How to Choose a Digital Fundraising Platform for Faith-Based Organizations in 2026

Choosing a fundraising platform may not be something you expected to be part of your church committee role. But when it’s time to improve fundraising or organise a bigger event, finding the right software can quickly become part of the job.

Perhaps you’re looking for a simpler way to manage donations and appeals. Or maybe you’re organising the annual dinner and wondering how you’ll keep track of a hundred silent auction bids without relying on paper and spreadsheets.

Either way, you’re already busy. And choosing a platform can be harder than it should be, because most platforms list much the same features, while the things that really matter aren’t always obvious from a pricing page.

So, what should you actually look for? And what questions are worth asking before you sign up?

What’s Changed in Faith-Based Giving in 2026?

The way people give to churches and faith-based organizations continues to change. People still give in person, but they also expect to be able to support an organization from their phone, set up a recurring gift, or donate to a specific campaign when it matters to them.

That doesn’t mean every church needs every new fundraising feature. It does mean it’s worth looking at where giving is heading when you choose a platform.

Here are a few trends worth keeping in mind.

Recurring giving is becoming part of the mix

Recurring giving can make it easier for supporters to give consistently, even when they aren't at church every week or their schedules change.

Recent church giving research found that recurring gifts accounted for 35% of digital giving in 2025. The same research found that churches offering recurring giving, digital wallets and livestream giving were nearly twice as likely to report increased giving. These figures don't mean that every church needs to offer every option, but they do show why recurring giving is worth considering when comparing platforms.

Mobile and digital payments matter

People are increasingly used to paying from their phones, so a fundraising experience that feels difficult or outdated can stand out. Payment options such as Apple Pay and Google Pay can make donating faster, particularly on mobile.

Digital wallets are also becoming more common in church giving. According to the 2026 Annual Church Giving Report, digital wallet donations more than doubled among the Ministry Brands churches included in its data, reaching 5.1% of digital donations in 2025.

Giving isn't always about the general fund

People may want to support a particular ministry, mission trip, building project, community program or seasonal appeal rather than make a general donation. That makes flexibility useful. A platform should make it possible to create different campaigns or giving options without making the donor experience confusing.

Events and giving are increasingly connected

For many faith-based organizations, fundraising doesn't happen in just one place. A church might accept regular donations online, sell tickets to a dinner, run a silent auction and collect additional donations during the event.

If those activities all happen on separate platforms, volunteers can end up spending a lot of time moving information between systems.

The platform matters, but so does the experience

The technology behind a fundraising platform isn't necessarily something donors will notice. What they will notice is whether giving is easy, whether the page looks trustworthy and whether they can complete their donation without unnecessary steps.

That makes the donor experience one of the most useful things to test before you choose a fundraising platform.

What to Look For

There are about six things worth paying particular attention to:

1. It Has to Work for Everyone

Your congregation probably spans several generations, so the same evening might include someone in their twenties who never carries cash and someone in their eighties who has never bid online.

In that situation, simplicity really matters.

Ideally, there shouldn’t be an app to download or an account to create just to look around. The link should open in a browser and work well on any phone.

If someone has to install something before they can even see the auction items, some of your congregation may simply give up. And those could be people who were ready to support you.

2. Giving Has to Be Quick

A simple way to test a platform is to count the taps.

Open the giving page, make a one-off gift and see how long it takes. Then try setting up a regular gift.

If either process takes more than a minute, it’s worth asking whether there are unnecessary steps. Every extra step creates another opportunity for someone to drop off - particularly when they’re giving from a phone in a pew with patchy signal.

It can also help to offer suggested amounts that give people some context. Something like “feeds a family for a week” can be more helpful than an empty box and a blinking cursor.

3. It Should Look Like Your Church

People give to communities they recognise, not just to a payment form. Your church’s name, photos and own words help supporters feel confident that they’re in the right place.

This can be particularly important for people who are newer to your community. Someone who has only been along a couple of times, or who received your appeal from a friend, may not have another way to know that the page is genuinely yours.

It’s worth checking whether a platform lets you add your own banner, wording and link so it looks like a professional fundraiser rather than a separate third party platform.

4. Ask Where the Funds Actually Go

There are two questions here, and it’s easy to focus on just one.

The first is security. A reputable platform will generally use an established payment processor such as Stripe rather than storing card numbers itself, so this is usually a straightforward question to ask.

The second is where the money actually lands.

Some platforms collect payments into their own account and pay you afterwards. That’s a common and legitimate model, but it does mean your appeal funds are held by someone else until they’re transferred to you.

It’s worth making sure your treasurer understands how this works before you sign up. Four simple questions should give you a clear picture:

• Whose merchant account do payments settle into?
• How many business days from the event to the payout?
• Are the funds kept separate from the platform's own operating account?
• Is the payout timing written into the contract?

5. Check the Event Side Before You Need It

Most churches don’t run fundraising events every week, which is probably why the event features sometimes get checked three weeks before the annual dinner -rather than before signing up.

It’s worth looking at them earlier.

Ideally, your giving and event fundraising should work together. If they do, someone who buys a ticket can already be set up to bid, your guest list and bidder list stay together, and you can export your records in one place.

If they don’t, you could find yourself matching names and lists by hand at eleven o’clock at night.

Running an auction? Our guide to which auction format raises the most covers how silent, live and fund-a-need fit together across one evening.

6. Find Out Who Answers on a Saturday Night

Church fundraisers often happen on Saturday evenings and Sunday mornings - exactly when many software companies have limited support. Most things about a platform can be assessed before your event. Support is different. You only really know how good it is when something goes wrong.

Imagine having 200 people in the hall and an auction item won’t load. It’s worth knowing in advance who you can turn to.

A few questions to ask:

• Is support staffed in the evenings and at weekends?
• Does a person reply, or a bot that hands over on Monday?
• Do you get a name, or a ticket number?

Having access to expert support when you need it is invaluable for most fundraising event organizers. Although we're very much in a digital, automated age - there are platform providers (like GalaBid) who provide real-person support.

One Church Group's Experience

The Salvation Army of Greater Charlotte runs an annual fashion show and silent auction, with proceeds funding college scholarships for local high school seniors and the Center of Hope, which provides meals for women and children experiencing homelessness. Beth Butchino has been running their fundraisers for nine years.

They used to manage the bidding on paper.

“We had little pieces of paper, three-part forms where they had to write their bids on, write their price, write their name, write their number, and oh, it was crazy.”

Collecting the slips and working out who owed what took roughly half of the admin team, in an office of about 22 people.

After moving online, however, what Beth noticed wasn’t just the reduction in paperwork. It was the difference it made to the experience for guests:

“They can go sit at their tables, they can get their notifications, and then they continue to participate regardless of what else they're doing or where they are.”

That’s a useful way to think about any fundraising platform. It’s not just about how many features are on the list. It’s about whether your congregation can actually use them easily, without spending the whole evening standing over a bid sheet.

Three Mistakes Worth Avoiding

1. Going on Price Alone

The cheapest option isn’t necessarily the one that costs you the least. A platform might have a low price, but if the process is complicated and fewer people end up giving or bidding, the overall result may not be what you hoped for.

It’s worth estimating what you expect to raise first. That gives you something useful to compare any fees against, rather than simply choosing the lowest quote.

2. Not Checking It on a Phone

Most people will experience your giving page on a phone, so test every option on yours before you decide. Even better, hand your phone to someone in the congregation who isn’t particularly confident with technology and ask them to make a test gift.

Five minutes of watching them use it can tell you a lot more than another hour of comparing feature lists.

3. Asking for Too Much Information

Every additional field adds a little more friction. Ask for the information you actually need to process the gift and thank the person properly, and leave the rest.

Address, phone number and title are only worth collecting if someone is going to use them. If they aren’t, there’s probably no reason to make a supporter fill them in.

How GalaBid Works for Churches and Faith-Based Groups

Giving, ticketing, auctions and raffles all sit in one campaign, so your congregation signs up once and your records stay in one place.

People bid and give through a link in their browser, so there’s nothing to download and no account needed just to look around. The page carries your church’s name and photos rather than ours.

For payments, you connect your own Stripe account, so payments go directly into your organisation’s account and GalaBid never holds your funds. Card processing is charged at Stripe’s own rates, with nothing added on top.

GalaBid has been working with churches, schools and charities since 2011. Pricing varies by region, so check the options available in your country.

Where to Start

You don’t have to change everything at once. In most cases, it makes sense to start with the area that’s causing you the most difficulty right now.

If giving is the gap, regular giving is a good place to begin, particularly given the Ministry Brands figures. If events are where your volunteers are spending the most time, start there instead and look for a platform that keeps ticketing and bidding together.

Whichever you choose, there are three simple things worth doing before you sign anything:

• Open every page on your own phone, then try it on somebody else’s.
• Make a test gift yourself and count the taps.
• Get it in writing whose account the funds land in, and when.

Our church and faith group fundraising page shows how it works in practice.

A Fundraising Platform Should Make Things Easier

Choosing fundraising software doesn’t have to mean changing the way your church or faith-based group does everything. The right platform should simply make the parts you already do - collecting donations, organising events, running auctions or managing raffles - easier to manage.

Start with what your group needs most, and take the time to test the experience from both sides: as the person running the fundraiser and as the person giving or participating. Look closely at the payment process, the costs and the support available, too.

If you’re considering GalaBid, you can explore our church and faith group fundraising platform to see how donations, ticketing, auctions and raffles can work together in one place.

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