What We Built in October 2026: Link-in-Bio Pages, Gig Rescue From the Booking Page & a GIGXCHANGE Website Rebuilt for Your PhoneThe month your work started travelling: a link-in-bio page with your free nights on it, a Rescue button for the night an act pulls out, venues editing their own listings, and a website rebuilt page by page for the phone in your hand
TL;DR: GigXchange October 2026 (v0.3.8 work, still landing in waves)
October was the month your work started travelling. Artists can turn their profile into a link-in-bio page at gigxchange.app/@yourname, where a booker can tap one of your free nights and ask for it. Your Links gathers everything you have made into one share hub, and the stage plot gained a plan drawn from above and an A4 rider for the engineer. When an act cancels, the booking page now opens with Rescue this gig, and venues that have claimed their listing in the venue directory can edit it themselves. On the website, nearly every page was rebuilt for the phone in your hand, and new pages cover the ways people actually come to live music: six kinds of venue, the kinds of act people book, six guides for event organisers, and a find-a-band page for each city in our guides. You can also ask ChatGPT or Claude about UK gigs through GigXchange.
As of 30 October 2026 the released version of both halves is still v0.3.7, dated 4 September, and the v0.3.8 work keeps landing in waves as each piece passes review. The app is free on the App Store and Google Play. The running changelog behind this roundup lives on our Release Notes page.
Every working musician I know has the same problem with the link in their bio. One link, and it has to do the job of a website, a diary and a press kit. So it points at a page of six buttons, two of them dead, and a booker who wants to know if you are free on the 14th still has to message you and wait for an answer.
October was about the places your work actually gets seen: the link in your bio, the page a venue lands on, and the night an act pulls out at five o’clock. The app gained 16 headline features and 87 smaller fixes this month, the website 17 and 77. Not all of it is glamorous. Most of the website work was rebuilding pages so they read properly on a phone, because that is where a booker or a fan is most likely to meet them.
October 2026 in numbers
Feature and fix counts are read from our Release Notes on 30 October 2026, and the help and blog counts are a census taken the same day. The pub fee is the live GX Index median, read as this page loads. The Musicians’ Union national gig rates are the floor worth knowing before you quote.
- 16Headline app features, on top of 87 smaller fixes
- 17Headline website features, on top of 77 smaller changes
- 6New pages on putting live music on, one per kind of venue
- 102Help answers, each now on a page of its own
- 14New pieces on the blog in October, before this one
- £350A pub gig for a trio or four-piece, the GX Index UK median
Feature and fix counts are read from our Release Notes on 30 October 2026, and the help and blog counts are a census taken the same day. The pub fee is the live GX Index median, read as this page loads. The Musicians’ Union national gig rates are the floor worth knowing before you quote.
The App: Mainstage (v0.3.8 Work, Still Landing in Waves)
Mainstage is the logged-in product: bookings, messages, events, payments, and the builders that make your public pages. The released version is still v0.3.7, dated 4 September. Everything below is v0.3.8 work that went live on the web app as each piece passed review, rather than waiting for one big release. The installed iPhone and Android apps pick changes up at their store releases, so they can run a little behind the web.
A Link-in-Bio Page With Your Free Nights on It
The Instagram Microsite turns your profile into one page for the link in your bio, at gigxchange.app/@yourname. Pick one of five looks, then show, hide and reorder its sections so it leads with whatever you want a booker to see first. The part I care about most is the diary. Your free nights sit on the page, each with its month under it, a date on hold shows in its own colour, and a booker can tap a free night and ask for that date without leaving the page. No DM, no ‘are you free on the 14th?’, no waiting.
It counts its own views, so you can finally tell whether the bio link is doing anything. If you are a venue, an agent or a promoter rather than an act, the link buttons on it fit what you do. The link-in-bio tool page puts all five looks side by side with a live example to open.
- Open your Promo Kit. The Instagram Microsite is built from there, and it sits on Your Links once it is made.
- Pick one of five looks. Then show, hide and reorder the sections so the page opens on what matters to you.
- Keep your availability current. The page shows the nights your calendar has not blocked, so block the ones you cannot do before a booker asks for them.
- Paste gigxchange.app/@yourname into your bio. Then let the view count tell you whether anyone is clicking it.
Your Links: Everything You Have Made, in One Place
Your Links is now a share hub. Your profile, What’s On, your EPK, your tour or events poster, your stage plots and your flyers each sit there as a picture tile. Pick one and it previews live, exactly as someone else would see it, with Copy, View, QR code and Share on the same screen. Anything you have not published yet offers to take you to its builder, which is a kinder way to find out you never finished your EPK than a booker telling you.
The cards you embed on your own website changed in the same pass. Each one now wears the same frame and sits flush with your page, and the availability calendar has its GigXchange bar back. The free tools page lists every builder that feeds the hub.
Gig Rescue: For the Night an Act Pulls Out
Every venue has had the phone call. The drummer is ill, doors are at eight, and you are scrolling through old WhatsApp threads looking for anyone who might be free. Now, if an act cancels on you, the booking page opens with Rescue this gig, ready to invite up to 25 acts who are free that night, near the gig, and who take last-minute work. Promoters can use it too: switch it on in Settings or straight from the page.
On the website, the Gig Rescue page now opens with a five-step checklist for what to do tonight, and every booking guide answers the same question. I would rather you never needed any of it. But the room should not go quiet because one band’s van broke down on the M6.
Venues Can Now Edit Their Own Directory Page
If you run a venue that has claimed its page in the venue directory, you can now change everything it shows from Venue Pages in the app: photos, capacity, the nights you put on music and when they start, opening hours, your kit, the genres you book and your links. Open mic nights get an editor of their own in the same style, and a help answer walks you through both.
To be straight about the gap: the open mic editor cannot change the entry fee or the kit list, or add new photos, yet. You can reorder or remove the photos already there, and everything else on the page can be edited. Claiming got smoother too. Claim a venue from its page and sign-up already knows the venue’s name all the way through, and your public profile links back to the listing you claimed. If you are new to running music in a small room, the Music Venue Trust resources are worth an hour of your time.
The Stage Plot, Seen From Above, and a Rider for the Engineer
September’s 3D stage got its other half. Every stage plot now has a plan view: the same stage drawn from overhead at true scale, in the lit look or as a blueprint. Switch between the 3D stage and the plan on the public page, in the embed and in the builder, and lay your gear out in whichever one you find easier.
The printable rider is now an A4 landscape sheet that reads like a tour book: a cover shot from the pit, the stage as the desk sees it, both sides and the view from above, then the channel patch, your notes, and a code the engineer can scan for the live plot. It builds in a second or two and prints as clean ink on white. Every item on the stage, and every band member, can carry a note for the engineer, and those notes travel to the public page, the embed, the picture and the rider.
Real Gear, a Full-Screen Stage, and a Room Around It
Everything you drop on the stage is now modelled on the kit it stands for: guitar and bass rigs, a full drum kit on its riser, stage keys, a DJ booth, wedges and a PA on poles, the sound desk, flight cases, a lighting truss with moving heads, drapes, and an LED wall behind the band. On a computer the builder and the public page fill the screen, and the stage gets a room: a brick back wall, a scuffed deck, risers and steps, and a view from the crowd or the balcony. On a phone you can pick an item up and nudge it rather than drag it.
One caveat. A computer or phone with no graphics hardware, or a browser with acceleration switched off, shows the plot as the plan only, and the 3D button says it is not available on that device. The stage plot tool page has real plots you can turn around before you sign up.
Find Artists Is a Wall That Moves
Finding an artist now opens a full-width wall of members that keeps turning, with one of them featured large: their bio, their photographs, the nights they are free, their fee and set length, and a map of how far they will travel, drawn as rings out to fifty miles. Click or tap any card to bring that member forward. Quick filters narrow the wall to a sound or a city, on a phone it opens as a carousel you swipe through, and the same featured wall now opens Find Venues, Find Agents and Find Promoters too.
The results underneath were brought into line as well. Find Venues, Find Agents, Find Promoters, Find Gigs, Classifieds, Events and Bookings now share one shape: a search rail that tells you in a line what you are about to see, one card featured at the top, full rows of everything else, and a pager that brings you back to where you were. Learn one and you know the lot. Choosing a profile photo now lets you frame your tall member card as well, so the wall shows you the way you meant.
Signing In, Rebuilt as One Short Flow
Getting in and getting started were rebuilt as one flow. Google, Microsoft and Apple sit side by side as equal choices (Apple works in the iPhone app, and on the web it is marked Soon while we finish it), anything you arrived with (a venue invite, a referral code, the kind of account you picked) is remembered through sign-in rather than lost on the way, and a brand-new account is asked once who it is and nothing more. A dropped connection no longer freezes the app or signs you out: it waits, then carries on.
It looks like the scene now, too. On a computer, sign-in opens on a contact sheet of real members on 35 mm film rolling past beside the form, and setting up your profile builds your backstage pass as you go: a 3D pass on a lanyard, made from your profile, that turns over at the end to show your own permanent member number. You keep it in Settings, where you can drag it round and tap to flip it.
A Long Session Feels Like a Fresh One
This one is invisible when it works, which is the point. The app now lets go of what it is no longer showing, so an hour of moving between pages feels the same as the moment you opened it. The iPhone app no longer reloads itself on Find Artists and Find Venues, moving parts stop while they are off screen so your battery lasts longer, pop-ups and sheets open about twice as fast on a phone, and photographs you send in chat appear in the thread straight away.
Your public pages got the same care. On a phone, your profile and the pages it opens (tour page, setlist, stage plot, flyer and What’s On) now read as editorial pages under one masthead, with a Where to next? menu so a visitor can jump to any part of the page or on to the rest of GigXchange.
The Website (v0.3.8 Work, Still Landing)
The public site is how people find us without an account, and in October it got most of my hours: 17 headline changes and 77 smaller ones. Two jobs ran side by side. Rebuild the pages so they read properly on a phone, then on a computer. And give each of the ways people come to live music a page of its own, so whoever you are, there is a page that starts where you are standing.
Rebuilt for the Phone in Your Hand
On a phone the homepage is now a design of its own rather than a squeezed-down desktop page: a moving wall of members you can swipe through, live counts of who is on GigXchange, and a 3D phone showing the app. Venue pages open on the room’s own photographs, say whether it is open right now with a countdown to opening or closing, and list the kit it has, telling you to contact the venue when that is not listed rather than guessing. Open mic pages lead with how long until the night kicks off, then lay out its running order in slots of 30 minutes, filling in as the evening goes.
The venue directory, the open mic finder and the gig directory were rebuilt for one hand: search at the top, a Refine panel that reads back what you picked, and Back that brings your filters back with you. The open mic finder puts tonight first, and the gig directory pages through results 10, 25 or 50 gigs at a time and returns you to the row you left. A gig that has already happened says so, with no ticket links. Nearly everything else followed: the role pages, the blog, the GX Index, What’s On, the Member Spotlight and the terms and privacy pages.
Then Rebuilt Again for a Computer
Once the phone pages were right, the big screen caught up. Every venue, open mic and gig page now reads as one editorial page on a computer too: the room’s photographs in a viewer you can step through, the quick facts up front and the nearest station. Open mic pages count down to the next night. Big headings show the photograph behind them through their lettering, every grid of cards pages through with the same control as the app, and the sign-up banner at the foot of a page shows portraits of real members.
A Page for Each Way Into Live Music
Nobody searches for ‘a live music marketplace’. They search for a jazz trio for a hotel bar, music for a care home’s summer fete, or what a wedding band costs. So October added a page for each of those starting points, with real GigXchange members you can book on them. The table is the map.
| If you are… | Start here | What the page gives you |
|---|---|---|
| Running a pub, hotel, club, care home, boat or holiday park | Live music for pubs, plus a page for each of the other five | The acts that suit the room, what to budget, and members ready to play |
| Booking a particular kind of act | Jazz bands, DJs, string quartets, tribute acts and more | Real members, the line-ups and occasions each one suits, and what it typically costs |
| Planning a wedding, a party or a community event | Six organiser guides, starting with weddings | The steps, what acts charge, the licence rules and how the day runs |
| Booking in a particular town | Find a band in Bristol, and the same page for each city in our guides | The local acts you can book, what they play, and who is free this weekend |
| Booking live music for the first time | How to book live music in the UK | The national guide that now leads the city guides |
| Starting out as an agent or a promoter | Becoming a booking agent and putting on a gig | Plain answers to the questions people actually ask |
October’s new starting points, checked 30 October 2026
Two numbers worth having before you book anyone. The GX Index UK median for a trio or four-piece playing a pub is £350 (379 fees), and for a solo act £265 (546 fees). And if you are a pub or a small venue wondering whether you need a licence first, the Live Music Act guidance on GOV.UK sets out when live music needs no entertainment licence at all. The organiser guides cover a birthday, a Christmas party, a garden party, a charity event and a community event alongside the wedding one, the city guides are now grouped by region, such as the South West, and the guides library starts by asking who you are.
Ask ChatGPT or Claude About UK Live Music
You can now connect ChatGPT, Claude or Codex to GigXchange in about a minute and ask about gigs, open mics, venues and gig rates in your own words. It is free, and read-only until you allow more. Claude lists GigXchange in its own connector directory, so you can add it from inside Claude, and the AI connector page has the steps for the others.
Under the bonnet it speaks the Model Context Protocol, the open standard these assistants use to reach outside tools, and the answers come from the same directories and GX Index you can read on the site. The how-to post walks through it with real questions.
Help, Embeds and Free Tools, Shown as They Really Are
Help now has an answer for each live feature, from setlists, EPKs and invoices to ticket orders, favourites and Smart Match, each checked against how the app actually behaves. Every answer has a page of its own, so you can send someone straight to it: 102 pages on 30 October, up from 55 answers a month earlier. The user guides open the same way on a phone, search first.
Each free tool page now walks through the tool as it really is in the app, screen by screen, with real members beside it. The venue tools, such as the compliance checklist and the Martyn’s Law checker, lead to each other, and so do the artist tools. If Martyn’s Law is the thing keeping you up, the government factsheets are the primary source. And the new embeds page gathers every widget you can add to your own website, lets you try each one live, then gives you the steps for WordPress, Squarespace, Wix, Carrd or Bandzoogle.
Open Data, Measured Uptime and the September GX Index
A few smaller pages matter more than their size. The status page now shows real measured uptime for each part of the service, day by day over the last 90 days. A new open data page lists the free datasets we publish, from open mics and grassroots venues to gig counts and the GX Index. And the September GX Index report came out in October, while the Pint Index gained a calculator that turns a gig fee into pints, for the whole act and per member.
Fourteen pieces went up on the blog this month, from what changes for UK venues in 2027 and whether gig fees will rise next year to the Hometown Meltdown tour and a pilot that matched grassroots live music to known songs for PRS licensing. The ones that go with this update are at the foot of the page.
October, by Role
Three cards: artists, venues, and the people booking music for an event. If you only read one thing on this page, read the card that is yours.
What’s Next, and What Is Not Finished
First what is coming, then what is still rough, because a roundup that only lists wins is an advert.
- Rescheduling in the app. Propose a new date and have the other side accept it, without going through us.
- Full agent matching. Smart Match built around how agents actually work, across a whole roster.
- EPK Builder v2. Full mobile editing, and steadier widgets.
- Richer public profiles. Verified booking history and review scores on public profile pages.
- Guides that point at the right tool. Our guides and tool pages linking each other up, so you land on the thing that solves your problem.
What Is Not Finished Yet
Here is what is still rough, and what to do about it in the meantime. Every row is also listed under Known issues on the Release Notes page, which is where it belongs.
| What you might see | What to do |
|---|---|
| Light mode is paused, so the app stays dark | Nothing yet: the switch is still there and explains itself |
| Apple sign-in on the web is marked Soon | Use Google, Microsoft or your email and password on the web. Apple works in the iPhone app |
| The open mic editor cannot change the entry fee or kit list, or add new photos | Reorder or remove the photos already there. Everything else on the page can be edited |
| The wall on Find Artists and Find Venues keeps turning while you read it | Rest the pointer on the featured card, or keep your finger down on a phone, and it holds still |
| A device with no graphics hardware shows a stage plot as the plan only | Use the plan view, which shows the same stage from above |
| An installed phone app that has not updated yet shows one offer card per conversation and fewer attachment types | Use the web app, which has both, until your phone app’s next store update |
| Very occasionally a flyer downloaded on an iPhone comes out wrong | Download it again, or download it on a computer |
Known issues on 30 October 2026, and the workaround
If something on this page does not work the way I have described it, the contact form reaches me, not a queue. If you missed what came before, the monthly release log collects every one of these, and September sits directly behind this one.
October’s reads that go with this update
Six of the fourteen, picked because each one sits behind a feature above. Start with the page for your role.
02 — Questions8 answersAsked and answeredFrequently Asked Questions
Annual refresh commitment
This guide was published on 30 October 2026 and is refreshed every October. Platform features and roadmap priorities evolve month to month, so annual verification matters. We re-verify every reference, recommendation, and data point once a year. Next scheduled refresh: October 2027. If any claim is outdated before then, email support@gigxchange.app and we aim to update it within one working day.
