Clio, or Clio Manage, is a legal practice management software designed to help law firms manage different aspects of their business, such as billing, timekeeping, and matter management. Some of its most popular features include document management, time tracking, and internal messaging. The platform is available in four subscription packages with monthly prices that start at $49 per user. You can try Clio for seven days for free, with no credit card required. Learn if it’s right for you in this detailed Clio review.
This article is a review of Clio Manage, Clio’s legal practice management software. Clio has a separate product called Clio Grow, a client engagement platform that includes customer relationship management (CRM) features.
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Pros
- It has built-in trust accounting features.
- Communications hub allows you to send text messages.
- It provides a comparison between predicted time estimates and actuals.
- It has unlimited documents in all plans.
- iOS and Android apps include almost all the features of the desktop interface.
Cons
- Accounting integration to perform essential accounting tasks is required.
- Only the Advanced and Complete plans give access to telephone support.
- Some features like CRM are offered only in the most expensive plan or in Clio Grow.
- It is difficult to find professional bookkeepers with Clio experience.
Supported Business Types | |
Pricing (Monthly Billing) |
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Free Trial | Seven days; no credit card required |
Standout Features |
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Customer Support | Phone and email support, live chat, online help center, and a community forum |
- Law firms seeking a fast communication solution: Clio includes a built-in text messaging feature that allows you to communicate quickly with your clients and team members. This makes Clio our best law firm accounting software for fast communication.
- Law firms working with different tools: You can integrate Clio with some of your favorite business management tools, such as Zoom, QuickBooks Online, and Gmail.
- Law firms needing a website: If you upgrade to Clio’s highest tier, you’ll get access to a do-it-yourself (DIY) website builder that lets you build simple, single-page websites with no codes required.
- Law firms dealing with many documents: You can process unlimited documents in any Clio plan.
Clio Alternatives & Comparison
Users Like | Users Dislike |
---|---|
It has user-friendly interface and intuitive design. | Plans can be expensive, especially for solo practitioners or small firms. |
Streamlined workflows help manage cases, billing, and client communication. | There are occasional challenges with connecting to other software. |
Its centralized platform allows for consolidation of tasks like document management and time tracking. | It has no advanced features needed by larger firms (e.g., complex legal matters). |
We checked out some review websites to see how Clio is performing, and we found that many users are impressed with the platform. Most users who left a positive Clio review commended the platform’s ease of use and the vast integration options available. Meanwhile, some reviewers complained that Clio’s a bit expensive and that they don’t like that Clio Grow and Manage are two separate products.
We agree that Clio’s plans can be on the pricier side, especially since they are priced per user—plus, Clio doesn’t offer more advanced features like the ability to handle complex legal matters. However, it is very user-friendly and easy to navigate, especially for novice users, and we find that the navigation is intuitive. We also like that its all-in-one platform lets you manage tasks that relate to clients and different matters.
Here are Clio’s ratings on popular review websites:
- Software Advice[1]: 4.7 out of 5 around 1,600 reviews
- G2[2]: 4.6 out of 5 based on about 620 reviews
Clio offers four packages, with prices running from $49 to $159 per user, per month, when billed monthly. You can sign up for a seven-day free trial without giving your credit card information.
EasyStart | Essentials | Advanced | Complete | |
---|---|---|---|---|
$/User/Month (Billed Monthly) | $49 | $89 | $129 | $159 |
$/User/Month (Billed Annually) | $39 | $79 | $109 | $139 |
Time & Expense Tracking | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Case Management | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Trust Account Management | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Unlimited Document Storage | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Invoicing | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
LEDES Billing | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Mobile App | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
QuickBooks and Xero Integration | ✕ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Custom Forms and Template Creation | ✕ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Client Portal | ✕ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Matter Budget Management | ✕ | ✕ | ✓ | ✓ |
Free Allocation Reporting | ✕ | ✕ | ✓ | ✓ |
Live Onboarding Training | ✕ | ✕ | ✓ | ✓ |
Priority Support | ✕ | ✕ | ✓ | ✓ |
Website Builder | ✕ | ✕ | ✕ | ✓ |
Client Intake Forms and CRM | ✕ | ✓ | ||
Referral Reporting | ✕ | ✓ |
Below, we discuss some of the features of Clio and how they can help you streamline your legal accounting and case management workflows. It offers many useful features—such as time and expense tracking, trust accounting, legal billing and invoicing, and an intuitive dashboard. However, it took a hit in our rubric because of an inability to customize the chart of accounts, reconcile bank accounts, charge sales tax on services, generate a trial balance and general ledger, handle sales tax, and generate basic financial statements.
The Clio Manage dashboard gives you an overview of three important metrics that help measure your company’s performance:
- Utilization rate: The number of hours worked divided by the number of hours in a day
- Realization rate: The number of hours invoiced divided by the number of billable hours worked
- Collection rate: The number of billable hours you collected divided by the number of billable hours invoiced
In addition, the dashboard shows other key information, such as the number of tasks due for the day, unpaid and overdue bills, calendar events, and detailed annual reports when you scroll to the bottom of the dashboard.
Clio dashboard
Time and expense entries are referred to as “activities” in Clio. The Activities tab on the left menu bar is where you can view and enter new time and expense entries across all of your matters. You can also use the “New time entry” and “New expense entry” buttons on the main page.
To record billable time in Clio, you can manually input the duration in the “New time entry” form. Alternatively, you can track time in real-time using the built-in timer, which is found on the “New time entry” form or can be accessed from the shortcut timer button on the homepage.
When recording time using the timer, click the timer button, stop when your legal work ends, and then populate the time entry form that will appear, as shown below.
Adding a new time entry in Clio
Also, you can enter and track time and expenses on the go using the mobile application. As with the desktop software, you can enter time manually or use the in-app timer.
Clio’s built-in trust accounting allows you to isolate accounts for your client trust funds and operating funds. Clio Manage includes a free client portal called Clio Connect, and it allows you to track and request funds easily, record trust reimbursements, and create invoices.
A huge drawback to Clio is that it doesn’t perform trust bank reconciliations. As such, you have to integrate it with QuickBooks Online or Xero to get the functionality.
Clio supports different billing formats, such as flat fee, hourly, and contingency. While the bill screen already includes all the important fields you need, you can add customized items—such as discounts, grace periods, and custom interest rates. You can also set up interest to apply to late payments automatically.
Invoices can be customized and sent from the portal, and then your clients can log into it to process their payments. However, we found some issues with Clio’s invoicing. For instance, there’s no option to create a new invoice from scratch. Instead, you need to use an existing time or expense entry from the Matters tab and convert it to an invoice using the “Quick bill” button.
Using “Quick bill” to convert a time entry to an invoice
Additionally, invoices in Clio are not as customizable as those in other similar programs like QuickBooks Online. However, we believe that they should be enough—especially since you can send the invoice in LEDES format, which is the standard among law firms.
Here’s a PDF preview of a sample invoice created in Clio.
Sample invoice in Clio
The platform could’ve aced our evaluation of its practice management features if it didn’t require integrations for document management and storage. However, Clio does offer trust accounting, three-way reconciliation, time tracking for billable hours, matter management, and the ability to communicate with clients via a client portal.
Clio provides a single place to manage and track all essential items related to legal cases and matters, such as activities, calendar events, communication history, notes, and timelines. You can enter case details, billing information, and documentation easily and organize case details with custom fields.
The custom fields feature lets you add, delete, or rearrange fields in the Matters tab. For instance, you can add a field for the Social Security number of your immigration clients.
Clio has a flexible contact management module that enables you to add any type of contact, such as clients, vendors, outside counsel, or witnesses. You can also assign bills, matters, documents, and transactions to each contact.
Additionally, the tool records important details from phone and email conversations with any of your contacts automatically through Gmail and Microsoft Outlook integration. You can add a new contact, either as a person or as a company.
Contact information screen in Clio
If you need to track important case milestones and schedule deadlines, then Clio’s calendar will come in handy. It is designed for law firm applications as you can add key events automatically based on specific rules and filing deadlines for hundreds of courts in the US.
Also, you can set automated email reminders so that no important events fall through the cracks. You can even set up multiple events and schedule the notification to be sent out days or minutes in advance.
We like the newly revamped calendar, complemented with easy-to-use buttons that allow you to switch between views easily. You can also easily add new events by clicking on the “New event” button on the top left of the calendar page.
Switching between calendar views in Clio
The task management module helps you stay on top of your deadlines so that you won’t miss any client obligations. Clio’s task management module is more robust compared with those of the similar software we reviewed.
You can assign tasks and case matters to your team members and to outside parties or cocounsel, and you can get alerted about upcoming tasks and deadlines on your dashboard. The program tracks the progress of each task, and it shows all upcoming and overdue tasks on your dashboard.
Clio’s task reports provide an overview of task status and task productivity for each user. The task progress by user report gives a detailed overview of each user’s task progress in each task status, which includes pending, in progress, in review, completed, and total completed tasks. The report also includes time estimates and actual time tracked.
A task productivity by user report is also available, and it gives an overview of each user’s task productivity. This is measured by the number of tasks each user has upcoming, overdue, and completed.
You can send text messages, which is a convenient way to communicate with your clients or team members. Clio assigns a unique toll-free number to your firm so that you don’t have to use your personal phone number.
You can send and receive SMS and multimedia messaging service (MMS) messages from your contacts, view documents, save message conversations, and add time entries.
If you have a large volume of documents to process daily, Clio doesn’t require you to upgrade to a higher tier. With any plan, you can store unlimited documents, including images, videos, and audio files. You can filter your file list by custom fields, categories, folders, and authors so that you can easily find the file you need.
The CRM feature in Clio Grow allows you to create and use online shareable forms and electronic signatures to help you better manage your client intake process. Clio streamlines various tasks, such as follow-up and data entry, appointment scheduling, and lead and revenue tracking, so that you can better manage your interaction with your existing and potential clients.
Also available in Clio Complete, the website builder allows you to create simple, single-page websites easily with no coding experience required. Once your website is up, you can use it to automate appointment booking, collect information from potential clients, and accept payments online.
Clio generates different types of reports on billing, clients, matters, productivity, tasks, revenues, and activities. Billing reports include accounts receivable, accounts receivable aging, and invoice payments.
Other useful reports that provide meaningful insight into your business include work-in-progress, matters by responsible attorney, originating attorney by revenue, and matter productivity by user.
Clio’s mobile application includes almost all of the available features in the web-based interface, including time tracking, document management, calendar, internal messaging, and task management. You can download the app on Google Play and App Store.
One of Clio’s biggest strengths is its robust integration with third-party solutions. It integrates with over 200 applications, as compared with similar programs that only integrate with a few. Some of the most popular apps that integrate with Clio include the following:
- Gmail
- Google Calendar
- Google Drive
- QuickBooks Online
- Xero
- Zapier
- DocuSign
- Dropbox
- Law Ruler
- Mailchimp
- Microsoft OneDrive
- Microsoft 365
Setting up an account with Clio is simple. At first, you’ll notice that it has a lot of features that may seem overwhelming, but as you explore and navigate through the menus, you’ll be able to find your way around easily.
However, it’s not the easiest to use among the law firm accounting software we reviewed. In terms of ease of use, we recommend LeanLaw.
How We Evaluated Clio
As part of our roundup of the best law firm accounting software, we evaluated Clio across the following criteria:
10% of Overall Score
25% of Overall Score
A good legal accounting software must-have features that enable law firms to manage invoices, bills, and payments. It must have adequate accounts receivable, accounts payable, and banking functions to manage cash flow, revenues, and expenses.
25% of Overall Score
20% of Overall Score
In evaluating user reviews, we looked at user review websites and checked reliable feedback. We weighed the positive and negative comments and assessed if the complaints were indeed present problems of the provider.
20% of Overall Score
The overarching goal of ease of use is to give users a smooth and easy experience in using the software. This involves an outstanding interface, multiple customer support channels, and a detailed knowledge base. We awarded a higher ease-of-use score to all-in-one software that doesn’t require an accounting integration.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Clio is great for lawyers in different practice areas, including family, business, administrative, real estate, bankruptcy, civil litigation, employment/labor, immigration, and government law.
Our recommended alternative to Clio is PCLaw (read our PCLaw review to learn more). You can check out other great options in our guide to the best law firm accounting software.
Clio allows you to create invoices, track time spent on cases, and accept payments online.
Clio offers features for case management, client communication, calendaring, time tracking, billing, and reporting.
Bottom Line
Clio stands out for its robust integration with third-party tools and its unique features, such as SMS text messaging and a DIY website builder. Unless you need full-featured bookkeeping and CRM and client intake tools, Clio is among the most affordable legal practice management solutions.
User review references:
[1]Software Advice
[2]G2