A recurring membership is a Zenamu feature that lets you offer clients a membership that renews automatically, charging their card on a regular schedule. It works like a subscription.
When a client first buys one, they enter their card once, agree to the recurring payment, and from then on the membership renews on its own. You don't have to send reminder emails or extend anything by hand.
How they differ from one-time (fixed-term) memberships
One-time membership | Recurring membership | |
Payment | The client pays the full amount up front | The client pays on a regular schedule (every week, month, year…) |
Renewal | The client has to buy it again manually | It renews automatically |
Reminder before it ends | An email asking the client to renew | Zenamu sends the client a renewal reminder automatically — you do nothing |
Cancelling | It simply ends when the period is up | The client can cancel anytime from their account |
Payment method | Card, bank transfer, cash, anything else | Card only |
Can the admin add it? | Yes — you can add it to a client from the admin | No — only the client can buy it (they have to enter their card and agree to the recurring payment) |
Best for | Courses, shorter programmes, gift memberships | Long-term clients and steady income |
The main benefits of recurring memberships
Steady, predictable income — you know how much comes in each month without having to chase renewals.
More clients stay with you — when the membership charges itself, clients are more likely to keep going than if they had to watch the expiry date and renew by hand every time.
Less admin — no reminder emails, no back-and-forth with clients, no keeping track of renewals.
The client stays in control of their membership — they can cancel auto-renewal or switch to a different variant from their account at any time. Pausing a membership (for a longer holiday or illness) is something the studio does from the admin at the client's request — the client can't pause it themselves.
Fully connected to Zenamu — recurring memberships behave just like regular memberships in bookings, limits, statistics, and exports.
When to choose recurring and when to choose one-time
A recurring membership is a good fit when:
You offer long-term attendance (a yoga studio with regular clients, a gym, a dance school).
You want steady, reliable income without having to deal with each renewal, and as little manual work and checking on your side as possible.
Your clients are used to a regular subscription (for example, they're coming from studios that already worked this way).
You want to give clients as much freedom as possible — they can cancel or change their variant themselves (pausing is handled by the studio by arrangement).
A one-time (fixed-term) membership is a good fit when:
The client wants to buy a specific package (say, 10 classes for a set price) with no commitment.
You want to accept membership payments by methods other than card (bank transfer or cash).
You offer courses or workshops with a fixed length.
You want to add memberships to clients yourself and keep everything under your control from the admin.
Tip: The two can run side by side. You can offer a "classic" monthly membership (one-time, renewed manually by the client) alongside an "automatic" monthly one (recurring, charged on its own), and let clients pick whichever suits them better.
What you need to switch it on
To start offering recurring memberships, you need:
The Ultimate plan or a trial. The feature isn't available on lower plans, including the Expert plan.
A connected Stripe account. Every recurring payment runs through Stripe. You'll find the connection under Settings → Payments (the Payment methods section).
The feature switched on under Settings → Passes and memberships → Recurring memberships — the Use recurring memberships toggle has to be active for the option to appear on your public schedule.
If any of these is missing, Zenamu will let you know and link you to the right setting.
What the recurring membership cycle looks like
The studio creates a variant — for example, "Monthly membership for €60 / month".
The client buys it on the studio's public page: they tap Buy, choose a variant, agree to the recurring payment, enter their card on the next step, and complete the payment (the Pay button). If their bank asks for 3D Secure verification, it happens right there in the browser.
The first payment is charged once the purchase is complete (or after 3D Secure, if the bank requires it). Until the payment goes through, the membership is briefly in the Waiting for payment state; as soon as Stripe confirms it, the membership activates. If the studio has set a fixed billing day, the first payment is prorated for the remaining days.
The membership is active and the client uses it like any other.
On the first day of the next billing period, the payment is charged automatically. If it goes through, the membership continues. If it doesn't, payment retries kick in (see the article on failed payments).
The client can cancel or switch variant, and the studio can additionally pause, resume, or retry the payment.
Important technical details
Everything runs through Stripe — payments, retries, 3D Secure, and refunds. Zenamu talks to Stripe within a few seconds.
A membership can have several variants — for example, the "Monthly membership" group can include a "Standard" variant (€60 / month) and a "Premium" one (€90 / month). The client can switch between them.
The membership status always matches what's in Stripe. When Stripe declines a payment, Zenamu knows within seconds. If a client removes their card or it expires, that only shows up at the next charge attempt — until then the membership keeps running.
The client pays by card only — Apple Pay and Google Pay work too, but bank transfer and cash can't be used for recurring memberships (because of the automatic charging).
Related articles
How to create a recurring membership — the full setup guide.
Billing day — automatic or a fixed day of the month? — how to choose when clients are charged.
How a client buys a recurring membership — the whole purchase, from the client's side.
Managing existing members — pause, resume, cancel, and retry a payment.
Changing a membership variant — how a client (or the studio) moves from one variant to another.
Changing the price for existing members — what happens when you change the price of an existing variant.
When a payment fails — how payment retries, the grace period, and renewal verification work.
Discount codes and recurring memberships — how discount codes work with automatic payments.
Common problems and how to solve them — fixes for the situations that come up most often.
Renewal history and membership activity — what you'll find in each membership's history and how to read it.
Refunds and disputed payments — refunding a client, credit balance, and handling disputed payments.
Migrating from another platform — how to move clients over from Mindbody, Glofox, and other systems.