In addition, what some users complained about was the scalability of the accounting software. However, there are no advanced plans for businesses looking to grow. What many point out is that it is easy to automate bookkeeping and billing with Wave, as the software automatically syncs accounting and invoicing. In addition, users are very pleased with the fact that invoicing features are unlimited and customizable. We’re beginning to sound like a broken record, but yes, with Wave, you’ll be able to take care of your accounting and bookkeeping for free. That’s worth reiterating over and over, because it’s hard to find functional accounting software tools without ponying up for some recurring payments.
Invoices & Estimates
- Although Wave’s paid plan offers additional features, it’s still missing some more advanced capabilities, like built-in inventory tracking and audit trails, that growing businesses might need.
- Get your money faster when you offer customers the ability to pay directly from your invoices, starting at 2.9% + 60¢ per card transaction.
- At Business.org, our research is meant to offer general product and service recommendations.
- Another big advantage of the app is it’s straightforward to use.
- The program did well in A/R management, and it could have scored higher if there were more options to personalize invoices.
Compared with free software like Wave, QuickBooks plans are expensive. The most basic plan, Simple Start, costs $30 per month, and the top-tier Advanced plan costs $200 per month, which is a sizable investment if you’re running a business on a tight budget. Includes tools that help automate the reconciliation process and auto-categorizes transactions for you in the Pro plan, but you can’t set up your own bank rules; no global search function.
With limitations on Xero’s lowest-tier plans, users will have to upgrade to a more expensive option to take advantage of everything the software has to offer. This free, easy-to-use accounting software is great for small businesses, especially for eCommerce, but lacks in project management, budgeting, and inventory tracking. While Wave’s software covers many basic bookkeeping needs, it doesn’t have many of the advanced accounting features that its competitors offer. Wave Accounting is an affordable bookkeeping and accounting software service that doesn’t sacrifice features for the sake of pricing. Its expense, income and cash-flow tracking features are perfectly suited to freelancers, solopreneurs and other self-employed individuals who want to keep their accounting software expenses low.
Mobile Apps
Wave Accounting imposes fewer limits than most of its competitors on everything from users to vendors. For instance, Xero’s cheapest plan limits users to sending 20 invoices a month, while FreshBooks’ cheapest plan limits users to invoicing only five clients a month. With Wave, you can send an unlimited number of invoices to an unlimited number of clients each month. Otherwise, unless you add an optional service like Wave Payroll or Wave Mobile Receipts, Wave Accounting is free to use.
Depending on your subscription, you can snap a photo of your expense receipt and upload it to Wave through the mobile app. All users can attach a receipt to transactions in the desktop interface, although you can’t attach them to unpaid bills. Wave is one of our best A/P software because of its ability to record unpaid bills even in the free Starter plan. With the paid version, you can connect your bank account to Wave and upload bank statements to synchronize your transactions. However, Wave’s reconciliation feature is not as functional as those in other software like QuickBooks Online—which is partly why Wave took a hit in this category.
For customers who only use our free Wave Accounting or Invoicing products, support is self-service with assistance available in the Help Center and through the chatbot, Mave. Wave accounting is a cloud-based accounting website designed for freelancers, self-employed contractors, small business entrepreneurs, and startup owners. Wave is best known for two things—its free version and ease of use. We’ll show how the app keeps track of your cash flow, and go over the most important app features, pricing, and pros and cons.
Wave uses 256-bit transport layer security (TLS) encryption for data security, and all accounting data are stored in servers monitored 24/7. The Wave Advisor program is an in-house bookkeeping, accounting, and tax service from Wave. The advisors are trained employees of Wave who will assist you with your bookkeeping needs. It also has a new company wizard to walk you through the setup process and that prompts you for the basic information needed. By default, Wave sets up your chart of accounts based types of equity accounts on common accounts and categories, but you can add other accounts if you need to.
Wave Starter Plan
When I set up my sample company for the case study, I had to manually input the chart of accounts, service items, and beginning account balances. Even worse, the only way I found to enter beginning account balances was with a large journal entry. None of these really matter if you’re setting up a brand new company—but it can take considerable time for established companies.
Wave’s key accounting features
QuickBooks Online is the most expensive service I reviewed; it starts at $99 per month but goes well beyond the capabilities of Wave. The offers that appear on the website are from software companies from which CRM.org receives compensation. This compensation may impact how and where products appear on this site (including, for example, the order in which they appear). This site does not include all software companies or all available software companies offers.