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Game Mode vs Upper Hand
Upper Hand is facility and training-business software: scheduling and registration, payment plans, memberships with join fees and agreements, resource rentals, retail and inventory, staff and payroll tools, and a mobile app for coaches, staff and athletes. Its tiers are priced for the facility, from an independent coach to a franchise. Evaluations exist as custom fields on an event.
Plans and fees
What each one publishes
Upper Hand’s figures are quoted as its pricing page wrote them on November 1, 2026. Their pricing page.
Game Mode
- Base
- $99/month
- Tryouts, recruiting, registrations, payments, teams, messaging, parent portal, app and AI.
- Growth
- $199/month
- Adds facility booking, memberships, the training library and your branding.
- Pro
- $399/month
- Adds your own branded app in the stores.
- Card processing
- 3.5% + $0.90
- Stripe’s 2.9% + $0.30 plus Game Mode’s 0.6% + $0.60; pass it to families or absorb it.
- Bank (ACH)
- 1.5% + $0.90
- Who holds the money
- You do
- Direct charges to your own Stripe account; your name on the statement.
- Setup fee
- None
- Contract
- None
- Month to month, 30-day free trial, no per-athlete fee.
Upper Hand
- Start
- “$79* USD/ month”
- “*Monthly cost paid annually”; “For independent coaches and trainers.”
- Grow
- “$199* USD/ month”
- Paid annually; adds facility and resource management, retail and inventory, staff and payroll.
- Scale
- “Contact for pricing”
- Adds franchise controls, a branded app and Upper Hand AI.
- WebKIT
- “$50 USD/ month”
- Website builder, an optional enhancement.
- Advanced Insights
- “$50 USD/ month”
- Premium reporting, an optional enhancement.
- Card processing
- Not stated
- No rate on the pricing page, the payments page, the terms or any help article.
- Processor
- Paysafe, not Stripe
- A sub-merchant agreement with Upper Hand; direct deposit to the club’s bank.
- Chargeback
- “$20 fee”
- When a dispute is lost or accepted.
- PCI portal
- “$8.95 a month”
- Paysafe’s fee for compliant merchants; “$34.95” while non-compliant.
- Term
- Not verifiable
- “Monthly cost paid annually”; renewal and cancellation terms are not published.
What a year costs
The arithmetic, from published figures only
No cost table: Upper Hand publishes no processing rate on its pricing page, its payments page, its terms or its help center, so a yearly total cannot be worked out without guessing, and this site does not guess. What is published is above: Start at $948 a year and Grow at $2,388 a year, paid annually, against Game Mode Base at $1,188 and Growth at $2,388 a year, month to month, with card processing at 3.5% + $0.90 on your own Stripe account.
Try your own numbers on the calculator.
Feature by feature
Sixteen things a club buys
Each Upper Hand answer links to the page it was read from on November 1, 2026. “Not verified” means no page on their site states it.
Tryout registration
Game Mode
A public form with your own questions, terms and age cutoff. No tryout fee is collected at signup. See it
Upper Hand
No tryout product; generic event and team registration with custom fields, and “private evaluations for tryouts”. Source
Custom scoring forms
Game Mode
Modules, criteria and weights you define, 1 to 10 ratings, timed and velocity criteria, a starter template for your sport. See it
Upper Hand
Event Evaluations with custom fields (multiple choice or a number); no rating scale, weighting or ranking described. Source
Coaches score on a phone
Game Mode
Coaches score in the Game Mode app and scores sync live to the Results tab. See it
Upper Hand
The app page lists scheduling, check-in, payments and booking; the evaluations article does not mention the app. Source
Video clips at tryouts
Game Mode
Coaches film clips in the app; they sit on the player’s results, grouped by module. See it
Upper Hand
Evaluations allow a photo upload; no current page mentions video capture. Source
Offers with tracked responses
Game Mode
Offers by email or text; opens, bounces and replies are tracked on the board, and a family accepts by registering. See it
Upper Hand
No offers, acceptance or decisions feature on the teams, software or help pages. Source
Automatic handling when a family does not respond
Game Mode
An offer with no answer after the days you set moves to “no response” on its own, so the column is always current. See it
Upper Hand
No offers to respond to; even the event waitlist “is not automated”. Source
No-show flag and follow-up
Game Mode
Players who never checked in are flagged when the session ends; one click emails them a link to reschedule or withdraw. See it
Upper Hand
No-shows appear in a report only; trigger-based email automation is “COMING SOON”. Source
Team assignment from tryout results
Game Mode
Drag players from their scores onto teams, the waitlist or not selected. See it
Upper Hand
Rosters with profiles, waivers and payments; no page links evaluations to team placement. Source
Season registration with payment plans
Game Mode
Deposit plus installments, by card or bank, charged to the saved card on each due date with retries. See it
Upper Hand
“Pay in full or pay as you go, with the ability to set up payment plans”. Source
Direct Stripe payouts to the club
Game Mode
Every payment is a direct charge to your own Stripe account, with your name on the statement. See it
Upper Hand
Direct deposit to the club’s bank through a Paysafe sub-merchant account; Stripe is never mentioned. Source
Facility booking: lessons and rentalsGrowth and Pro plans
Game Mode
Lessons, cage, court and field rentals, booking boards and coach availability. Growth and Pro. See it
Upper Hand
“Offer up any or all resources to be rented out”; Grow and Scale tiers only. Source
Memberships with recurring billingGrowth and Pro plans
Game Mode
Monthly plans billed to the card on file, with joining fees, commitments and signed agreements. Growth and Pro. See it
Upper Hand
Automated recurring payments and renewals, join fees, commitment lengths and membership agreements. Source
Point of sale with inventory
Game Mode
Products with sizes, colors, photos and stock counts; cash, check, a card at the counter or a pay link. See it
Upper Hand
“Retail & Inventory” on Grow and Scale. Source
Team chat app for parents
Game Mode
Team chat, direct messages and polls in the Game Mode app, with block and report. See it
Upper Hand
“Message Team Roster” is one-way email from an admin; “Loop (Coming Soon)” is not released. Source
Beside Upper Hand
What you would still need
- Tryout scoring with a rating scale, weights and rankings. Upper Hand’s evaluations are custom fields on an event. Source
- Video clips of players. Evaluations allow a photo upload; no page mentions video. Source
- Offers to families and anything that happens when they do not answer. Source
- A chat app for parents. Messaging is one-way email from an admin; Loop is “Coming Soon”. Source
- A published processing rate. Upper Hand states none; Game Mode is 3.5% + $0.90 on your own Stripe account. Source
Switching
How a club moves
A club on Upper Hand usually runs a season beside the facility, and the season is where Game Mode starts: the next tryout, its offers and its registrations. Lessons, rentals and memberships move on the Growth plan, which includes guided setup and help moving your data, and there is no annual prepayment: every Game Mode plan is month to month with a 30-day trial.
See it on your own tryout.
A 30-minute walkthrough with our team. Bring your rosters, your fee structure, and whatever your current setup can’t do.
Baseline, Upper Hand, SkillShark, TeamGenius, TeamSnap, LeagueApps, SportsEngine and PlayMetrics are names that belong to their owners. Game Mode is not affiliated with any of them. Every figure and every feature answer about them on this page was read from that company’s own public pages on November 1, 2026, is quoted as the page wrote it, and may have changed since. “Not verified” means their site does not state it; it is never a guess. If something here is wrong, tell us and we will correct it.