Accounting Software
Get the best accounting software for your business. Compare product reviews, pricing below. Read our buyer’s guide for more help.
Business owners crave an accounting software that will offer an easy to use, easy to implement, and inexpensive option. But which one can your business invest in to improve cash flow? There are dozens of specially designed accounting systems available for nearly all sizes and every industry.
Whether you’re self-employed or manage a business with a large number of employees, you’ll want to pick a software that offers a way to automate accounting as much as possible so you have more free time to grow your business.
To help you find the best accounting solution, we’ve conducted research on a wide range of management software and put together a collection of our 2020 best picks for accounting software.
FreshBooks is a true all-in-one accounting software that improves cash flow and automates your administrative tasks such as basic invoicing, organizing expenses, and tracking your time worked on projects. It also offers a large quantity of reports that help monitor the finances and financial health of your business.
The biggest benefit of FreshBooks is what you get included for the price. Rather than offer a limited base version of their software (such as only invoicing), their “Lite” package includes a full suite of unlimited invoices, expense entries, estimating, and time tracking. It can also accept credit card payments and ACH bank transfers and has an automated bank import feature built in.
AcountingSuite is basic option intended for the growing small business. Due to offering an integrated suite of banking, sales, purchasing, inventory management, and accounting in it’s base package, the solution encourages you to continue to use it as you grow and does not require 3rd party add-ons or outside stand-alone options.
AccountingSuite includes as many CPA/bookkeeper seats as needed so your accountant can help you use the program. The solution starts at $19/month for 1 user and the cost is mostly dependent on the number of users.
Want more results? Check out our list of best small business accounting software.
Wave is a forever-free accounting solution that offers accounting, invoicing, payments, payroll, and receipts. Wave is very transparent into their pricing structure. The accounting, invoicing, and receipt scanning is 100% free. Collecting payments via credit card or bank transfers, or running payroll for your employees, does come at a price, however.
Wave is not only one of the most popular free accounting solutions, it can also be thought of as one of the most popular accounting solutions period. Because of this, it’s a great choice for freelancers and start-ups who are strapped for cash.
Kashoo is a complete bookkeeping solution for small business owners, providing invoicing, income/expense tracking, and credit card payment processing. However, Kashoo has it’s roots as primarily a powerful invoicing tool, which provides unlimited invoices and unlimited users. You can brand your invoices with your company logo, include payment instructions, and send invoices on a recurring basis.
Billing and invoicing capabilities in in Kashoo will help customers make payments on-time through automatic payment reminders and notifications. Kashoo’s dashboard was designed to quickly enter income and expense transactions. There are some key metrics found on the right-hand side, but the home screen is mainly a form for entering income and expenses, which shows you where it’s priorities lie.
Want more results? Check out our list of best billing and invoicing software.
Over 1.3 million users have chosen Xero as their primary accounting software. Xero is very scalable, meaning many small businesses continue to use Xero as they grow into larger enterprises and upgrade to more advanced versions.
Online accounting solutions (also known as cloud accounting software) such as Xero provide a “log in from anywhere” approach, which is intended to increase usage given the ease of access. On top of being able to access your financial information from anywhere you have access to a web browser, Xero has a mobile app for iOS devices, which can provide accounting features such as receipt scanning.
Xero learns and categorizes each transaction to help save your business time. Xero also has a large customer support network and an online “checkup tool” that lets the customer support team run some system checks to identify issues and handle issues via chat support.
Want more results? Check out our list of best online accounting software.
QuickBooks for Mac is the Mac-exclusive version of one of the most widely used accounting products ever, QuickBooks Desktop. New in 2020, the Mac version includes modernized reporting, an improved customer snapshot, a dark mode, electronic invoices with online ACH, credit card, or e-check payment options, and bounced check processing.
Due to the widespread popularity of PCs, many software developers have a “Windows-first” approach when it comes to creating their software. While it can be challenging to find an accounting software with a Mac-specific UI, QuickBooks for Mac gives all the same features provided to it’s Windows counterpart.
QuickBooks for Mac primarily serves small businesses and starts at only $299 for a one-time purchase.
Want more results? Check out our list of best mac accounting software.
Accounting Software Buyer’s Guide
From a small-business that may require an off-the-shelf option to a larger enterprise that desires a vast amount of financial management customization, this buyer’s guide will cover everything you should care about during your search when reviewing accounting systems.
This guide will provide you with information on the following topics:
What Is Accounting Software?
Accounting software at a minimum keeps track of financial transactions to record profit loss and better improve business finances and overall cash flow. Core functionalities include general ledger (GL), accounts payable (AP), and accounts receivable (AR). Common additional functionalities include payroll services, billing, project management, and inventory management data.
Many industries have customized financial management functionalities/requirements like fund accounting for nonprofits, job costing for construction firms, or DCAA compliance for government contractors.
There are also different ways of conducting your accounting process, such as single-entry or double-entry accounting.
In larger organizations, the terms “accounting software” and “ERP” are often used interchangeably. The right software will provide the data management tools you’ll need for accurate account balances and let you be ready at tax time.
Features of Accounting Software
Business accounting software has features and applications that can be broken down into basic categories, such as common (typically found in all accounting software), industry-specific (only found in certain types of accounting software), and advanced (only used by mid-sized to larger businesses).
While many top accounting software features exist to benefit your business, lets focus on some of the essentials.
| Feature | Description | |
|---|---|---|
| Core accounting | Includes revenue and expense tracking and creates financial reports for your business. Includes modules such as accounts payable, accounts receivable, and a general ledger. | |
| Payroll | Manages employee compensation: wage calculation, direct deposits, check printing, and compensation tax reports. | |
| Billing & invoicing | Pay bills and create, send, and manage outbound invoices to customers for client work. Attach sales tax figures. Collect customer payments online via credit card or ACH bank transfers. | |
| Bank reconciliation | Imports bank records, often in real time, and attempts to auto-match bank and accounting records. | |
| Inventory management | Track inventory as current assets on the balance sheet. Track the cost of goods sold on your income statement. |
Our 2018 accounting software buyer trends report found that payroll, inventory control, and invoicing were the most requested additional accounting features that buyers search for more on top of the “core accounting” of accounts payable, accounts payable, and a general ledger.
What Accounting Software Does Your Business Need?
Creating financial management reports with your data, using mobile apps, finding a new support vendor, or finding the cheapest cloud-based accounting option; everyone has their main motivation for finding a new solution.
The buyer trends report mentioned above reviewed more than 3,000 accounting software projects and found the needs and motivations of many buyers. While many types of buyers exist, most can fit into these common categories below.
New Buyers and Small Businesses
New buyers will likely desire a basic solution that can easily and automatically manage their finances and help them pay bill. 37% of the companies we surveyed are buying accounting software for the first time. Many small business software buyers were looking for increased functionality over their current methods, which ranged from a manual bookkeeping method (pen and paper) to a popular starter solution such as Zoho Books or Sage 50c (Peachtree).
Existing Users Desiring Functions Beyond Core Accounting
Over 20% of buyers said they need more software that handles payroll, inventory management, and invoicing. These features are common in enterprise business accounting software. A growing business also has more users in the system, which means vendor support may be needed more frequently if your staff isn’t trained properly.
Growing Companies
Companies that require a healthy amount of users or manage multiple entities are more commonly shopping for small business ERP software that will include a full suite of functionalities to go along with their accounting.
More than 70% of larger businesses surveyed desired software that handles advanced budgeting and forecasting or a business intelligence (BI) package for better analytics and creating financial statements. Larger businesses also expressed a desire for fund accounting capabilities and a way to manage their procurement.
Outsourced Accounting Services vs. Using a Software In-House
Maybe your business feels it doesn’t even need an accounting software system and can get by with outsourced accounting services from a local accountant or CPA. While the service offered by these professionals is usually of a higher quality, owning your own software in-house almost always leads demonstrates an higher ROI.
There are instances where the best option is an outsourcing service, and instances where having software will work better in the long-term. Figuring out which path to take depends on 3 critical angles:
- Your staff’s skillset: Do you have the technical resources to deploy the software? Can you handle integrating with any other solutions?
- Your risk tolerance: Are you comfortable managing the financial records of your business, or would you rather use outsourced services to worry about that?
- The cost: Does the combined cost of software and cost of time spent using the software outweigh the cost of paying for a firm’s services to do the work for you?
Is QuickBooks the Right Choice?
Undoubtedly, QuickBooks is a massively popular product. While a product such as Intuit QuickBooks Online can serve many needs, it’s also the most commonly replaced accounting software on the market.
Our previously mentioned buyer trends survey found that 33% of upgraders are coming from QuickBooks.
QuickBooks Replacement Products
We also conducted a study on over 4,000 previous users for their most popular quickbooks replacement products. The solutions will vary by industry, but these options were found to be the most common choices for companies to review:
Is There Anything As Inexpensive As QuickBooks?
What is your business isn’t trying to upgrade from QuickBooks? Perhaps you are just looking for an alternative small business acounting software that still provides ease of use and an affordable cost. With the amount of options available today, some businesses may dislike an accounting program simply due to the interface or a lack of a mobile app.
For those businesses, we recommending looking at comparable options that are popular in 2020 with great sign-up offers, such as:
Accounting Software Pain Points
Undoubtedly in using any business software solution, you’ll find things you like as well as dislike. The best accounting systems will help alleviate pain points from manual methods, but they may also bring about some technological pain points that you’ll want to be prepared for.
Integration With Other Business Software
Companies that do not have a complete (all-in-one) software will look to combine more than one software to meet all of their applications needs. A common example is having a bookkeeping software and an inventory tracking option that do not integrate.
An off-the-shelf software that handles core accounting may lack additional applications such as payroll, advanced reporting, or more involved inventory tracking. Once the need for these accounting features arrives, many buyers may lack the means necessary to integrate the programs together.
Difficulty Finding Industry-Specific Tools
As consumers demand functionality more in-tune with their industry needs, software developers are doing everything they can to make those dreams a reality.
While a super-niche industry may not have a software option exclusively developed for them, be on the lookout for specialized vendors. These are companies that pride themselves in implementing specific software solutions into certain environments, and will offer customizations or add-ons for a generic-product that will make it more in line with what the business expects on a day to day basis.
Low Levels of Customization Available
Many companies will try to make due with a lower-cost solution at the expense of functionality. Options such as Sage 50c and Quickbooks are great low priced options for new businesses, but they’ll lack ways to customize the software towards your business.
Popular accounting software customizations include:
- Tailored reports
- Role-based dashboards
- Custom data fields
Trends in Accounting Software
The landscape of features and technology offered by software vendors is constantly changing. And as software changes, so do the demand for specific features.
Increased Adoption of Cloud Software
Also known as software-as-a-service (SaaS), cloud adoption rates have picked up over the past decade. In 2015, 76% of the buyers we spoke to indicated a receptiveness to have their software hosted externally, off-premise. In 2017, this percentage rose to 84%.
With cloud-based software, products are leased, rather than licensed, which becomes more attractive for smaller businesses with limited funds. The software industry has responded by making software more available on a cloud basis.
More Tablet and Mobile Apps
In 2016, mobile web browsing surpassed desktop browsing in user counts. Naturally, usage has translated into business demands.
Accounting software developers have responded in kind, especially within fields that require on the site analysis such as construction & field service.
Developer and Product Acquisitions
As markets mature, often companies will acquire, reposition, and/or consolidate their product lineups. This is especially frequent as of late. Sage’s acquisition of Intacct is a notable example.
More Data Means More Intelligence (BI)
Over the past five years (2012-2017), we’ve seen a whopping 42% increase in end users looking to evaluate Business intelligence software. Business intelligence software is used in virtually every industry.
Consulting firms need to track employee productivity by project/company. Retailers need to track profitability by SKU. Financial institutions set new account goals for personal bankers.
More Integrations and APIs
Integrations, or APIs, allow distinct products to talk with one another. For example, your payroll system could update your HR team with a chat program (such as Slack) of any processing errors. Your payment processor might automatically push new receivable entries to your accounting system. Your accounting software could share available funds with BI systems.
Expect inter-software communication abilities to increase in most products. While some accounting products may try and provide an “all-in-one” tool, others will focus on being the best at a few main areas, and offer integrations to tools that they feel help complete their program.
Lease Accounting Standards Update
In an effort to improve financial reporting, the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) issued a new standard on lease accounting.
Each asset with a 12+ month lease term needs to be included on a balance sheet. This includes equipment, buildings, vehicles, and other assets your company leases.
The new standard went into effect for public companies for fiscal years & interim periods beginning after Dec 15, 2018, and for private companies for fiscal years beginning after Dec 15, 2019 and interim periods within fiscal years after Dec 15, 2020.
Read more on our lease accounting software guide.