6 types of multi-site church websites

When a church grows past one location, the website has to answer a hard question: how do you serve every campus without building (and maintaining) a separate site for each one? Over years of building for multi-campus churches, we've seen six recurring models. Each suits a different organizational structure and campus relationship.

Model 1 — No campus page

Campuses appear only on a single locations page or as home-page cards, with no individual pages. Best for churches with one primary location and satellite "overflow" sites. Simple to maintain, but it can leave visitors unsure what to expect at each location.
Examples: FBCcov.org, CalvaryChristian.com, Real.Life, Wooddale.org

Model 2 — Campus one-pager

Each campus gets a single landing page; generalized content (like kids ministry) is linked from the campus page. Fits churches where campuses look and feel consistent with highly centralized operations. Risk: visitor disappointment when ministries vary by location, or when the imagery oversells a smaller campus.
Examples: Life.Church, NewSpring.cc, ChurchontheMove.com

Model 3 — Campus + subpages (best for most)

Each campus has a landing page with subpages (Visit, Kids, Students, Events, Groups, Sermons) tailored to that location, while the main nav stays church-wide. The best balance of flexibility and easy maintenance for most multi-site churches. We recommend housing groups and events on the site itself, using a cookie to remember a visitor's campus, and giving each campus its own kids page.
Examples: MarinersChurch.org, FreeChapel.org, NECchurch.org

Model 4 — Site within a site

Each campus runs as a nested site with its own header and navigation; visitors choose a campus early. Ideal for 2–7 campuses with higher autonomy and notable differences. Minimizes bouncing between contexts but demands more content. Use mirrored pages with automated canonical tags, dynamic content blocks that filter by campus, and let campuses override shared pages.
Examples: Christpres.org, Multiply.Church, RedemptionAZ.com

Model 5 — Context switcher

Visitors explore a generalized site, then the whole site transforms — header, nav, and all — when they pick a campus. Avoids forcing an early choice and eliminates dual menus, but it's trickier to do well and asks more operationally. (Tip: don't auto-save a campus preference too early — it can confuse first-time explorers.)
Examples: cotc.com, North Way

Model 6 — Separate websites

At least one campus runs on its own domain and site for full web and brand autonomy — useful for uniquely branded or multinational campuses. Maximum independence, maximum maintenance.
Examples: NorthPoint.org/locations, themissionabbey.org/parishes

How to choose

The right model depends on how independent your campuses truly are, who maintains the site, and how much duplicate content you can tolerate. For most growing churches, Model 3 is the sweet spot — local relevance without multiplying the work. For higher-autonomy campuses we reach for Model 4 or 5; we built North Way on a fully contextualized switcher across eight campuses.