Best Accounting and Bookkeeping Software for Small Businesses
Next to CRM, accounting and bookkeeping are the two most important things for any small business. You need to have the best tools at your disposal and that too at an affordable price.
In this guide, I have listed the top 15 of the Best Accounting and Bookkeeping Software for Small Businesses. These are not just loved by brands all over the world but also come very easy to your budget. Some even offer free services and some others offer perpetual licenses. But most of these are subscription-based and you pay as you grow.
Accounting and Bookkeeping Software for Small Businesses
The motive behind this article is to help you choose the best accounting and bookkeeping software for your business but what I like may or may not be exactly what you need. But no worries.
Most of these tools come with free trials or cheap first months — so for the maximum impact, give the trials a spin and decide on whether or not you want to continue with the software. Some of these come with CRMs too but if you are looking for a dedicated CRM, see this list of best CRM apps.
Without further ado, here are the 15 best accounting and bookkeeping software for small businesses:
| Software | Pros | Cons | Pricing |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intuit Quickbooks | The best. Accountants love it. | Can get more complicated than competitors | $12.50/month |
| Pabbly | All in one. | - | $9/month |
| FreshBooks | User-friendly; perfect for creatives and freelancers | Can be too straightforward | $15/month |
| mybooks | Free tier and more. | Free-$9.99/month | |
| Wave | Free! | Limited functionality; not a great fit if you're outside North America | Free |
| Sage 50cloud | - | - | $340/year |
| Zoho Books | Financial reporting; very budget-friendly | User interface is a bit clunkier than competitors | Free-$15/month |
| AccountEdge Pro | Perfect for creatives and freelancers | - | $149 one time |
| NetSuite ERP | - | - | Variable |
| Sunrise by Lendio | - | - | Free - $149/month |
| Zip Books | - | - | $15/month |
| SlickPie | - | - | Free - $39.95/month |
| Bill.com | - | - | $39/month |
| GoDaddy Bookkeeping | Affordable. Perfect for small businesses and freelancers | - | $4.99/month |
| Free Agent | - | - | $12-$24/month |
| GnuCash | Open Source | Poor UI | Free |
Let's see these in detail.
Intuit Quickbooks
Intuit Quickbooks is the most popular accounting software loved by small businesses.
It also tops this list for a whole lot of reasons.
Intuit Quickbooks is different from other software as it provides its users features like receipt capture and 24 / 7 chat support.
Popular Features:
- Inventory tracking
- Mobile app
- Super simple invoicing
- Time tracking
It also has incorporated PayPal, Shopify, and Square. All the plans offered by this software allow you to track income and expenditure, send invoices and receive payments, run reports, send estimates, monitor sales and taxes, and store and organize receipts.
You can also track inventory, monitor time, and even have full-service Payroll through advanced plans. The prices start at $ 12.50 / month.
Pabbly
Pabbly prices are much more reasonable at $9 / month. It is more of an all in one solution for small businesses. Pabbly also offers to automatize your business workflow, customer communication, and invoice creation to help you look out for other important things and not worry about these.
Pabbly is loved because of its simple and cheap subscription billing model.
FreshBooks
Freshbooks is another well-organized and systematic business accounting software. If you own a small business, using this software to keep track of your accounts will help you organize your business.
FreshBooks claims that its software can help users secure 46 hours per year on filing for their taxes. This software integrates with many other business applications and offers the users one unified dashboard to keep track of their finances and accounts.
Safe and structured backups are added in the packages, and there is a mobile application that allows you to stay updated regarding your small business anywhere at any time.
mybooks
mybooks is one of the simple accounting and bookkeeping software for small businesses. If a small business owner is looking for affordable accounting software, this software suits their budget.
mybooks is available for iOS, Android, and Web users. So users can utilize the software without any hurdles. They provide a free plan with basic accounting features. mybooks holds features such as inventory management, invoicing and billing, accounts payable and receivable, industry-specific features, multi-currency, multi-business management with multi-user role access, journal entry, double-entry accounting, and more.
The standard and premium plan of the software is $4.99 and $9.99 /month respectively.
Wave
Wave is a top-quality and free accounting and bookkeeping software used for accounting by small businesses and individual freelancers. It is easy to use and synchronous. It allows you to link your bank accounts, balance your books and monitor your expenses.
Wave also provides users extra features such as a comprehensive solution if you choose to invest in its other products. In addition, wave offers many free features like invoice and transaction management. It is the perfect little software for small businesses and especially for individual contractors.
Sage 50cloud
Sage 50cloud allows you to look more into expanding your business by managing all the accounting-related works. The software can send invoices, track expenses and payments, and calculates your taxes too. But Sage does not offer time-tracking and collaborating tool services. Also, Payroll comes separately with it.
Still, it is very efficient for small and medium-sized businesses. You can enjoy Sage 50clous's services by paying a minimum of $ 340 / year. It is a little bit expensive compared to other software available, but the features are well worth the pricing. You will not be disappointed.
Zoho Books
Zoho Books is an excellent software to help you manage your finances regarding your small business. It allows you to automatize workflows and work collectively across departments. It also offers top-notch tools for inventory management, time-tracking, banking, and financial reporting with awesome and comfortable UX. It also has a good customer support service and an online payment accepting feature.
Popular Features:
- Automated workflows
- Budgeting
- Zoho Sign Integration
- Projects and timesheets
Zoho Books is free to start and offers its basic services starting from $ 15 / month.
AccountEdge Pro
AccountEdge Pro accounting and bookkeeping software is available at a starting one-time fee of $ 149. It offers its users double-entry accounting tools such as time billing and reporting to inventory. These features can even be customizable and optimized according to users. If you need software for long-time use, this is the best software for you because of its one-time fee service. Though it does not have an option for mobile tracking of business updates with the help of a cloud-collaboration option (purchasable), you can also get the feature on your phone.
Oracle NetSuite ERP
NetSuite ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) products assist small businesses with financial management and planning, supply chain management, order management, fulfillment, and procurement. This is the great accounting software available in the market for business which expects speedy growth.
Sunrise by Lendio
Sunrise by Lendio is another small business accounting and bookkeeping software on our list. It is best if you want a dedicated bookkeeper for your business.
From automatic bank reconciliation, profit and loss reports to easy tax options and branded invoicing - Sunrise by Lendio has a lot to offer. Basic services are free, but Its dedicated bookkeeper service is included in a more thorough plan starting at $ 149 / month.
So if you are looking specifically for a bookkeeping service, this software is for you. It does cost a little extra, but the service is worth the money.
Zip Books
Zip Books is a very affordable Accounting and Bookkeeping Software tool made for small businesses. Through Zip Books, you get invoicing and billing services such as auto-billing and payment reminders to decrease the load of your shoulder. This way, you can focus on the growth of your business. You can also make use of their competitive intelligence to make data-driven choices regarding your finances.
Basic services of Zip Books are free, but users have to pay $ 15 / month to access more advanced features.
SlickPie
SlickPie offers invoicing, billing, automated data entry, live bank feeds, and more in its accounting software. This is one of the best free accounting software available in the market. It also provides functional reports. SlickPie has a MagicBot which will aid you to simplify expenses by directly putting information from receipts into digital data. Its only drawback is that it does not offer expense management.
SlickPiePro costs $ 39.95 / month as it also offers more advanced services.
Bill.com
Bill.com is best known for its AP and AR automation and new bill payment proficiency. Bill.com offers its users a cloud-based solution to automatic accounts for paying and accounts for receiving.
Bill.com offers amazing features like automatic data entry, detection of fake invoices, etc. In addition, it has new payment services like ACH, virtual cards, and international wire transfers and can log any payment-related work. It also offers services to establish approval workflows and custom roles.Bill.com offers four plans - Essentials ($39 / month), Team ($49 / month), Corporate ($69 / month), and Enterprise (Get a quote). It also has a free trial, so before committing, try it out.
GoDaddy Bookkeeping
GoDaddy Bookkeeping is a low-cost accounting and bookkeeping software tool loved by small businesses. It is one of the most affordable software, starting at only $4.99 / month. It incorporates data from Amazon, eBay, Etsy, and your bank accounts. And then, this data is used by making invoices and calculating quarterly tax estimates. If you make any sales through the sites listed above, you should use GoDaddy. Its drawbacks are that it does not offer project management, extensive reporting, and international billing.
Free Agent
Free Agent accounting software is good if you need to make many estimates and invoices to monitor your cash flow, track receipts, and time. Free Agent also allows you to connect your bank account to it so that you can see your businesses' view income performance and profitability. It is available for $ 12 / month for the first six months and then for $ 24 / month. But if you are unsure, then you can sign up for its 30-day free trial to determine if that this what you need or not.
GnuCash
GnuCash accounting and bookkeeping software is available free of charge. So, if you are slowly trying to get into these types of software, GnuCash is the perfect place to start. It is desktop software only, and you can simply go to the GnuCash site and download it for free. GnuCash can be used as personal accounting software along with small business accounting software. It is very easy to use and suitable for first-timers. In addition, it offers features such as vendor tracking, job costing, and invoicing. So, download the software and get to know the basic features it offers, as it is the same for almost all other accounting software out there.
So, this is it. These were the best accounting and bookkeeping software that are loved and used by small businesses all around the world. Which one are you going to use?