The CRM Built for Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Academies
You didn't earn your black belt to spend your evenings chasing dues and rebuilding a stripe spreadsheet. Red Belt Gym was built by a 10th Planet black belt who got tired of software that had never seen a mat.
What Running a BJJ Academy Actually Looks Like
Ask any academy owner what eats their week and you will hear some version of this list:
Stripes and belts tracked on a whiteboard, a notebook, and three different spreadsheets
Gi, no-gi, kids, and competition classes all running on separate mental schedules
Dad trains no-gi, two kids train in the gi program — and you invoice all three separately
Trial students take one class, love it, and are never contacted again
Chasing dues from the guy you just rolled with for six rounds
Admin work eating the hours you should be spending on the mat
A white belt who cannot see their own progress is a white belt who quits. Most academies lose students in the first six months not because the training is wrong, but because nothing in the school is tracking who is slipping.
Built Around How Jiu Jitsu Actually Works
Track every stripe, not just every belt
A blue belt with three stripes is not the same student as a fresh blue belt.
Red Belt Gym stores the full progression history on each student's profile — the belt, the stripes within it, the date each one was awarded, and who awarded it. Set attendance thresholds and time-in-rank minimums for each belt so the system can tell you who is genuinely due. No more guessing at the end of class whether someone has been a white belt for four months or fourteen.
Run gi and no-gi as separate programs — or one
Your academy structure, not a template.
Build gi and no-gi as distinct programs with their own schedules, pricing, and rosters. A student can hold a membership in one, both, or an unlimited package that covers everything. Because programs are independent, you can price no-gi as an add-on, run a no-gi-only membership for the wrestlers, and still keep one clean billing relationship per household.
Keep the competition team in its own lane
Tag them once, communicate with them forever.
Tag your competitors and your comp team becomes a reusable audience. Text the whole team about a Saturday tournament, email only the adult purple-and-up group about an advanced camp, or pull an attendance report for just the competitors preparing for the next IBJJF event. Recreational students never see any of it — which is exactly how they want it.
Convert the trial student before they cool off
The window between "I want to try a class" and "never mind" is measured in hours.
When someone submits your free-class form, Red Belt Gym can confirm instantly, remind them the morning of, and follow up by text after they train — without anyone at your front desk remembering to do it. Every message lands in the same conversation thread on their profile, so whoever picks it up next can see the whole history.
Open mats and visiting drop-ins, handled
Taking cash at the door is how drop-in revenue disappears.
Put open mats on the schedule as recurring events and sell drop-in access as a one-time item. A visitor travelling through pays through a landing page, signs your waiver digitally, and lands in your contact list — so next time they are in town they get a message instead of being forgotten.
See who is drifting before they quit
Nobody announces they are leaving. They just stop showing up.
Attendance data on every profile means the pattern is visible early: the four-stripe white belt who went from four sessions a week to one, the blue belt who has not trained since a bad competition. Automations can reach out on your behalf when a student hits a gap you define, and retention reporting shows you whether it is actually working.
Your Belt Ladder, Configured Exactly As Your Academy Runs It
Red Belt Gym does not assume a ranking system. You build yours — and every rung carries its own requirements, award dates, and eligibility rules.
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White belt
4 stripesUsually your largest and least stable group. Configure attendance-based stripe requirements so new students get visible progress early — the single biggest lever on first-year retention.
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Blue belt
4 stripesWhere the notorious drop-off happens. Time-in-rank and attendance minimums are tracked automatically, and at-risk attendance patterns surface before the student disappears.
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Purple belt
4 stripesOften your future coaches. Tag them as assistant instructors, give them staff logins with limited permissions, and track the classes they cover.
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Brown belt
4 stripesSmall group, high value. Promotion history, competition record notes, and seminar attendance all live on one profile.
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Black belt
degreesTrack degrees and award dates for your black belts and affiliated instructors, including those who train at your academy but teach elsewhere.
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Kids belts
grey / yellow / orange / greenThe IBJJF youth ladder runs on its own rank set with its own age bands, kept entirely separate from the adult progression while sitting in the same family account.
Affiliations differ, and so do academies. If your professor awards stripes on a different cadence, runs a four-degree black belt system, or uses a custom kids ladder, you configure it once and it applies to every student from then on.
The Ways BJJ Academies Actually Sell Membership
Every one of these is a standard setup in Red Belt Gym — not a workaround.
Unlimited academy membership
Your core adult offering — every gi, no-gi, and open mat session on the schedule.
- How you build it
- Set up as: One recurring program with all classes attached.
- How it bills
- Billing: Month-to-month recurring, billed on the signup date.
Gi-only or no-gi-only
Wrestlers who never want a gi, and traditionalists who never take it off.
- How you build it
- Set up as: Two programs, each attached to its own class set.
- How it bills
- Billing: Recurring at a lower rate, upgradeable without re-enrolling.
Family plan
Two parents and three kids across the adult and youth ladders.
- How you build it
- Set up as: One primary account holder with linked family members.
- How it bills
- Billing: A single payment method for the household with sibling pricing.
Kids program by age band
Little Kids, Juniors, and Teens with different mat times and rank sets.
- How you build it
- Set up as: Age-group programs with their own schedules and rank ladders.
- How it bills
- Billing: Recurring, commonly billed to a parent on the family account.
Drop-in and open mat pass
Travelling grapplers and lapsed members testing the water again.
- How you build it
- Set up as: A one-time item sold through a landing page with a digital waiver.
- How it bills
- Billing: Single charge, no membership created until they commit.
Competition team dues
Athletes who pay extra for comp classes, coaching, and corner support.
- How you build it
- Set up as: An add-on program layered on top of the base membership.
- How it bills
- Billing: Recurring add-on, or seasonal for a defined camp.
One Profile per Student, Not Six Places to Look
Rank, attendance, payments, waivers, and every text you have exchanged.
When a student walks up to the desk with a question, the answer should take five seconds. Red Belt Gym puts the full picture on one screen: what belt they hold and when they earned it, how often they have trained this month, whether their card went through, which documents they still owe you, and the entire conversation history with your school.
Where General-Purpose Gym Software Falls Down for BJJ
Belt and stripe progression
A configurable rank system with stripes, award dates, promotion history, and eligibility rules per belt.
Gi vs no-gi programs
Independent programs with separate pricing, schedules, and rosters that a student can combine.
Family billing
Linked household accounts on one payment method with sibling pricing.
Competition team comms
Tag-based audiences with 2-way texting and email from inside the CRM, logged to each profile.
Trial follow-up
Automated confirmation, reminder, and post-class follow-up triggered by the form submission.
Who owns your data
Your data is yours — export contacts and history whenever you want.
Belt and stripe progression
A free-text note field, or nothing at all.
Gi vs no-gi programs
One flat class list with no concept of program membership.
Family billing
Separate accounts and separate cards for every family member.
Competition team comms
A group text that half the team has muted.
Trial follow-up
A manual task list someone has to remember.
Who owns your data
Export locked behind support tickets or a cancellation fee.
What You Get on Day One
Configurable rank systems
Adult belts, kids belts, stripes, degrees, and any custom system your affiliation uses — with award dates and promotion history per student.
Program and class management
Separate gi, no-gi, kids, comp, and fundamentals classes with recurring schedules and per-class capacity.
Attendance tracking
Check students in by name or phone number at the front desk, or run a self-service kiosk on a tablet by the door.
2-way calling and texting
A dedicated gym number in the Red Belt Connect app. Calls and texts log automatically to the student profile.
Recurring billing and failed-payment recovery
Cards and ACH through PCI-compliant processing, with automatic reminders when a payment fails.
Digital waivers and documents
Send waivers, medical forms, and membership agreements for digital signature and store them on the profile.
Student Journey app
Students see their schedule, rank progress, assigned documents, and training videos, and get push notifications.
Retention and revenue reporting
New signups, cancellations, attendance trends, and revenue performance in one dashboard.
Red Belt Gym knows the difference between a blue belt with three stripes and a purple belt who was promoted last week. Generic software treats every student the same. We never have.
Founded by Brian Debes, a 10th Planet black belt who runs his academy on this platform. Watch the 10th Planet Orange Park case study on the case studies page.
From School Owners Running on Red Belt Gym
"Some of the best software on the market for helping every martial arts academy run smoothly! If you haven't checked them out, you're missing out!!"
Daniel O'Brien "I'm so excited to be one of the first gyms to get on board with Red Belt Software. Not only is Brian one of the best guys I know in Martial Arts, but he's also one of the smartest and hardest working people in the game. The software is everything we need for our gym, packaged into one easy system."
Brandon Mccaghren "Red Belt software is everything you want and nothing you don't. Easy to use, highly customizable and the best customer service in the business. It saves me money but more importantly, time."
Johnny Buck Frequently Asked Questions About Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Software
Can I track stripes within each belt, not just the belt itself?
Does Red Belt Gym handle gi and no-gi as separate programs?
How do the IBJJF kids belts work alongside adult belts?
Can one family pay for several members on one card?
How do I manage the competition team separately from regular students?
Can students book their own class times?
What happens to my current student data if I switch?
Is Red Belt Gym actually used by BJJ academies?
How These Features Work Inside Red Belt Gym
Create Belt Ranks
Setting color-based categories helps you keep track of student progress. Find the creating and editing process for ranking in this article.
Read the guide How-to guideAssigning a Belt Rank to a Student
Once you have created your class schedule, follow this step-by-step guide for managing martial arts ranking systems, tracking student progression, and updating belt levels.
Read the guide How-to guideCreate Styles and Classes
Setting martial arts styles helps you keep track of your offerings and allows students to be assigned to the appropriate program. Learn the creating and editing process here.
Read the guide How-to guideManage Family or Group Accounts
Learn how to add and archive dependents to your martial arts school.
Read the guide How-to guideCreate a Membership Program
Memberships control billing, attendance, and access to your martial arts school. Read on to develop custom memberships
Read the guideSee Red Belt Gym Running Your Academy
Bring your actual problem to the demo — the stripe spreadsheet, the family that owes you three months, the trial list nobody followed up on. We will show you how it looks once it is in one system.
- No credit card, no commitment
- Full data migration included
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