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ChurchPresentationSoftware

Background:
Our church used EasyWorship for many years. In moving from PowerPoint to church presentation software capabilities, I was excited about the possibilities of having motion backgrounds and using a database for song searching and "set list" creation capabilities. I'm a web-based computer programmer/musician/techie so the possibilities seemed wonderful.
Soon after I started using EasyWorship, I wanted more content. Having dabbled in videography, I decided to try to make some of my own loops. After creating my own loops, I deleted all of the samples that came with the package. I then became a content provider with EasyWorship. The company made purchasing content easier for non-EasyWorship customers in the mid 2010's. You can find my content on their site.
The big downside to EasyWorship is that it is Windows only. I'm a Mac guy. I ran EasyWorship via BootCamp successfully for many years. Running it on a VM was sketchy. Softouch Development, inc., the company that makes EasyWorship, had talked about a Mac version coming out for years. Last year (April 2016) I decided I couldn't wait any longer, so I searched for, and found, a Mac solution that fit my budget.
My research was intended to be only for my use so there are some gaps in the search results. I may update the research some day again. Basically, if I didn't like it, I moved on.
I joined a "Visual Church Media" Facebook group and found that many people were asking about church presentation software so I decided to create a blog with my research from last year. While doing so, I found out that the software I'm using, was discontinued back in October of 2016. While it still functions (and is great software), I plan on looking for a replacement soon. OS upgrades can affect this type of video-intensive software, so you need a program with active development.

Needs to support

Additional considerations for the next time

Research Results from April 2016

ProgramOS supportCostData
ZionWorx Windows only
LiveWorship Version 1.3.85, released publicly on May 20, 2011 Mac and Windows $300 site license
Proclaim $250 annually? Tiered pricing based on church size
Quelea $0 Sketchy download
OpenLP $0 Doesn't support background videos
EpicWorship Mac $0 Installed, not that great
OpenSong Mac $0 Probably no video backgrounds
Harmony (& Mac app store) Mac only $80 (30 day trial looks good) Does not support PowerPoint, use with Keynote

Top 3 Church Presentation Software packages ($400 and up)

ProgramOS supportCostData
ProPresenter (by Renewed Vision) Mac and Windows, Mac version probably more stable $400 single license, $800 campus license
Media Shout Mac and Windows, Windows version probably more stable $400
EasyWorship Windows $500

Other packages to research

Harmony Info

File locations

08-13-2017 Update

While responding to a post in the Visual Church Media group in October of 2016, and knowing that the video portion of presentation software is highly integrated/dependent on the operating system, I decided to move on replacing Harmony. Our church purchased ProPresenter 6. It's great. Even today I feel I'm only scratching the surface with what it can do. It's pricey though. If my church budget couldn't support $800, I would probably look at one of the free pieces of software previously mentioned instead of using regular presentation software. The benefit of storing songs in a database and being able to quickly put together 'play lists' highly outways the craziness that you quickly arrive at with a bunch of songs in a slideshow.

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