QuickBooks Online vs Desktop: Which Is Right for Your Business?

While these products will still be available to existing users, QuickBooks Desktop Payroll for Pro and Premier will no longer be available for new 9 ways to cut crypto taxes down to the bone users to purchase starting on September 31, 2024. One of the biggest differences here is that QuickBooks Online now offers a bookkeeping service called QuickBooks Live Bookkeeping, where you can pay for professional support from certified QBO accountants and CPAs. For small business owners new to the accounting scene, this service may bring much-needed peace of mind when managing your books and filing small business taxes. QuickBooks Desktop has a more dated user interface than some cloud-based products and requires prior accounting knowledge to get the most out of the product. QuickBooks Self-Employed is a QuickBooks Online product for contractors and freelancers, specifically for those who do not have separate business and personal financial accounts. It starts at $30 a month and includes basic features only, such as mileage tracking and invoicing.

It’s an acceptable system but isn’t nearly as convenient as sharing your books through QuickBooks Online. Additionally, all versions of QuickBooks Desktop allow you to set up cost estimates for projects and then compare them to actual expenses. In contrast, you need to upgrade to Advanced to be able to use QuickBooks Online’s budget vs. actual reporting feature. While QuickBooks Online and Desktop have their strengths and weaknesses, they ultimately balance out—which makes them tied in terms of overall features. Below we provide a detailed comparison across each feature, where we also determine a winner for each category. The vendors that appear on this list were chosen by subject matter experts on the basis of product quality, wide usage and availability, and positive reputation.

Customer Support: Tie

Also, the guided setup helps new users easily and effectively set up their company information, connect their bank accounts, create customers and vendors, etc. In both QuickBooks Online and Desktop, you can assign costs to your inventory items and track the quantities sold to calculate the cost of goods sold (COGS). While QuickBooks Online offers project management features, it doesn’t have the same level of customization options as QuickBooks Desktop.

Bookkeeping and accounting software

When you do, you’ll notice the difference immediately as QuickBooks Online offers a streamlined user interface, while QuickBooks Desktop relies on a flow-chart based interface. While both provide easy access to a variety of features and functions, only you can decide which one will work best for you. Both versions offer automatic syncing with your bank so you can categorize transactions. Add payroll to QuickBooks Online starting at $45 per month, or to Desktop starting at $50, plus $2 per employee, per month. For $27.50 per month for the first three months, then $55 per month after that, get up to three users, manage and pay bills and track time with its Essentials plan, which is its most popular plan. Upgrade to Plus for $42.50 per month for the first three months, then $85 per month afterward, and you will receive access for up to five users, inventory tracking and the ability to track project profitability.

The dashboard is super intuitive with large, easy-to-understand charts, and the mobile app is similarly easy to use. If your home or office has a slow or unpredictable internet connection, QuickBooks Desktop can ensure you can reach most of your data even if the internet goes down overnight. The downside to locally stored data, though, is that you can only access it from where it’s stored. You can pay extra (or upgrade to a pricier plan) to get data hosting through QuickBooks, which will let you access some financial information—though not all of it—on a different device. QuickBooks Online ordinary annuity formula is cloud based, which means you can access your QuickBooks account anywhere you have the internet and an internet-enabled device. QuickBooks Desktop is desktop based, meaning you’ll buy a hard copy of QuickBooks’ software, then download that software once onto a single device.

QuickBooks Online VS QuickBooks Desktop: 2024 Comparison

The online version of QuickBooks is much easier to use than the desktop version. Even though QB Desktop has more comprehensive features in general, there are some key features that only QuickBooks Online has, such as bookkeeping support. It’s hard to say accounts payable turnover ratio which software is cheaper because there are so many variables.

1. Product support can be accessed directly from within the application, where you can ask a question or connect to support personnel.
2. While QuickBooks Online boasts many of the features you’ll find with Desktop, some of its features, such as inventory management, aren’t quite as advanced.
3. No need to worry if you skip one; you can always go back and add it at a later date.
4. As I was testing them out, I found QuickBooks Online a lot sleeker, more modern, and easier to navigate than QuickBooks Desktop.

Our first-hand experience, guided by our internal case study, helps us understand how the different QuickBooks products compare with each other and how they work in real-world scenarios. Our unbiased reviews and content are supported in part by affiliate partnerships, and we adhere to strict guidelines to preserve editorial integrity. The editorial content on this page is not provided by any of the companies mentioned and has not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of these entities. This easy-to-use and feature-rich software is ideal if you have no bookkeeping experience and want top-notch customer support.

By providing feedback on how we can improve, you can earn gift cards and get early access to new features. Let us know how well the content on this page solved your problem today. All feedback, positive or negative, helps us to improve the way we help small businesses. Discover BusinessLoans.com’s lender network offering up to $3M in funding, no minimum credit score required. Both QuickBooks Online and QuickBooks Pro and Premier have notoriously poor customer support (QuickBooks Enterprise support has better priority support).