--- description: Learn how Realm can help your business. GetApp provides users in South Africa with the most detailed information on software tools, prices and features. image: https://gdm-localsites-assets-gfprod.imgix.net/images/getapp/og_logo-94fd2a03a6c7a0e54fc0c9e21a1c0ce9.png title: Realm Reviews, Prices & Ratings | GetApp South Africa 2026 --- Breadcrumb: [Home](/) > [Church Management Software](/directory/166/church-management/software) > [Realm](/software/102885/realm) # Realm Canonical: https://www.getapp.za.com/software/102885/realm Page: 1 / 12\ Next: [Next page](https://www.getapp.za.com/software/102885/realm?page=2) > Realm by ACS Technologies is a church management system with an emphasis on online community > > Verdict: Rated **4.4/5** by 273 users. Top-rated for **Likelihood to recommend**. ----- ## Overview ### Key benefits of Realm Realm gives donors a wide array of giving options, including text based giving, online donation, full management of payment methods, and recurring and scheduled donations, details of which can be entered by staff or managed fully by the donors themselves. Users can create an unlimited number of custom profile fields to suit their needs, and assign staff roles and set permissions to control access to personal information stored in profiles. Realm includes multiple customizable report templates, and custom reports can be shared with other staff members, who are notified on their next login. Staff can centrally manage check-in kiosks, help check people in, see attendance in real time, and run attendance reports, and for group events, group leaders can take attendance at the beginning of, during, or after meetings. Members can include notes on important information such as allergies or specific care instructions when checking their children into events. ## Quick Stats & Ratings | Metric | Rating | Detail | | **Overall** | **4.4/5** | 273 Reviews | | Ease of Use | 4.2/5 | Based on overall reviews | | Customer Support | 4.6/5 | Based on overall reviews | | Value for Money | 4.4/5 | Based on overall reviews | | Features | 4.1/5 | Based on overall reviews | | Recommendation percentage | 80% | (8/10 Likelihood to recommend) | ## About the vendor - **Company**: ACS Technologies - **Founded**: 1978 ## Commercial Context - **Pricing model**: Flat Rate - **Pricing Details**: Inform Plan: Designed to provide church staff with the tools to efficiently manage their tasks, gain insights about the congregation, enter contributions, and generate insightful reports. Connect Plan: Extends the capabilities to the entire church community, allowing them to connect with each other, manage personal giving, and participate more actively. It includes all features offered in the Inform plan. Multiply Plan: Adds multi-campus administration and a growing set of outreach features to the staff and member features found in both the Inform and Connect plans. - **Target Audience**: Self Employed, 2–10, 11–50, 51–200, 201–500, 501–1 000, 1 001–5 000, 5 001–10 000, 10 000+ - **Deployment & Platforms**: Cloud, SaaS, Web-based, Android (Mobile), iPhone (Mobile), iPad (Mobile) - **Supported Languages**: English - **Available Countries**: United States ## Features - Accounting - Accounting Integration - Accounts Payable - Accounts Receivable - Activity Tracking - Alerts/Notifications - Attendance Tracking - Bank Reconciliation - Budgeting/Forecasting - Built-in Accounting - CRM - Child Check-in - Compliance Management - Credit Card Processing - Customizable Reports - Customizable Templates - Data Import/Export - Donation Management - Donation Tracking - Donor Management ## Integrations (6 total) - BoxCast - Constant Contact - Engiven Cryptocurrency Donation Platform - Planning Center - Vanco Faith - Verified First ## Support Options - Email/Help Desk - FAQs/Forum - Knowledge Base - Phone Support - Chat ## Category - [Church Management Software](https://www.getapp.za.com/directory/166/church-management/software) ## Related Categories - [Church Management Software](https://www.getapp.za.com/directory/166/church-management/software) - [Church Accounting Software](https://www.getapp.za.com/directory/813/church-accounting/software) - [Fund Accounting Software](https://www.getapp.za.com/directory/168/fund-accounting/software) ## Alternatives 1. [Clearstream](https://www.getapp.za.com/software/112607/clearstream) — 4.8/5 (656 reviews) 2. [ChurchTrac](https://www.getapp.za.com/software/105371/churchtrac) — 4.8/5 (859 reviews) 3. [Tithely Church Management](https://www.getapp.za.com/software/102871/breeze-chms) — 4.8/5 (623 reviews) 4. [Planning Center](https://www.getapp.za.com/software/2035379/planning-center) — 4.7/5 (1137 reviews) 5. [Tithe.ly](https://www.getapp.za.com/software/105501/tithe-ly-church-giving) — 4.7/5 (691 reviews) ## Reviews ### "Great, user-friendly software and world-class help desk." — 5.0/5 > **Amy** | *14 June 2018* | Religious Institutions | Recommendation rating: 10.0/10 > > **Pros**: Realm is extremely user-friendly. I love that they have teamed with Vanco for donations/payments and the payments are recorded directly into the person's record in Realm. The pastor likes to do analytics and uses that feature all the time. I work in the contribution section every week and it couldn't be easier. The "icing on the cake" is the world-class Customer Service. After two quick prompts, a real person answers the phone within seconds. I don't get transferred. The person is very knowledgeable, friendly, polite, and most of all can answer my questions. They will also log onto my computer - with my permission - if that is the best way to help me. > > **Cons**: I can't get all the reports I used to get in ACS People. Also, I have not found a way to link different families together (i.e. showing one family is a mother and father to another family). I also wish that Realm Financials would stop pushing back their timeline to include Payroll so we can switch from ACS Financials to Realm for that part of business, also. > > Easy to learn and to use. Helps us track everything from giving to attendance, as well as trends. On-line (as opposed to desktop loaded) software keeps the worry out of losing data. Affordable, even for a smaller church. ----- ### "Realm Is The Best Database" — 5.0/5 > **Michelle** | *28 October 2021* | Religious Institutions | Recommendation rating: 10.0/10 > > **Pros**: I've worked with many databases in the past, including helping to build them from the end user point of view, and Realm is the best I've used. It is very flexible and user friendly. The Help feature is really helpful and the rare times I've had to contact customer service, they've been super friendly and very knowledgeable. I love using Realm\! > > **Cons**: My biggest complaint is that I have some members in my groups that do not receive the Realm emails when I send them out. I've called customer service a couple of times and have been directed to look for the emails in Spam, but that is not always the problem. I don't understand why some emails don't get received. > > I was responsible for rolling out Realm to my church. The training we received was great and the support resource materials helped out a lot. Unfortunately, my budget and team was super small, so it didn't go as well as I would have liked. Many of the congregants are very resistant. I use Realm for taking attendance weekly and I maintain the directory. I am also responsible for all training. Everything is really easy to work with except the congregation themselves. ----- ### "I'm not a fan of Realm" — 1.0/5 > **Shannon** | *01 November 2021* | Religious Institutions | Recommendation rating: 0.0/10 > > **Pros**: I was not part of the integration and am having a hard time find something positive to say about Realm. It's unsophisticated as far as software goes, the reporting system is very simple and the results are inconsistent and I often find unexplainable errors. > > **Cons**: When running queries, I would LOVE it to be more complex. You cannot run a giving query and get email addresses. Also, i've noticed households in queries when they dont match the criteria - I find a lot of mistakes. > > I'm not pleased with the inadequacy of the software. It's very basic and does not run reports that the Vestry and Clergy need. I find myself having to merge several excel spreadsheets to get the info I need for email merges, etc. ----- ### "MY REALM EVALUATION" — 5.0/5 > **SHARON** | *01 March 2024* | Religious Institutions | Recommendation rating: 10.0/10 > > **Pros**: WE LOVE THAT ONLINE DONATIONS POST DIRECTLY TO CONTRIBUTOR'S ACCOUNTS > > **Cons**: TAKES ME A WHILE TO FIGURE OUT SOME REPORTING FEATURES. ALSO CANNOT HAVE MORE THAN ONE GIVING DATABASE > > WE ENJOY REALM OVER THE ACS PEOPLE SUITE ----- ### "A decent web-based database" — 4.0/5 > **Dave** | *30 October 2020* | Religious Institutions | Recommendation rating: 7.0/10 > > **Pros**: Because we were previously on ACS, it was easy to import previous data. The online interface is much friendlier than the old version, and it generally has good features and capabilities, but as with any database/CRM, it's all in how you set it up and implement use. Overall, it's a solid choice. > > **Cons**: Being a Planning Center Services user who's dabbled in other Planning Center products, I prefer the integration and user interface of planning center. Overall Realm feels more PC than Mac - sturdy, but not as pretty and at times a bit frustrating with the number of clicks you need to do to get to where you want to go. It's functional, but it feels like it'll take longer for people to learn how to set things up and do things properly, which will impede good rollout and ultimately depth of functionality because of that. > > The customer service has been good, and their demo was reasonably well done, though their app crashed for their employee multiple times. I asked some tough questions about features that they said they were still building, and they admitted that they really couldn't compete with planning center in terms of a service planning module, but other things seem pretty good. My preference would have been Planning Center overall, but our finance people pushed us towards Realm because of some of the options on that side, so I'm living with it and trying to figure out how to manage my volunteers and services in planning center while keeping our main database and pathways on Realm. It's not ideal, but Realm doesn't seem bad per say. One oddity was that Realm's marketing pitch included the fact that they were a family business. I love families, but "family business" to me is a point against when I'm dealing with a software development company - as a user I want excellence of design and programming with great customer service, not friendly staff who are also designing software. That being said, we haven't had any significant issues or feature limitations yet\! ----- Page: 1 / 12\ Next: [Next page](https://www.getapp.za.com/software/102885/realm?page=2) ## Links - [View on GetApp](https://www.getapp.za.com/software/102885/realm) ## This page is available in the following languages | Locale | URL | | de | | | de-AT | | | en | | | en-AE | | | en-AU | | | en-CA | | | en-GB | | | en-IE | | | en-NZ | | | en-SG | | | en-ZA | | | es | | | es-CL | | | es-CO | | | es-MX | | | fr | | | fr-BE | | | fr-CA | | | nl | | | nl-BE | | ----- ## Structured Data