Disclosure: This comparison is published by Labbaik. We've tried to represent MaktabMate fairly using publicly available information, but we naturally know Labbaik in greater depth. If you spot something outdated, let us know.
At a glance
| Feature | Labbaik | MaktabMate |
|---|---|---|
| Free plan | Yes — Safar, free forever, no card, no expiry | 30-day trial, then paid |
| Student limits | Unlimited from day one | 10 on Lite, 100 on Pro, unlimited only on Max |
| Teacher limits | Unlimited | 3 on Lite, 10 on Pro, unlimited only on Max |
| Cost when madrasah collects nothing | £0 | Monthly or yearly subscription regardless |
| WhatsApp parent messaging | Full — fees, attendance, reminders, broadcasts, two-way | In-app messages, email and push; a "Share on WhatsApp" button for your parent group |
| Online card payments | Built in through Stripe, reconciled automatically; platform fee from 1.5% | Yes — through the maktab's own Stripe account; no MaktabMate fee on top |
| Direct Debit | BACS, in the same Stripe account as cards | GoCardless or Stripe (one per maktab); existing GoCardless mandates can be linked |
| Failed payments | Retried automatically, with WhatsApp alerts to parents | Office is emailed; staff press "Try again" |
| Self-serve onboarding | ~10 minutes, no sales call | Self-serve sign-up with guided setup; optional walkthrough call |
| Mobile-first design | Built for phones — teachers on the floor, parents on the go | Responsive web app, installable to the home screen |
| UK GDPR + ICO registered | Yes (ZC136003) | Yes (C1889637); data stored in London |
| Attendance tracking | Yes — multi-session, late, authorised absences | Yes — multi-session, late, authorised absences |
| Quran & Hifz progress | Yes — purpose-built, juz-by-juz, sabaq logs | Yes — juz-by-juz with tests; sabaq, sabqi and manzil records |
| House points & rewards | Yes | Yes |
| Homework tracking | Yes | Yes |
| Staff clock in / out | Yes — geolocation + QR | Yes — geolocation + QR |
| Incident logging | Yes | Yes — behaviour, first aid and safeguarding |
| Online enrolment | Yes | Yes — embeddable form with a waiting list |
| Trustee / committee access | Yes | Yes — management logins without student records |
| Multi-branch | Yes | Not publicly documented (multiple schedules within one maktab) |
| UK payroll | Yes — PAYE, NI, pensions, payslips | Not offered (staff hours only) |
| PDF reports & Excel export | Yes | Yes |
| Public educational page | Hosted page + embeddable SDK + public API | — |
| Sibling discounts | Yes — flexible rules | Yes |
| Charitable giving | Sadaqah-aligned roadmap | 10% of revenue donated |
| Beyond maktab & madrasah | Yes — donations, events, certificates & non-educational classes | Not part of the platform |
| Online classes (Zoom/Meet, OAuth cloud recordings) | Included — auto WhatsApp/email alerts, auto attendance, catch-up recordings | Not publicly documented |
| Built-in video classes (no Zoom account needed) | Included — Labbaik Live: private rooms, attendance on join, 0.35p per person, per minute | Not publicly documented |
| Alimiyyah / kitab-level tracking | Upload your own PDF syllabus, tracked kitab → section → page | Not publicly documented |
| Recurring compliance & admin tasks | WhatsApp alerts for renewals & overdue deadlines | Not part of the platform |
MaktabMate is a UK maktab app run by a serving imam, with a clean interface, attendance, Hifdh progress, a parent portal and — as of 2026 — online fee payments by card and Direct Debit. Labbaik is the mobile-first alternative built around a free-forever plan, unlimited students and teachers from day one, full WhatsApp integration, fee collection with automatic retries and a public educational page with an embeddable SDK and API. Both products can work well for different schools.
Where MaktabMate shines
MaktabMate is well built and moving quickly. The interface is clean, and the feature set now covers what most maktabs need — attendance, Hifdh tracking, parent portal, homework, exams and result slips, house points, parents' meetings, an incident log, online enrolment, staff clock in and trustee logins. Parents can pay fees by card through the maktab's own Stripe account, or by Direct Debit through GoCardless or Stripe, and MaktabMate adds no charge on top of the provider's fee. Maktabs already on GoCardless can link their existing Direct Debits without parents signing up again. Pricing is openly published, and the 10% revenue-to-charity pledge is a thoughtful touch. For a maktab that's happy with a fixed subscription and wants no per-payment platform fee, it's a credible pick.
More than a maktab or madrasah tool
MaktabMate is scoped to maktab administration — attendance, Hifz, fees, homework, exams, house points. Labbaik covers the same ground, then extends further: donation campaigns, community events and bookings, and verifiable Nikah, Shahada and ijazah certificates — useful whether you're a mosque-run maktab or a standalone madrasah with its own community programmes.
| Masjid & madrasah tools | Labbaik | MaktabMate |
|---|---|---|
| Sadaqah & Zakat donations | One-tap giving, campaigns, recurring donations, full reporting | Not part of the platform |
| Community events | Publish, sell tickets, take RSVPs, manage capacity | Not part of the platform |
| Bookings & class capacity | Included for events and non-educational classes | Not part of the platform |
| Nikah & Shahada certificates | Verifiable, institution-branded | Not part of the platform |
| Non-educational community classes | Same registration & payment tools as the maktab | Not part of the platform |
| One login, one bill | Yes — same platform | Maktab admin only |
Committee admin: compliance tasks that can't be missed
Running a masjid or madrasah isn't just the maktab register. Committees also carry a stream of dates that are easy to lose track of in a spreadsheet or someone's inbox: utility and insurance renewals, scheduled maintenance and annual servicing, Charity Commission report deadlines, safeguarding and DBS renewals, fire safety checks, and more.
Labbaik lets committees set these up as recurring administrative tasks with an owner and a due date, then sends WhatsApp alerts as renewals approach and if the most important deadlines go overdue — so nothing safety- or compliance-critical slips through because an email got buried. We found no equivalent task or compliance-reminder tooling in MaktabMate.
Kitab-level Alimiyyah tracking
MaktabMate tracks Hifz juz by juz with sabaq, sabqi and manzil records, and lets you define your own syllabus for each maktab class with daily reading logs. We found no publicly documented support for structured Alimiyyah or kitab-by-kitab tracking.
Labbaik lets institutions running Alimiyyah or other Islamic studies programmes upload their own PDF syllabus — Bahishti Zewar, Zad ut-Talibeen, Mishkat, Hidayah, whatever the curriculum requires — and automatically breaks it into trackable sections. Teachers log progress kitab by kitab, section by section, page by page, and that progress is reflected live in the student and parent portal.
| Alimiyyah & Islamic studies | Labbaik | MaktabMate |
|---|---|---|
| Alimiyyah / year-group tracking | Included, standard | Not publicly documented |
| Custom syllabus | Upload your own PDF — auto-split into sections | Define a syllabus per class by hand; no PDF import documented |
| Kitab tracking granularity | Kitab → section → page | Juz-by-juz Hifz; class syllabus completion (maktab-style) |
| Pre-loaded kitab library | Bahishti Zewar, Zad ut-Talibeen, Mishkat, Hidayah & more, or add your own | Not offered |
| Non-Hifz Islamic classes (Tajweed, Tafsir, Fiqh, Arabic, etc.) | Any class type, same tracking tools | Maktab-focused |
| Parent/student visibility of kitab progress | Live in the portal as teachers log it | Not offered |
| Alimah/Aalim completion certificates | Verifiable, institution-branded, print-ready | Not offered |
Where Labbaik wins
- Free forever, not 30 days. Safar covers attendance, Hifz tracking, student records and parent messaging — no card, no expiry.
- Unlimited students and teachers from day one. No 10-student or 3-teacher cap. Most maktabs grow past MaktabMate's Lite tier quickly.
- Real WhatsApp integration. Fee reminders, attendance alerts, broadcasts and two-way chat on the channel parents actually read (~98% vs ~20% for push/email).
- Fee collection that chases for you. Cards and BACS Direct Debit in one Stripe account, Stripe's smart retries on declined payments, and WhatsApp alerts to parents when a payment fails, is retried and goes through. In MaktabMate, a failed Direct Debit emails the office and someone presses "Try again".
- Mobile-first for both audiences. Teachers mark attendance and Hifz on the floor from a phone. Parents do everything from WhatsApp.
- Branded parent portal that converts. Parents see attendance, Hifz progress and fee balances — and pay instantly via Stripe from one link.
- Public page, SDK and API. No website? Get a hosted page out of the box. Already have one? Embed live student counts, announcements and registration with no developer.
- Multi-branch and UK payroll. Run more than one site from one account, and pay staff with HMRC-compatible payroll — neither is part of MaktabMate.
- Cost-neutral to the madrasah. Add ~3% to fees and parents cover Labbaik + Stripe — every pound stays with the school.
- Built-in video classes with Labbaik Live. Run private online classes and events inside Labbaik with no Zoom account: students join from the portal, attendance marks itself, and it costs 0.35p per person, per minute, with 2,500 free minutes to start. See Labbaik Live.
- Online classes with OAuth-connected Zoom, Drive & Dropbox. Start a live class on Zoom and Labbaik automatically alerts enrolled students by WhatsApp and email the moment it begins. Students and parents join straight from the portal, with attendance marked present automatically — no register needed. Recordings publish from your own Google Drive or Dropbox so anyone who missed the session can catch up, and Labbaik only ever sees the specific files your organisation publishes, never your whole Drive or Dropbox. We found no equivalent in MaktabMate.
- Kitab-level Alimiyyah tracking. Upload your own PDF syllabus and Labbaik breaks it into sections; teachers track progress page by page, visible live in the parent/student portal.
- Genuinely serves the whole masjid or madrasah. Sadaqah/Zakat donations, ticketed community events, bookings and verifiable Nikah/Shahada certificates alongside the maktab, not just a maktab-only tool.
- Compliance task reminders. Recurring admin tasks — insurance/utility renewals, servicing, DBS, fire safety, Charity Commission deadlines — with WhatsApp alerts before they're overdue.
Pricing — side by side
Labbaik publishes pricing openly: Safar is free forever, with a platform fee from 1.5% only on card and Direct Debit payments collected through Labbaik, falling as collections grow. Cash and bank transfers are never charged. If a madrasah collects nothing in a month, it pays Labbaik nothing. No per-student caps on the free plan, no setup charge, no annual contract.
MaktabMate charges a subscription after a 30-day trial: Lite £9.99/mo capped at 10 students and 3 teachers, Pro £24.99/mo capped at 100 students and 10 teachers, and Max £39.99/mo for unlimited. Yearly billing gives one month free (£109.89, £274.89 or £439.89 a year), and an early-bird offer halves the first year. MaktabMate adds no fee to online payments, but the subscription is fixed whether or not the madrasah collects fees that month.
Either way, the payment provider charges its own processing fee (Stripe or GoCardless) — that applies on both platforms. The real difference is a fixed subscription with no per-payment fee (MaktabMate) versus no subscription and a small per-payment fee you can pass on to parents (Labbaik).
Which should you pick?
Choose MaktabMate if you prefer a fixed subscription with no per-payment platform fee, already collect by GoCardless Direct Debit and want to keep those mandates, and don't need WhatsApp messaging, payroll or more than one site.
Choose Labbaik if you want to start free forever, run unlimited students from day one, let teachers mark attendance and Hifz progress from their phones on the classroom floor, give parents a branded portal where they can pay fees instantly, have failed payments retried and chased on WhatsApp automatically, and ship a polished public page (or embed the SDK on your existing site) without writing code.
The basics — attendance, Hifdh, homework, house points — both apps cover. The decisive questions are usually: free forever or a subscription from day 31; how many students and teachers you plan to grow to; where parents prefer to read messages; and whether you want failed fee payments retried and chased for you or handled by the office.
Compare the costShow ▾
Drag the sliders to match your maktab. See how each platform's cost moves in real time. Stripe or GoCardless processing fees apply on both platforms, so they're left out.
Frequently asked questions
Is MaktabMate better than Labbaik?
MaktabMate is a clean, credible product for a maktab happy with a fixed subscription. Labbaik covers the same core features, then adds unlimited students and teachers from day one, automatic retries on failed fee payments, full two-way WhatsApp messaging, UK payroll, multi-branch and a public educational page with an embeddable SDK and API — plus a free plan that never runs out.
Does MaktabMate take online fee payments?
Yes. Parents can pay by card once the maktab connects its own Stripe account, and by Direct Debit through GoCardless or Stripe, with no MaktabMate fee on top of the provider's. If a Direct Debit fails, the office is emailed and staff retry it by hand. Labbaik collects cards and BACS Direct Debit through one Stripe account, retries failed payments automatically and sends parents WhatsApp payment alerts; it charges a platform fee from 1.5% on payments collected instead of a subscription.
Does MaktabMate support Hifz tracking?
Yes — juz-by-juz progress with tests, plus sabaq, sabqi and manzil records. Labbaik covers the same ground with Sabaq, Sabqi and Manzil tracking built around UK maktab routines.
Does Labbaik include payroll?
Yes. Labbaik runs HMRC-compatible UK payroll on every plan — PAYE, National Insurance, pension and student loan deductions calculated automatically, with payslips and P45/P60 generation included. MaktabMate doesn't currently offer a payroll module.
Which is better for a small UK madrasah?
Both are aimed at smaller maktabs, but Labbaik's Safar plan has no student or teacher cap and no monthly bill regardless of usage — MaktabMate's Lite tier caps at 10 students and 3 teachers before you need to upgrade.
Can I migrate from MaktabMate to Labbaik?
Yes. Student, class and fee records can be imported from a CSV export, and our team can help with a guided migration — get in touch and we'll walk you through it.
Does MaktabMate have masjid tools like donations or events?
No — MaktabMate is scoped to maktab administration (attendance, Hifz, fees, homework, exams, house points). Labbaik covers the same ground, then adds donation campaigns, community events and certificates in the same system.
Does MaktabMate support Alimiyyah or kitab-level tracking?
MaktabMate tracks Hifz juz by juz and lets you define a syllabus for each maktab class, but we found no publicly documented support for structured Alimiyyah or kitab-by-kitab tracking. Labbaik lets institutions upload their own PDF syllabus, automatically breaks it into sections, and lets teachers track progress kitab by kitab and page by page, visible live in the parent/student portal.
Does MaktabMate remind committees about compliance deadlines like DBS or Charity Commission reports?
Not part of the platform, as far as we could find. Committees can set up recurring administrative tasks in Labbaik — utility and insurance renewals, scheduled maintenance and annual servicing, Charity Commission report deadlines, safeguarding and DBS renewals, fire safety checks and more — with an owner and a due date, and Labbaik sends WhatsApp alerts as renewals approach and if the most important deadlines go overdue.
Does MaktabMate support online classes with Zoom and cloud recordings?
Not publicly documented — as far as we could find, MaktabMate doesn't offer this. Labbaik has its own built-in video classes, Labbaik Live, where attendance marks itself as students join. It also connects your own Zoom account by OAuth to run live online classes, automatically alerts enrolled students by WhatsApp and email when a session starts, marks attendance automatically the moment they join from the student/parent portal, and lets you publish recordings from your own Google Drive or Dropbox so students can catch up on missed sessions. Labbaik only ever sees the specific files you choose to publish — never your whole Drive or Dropbox account.
Is MaktabMate mobile-first for teachers?
MaktabMate is a responsive web app that can be added to the home screen, and its register is quick to mark on a phone. Labbaik is built phone-first for teachers and parents alike — teachers log attendance and Hifz progress from the classroom floor, and parents handle fees, absences and messages from WhatsApp.
We compared Labbaik and MaktabMate using publicly available product information as of October 2026. Where possible, we checked the pages below directly rather than relying on secondhand summaries. Feature availability and pricing can change — the source is the most up-to-date word on either platform.
Weighing up more than one option? See our full round-up of the best MaktabMate alternatives for UK madrasahs.
Labbaik isn't only maktab and madrasah software — the same platform also runs donations, community certificates, events and non-educational classes, so a masjid can run its whole community on one system. It adapts to the organisation you run, so a madrasah or maktab only sees the tools it uses. See how Labbaik adapts to your organisation →
Parents and students sign in with a magic link sent to their email, with Google, or with a code sent on WhatsApp to the number the madrasah has for them. Admins and teachers sign in with a magic link, Google or a passkey, which uses their phone or computer's face, fingerprint or screen lock. Nobody has a password to set, forget or reset. Tour the parent portal →
Send us whatever you're using today — a spreadsheet, e-Maktab, IBEAMS, IlmFlow, or a folder of paper registers. We'll set Labbaik up for you and migrate every student, family, class and fee balance across ourselves, at no cost.
If your committee isn't ready to take its first register yet, that's fine too — we'll finish the whole setup so it's ready the moment you are. Get in touch and tell us what you're moving from.
Compare Labbaik with another platform
See how Labbaik stacks up against more of the alternatives UK maktabs and madrasas evaluate.