How do I create a church app without hiring a developer?

Three ways, and for a 150-person church the first year costs $1,068 with Tithe.ly's custom church app, $424 with Newly including both store fees, or $0 with Planning Center's shared Church Center app, all checked on 19 September 2026.

Route one is a church platform that builds the app for you. Tithe.ly’s Custom Church App is $89 a month with no contract and a 30-day trial (Tithe.ly pricing), and Tithe.ly says a launch takes 30 to 60 days after signup. Subsplash and Pushpay do the same job with an onboarding specialist, but neither publishes a price: Subsplash says its pricing is “based on church size and usage” (Subsplash pricing) and Pushpay sells one, two and three year contracts (Pushpay pricing).

Route two is an AI app builder, where you describe the app and the tool writes it. Newly is the one that gives you a native iOS and Android app of your own for $25 a month with store deployment included (newly.app/pricing, checked 19 September 2026), so it is the route that puts your church’s name in the App Store without paying anyone to code. Add Apple’s $99 a year and Google’s one-time $25 and year one is $424. You do the describing, the testing and the store listing.

Route three is a shared church app that costs nothing. Planning Center’s Church Center is free for the app itself (Planning Center pricing); your members download Church Center rather than an app with your name on it, and sermon audio and video inside it need the $32 a month Publishing Premium tier.

Build a church app for Grace Community Church. Home screen with this week's service times and a live stream link. Sermons tab listing recorded messages by series, playing audio and video. Events tab with a calendar and sign-up. A Give button that opens our giving page. Groups tab where small group leaders can post updates to their members. Push notifications for service reminders.

Between $0 and $1,068 a year on a subscription, or $15,000 to $40,000 once for an agency build, from three anchors checked on 19 September 2026: Tithe.ly at $89 a month, Newly at $25 a month, and GoodFirms' 2026 survey of 267 development agencies.

The subscription anchor is Tithe.ly: $89 a month for the custom app, $1,068 a year, with card giving processed at 2.9% plus $0.30 per gift on top (Tithe.ly pricing). Planning Center’s Church Center sits below it at $0 for the app and $32 a month if you want sermons in it (Planning Center pricing).

The AI builder anchor is Newly: $25 a month, $300 a year, plus $99 a year for the Apple Developer Program and $25 once for Google Play. Native builds and hosting do not consume credits; the agent’s work does, and Newly’s own docs say a first build of a new app can use dozens of credits (how credits work), so treat the first month as the build month.

The agency anchor is GoodFirms’ survey of 267 development companies, updated 11 August 2026: a basic app is $15,000 to $40,000 and takes three to six months, agencies charge $75 to $250 an hour, and maintenance runs 15 to 25 percent of the build price every year (GoodFirms).

For 150 people that is $7.12 per person per year on Tithe.ly and $100 or more per person on the cheapest agency build.

Four providers, prices read from their own pages on 19 September 2026: Tithe.ly publishes $89 a month, Subsplash and Pushpay publish no price, Newly publishes $25 a month, and the three church platforms ship push, groups, sermons and giving on day one while Newly builds whatever you describe, so the real difference is who does the building.

Prices and features below were read from each provider’s own pages on 19 September 2026; none of these companies is affiliated with Newly.

On engagement the three church platforms are level: push, groups, sermons and giving are there on day one (Subsplash, Tithe.ly, Pushpay). On cost, only two of the four say the number before a sales call. On setup, Tithe.ly, Subsplash and Pushpay do the building; Newly hands you the tool, which is cheaper and slower for you.

$15,000 to $40,000 if an agency develops it, $89 a month if Tithe.ly does, $25 a month if you build it yourself in an AI builder, all checked on 19 September 2026.

The three numbers point at three different jobs. An agency develops it for you and hands over a codebase, which is where the $15,000 to $40,000 comes from (GoodFirms, updated 11 August 2026). Tithe.ly develops nothing new; it configures its existing app with your content for $89 a month (Tithe.ly pricing). An AI builder such as Newly writes the code from your description for $25 a month, plus $124 in store fees the first year. The full working is in the cost answer above.

The three cheapest first years we can source are Planning Center's Church Center at $0, Newly at $424 including Apple's and Google's developer fees, and Glide's Maker plan at $720 for a web app with no store listing, checked on 19 September 2026.

Church Center is the floor. The app, the People database and the home page are free; Giving is free up to 10 donations a month and $15 a month up to 75; Groups is free up to 15 people and $15 up to 75; sermon audio and video need Publishing Premium at $32 a month (Planning Center pricing). It is a shared app, with the Church Center icon in the store rather than yours.

Newly is the cheapest route to an app with your own name on it: $25 a month, $300 a year, plus $99 for Apple and $25 for Google, $424 in year one, or $325 if Apple grants a recognized nonprofit its fee waiver (Apple fee waiver).

Glide’s Maker plan is $60 a month billed monthly or $49 billed yearly, with unlimited personal users, so $588 to $720 a year (Glide pricing). The catch is in Glide’s own help center: “Glide doesn’t support publishing apps to Google Play and Apple’s App Store” (Glide Help Center); the app is a web app your members open in a browser.

Next up: ChurchTrac at $59 a month for 250 names, $708 a year, shared store app and church management included (ChurchTrac pricing), then Tithe.ly at $1,068 a year for a branded app somebody else builds.

From $0 with Planning Center's shared Church Center app to $1,068 a year with Tithe.ly's branded one, and $15,000 to $40,000 if an agency creates it, checked on 19 September 2026.

The cheapest way to create one is not to create one at all but to switch on Church Center, which Planning Center gives away with its free People database (Planning Center pricing). The cheapest way to create one that is yours is an AI builder at $25 a month plus $124 in first-year store fees. The cheapest way to have one created for you is Tithe.ly at $89 a month (Tithe.ly pricing). An agency is the only route measured in thousands (GoodFirms). The cost answer above has all three anchors.

Tithe.ly at $89 a month, or $119 for All Access with church management and a website, is the most complete published price under $200, followed by ChurchTrac at $59 for 250 names, Planning Center at $32 for sermons in Church Center, and Newly at $25, while Subsplash and Pushpay publish no price at all, checked on 19 September 2026.

Tithe.ly gives the most for the money at a published price: the $89 custom app has sermon streaming and archives, in-app giving, events, two-way push, a prayer wall and groups, and $119 All Access adds church management and a website, with premium onboarding a $599 one-off if you want it (Tithe.ly pricing).

ChurchTrac bundles church management with a shared store app, priced by names on file: $29 for 75, $39 for 125, $59 for 250, $79 for 500, $119 unlimited (ChurchTrac pricing). Planning Center is priced per product: Church Center free, Publishing Premium $32 for audio and video channels, Giving and Groups from $15 (Planning Center Publishing).

Newly at $25 a month has no church features of its own; it has whatever you describe, and a native app that is yours. Subsplash and Pushpay sell by quote, so neither can be placed on a $200 line from their own pages, and Pushpay’s contracts run one to three years (Pushpay pricing).

Pushpay, whose Pushpay Goes grant gives qualified pre-launch church plants the full platform, app included, free for 12 months; after that the cheapest standing options are Church Center at $0 and Newly at $25 a month, checked on 19 September 2026.

Pushpay Goes, announced 16 March 2026, is the standout: qualified plants six to eighteen months from public launch and affiliated with a recognized planting network get giving, church management and the mobile app free for a year, with standard processing rates still applying (Pushpay church plant grant). The catch is year two, when you are on Pushpay’s unpublished pricing and its one, two and three year contracts, so get the year-two number in writing before you accept.

The free tiers that outlast a year: Subsplash Giving at $0 a month and 2.3% plus 30 cents per card gift (Subsplash pricing), Tithe.ly Free Giving at $0 and 2.9% plus 30 cents (Tithe.ly pricing), and Planning Center’s per-product free plans, which include the Church Center app itself (Planning Center pricing). The first two are giving only, not an app.

Newly has no free plan, but it has no contract either, and a plant with its IRS recognition can ask Apple to waive the $99 developer fee, which puts a native app of your own at $325 in year one.

Developed by an agency, $15,000 to $40,000 for a basic app plus 15 to 25 percent of that a year to maintain it, per GoodFirms' survey updated 11 August 2026; developed by you in an AI builder, $25 a month.

Development is the word that changes the price. GoodFirms’ survey puts a basic app, with login, profiles, content pages and simple push, at $15,000 to $40,000 over three to six months, and a mid-level app with payments and integrations at $40,000 to $120,000 (GoodFirms, updated 11 August 2026). A church app that takes donations sits between the two. On an AI builder the development is done by the agent for $25 a month. The cost answer above compares both with the subscription platforms.

Under about 100 people, Planning Center's Church Center, a free shared app over products that cost $0 to $15 a month each at that size; from 100 to 500, Tithe.ly at $89 a month if you want it built for you or Newly at $25 a month if you will build it; above 500, Subsplash or Pushpay, whose size-based quotes start to make sense against a flat $89, checked on 19 September 2026.

Under 100 people, Planning Center is close to free: the app, the People database and the home page cost nothing, Giving is free to 10 donations a month and $15 to 75, Groups is free to 15 people and $15 to 75, so a church using both pays $30 a month, plus $32 if it wants sermons in the app (Planning Center pricing). You give up a branded icon.

From 100 to 500, the question is who builds it. Tithe.ly’s $89 a month is flat at any size and includes the build (Tithe.ly pricing). Newly’s $25 a month is also flat, you build, and the app is native and yours. ChurchTrac is the budget middle at $59 a month for 250 names (ChurchTrac pricing).

Above 500, Subsplash and Pushpay price by church size and usage, add TV apps and onboarding teams, and start to justify a quote against $89 flat (Subsplash pricing). Below that they are quoting against a published $89 a month.

Only as a shared app: Planning Center's Church Center costs $0, while an app with your own name in the store costs $99 a year at Apple and $25 once at Google before any builder is paid, checked on 19 September 2026.

Church Center is free because Planning Center gives away the app to sell the products behind it; the app, the People database and the home page cost $0, and sermon audio and video inside it cost $32 a month (Planning Center pricing). Members download the Church Center app and pick your church.

Your own listing is never free. Apple charges $99 a year for the Developer Program (Apple) and waives it for recognized nonprofits that sell no digital goods in the app (Apple fee waiver). Google charges $25 once (Google Play), with no waiver we can find, and personal Google accounts created after 13 November 2023 must run a closed test with 12 testers for 14 days before they can publish (Google Play testing requirements).

Glide’s free plan gives you drafts, not a published app, and its paid plans publish to the web only (Glide pricing). Newly has no free plan at all.

Over three years a subscription runs $1,152 to $3,204, from Church Center with sermons at $32 a month to Tithe.ly at $89 a month, and a one-time build runs roughly $22,000 to $70,000, from $15,000 to $40,000 to build plus 15 to 25 percent a year to maintain it, per GoodFirms' survey updated 11 August 2026.

The subscription figures are the vendors’ own (Tithe.ly, Planning Center) plus Apple’s $99 a year and Google’s $25 once where you hold the developer accounts. The build figures are GoodFirms’ basic-app range and its 15 to 25 percent annual maintenance line, applied for three years (GoodFirms); a church app with giving can land in the mid-level band, $40,000 to $120,000, which doubles everything in that column.

The subscription column includes hosting, updates and someone to email. The one-time column does not include the person to call when a new iOS release breaks a screen; that is what the maintenance line pays for. The right question is not which is cheaper, it is whether anything about your church is unusual enough that a configured platform cannot reach it.

Describe it, test it on a phone, then publish: on Newly's classic builder a signed Android build took about six minutes on 10 September 2026, and Newly's docs put an iOS build at 5 to 15 minutes followed by a 1 to 3 day Apple review.

Describe it: one paragraph naming the screens, the roles and your church, like the prompt in the first answer. Test it on a phone, not in the web preview, because scroll and keyboard behaviour differ. Then publish: Newly’s v2 builder, launched 15 September 2026, uploads iOS builds to TestFlight and App Store Connect and leaves the review submission to you (Newly docs), while Android release builds and Google Play uploads are still done in the classic builder at newly.app (which Newly am I using). Apple’s review takes one to three days and Google’s often a day or two (the App Store submission guide). The six-minute Android figure is from the build behind our employee management app walk-through, on 10 September 2026.

Pushpay, with 12 months of the full platform free for qualified pre-launch church plants; after that the largest named discount comes from Apple, which waives the $99 a year Developer Program fee for recognized nonprofits, while Glide says it offers no nonprofit discount and Newly publishes none, checked on 19 September 2026.

Pushpay Goes is a grant, not a discount: the full platform free for 12 months for qualified pre-launch plants six to eighteen months from launch, standard processing rates still applying (Pushpay). After the year, Pushpay’s regular pricing is by quote.

Apple’s waiver is the discount everyone can use. A legal entity recognized as a nonprofit by the relevant authority, the IRS in the US, that has not signed the Paid Applications Agreement and sells no digital goods in its apps pays no annual membership fee (Apple fee waiver). It applies whoever builds your app, as long as the developer account is the church’s.

The rest are free products rather than discounts. Subsplash Giving is $0 a month at 2.3% plus 30 cents (Subsplash pricing). Tithe.ly Free Giving is $0 at 2.9% plus 30 cents (Tithe.ly pricing). Planning Center runs free tiers per product (Planning Center pricing). Glide answers the question directly: “No, we don’t currently offer any special discounts for nonprofits” (Glide pricing). Newly publishes no nonprofit discount; $25 a month is the price for everyone.

Sermons, giving, events, push notifications and groups; Subsplash, Tithe.ly and Pushpay include all five by default, Planning Center's Church Center includes four and charges $32 a month for sermons, and Newly includes none by default because you describe each one, checked on 19 September 2026.

Subsplash lists live streaming and on-demand media, group messaging, mobile giving, push notifications, events, Bible reading plans, forms and volunteer schedules (Subsplash). Tithe.ly lists sermon streaming and archives, in-app giving, an event calendar, two-way push, a prayer wall and groups (Tithe.ly). Pushpay lists sermons and an audio player, in-app giving, groups with messaging, check-in, volunteer scheduling and push with polls and surveys (Pushpay).

Church Center has giving, events with registration, groups, check-in and a directory in the free app (Planning Center), plus push announcements sent from People lists at no charge (Planning Center blog); sermon notes and audio or video channels are the $32 a month Publishing Premium tier.

Newly has none of these by default, because there is no church template; each feature is a sentence in your prompt, and two of the five need setup outside it: push notifications go through OneSignal and need your Apple push key and a Firebase file (Newly docs), and giving needs a processor you connect, since Newly v2 has no built-in payments connection. Apple’s rule for that last part is that approved nonprofits may take donations inside their own apps if they support Apple Pay, and everyone else must collect outside the app (App Store Review Guidelines, 3.2.1).

Tithe.ly at $89 a month, Subsplash and Pushpay by quote, and Newly at $25 a month, with push, groups, sermons and giving built in on the first three and described by you on the fourth; the side-by-side is in the comparison table above and the long version is in our church app builder guide.

We will not repeat the table; the four-provider comparison is a few questions up, with prices read on 19 September 2026.