Plan finder
Which QuickBooks plan do you actually need?
Four questions. No email, no signup. The answer comes from the things that genuinely differ between tiers — user seats, inventory, projects and payroll — not from the feature list length.
Your answers
0 of 4 answeredSimple Start
$38/month list price · 1 user + accountant
Recommendation only — you can switch plans at any time, and prices are the US list prices checked in October 2026.
What actually changes
The four differences that decide your tier
Ignore the long feature grid for a moment. Between the plans, four things really change — and only two of them are hard to live without.
| What changes | Where it starts | Why it matters | Can you work around it? |
|---|---|---|---|
| User seats | 1 → 3 → 5 → 25 | Anyone who needs a login is a seat, including your bookkeeper unless they use the free accountant login | Partly — accountant access is free on every plan |
| Inventory | Plus ($140) | Stock counts, purchase orders, cost of goods and item receipts live here and nowhere lower | No — moving later means re-entering items |
| Project profitability | Plus ($140) | Profit per job or client, not just a total at the bottom of the P&L | Clumsily — with class tags on Plus only, spreadsheets below |
| Bill management & multi-currency | Essentials ($85) | Entering supplier bills, scheduling payment, and invoicing in a second currency | Tediously — a spreadsheet and a manual journal |
Everything else — reports, dashboards, mobile app, bank feeds — improves gradually between tiers and is rarely the reason to upgrade. See the full price list →
Where people go wrong
The upgrade trap, and how to avoid it
The most expensive mistake is not picking a tier too high — you can downgrade. It is picking a tier that cannot hold your data, then rebuilding your books three months later when the business outgrows it.
Buying Plus for two users
Common and usually unnecessary. Plus is about inventory and job costing, not about being "the good plan". Two users on Essentials saves $55 a month — $660 a year.
Starting on Simple Start with stock
The opposite mistake, and the expensive one. Items, quantities and cost of goods cannot be retro-fitted cleanly — you end up re-entering a year of purchases.
Buying Advanced for the support line
Advanced costs $340 a month largely for seats, permissions and automation. If what you want is human help, a bookkeeper on retainer is cheaper and more useful.
Rule of thumb by headcount
- 1 person, services: Simple Start
- 1 person, side business: Solopreneur ($20/mo)
- 2–3 people: Essentials
- 4–5 people, or any stock: Plus
- 6+ people, approvals, multi-entity: Advanced
These are starting points, not rules. Inventory and project costing override headcount every time.
Test it, do not guess. Start the trial on the tier you think you need, enter a week of real transactions, and check that the report you care about exists. Switching later is easy; rebuilding is not.
Plan questions
The decisions owners hesitate over
What is the difference between Simple Start and Essentials?
Simple Start is one user with invoicing, bank feeds and basic reports. Essentials adds three users, bill management, time tracking on invoices and multi-currency. If anyone else needs to log in — a partner, a bookkeeper, an office manager — you need Essentials or above.
When do I need Plus?
Plus is the tier for inventory, project profitability, and five users. It is also the most common destination for product-based businesses and service firms that bill by job. If you track stock or want profit per project, this is the realistic starting point.
Is Advanced worth $340 a month?
Only if you need what it unlocks: up to 25 users, custom roles and permissions, batch invoicing, workflow automation, and consolidated reporting. Below roughly 10 staff, most businesses get more value from Plus plus a bookkeeper than from Advanced.
Can I start small and upgrade later?
Yes, and that is usually the cheapest path. Data carries over when you upgrade. The mistake to avoid is starting on a tier that cannot do the one thing you need — inventory tracking, for example — and rebuilding your books three months in.
Still torn between two plans?
Start the trial on the lower one. Upgrading takes one click and keeps your data — downgrading after entering inventory data does not work the same way.