NEST Versus MAAT
The best NEST alternative for BJJ, MMA, and Martial Arts gyms
What is MAAT
MAAT is a management App built specifically for BJJ, MMA, and Martial Arts gyms, offering all the essential tools for running classes, memberships, and payments.
Designed around combat-sports workflows, it includes native belt and progression tracking, attendance insights, and engagement features.
What is NEST
NEST is a comprehensive gym management system that includes student management, billing, attendance, communications, and marketing tools. It’s designed for traditional martial arts schools and offers a very wide feature set, which also makes it more complex to set up and manage compared to other combat-sports-focused solutions.
4.8 rating
practitioners Worldwide
Discover the right choice for your academy
NEST vs MAAT: Feature by Feature Comparison
Built specifically for BJJ, MMA, and martial arts gyms by people who train and understand combat sports.
Built for traditional martial arts schools, with broader business admin and franchise-style workflows.
Flexible free trial with full access and no commitment, ideal for testing before switching
No public free trial
59€/month + 1% transaction fee, price doesn’t increase as your gym grows
Pricing starts at £50/month for gyms with no members, but it scales very quickly up to £400/month or more as your gym grows.
Modern mobile-first app, loved by coaches and students for quick booking, check-ins, and progress tracking
Mobile app available, but mainly serves as a basic student portal and isn’t central to daily gym operations.
Available in EN, ES, DE, PT, IT, FR, more languages added on community demand
English-only
Includes leaderboards, streaks, belt/stripe engagement, and retention insights.
No gamification, includes generic marketing tools
Intuitive for coaches and students, designed for real academy workflows.
Comprehensive, but complex with many modules and a heavier learning curve.
Track student belt & stripe eligibility automatically based on attendance and milestones.
Supports gradings and events, but progression workflows depend heavily on manual configuration.
Fast, human WhatsApp support from people who understand combat sports
Support via ticketing/SaaS channels; not combat-sports-specialized.
Ideal for scaling, price doesn’t increase with member count
Scales well functionally but cost increases as your gym grows or adds features
Ready to switch from NEST to MAAT?
Book a call to migrate all your memberships from NEST to MAAT for free, with zero downtime.
"We have recently opened our second location in Costablanca (Spain) and MAAT has helped us all the way to make this possible. We can manage payments for all our members with ease"
Marco Canha
Fightzone
“We have believed in MAAT since the early days. It makes life at the academy much easier. MAAT supports our growth at every stage and simplifies daily operations while connecting gym members”
Yan Cabral
Aranha Barcelona
“MAAT lets me spend less time on paperwork and more time on the mat teaching. It’s a great tool to easily track students and classes. A must-have for every academy”
Federico Tisi
Tribe Jiu Jitsu
Everything You Need
The perfect system
Manage Your Finances
See what you earn, in real time
No more chasing payments or guessing income. Automate collections, refunds, invoices, and payouts.
Attendance & Promotions
Promote with confidence, no more guessing
Track progress and be notified when students are ready to be promoted to the next stripe or belt.
Manage Schedule
Full classes and complete visibility on attendance
Students can easily view schedules, book their spot, and manage all their classes right from their phone.
FAQs
All you need to know
Not at all. We have helped hundreds of academies migrate from other systems to MAAT.
We will migrate all the key data from your existing provider, including member profiles, active subscriptions, and payment methods (credit cards and SEPA/BACS mandates) — with no disruption to your operations or your students' payments.
Our import system supports most providers, including Mindbody, Glofox, Kicksite, Gymdesk, Martialytics, GoCardless, Clubwise, TeamUp, and many others.
The entire migration is handled by our team and 100% free of charge.
Have questions on migrations? Book a call
You can be up and running in less than 15 minutes.
We will help you configure your pricing, schedule, and your students can start signing up right away.
MAAT is built with the student experience in mind. The app is intuitive, simple to use, and widely adopted — tens of thousands of students use it daily with no training needed.
No at all. MAAT renews month to month, unless you choose the discounted annual plan.
You can cancel anytime, no questions asked.
You will get 1:1 support via WhatsApp, plus access to our Help Center with step-by-step tutorials. We also help answer student questions via email, so you can focus on running your academy.
Get in touch Book a call! Or find more in the FAQs