Tap-to-Give Plate Cost: 200-Seat Church Pays $800 (2026)
Tap-to-give plates cost between $3.50 and $4.50 each in 2026, paid once. A 200-seat church usually orders 200 plates at $4.00 each for a $800 one-time total, with free shipping and no monthly fees from Tap.Giving. That is the whole bill for adding NFC tap plates to a sanctuary, the giving platform your church already uses stays exactly the same.
$800
One-time total for a 200-seat church, 200 plates at $4.00 each. Free shipping. Nothing else.
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The Short Answer for Every Church Size
Tap-to-give plates from Tap.Giving are priced in three quantity bands, with the per-plate cost dropping as the order grows. There is no minimum monthly fee, no annual renewal, and no per-transaction fee from us. The whole cost lives in one line on the invoice.
| Church size (rough) | Plates you order | Price per plate | One-time total |
|---|---|---|---|
| 100-seat plant or small church | 100 | $4.50 | $450 |
| 150-seat neighborhood church | 150 | $4.50 | $675 |
| 200-seat congregation | 200 | $4.00 | $800 |
| 300-seat mid-size church | 300 | $4.00 | $1,200 |
| 400-seat large church | 400 | $3.50 | $1,400 |
| 500 to 1,000-seat multi-site | 500 to 1,000 | $3.50 | $1,750 to $3,500 |
Every row above is the entire hardware cost. Full quantity breaks and volume discount details live on the pricing page. The three price bands (100 to 199, 200 to 399, and 400 plus) are the same whether you order once or spread the roll-out over two campuses. Because a plate is the cheapest form of contactless giving hardware on the market, most churches move to this route once they compare it to a monthly platform subscription.
What "One-Time" Actually Means in the Church Budget
Church leaders are used to giving software billing monthly or annually. Tap.Giving does not work that way. Plates are hardware, and the invoice looks like buying a projector or a set of chairs, not signing up for a SaaS tool.
What you pay us
- Plate cost, once, at the per-unit rate
- Nothing else, no monthly, no setup, no design fee
- Shipping is included (free)
- The first-order discount is 10% for 14 days from first contact
What your platform charges (unchanged)
- Tithely, Pushpay, Subsplash, Donorbox, Givelify, or Anedot each keep their normal pricing
- Standard processing fee (about 2.9 percent plus $0.30 per gift)
- Adding NFC tap plates does not change any platform fee
- Our plates work with the church giving technology you already use
The chip in each plate stores one thing: the URL of your existing giving page. Because we do not touch the money, we do not add any processing markup. Every dollar a member gives on a plate hits the same platform, at the same fee, that a dollar given from home would. See the fuller breakdown in our hidden costs of church giving platforms guide.
How to Size Your Order (Seats vs. Plates)
The rule of thumb is one plate per seat in the main worship space. That gets you within reach of a plate for every attender, which is what drives an in-service participation rate of about 81 percent among our customer churches. But most churches do not need to buy for every chair.
Start with the row count, not the peak attendance
Count seats in the rows people actually sit in on a typical Sunday, not the maximum capacity for Easter. If the back three rows go unused most weeks, skip them until you are ready.
Order 15 to 20 percent extra as spares
Plates are hardy, but they get moved, dropped, and occasionally lost. A modest spares buffer avoids a re-order later at a higher per-unit price if you slip out of a tier.
Add plates for satellite areas last
Foyer, cry room, nursery, and youth spaces are worth covering once the sanctuary is done. Most churches add 20 to 40 plates in those spots and cross into the next price tier accidentally, at a lower per-plate cost.
Multi-site: order across campuses in one purchase
If two 200-seat campuses each need plates, ordering 400 together lands in the $3.50 tier, saving $200 over two separate 200-plate orders at $4.00. Read the tap-to-give for multi-site churches guide for the full playbook.
The Real Math for a 200-Seat Church
Take a fairly common example: a suburban church with a 200-seat sanctuary, a foyer, and a small back area for parents. They want to offer tap to give in every row, plus a few plates in the entry area for late arrivals. Here is the invoice, top to bottom.
| Line item | Detail | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Sanctuary plates | 180 seats, one per seat | 180 x $4.00 = $720 |
| Foyer plates | Late-arrival area, guest table | 10 x $4.00 = $40 |
| Spares | About 5 percent buffer | 10 x $4.00 = $40 |
| Subtotal (200 plates) | Qualifies for the 200 to 399 tier | $800 |
| Shipping | Included | $0 |
| the 14-day first-order discount | 10 percent off, applies at checkout | -$80 |
| Grand total (year 1) | Paid once, no renewal | $720 |
| Grand total (year 2, 3, 4, 5) | Plates already installed | $0 |
Over five years, the total spend on tap to donate hardware from Tap.Giving for this church is $720. If those 200 plates lift in-service giving by even one gift per Sunday (a common outcome), the plates pay for themselves inside a single month. See the return math in our NFC giving ROI numbers post.
What Else Goes Into the Total Line
Because the plate is a physical product, a few real-world costs live around the sticker price. Every one of them is small, but a church treasurer will ask, so here they are on paper.
Shipping: $0
Shipping is free to every destination we agree to serve. Delivery is typically 2-3 weeks from artwork approval, and rush service is available for a fee.
Design and proofs: $0
The design tool builds an editable mockup instantly with your church logo, color, and giving URL before we produce a single plate. There is no design fee. Add any usable logo, or ask us to help if you cannot find a vector file.
Mounting hardware: $0-$25 (from you)
Plates ship with adhesive backing that works on most pew backs and chair backs, and we can add pre-drilled screw holes at no charge. If you mount on fabric-backed chairs, some churches buy $10-$25 of Velcro or elastic bands from a hardware store. See the chair mounting guide for photos.
Volunteer install: 60 to 90 minutes for 200 plates
Two volunteers with a Saturday morning can mount a full sanctuary. No trained installer required. The plates work the day they arrive.
There are no ongoing costs. Once the plates are up, they keep working with the church giving technology you already have. If your platform later changes its URL, you can re-encode plates with a small utility, no re-order required. That is what makes digital giving for churches sustainable at the small-church budget end: the whole cost is booked once.
How This Compares to a Monthly Giving Platform
The most useful cost comparison is not one giving platform versus another, but a one-time hardware purchase versus an ongoing subscription. A subscription cost keeps ticking every month whether the church uses it or not. A plate purchase stops.
| Provider | Model | Year 1 cost (200-seat church) | 5-year cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tap.Giving (200 plates) | Hardware, one-time | $800 ($720 with the 14-day first-order discount) | $720 |
| Tithely (standard suite) | SaaS + transaction fees | $99 x 12 = $1,188 | $5,940 |
| Pushpay (typical) | SaaS + transaction fees | ~$1,475 x 12 = $17,700 | $88,500 |
| Subsplash | SaaS + transaction fees | Varies (starts at $99+/month) | $5,940+ |
Numbers reflect public pricing pages and quotes churches have shared with us as of 2026. Tithely and Subsplash have entry tiers below their standard suites, and Pushpay pricing varies by contract, so treat these as sensible defaults rather than exact quotes. For more detail see the full comparisons on Tithely pricing, Subsplash pricing, and Pushpay hidden costs.
Tap.Giving is not a replacement for those platforms. We complement whatever the church already uses. A church can keep Tithely (or Pushpay, or any other) and layer in NFC tap plates for a one-time $800. The plates do not compete with the platform, they surface it inside the offering.
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FAQ: Common Cost Questions
How much do tap-to-give plates cost per unit?
Tap.Giving plates are priced by quantity: $4.50 each for 100 to 199 plates, $4.00 each for 200 to 399, and $3.50 each for 400 or more. Shipping is free on every order and there are no monthly fees or transaction fees from us. The first-order discount is 10% for 14 days from first contact.
What does a 200-seat church actually pay?
A 200-seat church typically orders 200 plates at $4.00 each, which is $800 one-time, with free shipping. Applied with the 14-day first-order discount the total drops to $720. There is no second-year cost, no subscription, and no per-transaction fee from Tap.Giving.
Are there hidden costs on top of the plate price?
No setup fee, no design fee, no shipping fee, and no monthly fee from us. Your existing giving platform (Tithely, Pushpay, Subsplash, Donorbox, Givelify, Anedot, Planning Center Giving, or another) charges its normal processing fee, usually 2.9 percent plus $0.30 per gift. That fee is unchanged whether the donation comes through a plate, a QR code, or a manual login. Read our hidden costs guide for the platform side.
How does this compare to a monthly giving platform subscription?
Most SaaS church giving platforms charge somewhere between $99 and $1,475 per month on top of transaction fees. A 200-plate order from Tap.Giving is $800 once. Even the most expensive plate order (400 plates at $3.50) pays for itself in under two months at the low end of platform pricing, and continues working with no recurring cost.
How long do the plates last?
The NFC chip in each plate is passive: no battery, no moving parts. In normal indoor sanctuary use, plates hold up for years. The most common failure mode is a physical scuff on the printed face after heavy use, not a chip failure. We have customers still using their original plates from their first order without a single replacement.
Do I have to buy one plate per seat?
Not exactly, but one plate per seat is the rule of thumb that works. Plate-per-seat means every giver has a plate within reach during the offering, which is what drives the 81 percent in-service participation rate our customers see. Some churches order fewer plates for satellite areas and skip the very front rows if they are always empty. Ordering 20 percent extra as spares is common for busy sanctuaries.
What does a large multi-site church pay?
A multi-site church ordering 400 or more plates gets the $3.50 tier. A 1,000-plate order is $3,500 total, free shipping. That covers a 1,000-seat main campus or spreads across three 300-seat campuses with room for spares. Compared to a multi-site SaaS renewal at $1,475 per month, the plates pay back in under three months and keep working.
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