Editor's Review
There is a prerequisite worth stating before anything else: Church Center does something only if your church already runs Planning Center behind the scenes. The app is the member-facing window onto that system. Search for your congregation, and if it is not in the directory, nothing else in the app will matter to you.
Where a church does use it, the app gathers up the things a member would otherwise chase across email, a website and a paper form. Register for events, join a small group and message it, give a one-off or recurring donation, check children into a service, read the order of service, and keep a household profile so details do not have to be retyped for every family member. Giving tends to be the module churches adopt first, and it handles recurring gifts and a donation history without pushing people out to a separate portal.
The design is deliberately plain, which suits a congregation spanning a wide age range. Its main awkwardness is that every church configures what appears, so two people using the same app can see very different screens: one church switches on giving and check-in only, another enables the full set. That makes general advice difficult, and it means a missing feature is usually the church's decision rather than a fault in the software. At 4.4 across a million installs, the recurring complaints concern notification handling and occasional sign-in loops.
Features
Directory search to find and follow your congregation
Event browsing and registration, including paid registrations
One-off and recurring giving with a record of past donations
Small group listings, sign-ups and in-app group messaging
Children's check-in for services and programmes
Household profiles for managing family members together
Service information and announcements from the church
Pros
Replaces a handful of separate church links with one app
Giving and registration work without opening a desktop browser
Household setup saves retyping details for children and spouses
Free to members, with no advertising inside the app
Cons
Does nothing unless your church is a Planning Center customer
What you see depends on which modules the church has enabled
Notification behaviour is inconsistent and updates can be missed
Questions people ask
Can I use it if my church does not use Planning Center?
No. The app searches a directory of Planning Center churches, and there is no way to add a church from the member side. That decision sits with the church office.
Who handles the donations made in the app?
Gifts go to the church through its own Planning Center Giving configuration. Questions about receipts, refunds or fees belong with the church office rather than with the app.
