The default small-business ledger, now with built-in AI agents doing the routine posting
The most portable solo choice — the catch is it is software you run, not a service that runs your books for you.
Setup: Same day · Control: Approves before acting
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QuickBooks Online is the ledger most US accountants already know, and Intuit now layers its AI agents and automated bookkeeping on top of that familiar base. Bank feeds are matched and categorised using patterns it learns from how you post, invoices and bills live in the same file, and reports from a simple profit and loss up to project profitability and budgets are available without exporting anything. For a solo founder the real advantage is compatibility: if you later hire a bookkeeper, a tax preparer or a part-time controller, the odds are high they already work in QuickBooks, so you are not migrating at the worst possible moment. The trade-off is that it still behaves like accounting software you operate, rather than a service that operates for you. You choose a tier largely by user count and features — a second person who needs to post, inventory, or class tracking each pushes you up a plan — and payroll is a separate subscription on top. Prices also rose for the upper tiers in 2026, so the plan you need may cost more than the headline entry price suggests. It is the safest, most portable choice, not the most hands-off one.
Four published monthly tiers plus a free entry plan; new customers choose 50% off for 3 months or a 30-day trial, not both. Payroll is extra.
| Plan | Published price |
|---|---|
| Simple Start | $38/mo |
| Essentials | $85/mo |
| Plus | $140/mo |
| Advanced | $340/mo |
Integrations we verified: Bank and card connections, QuickBooks Payments, QuickBooks Payroll (add-on), Stripe, PayPal, Hundreds of third-party apps
A ledger that keeps your books current every day, not just at month-end
Excellent solo fit if you will review exceptions weekly — the catch is there is no human bookkeeper in the price.
Self-driving bookkeeping that categorises, reconciles and hunts deductions for you
One of the best-value solo options — the catch is tax filing and complex accrual work still sit outside it.
A clean cloud ledger with unlimited users and an AI assistant, JAX, learning your books
A tidy, collaborative solo ledger — the catch is payroll is extra and the cheapest plan is tightly capped.
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