How to plan a weekly class timetable

Your timetable decides who can come and how full your classes are, and so how many hours you and your teachers spend in an empty room. Many timetables are just the slots that were free when the studio opened. This guide covers planning one deliberately and improving it once you have bookings to learn from.

1. Start with when your clients are free

For most adult group classes, people come at a few times of day:

• early morning, 06:30 to 08:00, before work,
• lunchtime, 12:00 to 13:30, if you’re near offices,
• evenings, 17:30 to 20:30, the busiest slot almost everywhere,
• weekend mornings, especially for yoga, Pilates and families.

Children’s classes fit after school, roughly 15:30 to 18:00. Weekday mid-mornings suit parents of small children, retirees and shift workers. Ask your current clients when they’d come; ten answers tell you more than any general rule.

2. Run fewer classes at first

A new studio is tempted to offer something every hour. But a class with three people costs nearly as much to run as one with twelve, and a half-empty room feels flat to everyone in it. Start with fewer classes at the strongest times and add more as they fill. Adding a class is much easier than taking one away from the four people who love it.

3. Set capacity by the room and the teaching

Capacity depends on more than how many mats fit. Count the space each person needs (a yoga mat with room around it takes roughly 2.5 to 3 m²), the equipment you have, such as reformers, bikes or wheels, and how many people one teacher can watch. Beginners’ classes often work better with a few places fewer than the rest.

4. Keep it consistent

Regulars build their week around your timetable (“Tuesday 18:30 is yoga”), and the same class at the same time every week is what turns a visit into a habit. Avoid moving classes from week to week. When you run a special session, add it as a one-off instead of replacing a regular class.

5. Read the numbers every month

Once people book online, you have real data. Look at each regular class over the last four to eight weeks:

• The fill rate is booked spots out of capacity. Above about 85% with a regular waitlist, it’s time for a second session or a bigger room (see how to run a waitlist).
• Attendance is how many of the people booked actually came. A full class with many no-shows needs better reminders or a cancellation policy rather than a second session.
• If a class stays under about a third full for two months, try a different time or teacher before you drop it.

6. Change the timetable by season

Make bigger changes two or three times a year rather than every week. September, January and the start of summer are natural moments. Announce changes at least two weeks ahead, tell the regulars of a class that’s moving yourself, and suggest where they can go instead. If summer needs a lighter timetable, plan it in advance instead of cancelling classes one by one.

How Groopla handles this

In Groopla you set up each class once as a recurring schedule, on the weekdays you choose and every week or every few weeks, and its sessions appear on your calendar and booking page. Each session has its own capacity. You can add one-off sessions or cancel a single date without touching the rest, and booked clients are told automatically. Reports show booked spots, attendance, no-shows and revenue for every session over any date range, and you can export them as CSV.