Wave Accounting Reviews

Wave Accounting: Unmatched Free Invoicing and Accounting

Comments: I've been using Wave Accounting for almost a decade now, and I cannot imagine using anything else. Wave Accounting meets all of my professional needs at the free tier, but I would be happy to pay for this invaluable software.

Pros:

Wave Accounting allows you to easily design and send beautiful branded invoices that tell your clients "I'm a professional!" Everything is handled online, and the app works exactly as well as the desktop version. Oh: and did I mention you get everything you need for free? This is truly stellar software.

Cons:

For some reason, Wave Accounting hides the invoice title in an accordion drop-down. For years I sent invoices named "Invoice 24...", until I found this one day.

A User-Friendly Accounting Software: Wave Accounting

Comments: Overall, I'm very satisfied with the Wave Accounting software. It's comprehensive yet easy to use, and the mobile app makes it easy to stay on top of my business. The only downside is that some features are lacking compared to competitors, and the customer service could be improved.

Pros:

I've been using Wave Accounting for my small business for a few years now, and I'm really impressed by its user-friendly interface and the comprehensive set of features it offers. It's great for tracking expenses, managing invoices, and reconciling bank accounts. The mobile app is also very handy, making it easy to stay on top of my business even when I'm away from my computer.

Cons:

While Wave Accounting is a great accounting software, it is missing some features that competitors offer. For instance, it doesn't have budgeting or forecasting capabilities, and the reporting options are quite limited. Additionally, the customer service could be improved, as it can be difficult to get help when you need it.

Good invoicing software with reservations.

Comments: Overall, I would recommend Wave Accounting to other small business owners looking for a simple and affordable way to manage their finances (once you are from the US or Canada). While it may not have all the bells and whistles of other accounting software, it has proven to be a reliable and effective tool for my business.

Pros:

One of the main benefits of Wave Accounting is that it is completely free to use. This is a huge advantage for small business owners like myself who are looking for an affordable solution to manage their finances.The interface is user-friendly and easy to navigate. I was able to set up my account and start using the software within a few hours without any issues.Wave Accounting has a wide range of features that are useful for small businesses, including invoicing, receipt scanning, and expense tracking. These features have helped me keep track of my finances and stay organized.The software integrates seamlessly with other apps and tools that I use for my business, such as PayPal and QuickBooks. This has made it easy for me to import and export data as needed.

Cons:

One downside of Wave Accounting is that it doesn't have as many advanced features as some other accounting software. If you have a more complex business with multiple departments or locations, you may need to look for a more robust solution.The customer support can be slow at times, and I have had to wait a while for a response when I had questions or issues.Wave accounting was open for use by users from any country but a few years ago they changed this to only US and Canadian users. I am still able to use it but I can’t recommend it to any of my friends as a result.

We no longer accept Quickbooks clients after finding WAVE Accounting!

Comments: No matter what complaints we have, we 100% now use Wave Accounting. We no longer accept Quickbooks clients and encourage any nw client consultations to switch over. For every new start-up business we assist, we automatically set up a wave accounting software for them and help them sync their busienss bank accounts. We also assist former Quickbooks users to switch over and set everything up for them.

Pros:

This software is 100% FREE to use! No gimmicks, no catches. I was skeptical when one of my clients told me he used this. I did NOT want to lean yet another accounting software, but once I logged in and found out how easy and streamlined this software was to use, I was 100% sold on it! The ONLY fees they charge are IF you decide to use their payroll (I highly advise AGAINST using their payroll, it needs an overhaul), or IF you use them for payment processing of invoices you send to clients. The fees for using their payment processing are similar to those of Square and Stripe and a small price to pay for the amazing software. I would encourage you to use their payment processing so this service can remain on the free billing platform with no monthly charges!

Cons:

1) Reporting abilities are lackluster! No way to print "no receipts attached" reports for clients. 2) Sometimes has glitches. We will work in this software, then log in later and all of the work we did has disappeared. Major panic attacks more than once! Still having problems with one account in particular. If I log in on an incognito window, the work is there again (sometimes). 3) Payroll systems SUCKS. I do not recommend! Square payroll is our go-to! 4) Chart of accounts is OUTDATED and does NOT match Schedule C nor S-Corporation tax return expense line items. We should be able to customize a chart of accounts the way we want it and be able to copy/paste it into other client accounts 5) Accountant login is great except the list is not always alphatized correctly. We should be able to alphabetize and/or sort by PRIORITY account 6) Need an easier/quicker way to upload receipts

Everything a small business needs for invoicing

Comments: I love Wave. I switched from Freshbooks years ago and it was such a good move. Wave is so easy to use which means you save time and money.

Pros:

Wave is super simple to use. It's well laid out, intuitive and easy to use. I've been using Wave for years after switching from Freshbooks.

Cons:

Occasionally, Wave has issues sending invoices to Gmail addresses. This is very surprising given how prevalent Gmail is and I would hope they'd sort this out.

Great product for small business

Pros:

I love that I can add my accountant, that it's free and that I can do reporting, billing and invoicing all in one spot.

Cons:

I have no complaints about this product. It worked perfectly for us.

One of the best for small business and it's even free!

Pros:

The free version for a single user is nearly unheard of these days. Additionally, there are a TON of features that are available at the free price point. Certainly worth paying for the customization or additional users, though. It's in the cloud and you can access it anywhere. There's even an app for when you're on the go.

Cons:

Nothing that I can say. I use limited accounting functionality. I only use invoicing and payment recording. Everything just works.

We love wave accounting

Comments: it has been excellent and my bookkeeper loves using it

Pros:

price and functionality is awesome. We use for three of my companies

Cons:

it takes them a little longer to improve their functionality but they do keep

Wave Accounting, A Budget Friendly Must Have

Comments: My overall experience with Wave has truly been great this far. I haven't ran into any problems, I am able to get things done and track all information I would need to even if I am out and about. I would say that is a big positive in how I am solving business problems by using Wave Accounting.

Pros:

Features that I feel are most impactful in Wave Accounting are customizable invoices, getting paid promptly and hassle free, and the business dashboard being easy to navigate in general.Wave Accounting is definitely easy for me to use in my opinion because I am able to track all expenses and keep track of all customers information and invoices easily even on the go.Integration with other business processes I use was very simple and painless for me as I was able to use this feature with a few other tools that I use separately from Wave.

Cons:

As mentioned before integration in Wave Accounting was very easy for me to do. So no problem there. In my opinion Wave works great with my business, but as for larger business with 10+ employees it might be a bit more difficult as they are limited in software functionality, which is missing the option of an audit trail. The only other thing I feel Wave could improve is the limited customer service. Being able to have one on one customer support promptly is very important in my opinion.

Loved the original but now not supported in the Uk

Comments: Use for some historic clients for their invoicing.

Pros:

Free, easy to set up and use for sole traders.

Cons:

That support in the UK has stopped and that it does not comply with MTD for VAT and will not comply with MTD for income tax.

Wonderful accounting software for starting and growing a service business

Comments: I haven't gone through a tax season with my business yet, but I have been an independent consultant and I anticipate having everything tracked in Wave is going to help me out a lot come April. It's so easy to use and I can focus on my core business rather than spending a lot of time on admin.

Pros:

Wave helps me do so much. I can issue invoices, track them (I.e. I can see when a client has viewed it!), and allow clients to make payments directly through the invoice. I can also customize my invoice, which is great. I could do all of this from day 1. I'm a solopreneur and launched my business this summer. I was able to issue professional invoices from day 1 and track my expenses using their receipts app. The other thing I love about Wave is that they are very interested in feedback from their customers. I've had a few interactions with them and it's always been really pleasant. It's also free which helps me out a lot. I do use the credit card payments, which has a fee like any other service would.

Cons:

Their mobile app could use some work, and I've given them this feedback. The receipts app is great to take pictures really quickly, but I generally have to use the browser to do anything else.

A Solid Free Small Business Accounting Software

Comments: It’s been a solid piece of cloud accounting software, albeit limited. It’s hard to beat the price of it, and I have yet to find a similar but more fully featured one at the price of FREE!

Pros:

I use Wave to keep track of my personal finances, from income to spending. In that lens, Wave performs quite well, allowing you to tag transactions that are automatically imported from your bank. It also lets you generate some simple reports such as your income statement, balance sheet, and cash flow. The interface is simple to use and understand, and I was able to pick it up (coming from an accounting background) in under a few minutes, without having gone through a walkthrough. The included ability to reconcile statements is also quite handy and allows me to verify that all transactions are posted appropriately. The inclusion of receipt tracking and tagging is also quite handy! The best part about Wave is the price! If you don’t need features such as invoicing and payroll (some SMB’s may find these handy. From a personal perspective, I did not), the accounting software is completely free.

Cons:

Wave still appears to be in its infancy, although the product has been there for a while. The user interface will frequently be updated (the reconciliation flow changed 3 times since I signed up about 6 months ago), and new features will constantly be added without any notification, often shifting often things around from where you expect them to be. The reports from Wave are also very limited, so don’t expect any customizable reports as of 08/2019. You get about 12 reports total, some or all of which may not be very relevant to you, depending on your end goal. These reports are completely canned, system generated, and you do not have the ability to create new reports. This may change in the future, but as it stands, this is the current state of affairs. The receipt tracking feature is definitely handy to have. While Wave will OCR your receipts and tag them to a category, it will actually post an entire transaction to the ledger when you save it down. For those of us with a bank account and credit card linked to auto import transactions, you’ll get a duplicate: one from the CC, and one from the receipt. It would be nice if Wave included some intelligence to automatically match the receipt and transaction together, but for now, you need to manually merge each. Finally, as a small point, Wave does not obtain any service assurance through SOC1 or SOC2 reports, an issue that most people wouldn’t ever care about.

Wave has everything you need to run a small business

Comments: I LOVE this software. I have been using it without issue for 2 years + without issue and it has really helped me organize my business. I will definitely stay with them as long as I can

Pros:

The best thing about WAVE is its ease of use. It was so easy to learn to use this. Additionally the invoices are really customizable. There is a huge amount you can do with just the free version but if you upgrade to the paid version you can access a lot more of the accounting features and payment features. I like that for security reasons the software logs you out at the end of the day. The invoices look very professional and are downloadable and can be sent with a pdf attachment. When a partial payment is made you can send a receipt reflective of how much was paid, how, when and with how much balance left. The software will also alert me when a payment is overdue. You can also add tax and discounts to the invoices.

Cons:

The only gripe I have is that when I made changes to the invoice parameters, I was unable to delete the old parameters because they had been used in previous invoices. It would be nice to be able to "inactivate" or send to "archive" these parameters.

Excellent for the start-up to small company!

Comments: So far it has been a good experience overall. I haven’t had any issues. I haven’t had very much interaction with customer service other than the initial consultation Coach and the vetting process situation.

Pros:

Love this product because of the cost! Free! So many great tools that it offers to include invoicing. You can create all of your own products and services and include your terms & Conditions. Clients can pay directly from the invoice. You can get paid the same day if you attach your business card to your account. It has a payroll feature as well for an additional charge. I love the fact that the reporting is so simple and easy to read. I would highly recommend purchasing this set up package. It comes with consultations and assistance to work through all the process of setting up your account and different categories specific to your business. It was definitely worth the extra money spent. I also like the fact that there are apps available to send invoices if you are away from the office. Also, you can upload receipts directly from wherever you are by simply taking a picture and categorizing it on the spot. No more having to deal with Receipts in the shoebox LOL.

Cons:

On the Invoicing I wish there was an option to add tipping. Our clients like to add a tips for our service and while Square offers this feature, Wave does not. There was a weird vetting process that nobody told me about and at first I thought it was a scam and I didn’t reply. But then I confirmed with the consultant I had been working with and they verified that this was in fact something that I had to go through. It seemed kind of sketchy at first, but it had validity with regards to the financial process.

Wave Was/Is My Go To From QB Online

Comments: My overall experience has been great! I have to do some thinking/remembering at tax time to separate the double entries of income. I show an invoice paid by check WAVE shows that income on my account. I go to the bank and deposit, there is that check again. For the total amount of money saved, around $450-500, I will put up with it.

Pros:

It is FREE in the cloud, works on ALL platforms Windows 7,10, Android, iphones. Accepts all credit cards including Amex for 2.9% I am saving $420+ yearly by not having QB, I don't have to print invoices. Since WAVE is in the cloud I email my invoices and receipts.

Cons:

I wish it had more storage of customer service that has been performed in the past but I suspect that would require some expense. It only had 3 invoice templates and there wasn't much customization on those. You can't compound taxes on your invoices, let me rephrase, you can compound 1 tax but no more. Since my only taxes are State and County I found it best to compound none for fear of forgetting which one I had compounded

Best accounting software to grow as a small business

Comments: The overall experience with Wave has been very good. With some hiccups on the roadmap, Wave has evolved by leaps and bounds from a pretty basic software to quite a powerhouse, even for the free version. If my business grows and I will feel the need to add more features such as payroll and tax advisor use, I will still remain a Wave believer!

Pros:

I've used Wave since 2009!!! I feel like my company grew with it. It's helped me understand all I was doing right (and wrong!) financially in my business. It helps tremendously when filing monthly sales taxes. I keep a habit of staying organized, verifying all transactions and reconciling with my bank accounts. All of this, plus categorizing everything the right way makes tax time an absolute breeze - my taxes are done in two days and I don't need to freak out about it because everything is organized ahead of time and all I do is input expenses and sales.

Cons:

What I least like about Wave is that a few years ago they stopped support for free accounts. Absolutely no human support whatsoever. Disagree with that big time!!! Sometimes also a bank connection will be interrupted and you cannot reconnect for many many months and since there is no support, you are left without any help. I am a small business of one person and I do not need any of the paid features that Wave offers so I could be upgraded to paid support, so I am always stuck in no human support land. It doesn't feel good, especially to someone who has used this software for as long as I have.

I LOVE Wave!

Comments: Overall, I highly recommend Wave if you are running a business and want low costs and an easy way to manage your finances. My business is simple and Wave makes it so much easier for me to stay on top of things and know where I need to focus my energy.

Pros:

I have been using Wave since around 2015 and my books were a mess when I first began because I was doing them (not my strength) and once I heard about Wave's bookkeeping services, I couldn't believe how affordable they were. It's super easy to set up and use, run reports and know about your financials. I tried switching to QB for about 1 month and hated it, so I switched back. Lesson learned and I'm sticking around!

Cons:

One thing I had to get used to was because I had my bank account connected and until the month is reconciled, when a invoice is paid I mark it paid and then the 'payment' comes in again from banking. It was easy to catch and now my Wave bookkeeper keeps all that reconciled. Thank you!

Great Software. Super Affordable.

Pros:

For a small business, or probably even a larger one, it's a really great software with all of the accounting and billing basics needed, and it's basically free. The online payment system works really well for getting payments from clients. They can either pay with a credit card or ACH, which is great. You can turn off credit card payments too if you don't want to have a fee taken from your payments, which I also find as a nice feature. The invoices look very professional, can be white-labeled, so it just has your branded information on it. The invoices are also really easy to make. We had been trying to use Excel as an accounting system when we first started our small business, and found Wave soon after. It was a huge upgrade, and not very expensive. The reports are great, and it's easy to track expenses and monies brought in. It solved all of our accounting needs as a small website building business.

Cons:

The one thing we really think can be improved are the recurring invoices. It doesn't make the invoice numbers in order based on that client's invoices, so they're oddly out of order. It's not a huge deal, but would be much better if it kept the invoice numbers specific to each set of clients.

Free invoicing, billing, and accounting software with paid upgrade features

Comments: I like that I can do my own bookkeeping and light accounting and this keeps me relatively sane come tax time. I highly recommend Wave to anyone who's willing to learn at least a bit about accounting! With Wave Payments and Wave Payroll, the software works well for self-employed folks just getting started and will grow with them as they add to their team.

Pros:

The cost is compelling -- free! -- but beyond that I find the software is advanced enough to do what I need without being utterly overwhelming like other options. I'm not accountant and there's only so much geeking out I want to do. I can send invoices, get paid, track all my expenses and payments, handle business AND personal finances from the same account, and it all works really well with my bank and integrates decently with Stripe via Zapier.

Cons:

I'd love Wave Payments to allow for payments in more than one currency. I can invoice in USD and CAD (my main), but I can only accept online payments via Wave in CAD. No biggie.

Solid free platform for small business

Comments: 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.

Excellent alternative to QuickBooks

Comments: I've had a very positive experience with Wave. As mentioned, I have used their paid and their free offerings and feel both are an excellent value. I think Wave offers a great way to save on a monthly subscription fee. Their customer service has been very helpful when I've had questions.

Pros:

I use Wave for bookkeeping for our retail business as well as for consulting projects. It's easy to set up and is intuitive to use. Transactions are automatically imported and can be easily categorized. I also use Wave for our payroll (which is a paid service) - this was also easy to set up and Wave can manage sending in your employer taxes. Since I do not have a background in accounting, I also paid for a one-time session with a Wave accountant - this session was extremely helpful in ensuring I had my books set up correctly as we walked through my books in real-time and were able to identify necessary changes. I have never used another bookkeeping software, but I find that Wave meets all of our daily needs.

Cons:

Because I use Wave for two different arms of my business, I do wish you could automatically move them between the businesses. Instead, you have to manually enter charges. For example, if I have a charge auto-import from my business card I have to create a few transactions to get them assigned to the correct business because I want P&L tracked separately.

Great alternative to Quickbooks for small biz users

Comments: I have two small e-commerce business, and needed a way to track my inventory purchases, sales, shipping expenses, etc. I also had two independent contractor businesses, needing to track expenses such as mileage, supplies, etc. With Wave, I have each venture as a separate company, I can customize the chart of accounts for each one, create invoices for my independent contractor gigs, track invoice status so I don't overlook if something doesn't get paid on time, and review my income and expenses each month. I sometimes do consignment sales for clients in my e-commerce business, and Wave helps me keep track of those sales and settle up with clients each month. Truly a lot of great features offered, and I don't even use all of them (like Banking & Payroll). So glad I found Wave, and I have recommended it to many others.

Pros:

Wave offers a lot of the basic accounting functions needed for small business users, and the best part is that it's FREE TO USE! Woo hoo! I used QuickBooks in my previous career, and liked the detail it provided, but once I started my own small e-commerce business, I didn't want to spend hundreds of dollars on software, or get locked into a recurring monthly subscription. I was thrilled to find Wave and amazed that it was FREE!

Cons:

I wish there was a keyword search function in the Transactions section. Sometimes I need to look for a specific transaction but don't remember the exact date it occurred, so have to scroll through several pages to find what I'm seeking. A workaround is to export an Income Statement, then search or sort in Excel, but obviously that takes several extra steps and time. But since it's not costing me anything, this is a minor inconvenience.

Intuitive to use, great features and integrations, yet not for everyone

Comments: Wave was a joy to use, and it's free unless you need payroll! This is an excellent option for small businesses and contractors to get accounting / invoicing services very inexpensively, however note there are caveats that make Wave unattractive to some.

Pros:

The Wave interface is very intuitive to use, and there was no intimidation when dealing with complicated matters like invoicing or expense tracking. Out of the accounting services we tested, Wave had the best user interface. Additionally, the integrations with Zapier and PieSync are excellent.

Cons:

Bank reconciliation is known to be inaccurate with Wave, with many reports that data doesn't sync with the bank for months at a time. This is likely due to the banks breaking the connection with Wave's 3rd party service (Plaid) on a regular basis, but ultimately this is out of Wave's control.

Easy to use and helpful

Comments: Easy, almost fully automated bookkeeping. The invoicing and payment features automatically updates my books when I get paid, the bank connection means that I only have to reconcile my account to make sure everything is ok.

Pros:

This is great for the very new or very small business. It's easy to use and has all of the basic features that you will need for an unbeatable price. It's very easy to use and the documentation and support have been very helpful. There is no phone option but live chat is available and I have never had to wait more than a day for an e-mail response. It is truly free to use for accounting. You have the options of accepting credit card and bank payments for a very competitive rate. The only other cost is for payroll if you were to use that feature. The software is in active development and since I started using it they have added great features such as Invoicing app, recurring payments, and bank payments and it keeps getting better.

Cons:

Limited reporting, you get all of the basics that you will need to measure your financial health, receivables, etc but there are no custom reports. While you can very easily reconcile your bank account, you can't print a reconciliation report. There is no class/job tracking feature and while it looks like many users have requested it, it doesn't look like the developers are planning on implementing it anytime soon. So if your business needs this feature, this is not the right option for you.

Wave Accounting is a full-featured online bookkeeping web app.

Comments: Overall, Wave Accounting is an incredible, full-featured web-app and a free account is more than adequate for most small businesses. Upgrades would include payroll and some other things we don't use. We recommend it quite often to other small business owners.

Pros:

Wave Accounting is very easy to set up and understand, although we do not use all of the features available. We use Wave to track the day-to-day activity of our business, and then forward the information to our bookkeeper for further tracking.

Cons:

I would certainly suggest a few things. 1) Allow various levels of customer contacts: we are able to list a primary contact for each of our clients, but that person is not necessarily the person in charge of paying the bill. When sending through Wave, I can add in additional emails, but the software won't remember them; they need to be added in each time. 2) Emailed invoices go to the clients' SPAM folder quite often, even if they add in the Wave email as a safe sender. It would be nice to be able to add in SMTP server info so that emailed invoices would appear to come from our professional email. 3) There should be a way to VOID invoices where mistakes are made (duplicate invoices, cancelled jobs, etc.); at the moment, you would need to delete the invoice, but then it no longer exists which doesn't seem like a valid way of doing things.