The honest comparison
The problem isn’t your tools.
It’s the gaps between them.
Coaching software comes in slices — one app delivers workouts, another books sessions, another takes payment. Run your business across all of them and you become the thing holding it together by hand. Here’s the honest landscape — and why the future is one connected system, not five disconnected ones.
You are the integration
Five apps. None of them talk.
Your workouts, your calendar, your payments, your tracking, your client chats — five separate tools, each unaware the others exist.
So you become the sixth tool.
Every gap between them is work you do by hand: copy a booking into your program app, chase a payment, update a spreadsheet. Slow, easy to get wrong, and it never ends.
Everything merges into Raelan.
Your five tools become one system — and you run all of it from a single place, instead of stitching apps together by hand.
Most tools live in one territory. Raelan lives in all of them.
Each is genuinely good at its slice. The gaps between the slices are where your evenings go.
The teal line is Raelan — present in every territory. That’s the entire point.
Compare what you’re actually deciding
Nobody chooses software by counting features. They ask five questions. Here are honest answers.
1Which platform fits the way I actually run my business?
The only one that doesn’t make you pick a lane — online, in-person, hybrid, groups, and memberships in one place.2What will save me the most time?
The session settles itself, the booking already knows the program, progress updates the instant it happens. The seams — and the work inside them — disappear.3What scales with me?
Solo → team → facility on one modern codebase — you never migrate — and the price falls as you grow instead of taxing every new seat.4What creates the best experience for my clients?
One client app — workout, streaks that reward showing up, booking, payment, and messaging in the same place. Good enough that clients ask their coaches for it.5Is it fast, and easy to actually use?
Built recently, on a modern foundation: fast, reliable, and intuitive enough that a first-time client is up and training in minutes.The honest rundown
What each kind of tool is genuinely great at, who it’s for, and the trade-off.
Great at sending workouts. The business runs somewhere else.
Great atOnline workout delivery, habit coaching, and video form feedback.
Best if you’rea fully-online coach who mostly needs to program and message.
The trade-offPayments, real scheduling, and memberships are add-ons or afterthoughts; the in-person side isn’t their world.
Great at the front desk. The coaching lives elsewhere.
Great atMemberships, billing, class scheduling, and check-in at scale.
Best if you’rea facility that needs to run the desk and the door.
The trade-offThe actual coaching — programming, logging, progress — isn’t there, and much of it runs on decade-old software.
Great at the craft of individual design.
Great atIndividualized program design and a structured coaching method.
Best if you’rea 1:1 coach who lives in bespoke design.
The trade-offIt’s a design tool, not a business — payments, scheduling, memberships, and a polished client app aren’t the point.
Great at flexibility. You are the automation.
Great atBeing free, familiar, and infinitely flexible.
Best if you’rea coach just starting with a few clients and no budget.
The trade-offNothing talks to anything, there’s no client app, and it breaks the moment you get busy — you are the integration.
The full picture
Reviewed app by app — honest about what each one genuinely does well. ● built-in ◐ partial / add-on — not offered ◔ Raelan, coming very soon
| Raelan | ABC Fitness | Trainerize | TrueCoach | Everfit | CoachRx | Notion | Sheets | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Deliver the training | ||||||||
| Program builder | ● | — | ● | ● | ● | ● | ◐ | ◐ |
| Set-by-set logging + rest timers | ● | — | ● | ● | ● | ● | — | ◐ |
| Automatic PRs + 1RM trends | ● | — | ◐ | ◐ | ◐ | ◐ | — | ◐ |
| Exercise library with video demos | ● | — | ● | ● | ● | ◐ | — | — |
| Warm-up builder attached to programs | ● | — | ◐ | — | ◐ | ◐ | — | — |
| Assessments + custom test builder | ● | — | ◐ | — | ◐ | ● | ◐ | ◐ |
| Client experience | ||||||||
| Dedicated client app | ● | ◐ | ● | ● | ● | ◐ | — | — |
| Streak / award engine (healthy-by-design) | ● | — | ◐ | — | ◐ | — | — | — |
| Vaults with form feedback on photos + video | ● | — | ● | ● | ● | ◐ | — | — |
| Comprehensive messaging (send-later, media, communities) | ● | ◐ | ◐ | ◐ | ◐ | ◐ | — | — |
| Book + pay inside the client app | ● | ◐ | ◐ | ◐ | ◐ | — | — | — |
| 30-second check-ins on cadence | ● | — | ◐ | ◐ | ● | ● | ◐ | ◐ |
| Run the business | ||||||||
| Scheduling: client requests + auto conflict resolution | ● | ◐ | ◐ | — | ◐ | — | — | ◐ |
| Group sessions & classes | ● | ● | ◐ | — | ◐ | — | — | — |
| Semi-private overlap logic | ● | ◐ | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| No-show / late-cancel policies | ● | ● | — | — | ◐ | — | — | — |
| Memberships & packages | ● | ● | ◐ | ◐ | ◐ | — | — | — |
| Payments, autopay + refunds that reconcile | ● | ● | ◐ | ◐ | ◐ | — | — | — |
| Finances: payouts, reporting, session log | ● | ● | ◐ | ◐ | ◐ | — | ◐ | ◐ |
| Lead capture → pipeline | ● | ◐ | ◐ | — | ◐ | ◐ | ◐ | ◐ |
| Speed & ease of use | ||||||||
| Fast, modern foundation (not legacy code) | ● | — | ◐ | ◐ | ● | ◐ | ● | ● |
| Intuitive for a first-time user | ● | ◐ | ◐ | ● | ● | ◐ | ◐ | ● |
| One place — no exports between tools | ● | — | — | — | — | — | ◐ | — |
| Built for the next decade | ||||||||
| One data model (everything connected underneath) | ● | — | — | — | — | — | ◐ | — |
| AI importer (bring your old programs in a chat) | ● | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Aligned pricing (we earn when you do) | ● | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Run the facility Raelan coming very soon | ||||||||
| Front desk / member management | ◔ | ● | — | — | — | ◐ | — | — |
| POS + QR scan-in | ◔ | ● | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| Multi-site / multi-coach org | ◔ | ● | ◐ | — | ◐ | — | — | — |
| Every coach inside on the full platform | ◔ | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
Everything the others do, Raelan does — or is building. The one territory still in progress, full facility operations, is coming very soon; we won’t mark a feature done until it is. Marks reflect each product’s known capabilities and are reviewed regularly — features change, so treat this as a living comparison.
Why coaches make the switch
The moment a stack of tools stops being worth it usually sounds like one of these.
Moving over is an afternoon, not a migration
The Raelan importer reads your spreadsheets, PDFs, and exports, asks a few clarifying questions, and rebuilds your programs, clients, and schedule on a clean foundation. Run in parallel for a cycle if you want — no big-bang cutover. Founding members get hands-on onboarding.
Compare Raelan with a specific tool
Fair, feature-by-feature breakdowns — including what each one genuinely does well, and when it might be the right call over us.
Where this is going
We’re the future of the training industry.
The tools this industry runs on were built for a different decade — slow, glitchy, and trapped under legacy code. Raelan was built on a clean, modern foundation for where coaching is going: connected, fast, and made to scale with you. Everything a legacy tool has that we don’t yet, we’re building. The direction only points one way.
Comparison questions
Why was Raelan built?
We didn’t start as a software company — we ran coaching out of real facilities on the industry’s standard tools, including ABC Fitness and Baseline. They felt like they were built in the 90s: slow, prone to crashing, and buried under so much legacy code that real innovation for coaches and business owners was impossible. Nothing scaled with us. So we built the thing we actually needed, from a clean, modern foundation — one connected system designed for where the training industry is going, not where it’s been. Our first launch already proved the execution. Raelan is the future of the training industry, and this is the start of it.
What’s the best alternative to a coaching-delivery app?
If all you need is to deliver workouts, a delivery app is fine. If you want the delivery AND the booking, payments, memberships, and a client experience that actually connect, that’s Raelan — one system instead of a delivery app with a business bolted around it.
How do I choose between all the delivery apps?
They’re broadly similar at delivering workouts; the real question isn’t which sends workouts best, it’s what happens to booking, payments, and your client experience once the workout is sent. In every delivery app, those live in other tools. In Raelan, they live in the same one.
Can I run in-person AND online coaching in one app?
Yes — this is exactly what Raelan is built for. Locations, semi-private overlap, no-show policies, and group sessions sit right beside online delivery and auto-attaching meeting links. Most delivery apps simply weren’t designed for the in-person side.
Is Raelan actually faster and easier to use than what I have now?
That’s the whole reason it exists. Legacy platforms are powerful but slow, glitchy, and hard for a new client to learn. Raelan is built on a modern foundation — fast, reliable, and intuitive enough that a first-time client is training in minutes instead of fighting the app.
Does Raelan work for gyms and facilities?
Facility mode — front desk, POS, QR scan-in, multi-coach orgs — is coming very soon and is the one area we’re still building toward; today Raelan is strongest for solo, online, hybrid, and small-group coaches. When facility launches, every coach inside runs the full platform, which no facility tool offers today.
How hard is it to switch?
The Raelan importer takes spreadsheets, PDFs, exports, and screenshots, asks a few clarifying questions, and rebuilds your programs, clients, and schedule — an afternoon, not a migration project. You can run in parallel for a billing cycle, and founding members get hands-on onboarding.
Founding members get everything. Free.
Every feature, the full platform, while we roll out access — and founding terms locked in when billing turns on.
Takes 30 seconds. You'll join the waitlist for the beta.