The Best QuickBooks Alternatives in 2021

Intuit, QuickBooks' parent company, was founded in the '80s, which means QuickBooks has had ample time to build both comprehensive software and a solid user base. But numbers aren't everything, and what works for QuickBooks’ customers might not work for you. Luckily, other software options abound. Our favorites have a lower price tag than QuickBooks without sacrificing quality, features, and user experience. Keep reading for our list of the year's best QuickBooks alternatives for small-business owners like you.

Xero tackles all the typical accounting tasks, like generating financial documents, syncing with bank accounts to track your business's numbers, and sending online invoices. Plans start at $9 a month, and pricier plans for bigger businesses include features like project management and multi-currency support.

And at Business.org, we adore Xero: in a line-up that includes QuickBooks Online, Xero is still our top pick for small-business accounting software.

However, Xero's plans aren't limited by user numbers, but they are limited by how many bills you can send, bank transactions you can reconcile, and invoices you can create a month. With the $11 per month Early plan, you can only send 20 invoices and enter five bills (though you can reconcile an unlimited number of bank transactions). That limit probably won’t be enough for midsize businesses, or even for many small businesses.

Zoho Books is just about the most comprehensive accounting software you can find. Even its basic plan includes automated invoice reminders, multi-currency payment acceptance, and client portals, where your customers can approve estimates and make bulk payments. The most expensive plan adds on a superb inventory tracking feature: it allows for customized pricing and includes instant notifications when your stock is running low.

Speaking of automatic notifications, Zoho Books' automation dramatically lowers the frustration of constant data entry. Each plan includes a certain amount of workflows, or automated functions you can set the software to perform. Workflows can be a little hard to figure out immediately (you'll want to check out Zoho's tutorial), but once you've got them down, workflows can remove the most tedious aspects of quality assurance, emailing, and invoicing.

Unfortunately, Zoho has one huge drawback that distinctly limits its target audience: Zoho offers a payroll app only in Texas, California, and India. You can't even integrate Zoho with third-party payroll providers—while you can sign up for a provider like Gusto, you'll have to enter all employee data separately in Gusto and manually re-enter payroll info into Zoho Books for proper recordkeeping.

FreshBooks syncs with more than 200 other financial apps, but you don't need a third-party time tracking, expense tracking, or payment acceptance provider: all three tools are right there on your FreshBooks dashboard. FreshBooks also excels at customization, especially with invoicing: you can customize invoices with your business's logo as well as with the language you want to use and currency you want to accept (Xero charges extra for multi-currency functionality).

And FreshBooks' more expensive plans double down on automation. With automatic recurring invoices and late payment reminders, you don't have to stay on top of which client owes you what and when. Plus, no matter which plan you pick, the time-tracking feature lets you automatically add billable hours to invoices before you send them off so you get paid the right amount.

In spite of its stellar invoicing, FreshBooks does limit the number of clients you can bill a month. For the basic plan, that limit is just five clients. FreshBooks also limits its Lite plan to single-entry accounting only. Every other plan is based on the double-entry system, which is a much more accurate method of accounting. If you're sending only five bills a month, you can probably get away with single-entry accounting, but it's still a gamble.

Even if Wave Accounting weren't completely free, it would make our top five based solely on its excellent, extensive set of features. Unlike Xero and FreshBooks, Wave doesn't limit bills or invoices. Instead, you can send unlimited customized invoices, sync transactions from as many credit cards or bank accounts as you need, and even track expenses, which Xero includes with only its $60 plan. Unlike FreshBooks, Wave uses double-entry accounting, so you're much less likely to miss a numerical typo and end up with an IRS fine.

Wave's main drawback is probably its mobile app—or lack thereof. While Wave has perfectly functional receipt scanning, payment acceptance, and invoicing mobile apps, it still doesn't have an accounting-specific app. That's a major downside for freelancers who spend a lot of time on the go and need to reconcile transactions away from home.

Sage Business Cloud Accounting is the newest iteration of Sage One, and in spite of its clunky name, the new Sage is super streamlined and easy to use. It's also the most expensive of our QuickBooks alternatives—at $25 a month, it costs the same as QuickBooks' basic plan—but it does pack in a bunch of features QuickBooks doesn't, such as these:

• Unlimited users
• Inventory management
• Cash flow tracking, including cash forecasting

Sage Business Cloud Accounting has a basic $10 plan, but frankly, we don't recommend it. The plan offers just invoicing and bank account syncing, and you'll get much more than that with Wave's completely free plan.

Like we said, Sage is the priciest of our top picks. And unfortunately, it shares Zoho Books' main shortcoming: it syncs with only a handful of third-party apps . . . and payroll isn't one of them. As with Zoho Books, you'll have to independently subscribe to a payroll provider and update your payroll and accounting books separately.

Still haven't found what you're looking for? Don't worry, Bono—maybe one of our five runners-up will pique your interest.

Unlike Xero and FreshBooks, ZipBooks' free Starter plan lets you send unlimited customized invoices to an unlimited number of clients and contacts. You can also accept payments online via PayPal and Square. If you want a little more oomph, the $15 starter plan adds recurring invoices, auto-billing, and late payment reminders—all excellent ways to automate the toughest parts of working with customers.

Unfortunately, even though ZipBooks lists an app on Google Play, user reviews indicate that it quite literally does not work. Not even a little bit. ZipBooks also lacks a built-in inventory feature, so product-based companies might find a better fit with Xero, Zoho, or Sage.