The best invoicing software for your small business depends on various factors, such as your business size and type and your needed pricing, ease of use, and features. For most businesses, we recommend choosing a solution that lets you create customizable invoices and has enhanced features, such as recurring invoices, payment links, billing realization tracking, and a mobile invoicing app.
Here are our eight best invoicing software for small business operations, each tailored to address unique needs:
- QuickBooks Online: Best overall invoicing software with sophisticated accounting features
- Invoicera: Best standalone invoicing software
- FreshBooks: Best for solopreneurs and freelancers
- Square Invoices: Best for infrequent or low-volume transactions
- BQE Core: Best invoicing software for QuickBooks Online integration
- Zoho Invoice: Best free invoicing software
- ZipBooks: Best inexpensive invoicing software with basic accounting features
- TimeTracker by eBillity: Best for professional service firms
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Best Invoicing Software: Quick Comparison
QuickBooks Online: Overall Best Invoicing Software With Sophisticated Accounting Features
Pros
- Calculates sales tax rates based on customer address
- Able to add unbilled labor and expenses to invoices
- Lets you send unlimited invoices and include unlimited customers in all plans
- Has extremely customizable invoices
- Offers free setup assistance with a QuickBooks ProAdvisor
- Lets you create and send recurring invoices in all plans
Cons
- Is expensive for small businesses
- Limits the number of users in each plan
- Doesn’t let you contact customer support directly by telephone—unless you upgrade to Advanced
- Is unable to issue a refund check
- Simple Start: $30 per month for one user; includes all sales tax features
- Essentials: $60 per month for three users; can add time and expenses to invoices
- Plus: $90 per month for five users; includes the ability to track inventory
- Advanced: $200 per month for 25 users; has extensive reporting features and a dedicated customer support team
New users can choose between getting 50% off for three months or signing up for the 30-day free trial.
QuickBooks Online stands out with its exceptional invoicing features, which is one reason why it’s our best small business accounting software. Its invoices are extremely customizable—you can upload your logo, change the layout, add custom fields, and more.
Additionally, you can customize invoices based on your niche. For instance, law firms can set up additional fields for case numbers and retainer amounts while construction companies managing long-term projects can set up progress invoicing when they have the Plus or Advanced plan.
Since our last update: QuickBooks Online now lets you view a real-time PDF version as you complete the invoicing form. This eliminates the need to click “preview” to view your invoice.
Freelancers and service-based businesses can convert their hourly rates into invoices for work done. If you have multiple customers who purchase the same product or service from you, Advanced’s batch invoicing feature lets you send similar invoices to all of them in one go.
After sending an invoice, you can track the status in real time, helping you ensure that the invoice gets paid on time. You can even set up automatic reminders to alert customers of overdue invoices. Additionally, unlike any other bookkeeping software we’ve reviewed, it’ll calculate the sales tax rate automatically to apply to your invoice based on the customer’s address. It then tracks your sales tax collected by jurisdiction and helps you file required returns.
Finally, if you have QuickBooks Payments, you can set up and send a payment link where your customers can instantly pay you. Payment links only work once and will expire automatically after your customer pays their invoice. If you don’t have the solution, our review of QuickBooks Payments can help you decide if you should get it.
Invoicera: Best Standalone Invoicing Software
Pros
- Is built particularly for invoicing
- Tracks both receivables and payables for all businesses that you manage
- Lets you request personalized invoice template from Invoicera
- Enables you to monitor staff time and expenses by project and add to invoices
- Includes a client portal where customers can pay their invoice and export it if needed
Cons
- Lets you add unlimited customers, but this is very expensive compared to other options
- Requires at least the Business plan to add more users
- Requires integration with bookkeeping software
- Starter: $19 per month for up to 100 clients and one staff user
- Business: $49 per month for up to 1,000 clients plus 10 staff users; includes customized invoice approval workflows and application programming interface (API) access
- Enterprise: $99 per month for up to 2,000 clients plus 20 staff users; includes everything in Business plus batch PDF export (up to 50 invoices)
- Infinite: $149 per month for unlimited clients and unlimited users; includes everything in Enterprise plus custom integration and development services
New users can try all the plans for free for seven days.
Invoicera, despite lacking built-in accounting features, made it to our list of the best invoicing software for small business needs. Generally, we recommend that your invoicing be integrated with your accounting system, but if you’re looking for a standalone system, it is a good choice. It combines accounts receivable (A/R) management and accounts payable (A/P) management in a single dashboard.
The platform impressed us with its excellent invoicing features because it allows you to create your own invoice template or select from seven templates. You can customize your invoices and schedule them to be sent at a later time. You can even request a personalized invoice template by sending your specifications to Invoicera. Additionally, the solution lets you send recurring invoices, set up and send reminders, and charge late fees.
However, just like the other specialized invoicing software on this list, it lacks accounting features, which we consider crucial for most businesses. If you don’t want to use separate systems for your accounting and invoicing tasks, you should consider QuickBooks Online or FreshBooks.
FreshBooks: Best Invoicing Software for Solopreneurs & Freelancers
Pros
- Is affordable for freelancers or small businesses with a single accounting user
- Can send unlimited invoices in all plans
- Enables you to add time and expense to invoice
- Can accept short payments from customers
- Lets you send invoices on your mobile device using the mobile app
Cons
- Charges extra for additional users; can be expensive when adding more than three users
- Has a limited number of clients in less expensive plans
- Requires you to allow access to your bank account to use bookkeeping features
- Lacks inventory management features
- Lite: $19 per month for one user and five billable clients
- Plus: $33 per month for one user and 50 billable clients
- Premium: $60 per month for one user and unlimited billable clients
- Select: Custom pricing
Additional users can be added to any plan for $11 per month. Also, new users can choose a 30-day free trial for the Lite Plus, and Premium plans or 60% off the monthly price for six months.
FreshBooks has almost the same invoicing features as QuickBooks Online. However, since it includes only one user in all its plans, we believe it’s a more suitable option for solo business owners and freelancers. It’s an easy-to-use accounting software for those with little to no accounting knowledge because of its intuitive interface that makes it easy to navigate.
It integrates seamlessly with its project management and time-tracking features, allowing you to convert tracked hours into billable entries on your invoices easily. This is especially useful for service-based businesses that charge by the hour. It also allows you to communicate with team members.
Additionally, the program lets you accept online payments, calculate late fees automatically, create recurring invoices, and print a list of outstanding invoices. Moreover, it will connect with your bank to import transactions, reconcile bank and credit card accounts, and print basic financial statements like a balance sheet and profit and loss (P&L) statement.
The major difference between QuickBooks Online and FreshBooks in terms of invoicing is that the former calculates tax sales automatically to apply to an invoice based on your customer’s location. With FreshBooks, you need to set up the sales tax for each state manually. That said, if your business caters to customers across different states, you might prefer QuickBooks to FreshBooks. You can see how else the two differ in our comparison of QuickBooks Online vs FreshBooks.
Square Invoices: Best Invoicing Software for Infrequent or Low-volume Transactions
Pros
- Offers free invoicing for unlimited users
- Has no monthly fees for credit card and automated clearing house (ACH) processing
- Is easy to set up
- Has milestone invoicing for billing project completion
Cons
- Cannot track time and expenses
- Can be pricey for businesses with more than $10,000 in monthly transactions; they can likely find a cheaper credit card processor
- Lacks built-in expense tracking features
Both plans allow you to add an unlimited number of users:
- Free: Free forever
- Plus: $20 per month for additional invoicing features like custom fields and multipackage estimates
Square Invoices has a 30-day free trial for the Plus plan.
Additional fees:
- Invoices paid online: 2.9% plus 30 cents per transaction
- Tap, dip, and swipe payments: 2.6% plus 10 cents per transaction
- Card-on-file payments: 3.5% plus 15 cents per transaction
- ACH payments: 1% per payment—maximum of $1 per transaction
We selected Square Invoices as the best invoicing software for infrequent or low-volume transactions because it is a merchant services provider with no monthly fee. This makes it a great choice if your business processes less than $10,000 per month in credit card transactions or if you’ve been using other Square services.
The solution has good invoicing features, along with affordable credit card processing rates for low-volume businesses. While not as feature-packed as accounting or standalone invoicing options, it does let you create, send, and track invoices online or through its mobile apps. You can also create automatic payment reminders and recurring billing. You can learn about the provider’s features through our guide on what Square is and how it works.
On the flip side, the platform’s invoicing features are not as extensive as those in QuickBooks Online. For instance, it doesn’t calculate the appropriate sales tax rate automatically to apply to an invoice based on your customer’s location. Also, we believe that its payment processing feature could have been made more streamlined by allowing customers to make payments through payment links.
BQE Core: Best Invoicing Software for QuickBooks Online Integration
Pros
- Lets you calculate utilization and realization rates
- Offers strong project management tools
- Creates invoices based on your desired schedule and frequency
- Lets you create split invoices and track payments individually
- Integrates with QuickBooks Online
Cons
- Can be expensive for large businesses with multiple users
- Has a steep learning curve
- Lacks payroll features
The provider doesn’t disclose pricing information on its website, but it indicates that it has a per-user pricing structure. The accounting module is sold separately from the core invoicing module, which is good if you want to use QuickBooks for your accounting. There is no free trial, but you can schedule a free demo to see how the software works before buying.
BQE Core is a great integration with QuickBooks Online because of its ability to track realization rates for professional service firms. This pairs nicely with QuickBooks Online’s strong invoicing capabilities. If you often bill clients based on billable hours and need to track the profitability of your client engagements, it is an excellent option.
As one of our best billing software for small business workflows, BQE Core offers a lot of flexibility to create invoices, such as the ability to customize the appearance, margins, and colors of your invoice. It lets you perform advanced invoicing features, such as creating split invoices and setting up a schedule based on a desired frequency for fixed-fee contracts and retainers.
We like the platform because its invoicing feature is closely tied to the project accounting module. You can configure billing rates for different team members and roles, specify billing preferences, and define invoicing intervals, such as hourly, fixed fee, or retainer. Based on the tracked time and expenses, BQE Core generates accurate invoices for the project automatically. After sending the invoice, you can track the payment and then mark the invoice as paid once settled.
Additionally, BQE Core allows you to set up customized invoice approval workflows so that invoices are reviewed and approved by the right people in your team before they are sent to clients. It allows you to track billing realization rates by calculating the ratio of billable hours to the actual revenue generated from those billable hours. This is useful for professional service firms that invoice clients based on time and services rendered.
Zoho Invoice: Best Free Invoicing Software
Pros
- Is completely free with no hidden charges
- Has a wide array of invoice customization features
- Offers billing features for project management
- Features a low learning curve for existing Zoho users
Cons
- Requires a Zoho Books subscription for any bookkeeping features beyond invoicing
- Is not a substitute for accounting software
- Can’t process incoming vendor invoices
- Doesn’t integrate with Zoho Inventory
- Has limited invoicing features; can’t change invoice colors
Zoho Invoice is completely free with no hidden charges and credit card information required. You can add up to 20 users and send unlimited invoices to unlimited customers.
Zoho Invoice is our recommendation for totally free invoicing software, making it suitable for very small businesses, startups, and freelancers new to invoicing. It offers better customer support than other free software like Wave, and it has stronger invoicing customization options than ZipBooks.
Before you can start invoicing, you can toggle on or off several settings, allowing you to enable only the features you need. For instance, you can include a detachable payment stub in snail mail to make it easier for you to track payments.
Additionally, we like Zoho Invoice’s robust A/R tracking feature. It allows you to track all your outstanding invoices easily, and it provides various filter options to see your invoice list. For instance, you can filter invoices by status, such as draft, client viewed, partially paid, unpaid, overdue, and payment initiated).
On the downside, Zoho Invoice is good for one business only. We recommend upgrading to a more sophisticated invoicing solution like Invoicera if you need to manage multiple businesses under a single account. Also, while Zoho Invoice integrates with most other Zoho products, it doesn’t connect with Zoho Inventory, which we found surprising since inventory and invoicing are linked closely for most companies.
ZipBooks: Best Inexpensive Invoicing Software With Basic Accounting Features
Pros
- Makes it very easy to create invoices
- Offers unlimited customers with the free plan
- Has an A/R report that shows unpaid invoices
- Includes integrated time tracking features
Cons
- Has limited invoice customization in the free plan
- Doesn’t save products and services for future invoices under the free plan
- Includes only one user in the free plan
- Lacks inventory accounting features
- Starter: Free forever for one seat
- Smarter: $15 per month for five users
- Sophisticated: $35 per month for unlimited users
- Accountant: Custom pricing
If you are interested in the ZipBooks’ premium features, you can sign up for a 30-day free trial of the Smarter or Sophisticated plan.
ZipBooks is a great choice if you want an inexpensive invoicing solution with simple accounting features. It allows you to create and send invoices to customers and perform basic accounting and financial management tasks, such as income and expense tracking and simple project management.
Despite its limited customization options, ZipBooks provides decent invoicing features. When creating an invoice, it provides a template that you can tweak with your logo before entering your sales information. You can set up general invoicing preferences, such as the ability to add your accent color, set up a credit card and PayPal for customer payments, and track taxes as payables to facilitate easier payments.
After creating an invoice, ZipBooks will generate a link automatically that you can share with your customer for easy payment collection. You can send the invoice via email and print it if needed. ZipBooks also offers a free subscription option, which is all you need to create, send, and track invoices for an unlimited number of customers.
TimeTracker by eBillity: Best Invoicing Software for Professional Service Firms
Pros
- Tracks hours written off vs invoiced
- Includes employee management features like GPS tracking and facial recognition
- Includes client portal
- Lets you add payment links for easier transactions
Cons
- Is expensive for firms with many employees
- Has invoices that aren’t elegant as other options
- Must integrate with third-party software for accounting
- Time Tracker Premium: $15 per user, per month plus a base fee of $25
- LawBillity: $30 per user monthly with no base fee
To send invoices, you need to subscribe to Time Tracker Premium.
You can try all the plans for free for 14 days with no credit card needed.
TimeTracker by eBillity offers lawyers, accountants, engineers, and other professional service firms an invoicing option integrated with powerful time tracking features. It makes sense to combine these functions for professional service firms since billable hours are the primary item on your invoices.
What sets TimeTracker apart from other invoicing options in this guide is that it tracks billable hours that are written off. A billable realization report shows the billable hours sent to clients vs written off, which is a crucial report to gauge the productivity of your professionals and the profitability of your firm. TimeTracker also scored high for its customization features and mobile app.
Furthermore, TimeTracker by eBillity allows you to bill your clients directly from time entries and billable expenses—which is great for businesses that offer services billed by the hour or project. To help you speed up payment collection, you can add payment links to your invoices that your clients can use to process their payments conveniently.
How We Evaluated the Best Invoicing Software for Small Businesses
Choosing invoicing software requires careful consideration of the features that you need. We considered five key categories in evaluating the best billing software for small business operations.
10% of Overall Score
The most important factor in our pricing score is the monthly cost of the program. However, we also considered any limitations on transactions, vendors, or customers. Finally, we scored programs that offer a monthly option higher.
25% of Overall Score
A fully customizable invoicing software allows you to upload your company logo, select from various invoice templates, change invoice colors, edit invoice fields, and add personalized messages to customers.
25% of Overall Score
We looked into essential invoicing features, such as the ability to create recurring invoices and set up automatic payment reminders.
10% of Overall Score
Along with subjective evaluation by our accounting expert, the ease-of-use score indicates whether the software is cloud-based. Other components include whether it requires a third-party bookkeeping software integration.
5% of Overall Score
A mobile accounting app comes in handy for businesses that need to send invoices on the go.
15% of Overall Score
A good invoicing software must also provide sufficient customer support options for users, such as phone support and live chat.
10% of Overall Score
We gathered average review ratings of all providers from leading user review sites.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
A good invoicing software allows you to customize your invoice by adding your company logo, changing colors, and choosing from different invoicing styles. Also, it must be able to create recurring invoices and send late payment reminders to clients.
The best invoicing software depends on your needs. If you want a full-featured bookkeeping and invoicing solution, you may consider QuickBooks Online, FreshBooks, or ZipBooks. If you only need invoicing features, a specialized invoicing software like Invoicera might be enough. If you are on a budget, try free software like ZipBooks and Zoho Invoice.
Invoicing software runs from $0 (free) to $200 per month.
No, as standalone invoicing software often lacks other essential bookkeeping features, such as project accounting, inventory management, bank reconciliation, and tracking of total assets and liabilities.
Yes, you can create invoices from your mobile device using accounting software with a mobile app, such as QuickBooks Online and FreshBooks, or standalone invoicing software with a mobile app, such as Invoicera and Zoho Invoice.
Bottom Line
With these eight best invoicing software for small business owners, we hope that you’ll be able to choose a solution that matches your business needs. We have presented free and paid options with varying features. To make a decision, we recommend that you consider your business’ invoicing and information needs and possible integration with existing software or migration from legacy systems.