Planning Center

Avantages

The organized convenience of having almost every form of information about church members using features like groups, checkin, registrations, services, etc. is highly valuable. I do enjoy the customization opportunities to use specific church language, as well as the ability to use other supported platforms in combination.

Inconvénients

I don't enjoy the updated group chat feature as much as I did the functionality of it before.

Avantages

I use Planning Center weekly and would not want to use anything else

Inconvénients

Never had any issues with it, it is always getting better and better

Avantages

It is very easy to use and functional for all of the needs we have.

Inconvénients

There really isn't anything that I like the least about it.

Avantages

I like how audio can be uploaded and played on the app. Even downloaded. I could listen to songs so I know how to plan using the cameras.

Inconvénients

Sometimes it was hard to find specific things but that could depend on the admins and where they put it and label it

Avantages

I love using Planning center for weekly lessons and materials in kids ministry. I also enjoy being able to access music charts for worship.

Inconvénients

It has been difficult managing multiple profiles with different churches and deleting an "old" or unused account from my profile is not easy.

Avantages

Ease of use for all the applications and all the functionality.

Inconvénients

Getting phone support quicker however they still have great support via email and phone support if you wait.

Avantages

The application is very practical and fast .

Inconvénients

The application helps in completing tasks .

Avantages

We love how intuitive PCO is. It's easy to navigate & use, with very little extensive training required. It's the "Apple" of software. It is seamless for volunteer & attendee management, and it makes sign ups, giving, groups, etc. a breeze.

Inconvénients

It's not quite a customizable as we would like. All solutions are out of the box, and there's not the option to really change or amend things (functionality, reporting, etc.). I also wish the API, specifically for registrations, was open to developers so we could connect that into our main church database.

Avantages

It is the most user-friendly software. They have more features than you'll ever need and it makes collaboration a breeze. The system always functions as it should and most of the time the development team is several steps ahead, putting out new features that are actually helpful. The fact that they work with groups like renewed vision to integrate with propresenter is incredibly valuable. Everything being cloud based also makes it easy to collaborate between departments on events. Their groups search is easy to use, resolution-responsive and looks great integrated into any website. The kiosk option in their events module makes dynamic calendar-based digital signage really simple. Everyone who has ever resisted adopting planning center at our church has eventually come around to really like it.

Inconvénients

If you have a need for a feature the development team is going to tell you that they may add it one day and never commit to a release. Also they don't offer any training other than videos online - for savvy people this isn't much of a problem because their interface is so user friendly, but if you have staff who refuse to learn things on their own this will deter them from wanting to adopt planning center - though it shouldn't because it is really easy to learn. The pricing model can be somewhat confusing at times and I wish there was more of a discount for people using multiple modules; a large church can get close to spending a thousand dollars a month without much trouble, though I know this is comparable to some other platforms and honestly you get what you pay for.

Avantages

Planning Center has a suite of software that integrates so seamlessly and offers so much to help the teams. The team who plans and develops Planning Center has a deep understanding of the unique environment that churches are in, and their software constantly delivers modern tools to navigate it.

I use Services the most, and it does everything you could ask it to. The newly redesigned interface is beautiful, intuitive, and fast. The power user features make editing and managing songs and people easy.

The android and iOS apps are top notch as well. You can do most of what you would need to on mobile, and the apps report any updates instantly.

Oh yeah, pricing is incredibly affordable and there's a free version to boot. Once, the gracious support team even helped me add more members than my plan allowed.

Inconvénients

In services, I wish the apps allowed you to edit more song details, such as adding new keys and changing song sequences. Other than that, there are no cons.

Avantages

I've been using Planning Center for over three years for a multi-campus church. It has been instrumental in scheduling bands, mass communicating to these 10+ bands, creating and organizing set lists, etc. We have over ten services per week, and I can view them all side-by-side using the Matrix feature, which is incredibly helpful. I can also view many weeks at one time, which is essential while scheduling months at a time. We can drop in songs and other items to each plan very easily. Additionally, organizing People (in our case, staff and volunteers) is simple and efficient. Songs are stored in this software with all of our resources (chord charts, lyrics, mp3s, video tutorials, etc.) which is another invaluable benefit.

Inconvénients

One of the only features Planning Center is lacking is a "copy and paste" feature in Plans. We often have the same items in over 15 plans, and while dragging each individual item from plan to plan is simple, it would be more efficient to copy an entire plan's contents into another one.

Avantages

Ease of use for both volunteers and staff. Clean, concise user interface. Easily customizable to fit your own needs.

Inconvénients

The ONLY con I can think of is that sometimes their Music Stand app for sheet music use can be a little clunky and not load sheet music easily on a tablet or iPad.

Avantages

PC is a very robust system. I love that it incorporates multiple applications into one suite.

Inconvénients

I don't like that when I create an event I cannot give someone else access to edit the event. This is actually a big problem when it comes to having events approved and having an assistant make any changes. I wish they allowed you the ability to co-edit.

Avantages

I use Planning Center every single day in my job. I enjoy using the software because it is easy to use. It holds all of our 30,000 families from our church. It tracks all of their information. I can make registrations through Planning Center and the system tracks these registrations for me. There are countless other things Planning Center does and it is all in one place rather than using many different systems.

Inconvénients

Honestly, there is nothing bad I can say about Planning Center. I really enjoy using it. It helps keep me grounded as an administrator.

Avantages

I've used Planning center for about a year now though I've known of it for years. I don't know how other churches get by without it! It has so many different uses from checking in children, to organizing rooms and supplies for events, to keeping track of attendance for groups, and of course scheduling volunteers for services. It's very versatile and brings order to the chaos of being a volunteer based work space.

Inconvénients

It does have some software bugs with their mobile apps. Often, I've scheduled people on the computer, but when I go to the app it will have other people "pending" under the wrong date and when I try to remove them, I get the "oops, something went wrong" message over and over again. It would also be nice if Planning Center Groups had their own separate phone application to make things more versatile for group leaders, that would be amazing!

Avantages

I love that I can put all of my people and my service files in to one application, create an event, then easily pull them all together in one place. I'm a fan of the automatic reminders that I can program, and how customizable the templates are. Putting services and other events is easy and user friendly.

Inconvénients

There are so many functions and tabs that make using Planning Center through an app difficult. I can label people with a "tag" or a "position," and they can't be used interchangeably which makes putting my teams together difficult at times, so I feel like that could be improved. I would also like more library/database record keeping options for music.

Avantages

Planning Center basically a household name within churches. They've owned the market and help set worship teams up for success via scheduling, resources and service planning.

Inconvénients

The UI is still a little clunky to navigate. It all get's the job done, but I believe can be improved. Also, when you start to interact with other products in their suite, you can tell that there's not a holistic approach and the user's congnitive load is probably bigger than desired.

Avantages

It's a great centralized location for communication, planning, scheduling, and sharing. For music teams, it has some great resources for sharing sets, songs, and music sheets, and allows easy communication to everyone participating in the event.

Inconvénients

For administrators, there is a LOT to learn. What should seem like an easy process takes multiple steps, and it's easy to make a mistake or forget the specific area of the application you went to last time to complete a task.

Avantages

Wide variety of church functions can be managed (Security, Giving, Services, Groups, etc).
Relatively simple administration for admins makes it easy to get an overall picture of church functions.
Makes it easy to involve volunteers within the church in the administration process, such as managing small groups.

Inconvénients

Somewhat confusing for users within the church who are older. Different products offered do not exist together, but in their own silos. This can be confusing for users at first.

Avantages

We use Planning Center on a daily basis to schedule ALL our music and media volunteers for our weekend services! It's easy to navigate and plan all of our services via the service outlines. Then we schedule our weekly volunteers - it's all automated so once we plan a schedule, we send a mass notification (that can be personalized) off to all volunteers. Then they accept or decline their availability. It's such a great way to keep track and schedule our weekend services and any other "service" type events that need volunteers and media!

Inconvénients

Honestly, it's been great for our needs so no complaints at the moment!

Avantages

It is a great software to use for weekly worship organisations in Church. You can make slides for songs, messages, announcements etc. You can also set when you wanna air certain slides. You can edit as many times you want. It does not change the font size when projected. It also saves previous slides, so you can go back to previous weeks and used saved slides of songs or announcements.

Inconvénients

It does not have a free trial version and also the free version has less features. Also you cannot set timimg on the slides when do you want to project it and change.

Avantages

This software offers a wide variety of tools and programs that are incredibly easy to use and useful. My favorite aspect of this product is the simplicity of function combined with an overall attractive and clean interface.

Inconvénients

Back-end customization is limited, but customer support is always able to answer questions and help with back-end changes you'll need made!

Avantages

Planning Center has the best approach to building software for the church. They truely listen to the customer and work to build into the product what we're asking for. The product is also one of the cheapest options on the market for what you're getting.

Inconvénients

They are young so not everything is built in - yet! I honestly don't have much bad to say about them.

Avantages

Planning Center has a fantastic platform for planning, scheduling, and running events. Scheduling teams in the matrix view and auto-schedule function make staffing positions a breeze. It's convenient that they keep a history of deleted plans for about 30 days in case you need to refer to them. The songs section makes keeping any files such as PDF's, MP3's, or links organized with the correct asset.

Inconvénients

It can be daunting the learn how to use the software for a new user. I've encountered some issues when trying to print plans such as it not including elements I wished to include. It would be nice if you could see edits a user is making in real-time on the page.

Avantages

The integration and management of personnel, as well as the workflow of productions. The software also has many options for customization per production which is very useful.

Inconvénients

At the present time there are no real negatives.