QuickBooks Online Review and Pricing in 2025

Connecting directly with a business bank account simplifies reconciling transactions and improves the accuracy of your financial statements. Even if you rely on software, it pays to familiarize yourself with basic double-entry bookkeeping. The best affordable accounting software for small businesses offers tiered pricing with entry-level plans that include core bookkeeping features for recording income, expenses, sales, and purchases. Slight differences in how the vendor approaches usage limits, feature add-ons, and users can impact accounting software costs.

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You can file your state and federal taxes with the company’s professionals on staff. This option could work well for freelancers, independent contractors, or small businesses. If you have any issues with setup, you can find the appropriate customer support team to reach out to on the QuickBooks website.

Invoicing

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• Every invoice, payment, and adjustment flows through this central source of financial truth.
• Once your bookkeeper receives all the necessary documentation, they’ll typically complete your cleanup within 30 days.

In summary, QuickBooks is best suited for businesses that prioritize straightforward financial management and can manage occasional support delays. For those seeking extensive customization or more consistent support, exploring other options might be worthwhile. QuickBooks excels in offering small to medium-sized businesses a user-friendly interface that simplifies financial management compared to its competitors.

Past desktop users could choose between a one-time-purchase QuickBooks Desktop software (good for three years) or an annually renewing subscription. But as of 2022, QuickBooks Desktop’s single-purchase option has been discontinued. Now, all QuickBooks Desktop plans renew on an annual basis—you do not have the option to pay just once for three years of use. Terms, conditions, pricing, special features, and service and support options subject to change without notice. Not all versions of QuickBooks offer multiple plans or make it simple to move your business from one product to another. If you think you’ll need more advanced features in the future, it’s important to make sure you choose an option that can accommodate those needs.

• For a platform dedicated exclusively to automating accounts payable and receivable, consider our Plooto review.
• For example, if you expect clients to pay invoices within one month of receipt, you would select Net 30.
• These are all accounting issues that small businesses run into as they become medium-sized businesses.

QuickBooks provides various reports to help you monitor your company’s financial status effectively. In QuickBooks’ reports section, the reports are categorized into different sections. After setting up QuickBooks and necessary integrations, automate data-entry tasks, generate reports, and build custom reports to streamline processes and make the most of your QuickBooks data. QuickBooks is not inherently HIPAA compliant, as it is not specifically designed to handle protected health information. Businesses in the healthcare sector should evaluate whether QuickBooks meets their compliance needs or consider additional measures to ensure HIPAA compliance. Using our objective, data driven testing methodology, we’ve tested 300+ software.

Effective expense management supports strategic budgeting and financial planning, paving the way for sustained business growth. QuickBooks Online allows for the customization of reports to suit your business’s unique needs. You can tailor reports to highlight the information most relevant to your business, whether it’s tracking cash flow, monitoring expenses, or analyzing sales trends. Customizable options include date ranges, financial metrics, and comparison periods, making it straightforward to transform raw data into actionable insights.

Both software platforms can track your expenses and income and help you create budgets. But the major difference between Quicken and QuickBooks is that Quicken is meant for personal finance and QuickBooks is meant for small businesses. Users can connect their bank accounts to QuickBooks Self-Employed to separate business and personal expenses automatically, as well as track mileage and import receipts. You can also run business reports and calculate estimates for quarterly tax payments. QuickBooks falls under the Intuit umbrella and offers an array of bookkeeping and accounting services to its customers. There are three main versions of QuickBooks for small business, and each is made for a specific purpose.

Connect to your business apps

You can meet with your ProAdvisor as often as necessary to ask questions. IOS users awarded the QuickBooks Online mobile app 4.7 out of 5 stars, while Android users gave it only 3.9 out of 5 stars. The only thing missing from QuickBooks’ sales tax feature is the ability to actually electronically file the sales tax return directly from the program. All QuickBooks Online products have the same interface, and so do all the QuickBooks Desktop products. There are also available free online training resources that you can use to get up to speed quickly. Employees or subcontractors can enter their own time as they progress through the day, or a bookkeeper can enter their weekly time if the employee submits a manual timesheet.

QuickBooks Online Features

As CFOs ourselves, we know how critical and difficult it is to make the right decision when selecting software. Yes, but it is quite different from the QuickBooks desktop program, which frustrates many users. When converting from desktop to online, users should approach it as learning new software. Learn about the QuickBooks Online desktop app, which provides a similar dashboard as the desktop version of QuickBooks. I can view the total units and total cost of inventory on hand directly from within the software without the need to print a report.

Their professional plans and above offer Bill Pay, purchase and sales approvals, multi-currency features and custom reports or workflows. QuickBooks Plus is the most popular plan for businesses since it includes features such as inventory tracking, project management and tax support. Midsized businesses with several customers or clients might benefit from the ability to track profitability with QuickBooks Plus. Although you can track expenses, QuickBooks Simple Start doesn’t enable users to pay bills.

When we tested the software, we were impressed by QuickBooks Online’s inventory features. Plus and Advanced plan users can manage inventory, vendors and create purchase orders through the accounting platform. You can add images of inventory items and bundle products or services frequently sold together, saving you from entering them on an invoice separately.

Locking this in early keeps you consistent as you start recording financial transactions. Most small business accounting software allows accountant access, but permission levels and collaboration features vary. Compare accountant options when reviewing bookkeeping solutions, or if you work with an accountant during tax season, ask if there’s anything you should consider. QuickBooks is easy to use and helps automate accounting tasks such as bookkeeping, invoicing, time tracking, expense tracking, inventory tracking with increased accuracy. It allows you to connect to your business apps and create reports to gain business insights to make smarter financial decisions for your small business.

In QuickBooks, go to “Get Paid” → “Customers” quickbooks small business accounting to add or manage customer and vendor accounts, including payment details. Once you have added all the information, link your bank accounts and bank cards to the QuickBooks account. Finalize your company file setup by adding users and defining their permissions. It will help you secure your account and limit access to your financial information. FreshBooks is great for self-employed individuals, sole proprietors and independent contractors.

However, some solutions offer additional automation features that are especially helpful for tax season prep. In addition to the monthly or annual price of accounting software, consider any one-time or ongoing costs. For example, if you are switching software providers, you may pay a data migration fee to transfer accounting or payroll data. Also, factor in time and wages for backing up your files, training, and implementation. Post-setup, QuickBooks helps you stay on top of your finances with extensive reporting.