The renowned accounting software, QuickBooks Online, meets expectations in its review.

Is it possible to run a business without accounting software, like taking a road trip without a map app? While Intuit's QuickBooks® Online is well-known, does its cloud-based software have the necessary features to keep your small business on track for success? Check out CNBC Select's review to find out.

How does QuickBooks work?

After signing up for one of QuickBooks Online's four pricing plans and creating an account, you can link your sales channel, bank accounts, and other data sources with the accounting software platform. For example, you can connect your Stripe account, which enables you to process payments for your e-commerce store, so that QuickBooks can accurately track your earnings and assist you in filing your taxes correctly.

QuickBooks offers more than just financial tracking; it also includes features for managing your business operations, such as invoicing, inventory tracking, and contractor payments. However, some features are only available in specific plans, so it's important to determine your needs before selecting a plan.

QuickBooks pricing and features

The four pricing tiers offered by QuickBooks are Simple Start, Essentials, Plus, and Advanced. Each package includes different features.

Across all pricing plans, QuickBooks provides a promotional discount of 50% off for the initial three months, allowing you to test its features without committing to a significant financial investment.

Features in a nutshell

Some of the most notable features of QuickBooks, which are available across all pricing levels, are particularly useful for tracking and managing your business' finances.

• income and expense tracking
• automatic bookkeeping
• invoice management
• profit, loss and expense reporting
• automatic sales tax calculation
• bill payment organization
• 1099 payment management

The Essentials, Plus and Advanced plans offer the ability to connect QuickBooks to multiple sales channels, while more advanced features are available with higher-cost tiers.

With these tiers, you can grant QuickBooks access to your accountant or employees without sharing your login information, and you can control which features they get access to.

Before selecting a plan, it's crucial to consider your business requirements, as the Simple Start plan does not offer this type of access.

Businesses that sell physical goods can benefit from the Plus and Advanced plans, which offer inventory tracking features.

Customers can determine the best QuickBooks plan for them by taking a brief quiz on the website.

QuickBooks perks

For 30 days, QuickBooks provides free live assistance from an expert to help new customers connect their accounts, master the software's features, and optimize their business operations.

QuickBooks offers a variety of resources to customers, including a blog on business growth, a community forum, and tools such as calculators for sales taxes, paychecks, timesheets, and payment costs. Additionally, QuickBooks provides balance sheet, income statement, and invoice templates for customers to use.

QuickBooks pros and cons

Before you sign up for QuickBooks, consider these pros and cons.

Availability and ratings

The QuickBooks Online app can be downloaded from the App Store for iOS and Google Play for Android, or it can be accessed through a web browser.

The rating of the app in the App Store at the time of writing is 4.7 out of 5, with over 200,000 ratings.

The rating on Google Play at the time of writing is 3.9 out of 5, with over 61,000 ratings.

QuickBooks alternatives

If QuickBooks is not suitable for you, consider these alternatives.

QuickBooks vs. Xero

While QuickBooks is a popular accounting software, one major disadvantage is its high cost. In contrast, Xero offers a more affordable option with its basic plan, Early, priced at $15 per month. Additionally, Xero provides a discount that reduces the monthly cost of Early to $0.75 for the first three months.

Xero's most expensive plan costs $80 per month, while QuickBooks' Advanced plan can cost up to $235 per month without a discount.

QuickBooks' basic plan offers a more comprehensive suite of features compared to other software, including income and expense tracking, automatic bookkeeping, live expert tax help, basic reporting, bill and receipt capturing, mileage tracking, automatic sales tax calculation, and custom estimates.

In contrast to Xero's most basic plan, it only includes a sales tax calculator, 1099 and W-9 payment management, short-term cash flow snapshots, bill and receipt capturing, and a limited number of bills and invoices that can be entered.

Although QuickBooks can be more expensive, it offers valuable features that justify its cost. On the other hand, if Xero's features meet your needs, selecting it could be a wise financial decision.

QuickBooks vs. Wave Accounting

Wave's two pricing plans may be more straightforward for those who find sorting through different plans and price tiers overwhelming, compared to QuickBooks' four options.

The Starter plan of Wave is priced at $0, making it a tough competition. This plan includes unlimited bills, invoices, estimates, and bookkeeping records. Additionally, it offers a mobile app and a dashboard for managing cash flow and customers.

You can pay online with Wave, but you'll be charged a fee starting at 2.9% plus $0.60 per credit card transaction (for the Starter Plan) or 2.9% plus $0 per credit card transaction for the first 10 transactions per month (for the Pro Plan).

QuickBooks offers a lot in terms of its features, but the Pro Plan with Wave costs only $16 per month, making it cheaper than QuickBooks.

Both platforms provide payroll services in addition to accounting.

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Our goal at CNBC Select is to deliver top-notch service journalism and in-depth consumer advice to our readers, enabling them to make well-informed decisions when it comes to their finances. Each review we publish is the result of thorough reporting by our team of expert writers and editors, who possess extensive knowledge of small business products. At CNBC Select, we take pride in our journalistic standards and ethics, and we earn a commission from affiliate partners on many offers and links. However, our content is created independently, without any input from our commercial team or external third parties.