# QuickBooks Online > Cloud accounting from Intuit, from a free plan to 25-user Advanced QuickBooks Online is Intuit's cloud accounting service for small and mid-size businesses. It connects bank accounts, categorizes transactions, sends invoices, pays bills and runs financial reports, with Intuit Intelligence AI tools added on the paid plans. Payroll is sold separately as QuickBooks Workforce and can be added to any plan. - **Category:** Accounting & Invoicing - **Made by:** Intuit Inc. - **Website:** https://quickbooks.intuit.com/online/ - **Runs on:** Web, iOS, Android - **Facts last checked:** Oct 17, 2026 ## Pricing QuickBooks Online has a free plan. Paid plans start at $38 per month, billed monthly. - **Pricing model:** Free plan - **Free plan:** 1 user, income and expense tracking, 2 invoices a month, 3 reports and 1 connected bank. No accountant access, mobile app or third-party apps. - **Free trial:** 30-day free trial on paid plans, taken instead of the 3-month discount. | Plan | Price | What you get | | --- | --- | --- | | Free | $0 | 1 user, 2 invoices a month, profit and loss, balance sheet and account quick report, and 1 connected bank account. | | Simple Start | $38 per month for 1 user, billed monthly | Advertised at $19 a month for the first 3 months. Automated bookkeeping, invoicing with online payments, bill pay and access for 2 accountants. | | Essentials | $85 per month for up to 3 users, billed monthly | Advertised at $42.50 a month for the first 3 months. Adds enhanced reports, employee time on invoices and web lead forms. | | Plus | $140 per month for up to 5 users, billed monthly | Advertised at $70 a month for the first 3 months. Adds budgets, project profitability, inventory and up to 40 classes and locations. | | Advanced | $340 per month for up to 25 users, billed monthly | Advertised at $170 a month for the first 3 months. Adds custom roles, workflow automation, Excel sync, batch invoices and priority support. | Read from https://quickbooks.intuit.com/pricing/ on Oct 17, 2026. Prices change, so confirm with QuickBooks Online before buying. ## Ways to pay less - **50% off the first 3 months** (Other savings): New customers on a monthly plan pay half the base price for the first 3 months, then the regular price. It does not apply to per-employee fees. Source: https://quickbooks.intuit.com/pricing/ ## Key features - **Bank feeds and automatic categorizing:** Connect bank and card accounts and QuickBooks learns how you categorize transactions, then matches and records new ones the same way. - **Invoices and online payments:** Send invoices and estimates, take card and bank payments through QuickBooks Payments, and get status updates and reminders. - **Bills and accounts payable:** Organize and pay bills by ACH from paid plans. Standard ACH payments beyond the monthly allotment cost $0.50 each. - **Reports, budgets and projects:** Profit and loss and sales reports on every paid plan. Budgets, project profitability, inventory and class tracking start on Plus. - **Intuit Intelligence:** AI tools that categorize expenses, reconcile books and flag anomalies, with more of them unlocked on Plus and Advanced. - **Payroll through QuickBooks Workforce:** A separate subscription that runs full-service payroll, files payroll taxes and e-files 1099s, added from the same checkout. ## Good for - US small businesses that want their accountant working in the same books - Businesses that expect to add payroll, inventory or project tracking later - Sole traders who only need to track income and send a few invoices ## Worth knowing - The advertised prices are a 50% discount for the first 3 months; the plan then renews at $38, $85, $140 or $340 a month. - Each plan caps users: 1 on Simple Start, 3 on Essentials, 5 on Plus and 25 on Advanced. - Payroll costs extra: Workforce Payroll alone is $50 a month plus $7 per employee, and Premium is $88 plus $13 per employee. - These are US prices and plans; Intuit runs separate country sites for Canada, the UK, Australia, India and others. ## ToolGPA grades **GPA: 2.4 out of 4**, graded Oct 17, 2026. QuickBooks Online does the whole accounting job, from bank feeds and bills to budgets and inventory, and your accountant can work in the same books. But it's one of the dearer ways to start in this category: Simple Start is $38 a month for one user once the 3-month half-price offer ends, and three users means $85. - **Value for money: C.** Simple Start is $38 a month for 1 user, above the dearer quarter of accounting tools at $31.10 but short of the dearest tenth at $49. Three users is $85, and inventory and budgets need Plus at $140. The 50% off lasts only 3 months. - **Free plan and trial: C.** There's a free plan, but it's 2 invoices a month, 3 reports and 1 bank account, with no accountant access or mobile app. You'll hit that fast. Paid plans have a 30-day trial instead of the discount. - **Features: B.** Bank feeds that learn your categories, invoices and payments, bill pay by ACH, reports, budgets, project profit, inventory, classes, AI that reconciles and flags oddities, and payroll as an add-on. That's the whole job. - **Ease of use: C.** No store rating on record. Its bank feeds learn how you categorize and copy you, which helps, but there are accounts to connect and reports to learn before it runs itself. - **Platforms and integrations: B.** Web, iPhone and Android, with PayPal, Square, Shopify, Amazon, Etsy, eBay, Gusto and QuickBooks Time. No desktop app is listed, and the free plan gets no mobile app or third-party apps. These are ToolGPA's own grades. Graded from this listing, whose facts were read from Intuit's own pages on 17 October 2026. Not based on using the product, and shorter than our full reviews. ## Where it stands among accounting and invoicing tools - QuickBooks Online's GPA of 2.4 is higher than 4 of the 17 other accounting and invoicing tools we grade, and level with 5. - It stands best on features (B, above 13 of 17) and worst on free plan and trial (C, above 0). - Its paid plans start at $38 a month, against a middle price of $19 for the category: 14 of the 16 others that charge start lower. - On features, ease of use and platforms it scores 2.7 out of 4. 5 tools score higher and cost less. The category's chart of price against score: https://toolgpa.com/charts/accounting ## Keep it, or make your own? **Keep it.** To replace QuickBooks Online you would be making live feeds from your bank, which take an agreement with each bank or a service that has them. That is not a weekend's work, with an AI app builder or without one. That makes this kind of software worth paying for, not this one in particular: 8 of the 17 other accounting and invoicing tools grade higher. It costs $456 a year. - You could make: Invoicing, expense tracking and reports: an app builder makes these well. - You could not: Live feeds from your bank, which take an agreement with each bank or a service that has them. - You could not: Payroll taxes worked out and filed with the government for you. - You could not: A real app for iOS and Android. Something home-made would be a web page. - You could not: It plugs into other products, PayPal, Square and Shopify among them. - You could not: AI features, unless you pay a model provider for each request yourself. - You could not: The depth: we grade its features B, which means it covers the whole job. A judgement by ToolGPA from this listing, by rules that are the same for every tool. Nothing was built to test it. ## Works with PayPal, Square, Shopify, Amazon, Etsy, eBay, Gusto, QuickBooks Time **Tags:** Bookkeeping, Invoicing, Expense tracking, Reports, Payroll, AI features ## Alternatives - [Xero](https://toolgpa.com/tools/xero): Cloud accounting for small businesses, with unlimited users. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/quickbooks-vs-xero) - [FreshBooks](https://toolgpa.com/tools/freshbooks): Invoicing and accounting for freelancers and service businesses. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/freshbooks-vs-quickbooks) - [Zoho Books](https://toolgpa.com/tools/zoho-books): Online accounting from Zoho, with a free plan and six paid tiers. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/quickbooks-vs-zoho-books) - [Wave](https://toolgpa.com/tools/wave): Free invoicing and bookkeeping for US and Canadian small businesses. [Compare](https://toolgpa.com/compare/quickbooks-vs-wave) ## Sources The prices, plans, platforms and features above were read from these pages on Oct 17, 2026: - https://quickbooks.intuit.com/pricing/ - https://quickbooks.intuit.com/online/ - https://quickbooks.intuit.com/payroll/pricing/ - https://quickbooks.intuit.com/payroll/pricing/bundle/ - https://quickbooks.intuit.com/accounting/mobile/ - https://quickbooks.intuit.com/online/integrations/ Page: https://toolgpa.com/tools/quickbooks Listed by ToolGPA (toolgpa.com).