About Wave Accounting
Wave is a fully integrated solution designed for small businesses with 9 employees or less. With our total focus on small business owners, you’ll never have to navigate inflated or cluttered to find what you need, right now. With an easy to navigate interface and single login, it’s never been easier to find what you need, when you need it.
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Use the 100% free accounting tools in Wave to gain the insights you need, without the legwork. With our automatic bank connections, your information flows seamlessly into Wave, without the manual entry. And even though it’s easy to navigate and understand, it’s still a real, double-entry application. Collaborate with your accountant or bookkeeper in real-time, and save both of you time!
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Use Wave’s invoicing tools to collect your money faster. Choose the template that best reflects your business, load your own logo, and choose a color for your invoices. Email invoices right from Wave, and collect credit card payments through our payment processing. Use Wave’s invoicing tools to stay professional, get paid faster, and keep track of where your money is.
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Everyone loves getting paid, but no one likes running payroll. Now, use Wave’s Payroll tools in America and Canada to take the headaches out of running your payroll. With guaranteed accuracy, direct deposit and employee self-service all included, at $5 per employee per month or less it’s never been more affordable for your employees to get paid.
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Use Wave’s personal finance tools to gain better insights into where your money goes. With simple budgeting tools, real time investment tracking, and more, Wave’s personal tools are the best way to master your personal finances.
Pricing starting from:
N/A
- Free Version
- Free Trial
- Subscription
Top 5 alternatives to Wave Accounting
Key benefits of Wave Accounting
Wave is 100% focused on the real small business owners, with nine employees or less. That means you’ll never see cluttered, complicated software that you can’t navigate, never mind understand.
What you will see is all the tools you need to gain better insights into your personal and business finances, all with one login. Whether it’s invoicing, payroll, or personal investment tracking, the days of multiple logins are in the past. And with free accounting and invoicing tools and totally affordable payroll, getting organized has never been more affordable.
Get paid faster, gain insights into your businesses financial health, know where your money goes and pay your employees, all with Wave.
Devices
Business size
Markets
Supported Languages
Pricing starting from:
N/A
- Free Version
- Free Trial
- Subscription
Top 5 alternatives to Wave Accounting
Images
Features
Total features of Wave Accounting: 65
- ACH Payment Processing
- Access Controls/Permissions
- Account Reconciliation
- Accounting
- Accounting Integration
- Accounts Payable
- Accounts Receivable
- Activity Dashboard
- Activity Tracking
- Alerts/Notifications
- Automatic Billing
- Bank Reconciliation
- Billing & Invoicing
- Budgeting/Forecasting
- CPA Firms
- Cash Flow Management
- Cash Management
- Core Accounting
- Credit Card Processing
- Currency Conversion
- Customer Statements
- Customisable Branding
- Customisable Templates
- Data Import/Export
- Electronic Payments
- Email Invitations & Reminders
- Estimating
- Expense Tracking
- Financial Analysis
- Financial Management
- Financial Reporting
- Fixed Asset Management
- For Government
- Fund Accounting
- General Ledger
- Income & Balance Sheet
- Inventory Management
- Invoice Creation
- Invoice History
- Invoice Management
- Invoice Processing
- Mobile App
- Multi-Currency
- Nonprofits
- Online Invoicing
- PCI Compliance
- Partial Payments
- Payroll Management
- Profit/Loss Statement
- Project Accounting
- Purchase Order Management
- Real Time Notifications
- Real-time Updates
- Receipt Management
- Reminders
- Reporting & Statistics
- Revenue Recognition
- SSL Security
- Sales Tax Management
- Spend Management
- Status Tracking
- Tax Management
- Third Party Integrations
- Time & Expense Tracking
- Transaction History
Alternatives
QuickBooks Desktop Enterprise
QuickBooks Online Advanced
Xero
Quickbooks Online
Reviews
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- Industry: Design
- Company size: Self Employed
- Used Daily for 2+ years
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Review Source
Overall rating
- Value for Money
- Ease of Use
- Likelihood to recommend 10.0 /10
Awesome free accounting online software for your business that is super professional!
Reviewed on 5/08/2021
There is very little more I can ask for with Wave for my small business. It is free for the...
There is very little more I can ask for with Wave for my small business. It is free for the features I need and allows me to take only ACH or credit card payments with a reasonable fee and I only pay the fixed percentage when I use those features so I can just turn it off and get a check from a client and not pay anything. Great Flexibility!
Pros
Its free for small businesses that just need a good business accounting software! You can take ACH and CC payments if you want and turn them off on invoices you don't want it on. The rates are reasonable enough for using these services. The reports are easy enough for doing taxes. It's awesome and cheap for those that are one man shows or freelancers.
Cons
The thing that is the most annoying is when you want to do a recurring billing. It doesn't use something like Maintenance contract #1 then go to #2 or something like that it makes recurring billing invoice names that were the most recent of any invoices. Maybe I am not using it correctly, but each time I have to go and change invoice names then manually send it to the client.
Alternatives Considered
Quickbooks OnlineReasons for Switching to Wave Accounting
I originally chose Wave as it was free. Now I just love it and it works well for me so no reason to even look somewhere else.
- Industry: Marketing & Advertising
- Company size: Self Employed
- Used Weekly for 2+ years
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Review Source
Overall rating
- Value for Money
- Ease of Use
- Likelihood to recommend 10.0 /10
Excellent for freelancers and small businesses
Reviewed on 23/09/2021
Extremely positive. In 3+ years I don't think I've had to contact support once, nor have I ever...
Extremely positive. In 3+ years I don't think I've had to contact support once, nor have I ever considered switching to other tools. It is one of the few software tools I use regularly where I am happy to open it, and I'm happy to give them their percentage.
As a freelancer, Wave has been indispensable to me. Always simple and smooth, and exceptional bang for the buck. Not only would I recommend Wave to freelancers and small businesses, I have recommended it. Numerous times.
Pros
Wave is ideal for freelancers. Set up is really simple and the interface is user-friendly. I have zero background in financial matters, and with Wave that's totally fine.
The price is also right. There's no subscription or hidden fees, they just take a perfectly reasonable percentage from invoice payments. I asked a financial advisor friend of mine before signing up, and she was pleasantly surprised by the low rates, and told me to go for it. I've been using Wave for over 3 years, and I have never once been hit with a fee outside of the basic rates.
Wave also provides a host of reporting and tracking tools in this basic account. They didn't influence my decision to sign up, but they've proven to be very useful.
And finally a small but really helpful feature, especially if you're a freelancer just starting out: immediate money transfers. Once someone pays your invoice, the money is in Wave, and takes 2-3 days to transfer. For 1% more payment, you can transfer money within minutes. For the cash-strapped freelancer, that can be mana from heaven.
Cons
There are no major cons that I can think of. One issue I have is mostly my fault: When I first started using Wave I didn't know what I was doing, and I ended up creating a whole bunch of client and work type records unnecessarily. It would be nice if there were some more in-your-face tutorials, maybe some hover tips for new users. But the messiness is mainly from me leaping in before looking.
Reasons for Switching to Wave Accounting
It was the cheapest option, and the most user-friendly looking. I have no background in finance and didn't want complex features built for accountants - Wave has those features, but only if you want them.- Industry: Marketing & Advertising
- Company size: 5,001-10,000 Employees
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Review Source
Overall rating
I want to like Wave, and have been trying for years
Reviewed on 7/06/2015
..., but I need them to help me figure it out. I have a full-time salaried job as a copywriter and...
..., but I need them to help me figure it out. I have a full-time salaried job as a copywriter and a few self-employment careers, like freelance writing, voice acting. I've always found doing my taxes to be a nightmare. I'd spend months stressing about it and trying to calculate income and expenses. Originally, I was adding up all my expenses with a calculator. When I discovered I could put things into Excel, it got a bit easier add numbers. And then about 4 or 5 years ago, I started using a new accountant, and he suggested Wave to me. I was excited to hear that it would important my bank and credit card statements, and that I could then quickly and easily categorize everything. I was sure this would save me so much time and stress. But I found Wave very hard to use. I wasn't sure how to create my own categories. I could never tell if my statements had been uploaded completely, and I would often wind up with duplicate transactions. And I still can't find a way to view the categories after I've allocated transactions to them. I tweeted to Wave a lot, and they were nice enough to send one their IT guys to sit with me in a coffee shop for a few hours. He watched as I tried to do things and he gave me help. He said this was useful to him, to see what people might be having trouble with. And, I figured I would then be ok. But I'm still having a lot of trouble. I'm not asking a lot. All I want to be able to do is import my bank statements and credit card statements, and categorize all the transactions. And being able to invoice people would be nice too. And it seems that his app has those features. But I still find it very complicated. I don't understand the categories. I can't find where the totals are. And lately, my mbna Mastercard has been saying it can't link to Wave. So tonight, I went in and started deleting all the transactions from 2014, hoping that I could start fresh and be sure that everything was imported correctly. But now I see that mbna won't give me the data files for before August (that's an mbna problem, not Wave) and I can't undelete what I deleted. And there's no way to get support without paying for it. But I don't want to pay until I'm confident the site can do the simple things I need it to do. Anyway, I'd love to support a local Toronto company. And I appreciate that someone from the company sat with me in person. And I see people reviewing positively, saying it makes a freelancers life easy. Someone even tweeted today that Wave makes doing accounting fun. But I just don't understand how people are able to use this site. If someone from the company, or one of the satisfied customers, could explain to me how to use this site properly, I'd love to be converted. But at this point, I fear I need to cut my loses and simplify my life by paying for some other software. I just want to be able to file my taxes and concentrate on my creative projects.
Pros
It seems like it offers the ability to import credit card and bank statements, categorize expenses, and invoice people. Those are the features I want. But...
Cons
...I haven't been able to figure out how to smoothly and accurately use the features I want. This app is making my life harder than it was when I just manually typed in all my expenses into a Microsoft Word and added them up with a calculator.
Response from Wave Accounting Inc.
Thanks for sharing with us your experience. Firstly, thanks for being such a valuable customer over the years. We especially appreciate your patience trying to make WaveApps work for your financials.
We have available Premium Support for customers who are getting started with Wave. We suggest those looking to best learn work arounds, and setting up proper customizations subscribe to our chat and phone support (unlimited - 9am-5pm EDT M-F) - $49 for three months. You can place a call and speak to one of our product specialists to help you work through your challenge.
If you could reach out to me [email protected] We'll try to match you with a member of our team to help troubleshoot since you have invested your valuable time into Wave to manage your business financials.
Jennifer from Wave
- Industry: Construction
- Company size: Self Employed
- Used Daily for 6-12 months
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Review Source
Overall rating
- Value for Money
- Ease of Use
- Customer Support
- Likelihood to recommend 10.0 /10
Solid free platform for small business
Reviewed on 23/07/2021
I am really impressed for a free offering. Everything looks and feels professional and I'm able to...
I am really impressed for a free offering. Everything looks and feels professional and I'm able to focus on running my business and not learning accounting.
Pros
Having a system that connects to your bank and imports all the transactions for you is a game changer. This is almost as simple as using something like Mint to manage your personal budget. Once the transactions are imported, they definitely lead you down the path to success even if you know nothing about accounting.
Cons
The lack of accounting/reporting for individual projects is a massive omission. I don't think they need a full blown project system, but just some way to tag transactions so that you know the expenses and income for a given project.
I also found the sales tax feature a little simplistic. Here in Washington state we have really small tax zones (customers less than a mile apart can be in different zones) and I have to track the sales tax collected/paid per zone. I was able to do this, but it feels very clunky as the system seems to be designed for a just a handful of different sales taxes.
Alternatives Considered
Quickbooks OnlineReasons for Switching to Wave Accounting
Price. I don't mind paying for things when it makes my life easier. But Wave is a really great product and I don't see any need to pay for something.- Industry: Building Materials
- Company size: 11-50 Employees
- Used Daily for 2+ years
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Review Source
Overall rating
- Value for Money
- Ease of Use
- Customer Support
- Likelihood to recommend 10.0 /10
Perfect book keeping and invoicing Software
Reviewed on 5/08/2021
I have had a wonderful experience using Wave Accounting and have encountered no problems at all.
I have had a wonderful experience using Wave Accounting and have encountered no problems at all.
Pros
The fact that this software is 100% free and includes the aspects that are most critical to my business is why I give this such a high rating. The interface is easy to use and getting the system setup and all data input is a breeze. Wave has made my life so much easier and has taken hours of paperwork off of the table. Easy, convenient, reliable, absolutely affordable!
Cons
It does not keep track of inventory or scheduling jobs, but this was not a huge factor for me because I use an old fashioned appointment book and for all of the other free features it’s definitely worth it.
Wave Accounting FAQs
Below are some frequently asked questions for Wave Accounting.Q. What type of pricing plans does Wave Accounting offer?
Wave Accounting offers the following pricing plans:
- Starting from:
- Pricing model: Free Version, Subscription
- Free Trial: Available
Accounting & Invoicing - Free Receipt Management - Free Credit card processing - $0.30 + 2.9% per transaction Bank payment/ACH processing - 1% per transaction ($1 minimum fee) Payroll (tax service states): $35/month base fee + $4/active employee + $4/independent contractor paid Payroll (self service states): $20/month base fee + $4/active employee + $4/independent contractor paid
Q. Who are the typical users of Wave Accounting?
Wave Accounting has the following typical customers:
Self Employed, 2-10, 11-50, 51-200
Q. What languages does Wave Accounting support?
Wave Accounting supports the following languages:
English
Q. Does Wave Accounting support mobile devices?
Wave Accounting supports the following devices:
Android (Mobile), iPhone (Mobile)
Q. What other apps does Wave Accounting integrate with?
Wave Accounting integrates with the following applications:
Gmail, Microsoft Outlook, PayPal, Shoeboxed, Zapier
Q. What level of support does Wave Accounting offer?
Wave Accounting offers the following support options:
Email/Help Desk, FAQs/Forum, Knowledge Base, Chat
Related categories
See all software categories found for Wave Accounting.
