What Does Gym Software Really Cost in 2026?

Most gym owners pick software by comparing monthly prices across three pricing pages. It is the wrong comparison, and it is wrong by a factor of four.

On $20,000 a month in member payments, a gym pays somewhere between $188 and $610 in processing fees. The subscription is $75 to $229. The number almost nobody checks is three to four times bigger than the number everybody compares.

So here is what gym software actually costs in 2026. Every price below was read off the vendor's own website in August 2026. Where a vendor does not publish something, this says so instead of guessing, because "we could not find it" is useful information when you are the one about to hand over your payment processing.

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Software Subscription Costs

Subscription pricing for gym management software runs from $0 to about $290 a month for a single location, and platforms structure it two different ways. Some charge a flat rate per plan. Others charge by active member count, which means your bill goes up as your gym grows.

Free and entry-level platforms ($0 to $99 a month) cover scheduling, billing and member management. PushPress Core is genuinely free at $0 a month. Not a trial, not a teaser, a working platform you can run your gym on from day one.

The tradeoff is the processing rate: 4.99% + $0.30 per credit card transaction. Do that math before you decide. A gym doing $5,000 a month pays about $250 in processing. A gym doing $10,000 pays about $499. Somewhere in that range, paying for a plan with a lower rate starts costing you less than staying free. Free is built for the gym still filling its first thirty members, not the gym that is already busy.

Mid-range platforms ($100 to $200 a month) are where most gyms land once they are past that point. PushPress Pro is $159 a month: automated billing, class scheduling, member management, reporting, a member app, and card processing at 2.89% + $0.30 with ACH at 0.79% + $0.30. Gymdesk sits at $100 for 51 to 100 members. Pike13 Essential is $139 on annual billing and $159 monthly.

Premium platforms ($200 a month and up) add advanced features and dedicated support. PushPress Max is $229 and drops the card rate to 2.75% + $0.30. Mindbody publishes $79 per location for its entry tier and no dollar figure at all for the three tiers above it, so what a scaling studio actually pays there is a sales conversation.

Where PushPress is modular. You add capabilities as the business needs them rather than buying a bundle up front. Workout programming through PushPress Train starts at $79 a month. A branded app in the App Store under your gym's own name is $97. Full marketing automation with CRM, lead nurture and a website through PushPress Grow is $329.

Here is where the major platforms actually fall.

Two things in that table matter more than the starting prices.

The first is the right-hand column. Four of these seven platforms will not tell you what they charge to process a payment until you are talking to a salesperson. That is not a small omission, for reasons the next section gets into.

The second is the "how they price" column. If you are on Zen Planner and you grow from 45 members to 150, your subscription goes from $99 to $229 without a single new feature. On Gymdesk the same growth takes you from $75 to $150. PushPress Pro is $159 whether you have 40 members or 400. Which structure is cheaper depends entirely on where you are today and where you expect to be in two years.

Transaction Fees: The Hidden Cost Multiplier

Processing fees are the largest recurring software cost most gym owners never compare. On $20,000 a month in member payments, they run between $188 and $610 depending on the platform and the payment method. Every subscription in this post is smaller than that.

Here is the part that surprises people: card rates are nearly identical across every platform that publishes one. They sit between 2.7% and 2.9%. Anyone telling you their card rate is a major cost advantage is rounding a fifth of a percentage point into a headline.

What differs is whether a platform will tell you the rate at all.

Four publish nothing. Mindbody's payments page says only "competitive rates. No monthly fees. No minimums." Glofox and Pike13 say nothing. Zen Planner's payments page describes a feature for passing fees on to your members, which is not the same as disclosing what they charge you.

Three publish something. Gymdesk lists 2.9% + $0.30 for cards and 1% for ACH in its help docs, and states it adds nothing on top of the processor's base rate. GymMaster publishes the flat $0.20 it adds to each transaction on top of whatever Stripe charges. Wodify puts card rates as low as 2.7% + 30¢ and ACH as low as 1.5% + 30¢ on its pricing page.

That last one is the only real head to head available, so here it is straight.

Wodify's card rate is a hair under PushPress Max. On $20,000 a month in card volume, their rate saves you about $10.

Then look at ACH. Ours is 0.79% + $0.30, capped at $5 per transaction. Theirs is 1.5% + $0.30. On the same $20,000, that is $142 a month in your pocket, or $1,704 a year. Against Gymdesk's 1% it is $42 a month.

Ten dollars against seventeen hundred. That is the whole argument, and it is why bank transfer is the line worth looking at rather than the card rate everyone advertises.

On Pro or Max you pay $580 to $608 a month to process $20,000 on cards. Move that same volume to ACH and you pay $188. For most gyms, shifting members to bank transfer saves more than switching platforms does.

Four questions worth asking any vendor in writing before you sign:

1. What is your credit card rate, as a percentage plus a per-transaction amount?
2. What is your ACH rate, and is it capped?
3. Do you add anything on top of the payment processor's base rate?
4. If you offer a free plan, how is it subsidized?

If a vendor will not answer the first two in an email, that is your answer.

If you want the full PushPress pricing breakdown, see our plans and pricing.

Time Savings: The Cost Most Gym Owners Ignore

Nobody has published a real study on how many hours a week a gym owner spends on admin. Plenty of software companies cite one, including ours until this update. It does not exist.

So here is our estimate, labeled as an estimate. We think a typical single-location gym spends 10 to 16 hours a week on the five tasks below, and that software removes most of them. Check it against your own week before you believe it.

What that time is worth is easier to source. Two-Brain Business surveys roughly 8,800 gyms a year for its State of the Industry report. In the 2024 edition, the median big-group gym owner's effective hourly rate was about $25, with top performers at $46 or more. For context, the average coach was paid $32.50 an hour to lead a class that year. The median owner earns less per hour than the coach they hire.

That is the number to price your own time at, and it is roughly half what most software ROI math assumes. At $25 an hour, ten hours a week back is $250 a week and $13,000 a year.

Even at the honest number, a $159 platform that removes ten hours a week returns roughly seven times its cost. The point is not that the math is enormous. The point is that it survives being checked.

How to Calculate Your True Cost of Ownership

Stop comparing subscription prices. Use this instead:

Monthly total cost of ownership = subscription + processing fees + add-ons

Then run it against a real platform rather than a hypothetical one. Gymdesk is the fairest comparison for a cost-conscious gym: it is genuinely cheap, it publishes its rate, and it tells you plainly that it adds nothing on top.

Two honest readings of that table.

If your gym is under a hundred members and everyone pays by card, Gymdesk costs you less. Their card rate is within a hundredth of a point of ours and their subscription is $59 cheaper. We would rather tell you that than have you find it yourself after a demo.

Two things change the answer. The first is bank transfer. On $20,000 a month, our ACH rate saves you $42 against Gymdesk and $142 against Wodify. That is up to $1,704 a year on the one line most owners never look at. The second is growth. Their price moves with your member count and ours does not. At 150 members you are paying about the same. At 250 you are paying $41 a month less with us, and you were never asked to renegotiate.

That is the actual shape of this decision. Anyone who tells you a cheap platform always costs more in fees is selling you something.

Now factor in the tools most gyms end up needing anyway.

A typical PushPress stack is $335 a month: Pro ($159) + Train ($79) + Branded App ($97). Month to month, no setup fees, no annual lock-in.

Worth being straight about one thing here. At $79, Train is not the cheapest way to deliver programming. A 25-athlete team pays TrainHeroic $44.99. What Train does that neither of them does is sit inside the same system as your billing and your member app, so a member who cancels stops seeing workouts without anyone touching a spreadsheet. If you only need programming, buy programming. If you are tired of three tools that do not talk to each other, that is the trade.

Ready to see what PushPress can do for your gym? Compare our plans and pricing to find the right fit, or book a demo to see the platform in action.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much does gym management software cost per month?

Most gym management software costs $75 to $290 per month for a single location. PushPress runs $0 (Free), $159 (Pro) and $229 (Max), with optional add-ons. Some platforms price by active member count, so your bill rises as you grow. Processing fees typically cost more than the subscription.

What are the hidden costs of gym software?

The four most common are processing rates the vendor will not publish, per-transaction surcharges added on top of the payment processor's base rate, add-on fees for programming or marketing or a branded app, and annual contracts. Ask for every rate in writing before you sign anything.

Is free gym software actually free?

The subscription is free. The processing is not. PushPress Free costs $0 a month and charges 4.99% + $0.30 per card transaction, so a gym doing $10,000 a month pays about $499 in processing. That is a real starting point for a new gym and an expensive place for a busy one.

At what point should I upgrade from a free gym software plan?

Run the arithmetic on your own volume. On PushPress, Free costs 4.99% per card transaction and Pro costs 2.89% plus $159 a month. The two break even around $7,600 in monthly card volume. Above that, paying for Pro costs you less than staying free. Pro and Max break even around $50,000 in monthly card volume.

How much can gym software save me in time?

We estimate a single-location gym spends 10 to 16 hours a week on admin, and that software removes most of it. At $25 an hour, the median gym owner's effective hourly rate in Two-Brain Business's 2024 survey of 8,800 gyms, ten hours back is worth about $13,000 a year.

What transaction fee rate should I expect?

Card rates cluster between 2.7% and 2.9% across every platform that publishes one. PushPress Pro is 2.89% + $0.30, Max is 2.75% + $0.30. ACH varies far more: ours is 0.79% + $0.30 capped at $5, against 1% and 1.5% elsewhere. Four major platforms publish no rate.

Should I choose the cheapest gym software?

Sometimes, honestly. A sub-100-member gym taking card payments may well pay less on a cheaper platform. What changes the answer is bank transfer volume, whether the price rises with your member count, and how many separate tools you are paying for on the side.

Use the Right Tool for the Job

Choosing gym software on sticker price is like hiring a coach on their hourly rate without asking about their results. The cheapest option is not the one with the smallest number on the pricing page. It is the one with the smallest number once you add up every dollar that flows through it.

Before you commit, get written answers to four things: what is my total monthly cost including processing and add-ons, what is the ACH rate, does the price change as I add members, and what happens to my data and my members if I leave.

Analysts size the gym management software market at roughly $2.1 billion in 2024, growing to $3.8 billion by 2030. More competition means better tools. It also means more pricing pages written to be hard to compare, which is exactly why it pays to be a sharper buyer.

Ready to see what PushPress can do for your gym? Compare our plans and pricing to find the right fit, or book a demo to see the platform in action.