All guides · Published September 6, 2026 · 4 min read
Choosing software for your Pilates or yoga studio: seven questions before you sign
Studio software is a choice you live with for years. Here are the seven questions that separate a good choice from a subscription you regret, with figures taken from public pricing pages in September 2026.
Disclosure: this guide is written by the team behind Ritmello, a studio management platform. We have that bias, and we make up for it with figures you can check yourself.
1. What will it cost in a year, not this month?
The advertised price is almost always the first month, on the entry plan. The real question is what you will pay once the studio has grown. Three mechanisms push the bill up without anyone having lied to you.
- Customer tiers: TeamUp’s pricing page shows $189 a month for 101 to 200 active customers, and more above that. GymMaster’s entry plan stops at 100 members, the next at 400.
- Modules: at Xplor Deciplus, the branded app costs 139 € a month on top of the plan, and training tracking 39 €.
- Mid-subscription increases, a recurring theme in public owner testimonies about WellnessLiving.
Ask the vendor to write down what you will pay at 150 clients, with your booking page in your colors and automatic reminders on. The answer is a single number, or it does not exist.
2. Who collects your clients’ money?
Two models coexist. In the first, you are the merchant: your clients pay into your own Stripe account with your keys, and the software never sees the money. In the second, the platform collects, takes its share, then pays you the rest.
The second model has a price. On Momence’s pricing page in September 2026, the free plan charges 5% on you and 4% on the client, the Pro plan at $60 a month charges 2.5%, and you need the $199 a month plan to pay nothing. Card processing fees come on top.
The question is four words long: who is the merchant? If it is not you, work out the commission on your monthly revenue before signing.
3. What does a client have to do to book a first class?
Open the booking page of a studio that uses the software and count the steps. Create an account, choose a password, confirm an email, install an app: every step loses some of the people who found you on Instagram at 10 pm.
One-step booking with just an email exists. It is not a detail: it is the difference between a browser and a client.
4. How do you leave?
The most revealing test happens before you sign: ask how to get all your data back if you leave. An export button in the settings that returns a complete file with no call and no delay is the right answer. “On request through support” is a signal.
Look at the contract length and the renewal too. A twelve-month auto-renewing contract is usually discovered the day you want out.
5. Who does the migration, and what survives it?
Three things must survive a software change: your client list, their current passes with the remaining credits, and their memberships with the renewal date. Ask who does that work, what it costs, and above all what happens to remaining credits: imported as they are, or lost. We wrote a full guide on migration.
6. Do the reports answer your questions?
A useful report answers a question an owner actually asks: which class type earns the most, which instructor fills the room, what share of January’s new clients is still there in April, what no-shows really cost. A report that hands you a spreadsheet to rework answers nothing. Ask to see those four reports in the demo, not in a brochure.
7. Your timezone, your currency, your clients’ language
Check that your timezone is in the list, that your currency is accepted, and that your clients will get confirmations in their own language. A Montreal studio needs both languages on the same page; an Auckland studio needs daylight saving to move the right way. These are details until the day they are not.
What is left to do
Test with your own data, not the vendor’s. Create three classes, sell a ten-class pass to a fictional client, book them, cancel, and read what the report says. One hour is enough, and it is worth years.
Figures recorded in September 2026 on the public pricing pages of TeamUp, GymMaster, Xplor Deciplus and Momence. Always check current terms.
Also read: Switching studio software without losing your clients’ credits · What a commission on your own clients really costs