
    No answers on this topic
    Offerings
    Pricing Offerings
    Planning CenterRealm Church Management
    Free Trial
    YesNo
    Free/Freemium Version
    NoNo
    Premium Consulting/Integration Services
    NoNo
    Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
    Additional DetailsPrices increase based on the number of members and attendees.—
    More Pricing Information
    Community Pulse
    Planning CenterRealm Church Management
    Considered Both Products
    Planning Center
    No answer on this topic
    ACS Technologies
    Chose Realm Church Management
    Realm, from my vantage point, has more ways to engage the community. It allows for planning and scheduling, but has a dashboard which allows the congregation to see ways they can connect and get involved in the community. Having graphics and links available is key for people …
    Incentivized
    Key User Insights
    Would buy again
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Delivers good value for the price
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Happy with the feature set
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Lived up to sales and marketing promises
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    Implementation went as expected
    No answers on this topic
    No answers on this topic
    User Ratings
    Planning CenterRealm Church Management
    Likelihood to Recommend
    10.0
    (3 ratings)
    8.0
    (3 ratings)
    Likelihood to Renew
    -
    (0 ratings)
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    Support Rating
    9.0
    (1 ratings)
    10.0
    (1 ratings)
    User Testimonials
    Planning CenterRealm Church Management
    Likelihood to Recommend
    Planning Center
    Planning Center is incredibly helpful if you are in the business of putting on events, performances, or productions. In such situations, Planning Center will help you coordinate with a large group of people, clearly showing who is expected to do what during the order of a service. If you are planning a major event (a wedding service, a major birthday party, a work event, or any kind of production), Planning Center will foster both teamwork and clarity. The only scenario I can envision Planning Center not being helpful would be a more laissez-faire type of event, (like a "come and go" reception).
    Incentivized
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    ACS Technologies
    In my current project, I am saving the full model into the Realm Database. it takes very little time to integrate into our existing project. So it helps us to save a lot of time and easy to fetch data and CRUD operation with any type of data. and according to our need, we can modify it as well.
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    Pros
    Planning Center
    • Volunteer Management
    • Scheduling
    • File Hosting
    • Communication tools
    • Automated reminders
    Incentivized
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    ACS Technologies
    • Tracking attendance
    • Running reports, both financial and membership-related
    • Nursery check-in
    Incentivized
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    Cons
    Planning Center
    • Adding files to an item on a playlist can be hard to find outside of that set.
    • Previewing songs on import gives very limited info - can be hard to find the correct one.
    Incentivized
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    ACS Technologies
    • Notifcations
    • Connecting with other social media platforms
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    Usability
    Planning Center
    Planning Center is very user friendly on both the front and back ends.
    Incentivized
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    ACS Technologies
    No answers on this topic
    Support Rating
    Planning Center
    I've not needed to use Planning Center support. In the few instances that I would have thought would "require support," tips and notices popped up on screen letting me know what was happening. There are very VERY few issues that I've found with Planning Center. The interface has been intuitive and powerful, so I've not needed to use their support service.
    Incentivized
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    ACS Technologies
    Our transition to Realm was fantastic. We had a rep do two days of training with staff. She also provided us with a step-by-step plan for our rollout to the congregation. In addition to the fabulous customer service team, the "help" section of the Realm website is useful--it includes written answers and also video tutorials/webinars. The search function in the help section is built effectively.
    Incentivized
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    Alternatives Considered
    Planning Center
    At one point, I was presented with both Asana and Trello as helpful tools to facilitate teamwork and collaboration amongst a large group of people. However, when it comes to putting on productions/services/events, Planning Center just seemed to have everything we need. I have never really once given thought to moving on from Planning Center. I'm sure Asana and Trello have much to offer, and I did briefly consider the, but Planning Center (for what we needed) was a grand-slam, home run.
    Incentivized
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    ACS Technologies
    From my experience Realm is fatter than SQLite. Realm has less Query and is easy to understand. even new developers also can use it In his/her project. It has a good document so a new developer can read and understand and apply it to the project. SQLite is old and not so easy to understand. we need to add a third-party library to easily use SQLite.
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    Return on Investment
    Planning Center
    • Planning Center Services has become an irreplaceable part of our Sunday gathering preparation
    • Planning Center Music Stand is an invaluable tool for rehearsal and performance of songs each week
    • Planning Center Giving helped us establish easy ways for folks to give online during COVID and beyond
    • Planning Center Registrations helped us navigate attendance issues during COVID, and has always been our go-to for gathering information for Events
    Incentivized
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    ACS Technologies
    • Class sign-ups
    • Event attendance
    • Communication within certain groups
    Read full review
    ScreenShots