PowerChurch Pricing: What It Actually Costs for Nonprofits (2026)

PowerChurch Plus Pricing Tiers

Hidden Costs You Won't See on the Pricing Page

• ⚠ Full church management suite bundled — membership, attendance, pledging, check-in included whether you need them or not
• ⚠ Fund accounting module has limited grant compliance depth — no restriction enforcement, no automatic grant budget vs. actual tracking
• ⚠ No Form 990 export — 990 preparation requires a separate tool or CPA manual work
• ⚠ Desktop version (Plus) requires local IT for backups, updates, and data security
• ⚠ Annual support plan (~$100/yr) required for ongoing software updates on the desktop version
• ⚠ Limited audit trail depth for grantor reporting — manual workarounds needed for restricted fund documentation

Published pricing

PowerChurch offers two purchasing paths. PowerChurch Online is a cloud-based subscription starting from $35/month (per their pricing page). PowerChurch Plus is desktop software on a perpetual license model — a one-time purchase of approximately $395, with no monthly fee unless you opt into the annual support plan (approximately $100/year for updates and support).

For organizations that prefer not to pay recurring software fees, the Plus desktop version is genuinely attractive. The tradeoff is local installation, self-managed backups, and IT overhead that cloud software avoids.

What you’re actually buying

Both versions deliver the same core feature set: fund accounting, giving and pledge tracking, a member directory, attendance records, event management, and check-in tools. For a church managing congregation members and weekly giving, that bundle makes sense.

For a nonprofit managing restricted grants, program budgets, and annual audit requirements, most of that bundle is overhead. Membership directories and attendance tracking have no place in a grant compliance workflow. The price — whether $35/month or $395 one-time — reflects a platform built for church operations, not fund restriction enforcement.

Fund accounting depth for compliance-focused nonprofits

PowerChurch’s accounting module handles basic fund accounting: it tracks fund balances, separates income and expenses by fund, and produces fund-level reports. For small churches with simple giving and benevolence funds, this works.

The limitations appear under compliance pressure. PowerChurch does not enforce fund restrictions programmatically — there is no system-level block on spending restricted grant funds on ineligible expenses. Grant budget vs. actual tracking requires manual workarounds. There is no Form 990 export or line-item mapping, so annual 990 preparation means either a separate software tool or CPA time translating fund reports into 990 format.

Nonprofits managing three or more restricted grants, conducting annual audits, or filing complex 990s typically find that PowerChurch’s accounting depth stops short of what they need.

Total cost of ownership

RestrictedBooks covers fund accounting, grant tracking, restriction enforcement, and Form 990 mapping at $20–$99/month ($1,188–$2,988/year), without the church management feature overhead.