A climbing gym management system is usually priced one of three ways: per hall, in fixed feature tiers, or as a percentage of the turnover that passes through the system. The number on the price list matters less than which of these three you're committing to, because each one quietly punishes a growing gym in a different way.
Here's what the models actually do, what they leave out, and what GymKeeper costs.
Three pricing models
| Model | How it works | What it punishes |
|---|---|---|
| Per hall | Price per hall | The new hall's first months |
| Tiers | Fixed monthly fee by feature level | Needing just one feature from the tier above |
| Revenue-linked | A percentage of the turnover passing through the system, usually with a minimum | A good month |
Per hall is the most common model in general-purpose gym software, and the easiest to model in a spreadsheet. Its flaw is that it ties your software bill to the number of halls. The price per hall is usually fairly steep, and opening a new hall immediately bumps you into the next pricing step, even though the new hall is just getting started.
Tiers are easy to compare and easy to misjudge, because the tier boundaries are drawn wherever they happen to land. Access control, multiple locations and API access are typically standard content in the tier one step above the one you were about to buy. The question to ask isn't what the tier costs, but which single feature you'll want eighteen months from now, and what that tier will cost then.
Revenue-linked ties the bill to what the software actually helps you earn: a quiet January costs less, a busy October costs more. It suits seasonal businesses and new gyms, and it annoys people who want a flat line in the budget. Its real advantage is that it removes every other limit — if a vendor is being paid a share of revenue, they have no reason to also charge for users, devices or locations.
What GymKeeper costs
€149/month minimum. On top of that, the fee is a percentage of the turnover that actually passes through GymKeeper, in progressive brackets — the percentage applies to the portion of turnover inside each bracket, the same way income-tax brackets work:
| Monthly turnover through the system | Percentage |
|---|---|
| Up to €20,000 | 1.5% |
| €20,000 – €90,000 | 1.0% |
| €90,000 – €180,000 | 0.9% |
| Over €180,000 | 0.8% |
Unlimited users, unlimited gyms, unlimited devices, at every level. No per-user fee, no device cap, no feature tiers — so "is it worth adding one more staff login?" is never a question you have to price out.
Or if you want to try some new piece of functionality, there's no risk attached to it at all. If it grows revenue, good. If it doesn't, well, you tried it.
Two consequences are worth saying plainly. In a quiet month, the cost drops back to the €149 minimum — that's the whole point of the minimum. And in a very good month, you pay more in absolute terms than a fixed package would have cost — that's the trade, and if a flat line in the budget matters more to you than a bill that follows the season, this model is the wrong one. Current brackets are on the pricing page, which reads them from the same source as this article. And the thing about this model is: by the time next month's charge is due, you've already earned the money you're paying it with.
What isn't included in the software price
Surprise costs are rarely the licence. Budget separately for:
Card-terminal fees. Card payment is a separate contract with a separate provider, priced per transaction. This is usually the biggest recurring line in the stack after rent and payroll, and it has nothing to do with the software vendor. What the software affects is whether the terminal is integrated — the amount goes straight to the terminal instead of being typed in by hand. Integrated terminals remove an entire category of end-of-day discrepancy. GymKeeper's till works with NETS terminals across Scandinavia; others can be integrated, but that needs the provider's documentation and is project work.
Door hardware. Controllers, readers, locks or turnstiles, and an electrician to install them. A turnstile roughly halves tailgating and roughly doubles the installation cost. This is a capital investment, it's site-specific, and no vendor can price it from a website. See how access control works for what to decide before buying anything.
Receipt printer and cash drawer. GymKeeper supports Star TSP-100 Eco and Epson receipt printers directly; the TSP-100 is inexpensive, has a cutter, and drives a cash drawer.
Till hardware and check-in terminals. These cost a few hundred at the cheap end, but if you go for something like a MacBook Neo, a 27" 4K display and a good check-in terminal, you're talking about a couple of thousand euros.
Migration work. The thing nobody budgets for. Someone has to dig your members, serial-card balances and signed waivers out of whatever you're using now, map them, check them, and fix whatever doesn't come across cleanly. Expect days, not hours, and expect to want the old system readable for another season. Do it in your quietest month. For climbing gyms, summer is the best time for this.
Your own time learning it. Every system in this category takes a few weeks before the front desk stops thinking about it.
How to compare two quotes honestly
Price the same twelve months under each model, with your own numbers, not the vendor's sample gym:
- Take your last twelve months of turnover, month by month. Seasonality is the whole point — an annual average hides it.
- Run all three models over those twelve months. The revenue model and the per-hall model can differ by a factor of two in the same year, in either direction.
- Add the hardware you'd have to buy under each, spread over three years.
- Add a realistic migration cost for each, in person-days at your own labour cost.
Then ask what happens at double your current size, because that's the decision you're actually making: switching gym systems is expensive enough that most gyms do it about once a decade.
Frequently asked questions
Is there a free climbing gym system? Free booking and scheduling tools exist, and a spreadsheet works longer than most people believe. A credible free system that also handles access control, payments and waivers doesn't exist, because those carry liability, PCI obligations and support costs that nobody carries for free. A small gym with no unstaffed hours can genuinely wait — see what a climbing gym management system is for the signs that the time has come.
Do I pay per location? Not with GymKeeper — unlimited gyms, users and devices, and the bill follows turnover regardless of how many sites it comes from. Many vendors price per location, so it's worth asking early if a second gym is on the roadmap.
What happens if I want to leave? Ask in writing before signing: how you get your customer register, sales history and signed waivers out, in what format, and how long it takes. This is as much a data-protection question as a contract one — you're the data controller for your members' information regardless of which system holds it.
Isn't a percentage of revenue just taxing growth? That's a genuine objection, and the bracket structure is the answer to it: the percentage falls as turnover rises, so the marginal rate at €200,000 a month is roughly half of what it is at €10,000. Whether that's answer enough depends on your margins, and that's fair to negotiate.
GymKeeper is a climbing gym management system built by GymKeeper Oy in Finland: memberships, invoicing, point of sale, access control, waivers, courses, rentals, a web shop and reporting in one system. The pricing page has a calculator with current brackets, and get in touch if you'd like the numbers run with your own figures.
Checked: 24 September 2026.