7 Best Farm Accounting Software Options for 2022

There’s a wide range of accounting software designed specifically for the agriculture industry. We looked at a mix of online and desktop accounting software created specifically for farming and ranching, as well as the top general accounting packages, to find the best software for your farm. While QuickBooks is often an excellent choice for farmers and ranchers, there are other farm-specific accounting software programs that deserve serious consideration.

Here are the seven best accounting software options for farmers:

• QuickBooks Online: Best overall accounting software for farmers and ranchers (3.91 out of 5 points)
• FarmBooks: Best for farmers looking for the most affordable farm-specific software (3.64 out of 5 points)
• EasyFarm: Best for self-employed farmers without bookkeeping knowledge to keep their own books (3.29 out of 5 points)
• CenterPoint Accounting for Agriculture: Best farm-specific accounting software for use by internal finance and accounting pros (3.38 out of 5 points)
• QuickBooks Desktop: Best desktop software for farmers working with an independent bookkeeper or tax preparer (3.34 out of 5 points)
• The Farmer’s Office: Best software for detailed cost accounting by farmers and ranchers (3.23 out of 5)
• Wave: Best free accounting software for farmers to track income and expenses (2.48 points out of 5)

QuickBooks Online: Best Overall Farm Accounting Software

Features

• Class and location tracking: In farm accounting, classes help farm managers classify groups of assets or expenses by crop or livestock. Location tracking can also be used to track individual fields.
• Access to QuickBooks ProAdvisors: A large QuickBooks Online ProAdvisors network makes it very easy to set up your books. Plus, you can share your books with your accountant to make tax time extremely simple.
• Inventory management: QuickBooks lets you manage inventory, calculate the cost of each product sold, and generate reports showing which items sell the best.

Our Expert Opinion

QuickBooks Online is our choice for the best overall accounting software for farmers because it has outstanding general accounting features that can be customized easily for farm operations. While it doesn’t come tailored for farms out of the box, it’s easy to set up classes and locations to track income and expenses by your cost centers and enterprises. You can get even more detailed by using project tracking to track small parts of an enterprise, like particular breeding stock or fields.

Many busy farmers who need to manage and track their books on the go are happy with its powerful mobile application. QuickBooks Online is flexible enough that it can be customized to nearly any business, making it our top pick among the best accounting software for small businesses.

FarmBooks: Most Affordable Farm-specific Software

Features

• Specialized Chart of Accounts: FarmBooks makes it easy for farmers to maintain the books even without an accounting background by providing a specialized chart of accounts.
• Financial Reports: FarmBooks’ financial reports can provide insightful information about farm performance and liquidity. It contains financial analysis, basic financial statements, Schedule F, cash flow statements, and more.
• Inventory Management: A notable feature of FarmBook’s inventory management is its real-time inventory for crops, key dates, and weight measures for livestock. Animal births, weaning, and deaths can also be tracked.

Our Expert Opinion

If you need full-featured farm accounting software and you’re on a tight budget, FarmBooks is your best option. The program is designed particularly for farmers and ranch managers who have no bookkeeping experience. For less than $400, you get all the must-have features that you need to manage both farm and nonfarm transactions. It has a specially designed chart of accounts and customized reports for farmers so you can get started easily―even without a background in accounting.

The main drawback of FarmBooks is that each farm requires an additional fee, so it might not be the best choice for farmers with multiple farm locations. Despite this weakness, FarmBooks is still our pick for the most affordable farm accounting software.

EasyFarm: Best for Self-employed Farmers Without Bookkeeping Knowledge

Features

• Single-entry input: The single-entry input is an easy solution for people without a solid background in double-entry bookkeeping. You can record multiple items in a single entry, which effectively reduces data entry time.
• Cost centers: Creating cost centers helps you track income and expenses by fields, herds, and other farm elements. Moreover, these cost centers can help you allocate costs strategically and appropriately.
• FINPACK Exports: EasyFarm exports to FINPACK, a software program for financial and credit analysis of farm and agricultural producers.
• Payroll: EasyFarm lets you manage your farm payroll through its check writer, time and cost assignment, and tax withholding features.

Our Expert Opinion

EasyFarm is great for farmers who tend to mix their farm and personal funds in the same account. EasyFarm has a spot on our list because it’s easy to use, and it comes replete with all the necessary features that farmers need to manage their books.

On top of its extensive farm accounting functionality, it also includes farm management capabilities, including crop and livestock management. The program highlight is its unique one-entry method for easy data entry, a real bonus for farmers who don’t have bookkeeping experience. EasyFarm isn’t the most affordable farm accounting software, but it’s a valuable tool for your farm business.

CenterPoint Accounting for Agriculture: Best for Ag Companies With In-house Accountants

Features

• Production analysis tool: The production analysis tool can help with farm management decisions, such as those involving profitability and cost control. This feature also uses geospatial maps to show production details visually.
• Ratio analysis: Decision-makers will like ratio analysis because it can help them assess the performance, liquidity, and profitability of the business.
• Management accounting module: This module tracks income and expenses on an actual cost basis rather than an accrual basis. With this module, farm managers can see the flow of actual costs and how it impacts cash flow and income. Moreover, this feature lets you set up profit and cost centers to help in tracking performance for responsibility centers and accountable employees.

Our Expert Opinion

CenterPoint Accounting for Agriculture, by Red Wing Software, is ideal if you’re working with an in-house accounting, finance, or tax professional. It has a strong set of financial management and automation features as well as powerful budgeting and forecasting capabilities, making it a terrific choice for multisite and multicrop operations. It also comes with production analysis and ratio analysis tools, which are extremely helpful for evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of your farm operations. These features aren’t present in most other accounting software.

The software can be on-premise or cloud-based. On the downside, CenterPoint Accounting for Ag doesn’t disclose its pricing information, so it might be expensive, especially for small farmers. Nonetheless, it’s a versatile software program and can be a great help for agricultural firms wanting to scale up their business.

QuickBooks Desktop: Best Desktop Software for Farmers With Independent Bookkeepers or Tax Preparers

Features

• Industry-specific reports: Track your profitability by product, client, or project depending on how you want to see your performance. With QuickBooks Desktop, you can generate reports on different areas of your business for analysis.
• Cash and accrual reports: Reports can be printed using either accrual or cash-basis accounting. Cash basis reports can help farm managers identify cash flows and assess how to maintain or fix cash flow issues.
• Class and location tracking: Just like its cloud-based counterpart, QuickBooks Desktop has class and location tracking to help farm managers classify operations and set locations for performance evaluation.

Our Expert Opinion

QuickBooks Desktop is affordable yet comprehensive accounting software that can be customized to any business requirements, including farm operations. The QuickBooks Desktop Pro edition is usually sufficient for farmers, but those who need forecasting or advanced job costing should upgrade to QuickBooks Premier. As an on-premise software program, QuickBooks Desktop is great for farmers who don’t have an internet connection or have a low-speed connection. It’s easy to share your books with an external accountant or certified public accountant (CPA) at tax time by creating an accountant’s copy that will allow them to make changes to your books.

The Farmer’s Office: Best for Detailed Cost Accounting for Farmers and Ranchers

Features

• Cost accounting: Farms need dedicated cost accounting functions to keep track of costs, overhead, and other farm-related expenses. Farmer’s Office lets you create crop and equipment cost centers to compute materials, labor, and overhead used in farming activities. Moreover, you can also generate cost accounting reports, like crop reports, expense reports, and variance analysis reports.
• Crop budgeting: Crop budgeting is helpful for keeping track of costs and applying for loans. Budgets can also be a performance indicator when analyzing variances.
• Pesticide application reporting: Another useful feature of Farmer’s Office is its pesticide application reporting. It helps you monitor pesticide activities, including materials used during application. This feature can also help in production since pesticides help secure a high yield from farm products.

Our Expert Opinion

The Farmer’s Office, by Datatech, comes with enhanced cost-accounting features, which are extremely important for farm planning and decision-making. These features include crop budgeting, equipment costing, crop-year tracking, and consolidated reporting. Using cost centers or enterprises, The Farmer’s Office tracks your income and expenses based on specific elements of your farm like fields and herds. It also includes chemical inventory and pesticide application reporting systems, which help farmers avoid the overapplication of pesticides and chemicals. Farm managers can use the customized payroll features to manage their farm employees’ salaries and deductions better.

Wave Accounting: Best Free Online Accounting Software

Features

• Free for invoicing and accounting: One of Wave’s strengths is its free service. Small farms can start with Wave for simple accounting and invoicing needs. However, for large farms, we recommend choosing other accounting software.
• Assisted bookkeeping options: Wave offers auxiliary bookkeeping services through its Wave ProAdvisors. These trained professionals can maintain your books, keep up with taxes, and perform other routine accounting tasks. This feature is a paid service.
• Sales and income tax accounting: Wave automatically records sales tax from transactions and accrues it to the sales tax liability account. This feature is handy for keeping track of tax liability in every transaction.
• Form 1099 Reporting: Wave can track 1099 independent contractor payments. Given that farms often hire independent contractors, this feature is helpful in complying with tax requirements.

Our Expert Opinion

If you’re a small farmer that can’t afford accounting software, Wave will help you with the essential tasks of tracking income and expenses for your tax return. It has no farm-specific features and can only track income and expenses in total, not by field or herd. It’s free and easy to use, and it supports unlimited bank account and credit card connections. Other helpful features include accounts payable (A/P), receipt scanning, and contact management. The features are limited but sufficient for gathering tax return information.

How We Evaluated Farm Accounting Software

We evaluated farm accounting software based on their price and ability to track cash sales, manage unpaid invoices, and perform general bookkeeping functions. More importantly, we considered each software program’s ability to handle farm-specific accounting tasks like creating cost centers to track profit and loss by specific farm unit, managing inventory items like feed and grain, and creating payroll reports for farm employees. We also focused on the software’s ease of use, available support, and integration options. Our evaluation boils down to five factors: pricing, ease of use, general features, farm features, and expert evaluation.

Bottom Line

We believe QuickBooks Online is the best overall accounting software for farmers and ranchers because it has outstanding accounting features and flexibility, a reasonable cost, is easy to use, and has abundant support through both QuickBooks and independent ProAdvisors. We particularly commend its powerful mobile app and its ability to manage unpaid bills and assign income and costs to enterprises like fields or herds.