A giving kiosk is a touchscreen station in your church that lets someone give, buy, or register with a tap of a credit or debit card, Apple Pay, or Google Pay. It’s built to catch generosity in the moment. Because, whether a longtime member or a first-time guest, everyone has a card or phone on them. Giving kiosks work for churches of any size.
Why your church needs a giving kiosk
Giving kiosks facilitate generosity “in the moment.” When someone decides to give to your church on Sunday morning, they need a simple, clear way to take action. Because if they have to remember to do it later, there’s a good chance they won’t. Across SecureGive’s 20+ years of kiosk data, 27% of people who give on a kiosk have never given to that church before. More than 1 in 4 kiosk gifts comes from a brand-new donor.
That pattern lines up with a broader shift: the way people pay for almost everything has moved to cards and digital wallets. Specifically, people pay with a tap. Giving is no exception. According to the Federal Reserve’s 2026 Diary of Consumer Payment Choice, credit and debit cards now account for roughly two-thirds of all U.S. consumer payments, while cash makes up about one in seven. Barna Group’s research on digital donors found that nearly half of Americans, 44%, now prefer giving digitally over any other method.
None of that means people give less generously in person. It means the method matters less than the moment, and a kiosk exists to catch that moment: a guest moved by the sermon, someone deciding on the spot at an event, a member checking out at the bookstore.
The average kiosk gift over the past 12 months has been $116, and it isn’t limited to small transactions: SecureGive has processed single kiosk gifts of $100,000 and more.
None of this requires changing how your church gives. A kiosk isn’t meant to replace the offering plate, online giving, or recurring gifts, it’s meant to fill the one gap those channels don’t cover. Online giving works when someone gives from home. Recurring giving works for members who’ve already made it a habit.
A kiosk works for the person standing in your lobby right now, moved to give today, whether that’s a guest deciding on the spot or a member who left their wallet at home. Each channel is doing its own job, and a kiosk just adds the one your church may currently be missing: catching a gift the moment someone’s physically in the building and ready to give.
Some pastors worry that a screen in the lobby makes giving feel transactional instead of personal, but a kiosk doesn’t replace the offering plate, and worship doesn’t change. It simply gives the person who already wants to give, but has no cash or checkbook on hand, a way to actually do it.
What a church giving kiosk can process
Giving is the core function of a kiosk, but it’s built to handle more than the offering. The same screen that takes a tithe can also process a purchase or a payment, without a separate system or a second checkout line.
- Tithes and offerings. A simple tap, with the option to give to a specific fund.
- Suggested giving amounts. Preset amounts by fund, so a donor has a clear starting point.
- Merchandise and bookstore sales. T-shirts, books, mugs, or anything else your ministry sells.
- Event payments. Camps, retreats, VBS, and conference registration fees.
For a pastor, that means one lobby conversation can end in a completed gift, a purchase, or a paid registration, instead of pointing someone to a separate table for anything that isn’t a tithe.
For a finance team, it means all of that activity (tithes, merch, event fees) lands in the same reporting dashboard instead of a cash box for merch or a spreadsheet for camp signups. Reports break out by fund and by transaction type, so reconciling a Sunday’s activity means pulling one report, not stitching together three.
Choosing the right kiosk for your church
SecureGive offers four kiosk series, and the right one depends on traffic, space, and how you plan to use it, not just budget.
- iPad Series: best for popup bookstores, merch tables, secondary kiosks alongside a larger unit, or a group of kiosks placed for visibility across a lobby or multiple sites. These are easy to move around your facility.
- Classic Series: best for a designed giving center in a lobby, built for long-term, high-traffic use at a lower profile.
- Modern Series: best for high-traffic lobbies, giving centers, and bookstores that need a larger, higher-resolution display.
- Signature Series: best for large, high-traffic lobbies that want a highly visible, custom kiosk.
Current pricing and full specs are available here.
Every SecureGive kiosk includes contactless payment support for Apple Pay, Google Pay, Samsung Pay, and any credit or debit card, an encrypted card reader, the ability to accept both donations and purchases, and access to SecureGive’s analytics and reporting dashboard
Where to place a kiosk for the best results
The goal is that people encounter a kiosk wherever they naturally pass through, not just where the loudest crowd is.
- Main lobby, in the main flow of foot traffic, not tucked into a corner people have to seek out.
- A dedicated giving center, a clearly marked spot that signals “this is where you give.”
- Near event tables, bookstores, or overflow areas, to reduce lines at a single main unit.
- Common gathering spots, such as each main entrance, near children’s check-in, by a coffee or welcome area, and at a second-floor or overflow-room entrance if your church has one.
The Classic and Modern Series are built for a fixed, high-traffic location like a dedicated giving center.
The iPad Series, being lighter and less expensive, works better for secondary spots like event tables or bookstores, or for placing several kiosks around a lobby for visibility.
Conclusion
People rarely carry cash or a checkbook anymore, and that isn’t changing back. What that means in practice: if someone wants to give and there’s no way to act on it in that moment (a longtime member without cash, a first-time guest moved during the service, a parent paying for a retreat on the way out), the gift often doesn’t happen.
A giving kiosk works for a church of 200, 2,000, or 20,000, in a single lobby or spread across several entrances and event tables. It gives your finance team one clean report instead of a cash box for merch and a separate spreadsheet for camp signups. Picking the right series and placing it where people actually pass through are just the details of making that moment easy to act on every week.
Frequently Asked Questions
A church giving kiosk is a touchscreen station, usually in a lobby, that lets someone give, buy merchandise, or pay for an event with a tap of a card or phone. It works for any church size and can process donations, purchases, and registrations from the same screen.
A card reader needs someone to operate it and enter the amount. A giving kiosk is self-service: the donor selects a fund or item, enters an amount, taps to pay, and gets a receipt, all without a staff member or volunteer involved.
No. A kiosk adds an option alongside the offering plate, cash giving, and online giving. It's built for the people who would otherwise not give in the moment because they don't have cash or a checkbook on hand.
Yes. SecureGive kiosks use encrypted card readers, the same standard used at any secure point-of-sale station. We can’t speak for other providers, so ask any kiosk vendor whether their reader is encrypted and how the kiosk fits into their PCI compliance scope before you buy.
In the main flow of lobby foot traffic, not a side room or corner. Larger churches often add a designed giving center or a second kiosk near event and bookstore tables to avoid lines during busy services.
They work for both. Smaller churches often start with a single, lower-cost iPad Series kiosk, while larger or multi-campus churches scale up to the multiple iPads or Classic, Modern, or Signature Series across more locations.
Pastor Marty Baker of Stevens Creek Church invented the giving kiosk in 2004 when he realized his congregation, like him, mostly carried cards instead of cash. That kiosk became the beginning of SecureGive, which has kept building on the same idea for over 20 years.
