Plans and editions compared
A site we host is on one of three plans. A site you run yourself has a licence for one of two editions. This page puts them side by side so you can see, for one feature, what you get where. Prices are not repeated here: see What each plan includes and the pricing on choirmastercms.com.
The comparison
| Hosted Free | Hosted Starter | Hosted Premium | Self-hosted Community | Self-hosted Standard | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Public website, themes and your own pages | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Member portal, and its parts (announcements, schedule, rehearsal tracks, member files, useful links) | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Emailing announcements to members | No | Yes | Yes | Yes, with email set up | Yes, with email set up |
| Forwarding contact-form messages to the choir by email | No (kept in Messages) | Yes | Yes | Yes, with email set up | Yes, with email set up |
| Your own domain name | No (a cmcms.org address) | Yes | Yes | Your own DNS | Your own DNS |
| Own mail server page (Email in the admin panel) | No | Yes | Yes | Not applicable: server settings instead | Not applicable: server settings instead |
| Ticketing (sales, orders, check-in) | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Donor records and receipts | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Mailings to donors and to ticket holders | No | No | Yes | Yes, with email set up | Yes, with email set up |
| Card payments (tickets and online gifts) | No | No | Yes, with Stripe connected | No | No |
| Custom style sheet | No | No | No | Yes, Site Admin | Yes, Site Admin |
| Writing assistant in the guided setup | Yes | Yes | Yes | With your own key | With your own key |
| Updates | Ours | Ours | Ours | Yours; Community updates are at our discretion | Yours; included for 12 months from purchase |
| Hide "Powered by Choir Master CMS" | No | No | Yes, see below | No | Yes, see below |
| Warranty and support | None; may be withdrawn at any time | See the cloud terms | See the cloud terms | None | Limited to what was described at purchase |
Notes on the table:
- "With email set up" means you have chosen an email provider; see Email.
- Card payments are available only on a site we host, and only once the choir has connected a Stripe account; see Take card payments: connect Stripe. A self-hosted site sells tickets and takes gifts without online payment: the buyer pays on arrival or the gift is recorded by hand.
- The warranty and support terms are in the licence terms.
- A hosted site whose plan the platform does not recognise is treated as Free, so that nothing is handed out that has not been paid for.
- Self-hosted editions do not turn features on or off. Every feature is present on both; the difference is the link below and what comes with the licence.
The "Powered by Choir Master CMS" link
A small link at the foot of every public page and of the member portal. Whether you may hide it depends on where you run the site:
| Where | Rule |
|---|---|
| Hosted Free and Starter | Always shown. |
| Hosted Premium | You may hide it, in Site Settings, Footer, by turning off Show "Powered by Choir Master CMS". The exception: if the setup and migration package was bought at the founder price, the link must stay for 12 months from the purchase, and you may hide it afterwards. |
| Self-hosted Community | Always shown. |
| Self-hosted Standard | You may hide it, in the same setting. The site learns it has a Standard licence when it asks the release server about updates, so it needs your LICENSE_KEY and update checks switched on (not UPDATE_MODE=off). Until one check has succeeded, the link stays. |
The link is also always present on the product's own screens, such as the admin login page and the guided setup, together with the version number. Those are not under your control.
While the link is required, the setting in Site Settings has no effect: it stays on whatever you choose.
How the server enforces a plan
On a hosted site, the server refuses what the plan does not include, whatever the Features switches say, and the browser hides it. The refusals are:
| What is not included | The message |
|---|---|
| The member portal | "The member portal is not part of this site's plan." |
| Own mail server | "Sending through your own mail server is not part of this site's plan." |
| Ticketing | "Ticketing is not part of this site's plan." |
| Donor management | "Donor management is not part of this site's plan." |
| Emailing donors or ticket holders | "Emailing these people is not part of this site's plan." |
A plan that lacks a feature leaves your switches as you set them, so everything comes back as it was after an upgrade. A plan that lacks email does not show a message; contact-form messages are kept and announcements cannot be emailed. Self-hosted sites have no plans and are never refused.
For the full list of differences between hosted and self-hosted, see Hosted and self-hosted: what is different.