A Guide to Choosing The Best QuickBooks Online Version for Your Business

QuickBooks Online has earned a reputation for being a powerful all-inclusive accounting software for small and medium-sized small businesses. Thanks to its extensive features and its flexibility in addressing the diverse needs of nearly any industry. QuickBooks Online is available in four different versions, each designed to meet specific business needs.

In this post, let’s take a look at the four QuickBooks Online versions, and see which product is the right option for your business.

Simple Start

If you are a solopreneur that needs simple tracking of income and expenses, then Simple Start is for you. It caters to one user, and it supports basic accounting tasks, such as sending customized estimates and invoices, accepting payments online, tracking business miles, and creating digital transactions from paper receipts. Simple Start also includes payroll processing, which enables you to track payroll taxes, and is also ideal if you wish to track assets and liabilities and apply automated sales tax on your invoices. Some of the drawbacks of Simple Start include limited reports, and the inability to track unpaid bills, inventory, and project profitability.  

Essentials

An upgrade to QuickBooks Essentials is worth the additional price if you want the ability to manage unpaid bills and assign billable hours and expenses to customers. Recording unpaid bills is one of the keys to paying bills on time, and it’s useful for producing accrual-based financial statements. If your company bills customers for hourly services, then you may prefer QuickBooks Online Essentials to Simple Start. The Essentials plan supports up to three users. 

Plus 

QuickBooks Online Plus is designed for companies with up to five users and is a crucial upgrade as it comes with enhanced features needed for managing inventory and tracking profit and loss by projects. Product-based businesses that need to track the quantity on hand and the cost of products sold will benefit from Plus. The program contains features not included in Simple Start and Essentials, including the ability to track income and expenses by class and location, track project profitability, enter expenses and invoices in bulk, and create automated workflows with custom reminders and triggers. Learn the benefits of using QuickBooks Online Advanced.

Advanced

Advanced has more features than Plus, but the main reason we see for an upgrade is the need for additional users. If your business has grown from small to medium-sized, then you should consider Advanced as it supports up to 25 uses. On top of that, Advanced has no limitation in terms of the number of classes, locations, and accounts you can set up, as compared to Plus. Other features not available in Plus include access to a dedicated manager and complimentary training for your team. Getting a dedicated manager and free training is crucial especially if you or your staff are not yet familiar with QuickBooks Online.