Small businesses that need basic invoicing and reporting capabilities will do fine with free or low-cost cloud-based accounting software. As your business grows, you can add more features and functionality. The best accounting software for SMB makes it simple and easy to keep accurate financial records for expenses, profit and purposes. Accounting software is a non-negotiable if you’re trying to run your own small business, and the sooner you deploy one of the best accounting software products the better.
The extremely popular accounting software is used by small businesses across the country. Accountants are quick to praise the application for its affordability, ease of use and effectiveness. It’s hard to find many flaws with QuickBooks, especially considering the needs of small businesses today. QuickBooks Online offers small business owners a feature-rich accounting platform that integrates with tons of business applications and doesn’t break the bank. Many businesses find it helpful to connect their credit card processing provider to their accounting software to close the loop on their sales. We like that the software is cloud-based and updated regularly.
We chose QuickBooks Online as our best pick for small businesses for several reasons. With this accounting software, you can create professional invoices, accept payments, track expenses and keep a steady eye on your cash flow. And that’s just with the Basic plan; the higher-priced plans let you send batch invoices, engage in deep analytics and even access a dedicated accounting team. QuickBooks Online integrates with several popular business apps, including Bill.com, Salesforce and HubSpot.
With QuickBooks, you don’t have to create financial reports from scratch, thanks to the software’s built-in reports, which include the trial balance, general ledger and 1099 transaction detail reports you’ll need at tax time. You can mark the reports you use most as favorites so you can quickly find them at the top of the Reports page. You can also set up the software to automatically run and email reports to you, and schedule them for a specific time of day and frequency, such as daily, weekly, monthly or quarterly. QuickBooks offers some of the best reporting options of any accounting software we reviewed.
Another advantage of QuickBooks Online is its versatile support. Whether you are the DIY type or prefer more hands-on help, QuickBooks delivers. With its Live Bookkeeping service, you can get help from a bookkeeper who will set up your software, categorize transactions, reconcile your accounts and close your books monthly and yearly. Even better, you don’t get charged for services you don’t need; the pricing for Live Bookkeeping depends on your needs.
If you already have an accountant, it’s easy to collaborate with QuickBooks. The software lets you give your accountant access for free; all they need to do is accept the invitation. You can remove access anytime. QuickBooks offers all types of small businesses a ton of accounting features without breaking the bank, and its reputation and adoption rate stand out in the market.
Oracle’s NetSuite is a great choice for small business owners who want to get a complete picture of their business while automating aspects of accounting. With this software, you can manage all aspects of your business from one dashboard, making NetSuite our pick for the best accounting software with enterprise resource planning (ERP) tools.
NetSuite is a full-featured accounting and ERP program geared toward businesses with more complex needs. You can make and receive payments, run a slew of reports and manage taxes. NetSuite has embraced automation, making it easy to send invoices and receive payments, and it has robust tax management tools that support all currencies and exchange rates. If you have international sales, the software automatically processes sales and payments based on the local laws you’re selling or operating in. There’s also a revenue recognition management solution that helps business owners meet accounting standards and report financial results on time.
Cash flow management is also simple thanks to a robust set of features that provide insight into your cash, making it easier to optimize cash, control bank accounts and remain compliant with rules and regulations. NetSuite’s payment management system centralizes payments, while the planning and budgeting features unify data to help you plan. It’s also easy to create budgets and forecasts, plan for what-if scenarios and run reports on many aspects of your business. To keep you in control, NetSuite lets you set permissions.
NetSuite also has numerous ERP tools to manage finances, inventory, production and the supply chain, and the ERP functionality also helps you plan for the future. Because NetSuite comes with so many features and tools, it’s difficult to get an accurate price without reaching out to a NetSuite sales representative. There’s an online form you can fill out to set up a free demonstration.
NetSuite may not make sense if you are self-employed or a microbusiness without complex needs. But if you require a more holistic approach to accounting and want to be able to budget, plan and forecast, NetSuite deserves serious consideration.
Xero might grab your attention with its low-cost Early plan account but look closely and limitations soon become apparent – like being restricted to sending a maximum of five invoices, entering five bills, or reconciling only 20 bank transactions.
Still, if you can live with those restrictions there are some pluses here. The service offers smart expense tracking and management, optionally on your mobile with Xero’s excellent app for Android and iOS. There are dozens of configurable reports, simple budgeting, and no limits at all on additional users or the accountants you might want to access the data. If the invoice, bank, or billing issues are a problem then the Xero Growing plan looks like a better deal. It’s a lot more money, but you can issue as many invoices and enter as many bills as you like.
Xero offers plenty of functionality for any small business, including a handy “convert your QuickBooks files” service to help you get started, and it’s certainly easy to use. But if you don’t quite need all that power, there’s better value to be had elsewhere. Xero has built up its cloud-accounting services substantially in recent years and how has an easy-to-use package that can be tailored to suit the needs of small business owners, accountants, and bookkeepers alike. Central to its universal appeal is a simple dashboard design that lets multiple users make use of its many and varied features and functions. The accountancy package is additional appealing thanks to several extra features that include expense and project tracking.
Zoho Books is just one small part of a much greater business concern based in India that offers all manner of solutions for anyone and everyone. With its clean and simple cloud-based interface Zoho Books makes a great cost-effective option if you’re a freelancer, sole trader, or someone running a small business.
While the desktop route is a solid one Zoho Books also has an impressive app presence, making it a good mobile bet too. The basic plan offers a limited number of contacts (as in the maximum amount of customers or vendors you can create transactions for), 2 users (as in yourself and your accountant), and 5 automated workflows.
The most popular package is Standard, which comes with up to 500 contacts, 3 users, and 10 automated workflows. Professional, meanwhile, is a full bells-and-whistles experience that offers 500 contacts, 10 users, and 10 automated workflows. Incidentally, sign up for a yearly package and you get 2 months off. Zoho does offer additional add-ons, more about which you can glean from its website. There’s also a free 14-day trial available.
ZohoBooks is just one of many different software packages available from this software publisher. It makes a great choice if you’re a small or medium-sized business owner who needs plenty of features and functions. It’s made even more appealing thanks to a high level of automated functionality, which in turn makes light of many everyday accounting chores. The additional benefit of ZohoBooks is that it can also be combined with many of the other products in the Zoho catalog.
Wave Financial offers many important, quality accounting features for free. It connects to your bank accounts in real time, and offers payroll and invoicing features and unlimited accountant connections. Those are just a few of the reasons we selected Wave as our pick for the best free accounting software.
With Wave, you don’t have to worry about monthly or annual fees, nor do you have to license software. Wave is completely free unless you select optional add-ons. That means that, if you want to send invoices, run reports and integrate with popular business apps, you don’t have to pay a penny. There are no limits on the number of transactions, invoices you send and users who access your Wave account. If you want to accept invoice payments, Wave charges a flat rate of 2.9% plus 30 cents per credit card transaction. For ACH bank transfers, Wave charges 1%, and there’s a $1 minimum fee. The company also has additional payroll and bookkeeping services that business owners can access for a fee.
Wave easily holds its own when compared with paid accounting software. This program automates many aspects of accounting, thereby saving business owners precious time. Through the cloud-based accounting program, you can create and schedule recurring invoices and payments, as well as set up automatic payment reminders and automatic syncing with your bank, credit card and PayPal accounts.
Wave’s reporting capabilities also stand out. You might think a free accounting application wouldn’t have many reporting features, but that’s not true of Wave. You can run dozens of reports on everything from cash flow to profits and losses, as well as track expenses and upload receipt images. Wave integrates with Etsy, PayPal, Shoeboxed and Zapier, which gives you access to hundreds of third-party apps.
Small businesses should seriously consider using Wave. The platform is easy to use and offers many of the features included in the best paid accounting software programs at a similar level of quality. Wave Financial might not be as comprehensive as some accounting programs, but it’s still a step ahead of other free accounting software.
GnuCash is accounting software designed for individuals and small businesses and was initially conceived as an open source alternative to apps such as Intuit’s Quicken.
This app has been around since the late 1990s and is available for Linux, GNU, OpenBSD, Android, macOS and Windows. It handles invoicing and credit notes, accounts payable and receivable, employee expenses and some payroll features too, and it’s quite happy with multiple currencies, cards and accounts. Its sheer flexibility makes it our top choice when it comes to accounting software for kitchen table businesses.
GnuCash is pretty simple to look at and even more straightforward to get to grips with, making it suitable for small business owners with simple accounting needs. The accounting software has been around for a long time, so it works surprisingly well for a package that can be used for free.
Freelancers and self-employed people need an affordable accounting program that can help them send invoices and get paid. Sage Business Cloud Accounting offers that and much more, making it our pick for the best accounting software for freelancers and the self-employed.
Sage Business Cloud Accounting is inexpensive accounting software that packs a lot of punch. With the entry-level plan, you can create and send invoices, track payments and automatically reconcile bank entries.
Sage has another plan that costs $25 a month for unlimited users. With it, you can send invoices, quotes and estimates; run reports and conduct analysis to forecast cash flow; manage purchase invoices; and automatically snap and post receipts. Sage makes that service free for the first three months, and the company is currently running a promotion that gives business users 50% off the higher-tier plan for six months.
We also like that Sage offers a free 30-day trial. Sage also makes it easy to cancel; there isn’t a long-term contract that costs extra to break, but you do have to give the company advance notice of cancellation. Another reason we chose Sage for freelancers and self-employed people is that it is easy to set up and navigate. The software automates a lot of the accounting processes that are typically manual, such as posting expenses and payments and sending invoices and reminders about past-due bills. Thanks to its integrations and apps, Sage is easily expandable as your business grows. The company operates an online app marketplace and integrates with a slew of apps, including AutoEntry, Draycir, Avalara and Credit Hound.
Sage’s customer service is very accessible, which is good news for freelancers and self-employed people who don’t have accounting expertise. If you have questions or need help, you can access customer support 24/7 by chat and live Q&A sessions. Sage also offers one-on-one help through online sessions with Sage accounting experts.
For self-employed and freelance workers, it’s essential to be able to quickly and easily send invoices and track payments. With Sage Business Cloud Accounting, you get an affordable way to keep cash flowing, making it a great accounting program for freelancers and self-employed individuals.