In short: A MaxPreps membership is a free account — there is no paid MaxPreps membership tier. One account lets you follow teams and athletes, get score and ranking alerts, join game chat, and save 10% on professional photos. From there, athletes and parents can claim a profile, and coaches and athletic directors can request Team Admin access to manage their program's official record.
Every free account includes
These come with the account itself — no approval step, no cost.
- Follow your teams and athletes. Favorited teams and athletes appear in your account menu for one-click access on every page.
- Score, ranking, and media alerts. Favoriting a team automatically subscribes you to final scores, rankings movement, and new videos, photos, and articles. See MaxPreps Emails & Notifications for every list and how to change them.
- Game chat. Join the fan chat on contest pages while the game is happening.
- 10% off professional photos, permanently. The discount applies automatically at checkout whenever you are signed in — see Purchasing Professional Photos.
- Contribute to coverage. Report a final score, or sign up to provide live play-by-play updates for a game. See How do fans report scores? and Become a MaxPreps Scorer.
Fans can start here: create your free MaxPreps account, or read MaxPreps as a Fan for the full walkthrough.
Athletes and parents: claim a profile
Most athletes already have a profile page built from coach-entered rosters and stats. Claiming it gives you editing control over how that athlete is presented to fans, media, and college coaches.
- Add roster photos for every sport and season.
- Add strengths, personal records, and accomplishments.
- Add academics — classes, GPA, test scores — and club teams.
- Upload highlight videos from the MaxPreps app.
- Combine a multi-sport athlete's separate pages into one career profile.
- See follower counts and audience insights for a claimed profile.
To claim, sign in and search for the athlete's name, then choose Claim on their profile page — or go directly to claim an athlete profile (you will be asked to sign in first). Step-by-step instructions are in MaxPreps as an Athlete and MaxPreps as a Parent.
If no one has entered your stats
Stats normally come from a coach or team admin. When a season goes by without them, an athlete or parent who has claimed the profile can now enter that season's stats themselves. These appear on the profile as Athlete-Entered Stats.
- Available for any season a coach has not already entered stats for.
- Enter them from the Admin tab on the claimed profile, under Stats.
- They are labeled on the profile, so anyone viewing it can see where the numbers came from.
- They appear on the athlete's career profile only — not on team pages — and they are not eligible for stat leaderboards or awards.
- If a coach later enters stats for that season, the coach's stats replace them. Any single season is either all coach-entered or all athlete-entered, never a mix — though a career can include both across different seasons.
The full rules and entry steps are in Athlete Entered Stats. If a coach's existing stats look wrong, use a Stat Correction instead.
Coaches and athletic directors: Team Admin access
Coaches and ADs start with the same free account as everyone else, then request Team Admin access on top of it. This is the largest unlock on MaxPreps, and the only one that requires verification — because it grants control over a program's public record.
With Team Admin access, you can:
- Manage your roster, schedule, and final scores.
- Enter game-by-game player statistics, which makes athletes eligible for MaxPreps awards.
- Upload game film and highlight videos for the team.
- Delegate access to assistant coaches, statisticians, or a team volunteer.
- Import stats from partners such as GameChanger and MaxStats instead of entering them twice.
Your entered scores also feed the MaxPreps rankings — and, in many states, the official ratings associations use for playoff seeding.
What to expect: access is reviewed before it is granted, so there is a short approval step rather than instant access. Start with a free account, then request Team Admin access (sign in first). Full instructions are in Team Admin Access, and What are the benefits of using MaxPreps for coaches? covers why programs use it.
Free membership vs. a paid video subscription
These are two different things, and the difference is the most common source of billing confusion:
- MaxPreps membership is free. Everything above costs nothing. The only thing MaxPreps charges for is photos purchased from professional galleries.
- Watching live and on-demand games is a paid subscription through the NFHS Network. Billing and access for it are handled by NFHS Network support — see MaxPreps Subscription Support.
If you see a recurring charge, it is an NFHS Network video subscription, not a MaxPreps membership fee.
How to get started
- Create your free account — or sign in if you already have one.
- Follow your school's teams and any athletes you want updates on.
- Choose your role: claim a profile as an athlete or parent, or request Team Admin access as a coach or AD.
Getting Started on MaxPreps walks through all three paths with the claim steps for athletes, parents, and coaches side by side.
What to keep in mind
Alert options vary by sport, team, and whether you are on the web or the MaxPreps app. Claiming a profile requires the profile to exist first, which depends on a coach having entered the roster. Team Admin access is reviewed before approval. You can adjust or turn off every email and notification at any time, and you can cancel the account entirely — see Cancel MaxPreps Membership or Deleting an Athlete Profile.
Last updated: July 2026.