CollectIt vs ClayTrack vs KilnFox vs Kilndar: which fits your studio

If you searched for pottery studio software, you have probably already found CollectIt, ClayTrack and KilnFox, and now you are trying to work out which one, if any, actually fits what you run. This is not a scorecard with a winner circled at the bottom. Each of these tools was built for a slightly different studio, and the honest answer to "which is best" is "it depends what you are".

Four tools, three different jobs

CollectIt, as published on their site in September 2026, is built for pottery painting studios: piece tracking with QR self check-in and photo matching, online booking, a browser-based till, an online shop and a staff rota still in beta. It is a focused tool for a focused type of studio.

ClayTrack, as published on their site in September 2026, does one job and does it as its whole product: paint-your-own-pottery piece tracking with QR labels, nothing broader bolted on. If piece tracking is the entire problem you are trying to solve, that focus is the appeal.

KilnFox, as published on their site in September 2026, tracks pieces through greenware, bisque, glaze and ready, and adds memberships and equipment bookings on top, aimed at studios doing more than paint-your-own-pottery, working in clay from the wheel or the hand-building bench.

Kilndar covers bookings, the front desk and till, kiln and piece tracking, team rotas, marketing and reports on one customer record, and was built with a seven-studio UK operator running its day-to-day on it. It is the broadest of the four, which is a strength for a studio trying to get off several separate tools and a needless cost for a studio that only ever wanted piece tracking.

If you are a single paint-your-own-pottery studio

This is the case CollectIt and ClayTrack are both built for, and either is a sensible starting point if piece tracking, self check-in and a straightforward till are genuinely the whole of your problem. CollectIt adds online booking and a shop alongside piece tracking, so it suits a studio that wants those in the same place. ClayTrack stays narrower and, as published on their site in September 2026, puts every feature on every plan rather than gating anything behind a higher tier, which suits a studio that dislikes feature walls more than it needs the extra breadth.

If your studio is genuinely just walk-ins painting pre-made pieces, with nothing else to manage, a tool built only for that job is not a compromise. It is the right size.

If you sell courses, memberships and parties too

The moment you are also running wheel classes, terms with a syllabus, memberships, or birthday parties with an enquiry and a quote, a tool scoped to paint-your-own-pottery piece tracking stops covering your day. This is where KilnFox and Kilndar sit: KilnFox adds memberships and equipment bookings alongside its piece stages, while Kilndar adds courses, parties, front desk and till, and marketing on top of kiln and piece tracking, all reading the same customer record.

The practical question is not which has more features on a page, it is whether a course booking, a membership credit and a piece on the shelf can all point back to the same person without you reconciling three separate systems by hand. If your studio already juggles that many moving parts, that is the gap worth closing first.

If you run more than one site

Running more than one branch changes what you actually need from software, whichever of these you are looking at. You need one customer record across every site, so a regular at one branch is not a stranger at another. You need to compare branches against each other rather than reading each one's numbers in isolation. And you need settlement that tells you, honestly, what each branch is actually bringing in.

Kilndar was built for exactly this, with a multi-site operator as the customer it grew alongside, and its Group plan is aimed squarely at three sites or more. Whether CollectIt, ClayTrack or KilnFox suit a multi-site operation as well as a single studio is worth testing directly against your own branches before you commit, since a tool that feels complete for one site does not automatically stay complete once you add a second.

What every one of them charges, and what changes as you grow

CollectIt, as published on their site in September 2026, prices in four bands, £15, £30, £50 and £100 a month, set by how many pieces you submit that month, plus a 1% fee on online card payments, and offers its first 50 customers a free trial with no time limit.

ClayTrack, as published on their site in September 2026, prices from $19 to $129 a month by how many items you are tracking, with every feature available on every plan, a 14-day trial, and no per-transaction fee.

KilnFox, as published on their site in September 2026, offers two plans priced in euros, scaled by how many pieces you track, without breaking pricing tiers into more than that.

Kilndar starts on Pay as you go, a small percentage on your online payments and nothing fixed each month, then moves to Studio, Pro or Group as a flat monthly plan per branch with no commission on anything you sell once you are on one. The actual figures are published, not quoted here, on the pricing page.

The pattern across all four is the same shape even where the mechanics differ: a lighter tier priced by volume, or a fee on transactions, suits a studio still finding its feet, and a flat monthly plan with everything unlocked suits a studio that already knows it is going to be busy and would rather the bill not move with it.

How to choose in an afternoon

Write down, honestly, what you actually run today and what you plan to run soon after: paint-your-own-pottery only, or courses and memberships and parties as well, a single site or several. Match that against the four scopes above rather than a feature list, because the scope is what determines whether you outgrow the tool quickly or grow comfortably into it.

Then take each candidate through the same real task: track a piece from being painted to being collected, book a party from enquiry to deposit, and, if it applies to you, compare branches against each other. A tool that handles your actual workload well in an afternoon of testing tells you more than any comparison post, this one included.