Wave Accounting Reviews

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.

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.

The flexibility of being able to do invoice and quotes from anywhere

Online it sometimes lags depending on your internet speed.

The best thing about this software is its ease of use.

It is more like an expense and revenue tracker than an actual accounting software. It is limited when compared to the market in terms of journal entries and closing out accounting periods.

Wave is absolutely amazing! We started with a paid subscription for payroll and transitioned into the free version. Both are great and easy to use. They make tracking expenses and invoicing simple and quick. I used to spend hours every week inputting information into a manual system. Now, when an invoice is paid, it automatically goes into the income without me having to do anything. It is the best thing ever!

There is nothing that I dislike about the software. If there is something, I haven't found it yet!

It's very easy to use and implement. It's free for small businesses with fewer transactions.

It's not the best for reporting. I can't pull statements very easily.

After using wave accounting software I've observed many positive points regarding accounting general journal, general ledger, trial balance, posting into balance sheet, income statement, adjusting entries and closing entries.

As such I haven't found any major flaw in this accounting software yet but maybe there is a possibility and a probability to be faced in the future.

It is an accounting software that does not require much learning and is easy to use

The problem with this software is that sometimes its functionality becomes slow

It’s easy to use. 100% on the cloud you can even create an account with your gmail. It’s perfect for day to day money expenses and incomes tracking . And also very good for billing and invoicing the costumers. It’s a really good accounting software for startup and SMB

You can’t upload your stamp on the bill or invoice

Ease of use for someone with limited accounting software experience. Explains each module's function in an easy and understandable way.

If you are an experiences accounting software user, this will be too basic for you.

A perfect system for my one-person business. No feature bloat, everything is fast and lightweight. Bank account integration makes it easy to keep track of finances.

Nothing so far. It works just the way I need.

It was wonderfully easy to use, the invoices looked professional and payment processing features were handy.

TLDR: Major syncing, reconciling and support issues

Two of my accounts synced twice (so I had four accounts in Wave where there should have been two) and they were unable to fix this. Their suggested fixes did not work. They have chat and email support but no phone support and even though they logged in as an admin they were unable to fix this problem.
A recent update to their system caused my entire past four years of records to be unreconciled, and the only fix was to go back to the beginning of time and compare each transaction ever made.
They offered me a bookkeeper to do this for me for $269/month for a minimum of 12 months, despite my being very diligent about keeping my account up to date for the past four years.

I have switched to another system now.

Setting reminders to be sent to clients for payment is the most important feature from wave in my opinion. Also being able to create recurring invoices you you don't have to do the same thing every week or every month. My other favorite is customer statements. Pulling out customer statements and sending to your clients gives you points in terms of professionalism. I also appreciate that when Wave stopped operating in South Africa they recommended Zoho and gave us a year of free use of Zoho. Even though I did not like changing, this was a very thoughtful move by wave.

For some reason wave starting giving limited access to its South African customers and partnered with Zoho for customers to migrate. Even though the apps are similar, they're not the same and it took a little bit of time to now learn Zoho a new app.

This is a very complete software that allows you to build quotes and convert them into invoices in a fraction of a second without much effort.

Wave is excellent especially when it comes to credit card processing which is done automatically with a very low 1% fee.

It is very easy to set up and use and the cost is low or even free. Personally, I recommend buying this package because it comes with support: from setting up your account to the specific categories for your company .

The other advantage of Wave is the presence of a number of applications to send invoices when you are away from your workplace.

So even when you're away from home you can download them. In this case, all you have to do is take the photo on the spot.

The problem on the Wave software is not so numerous, but we notice that it is impossible to close a period correctly.

All members who are able to make transactions have the possibility to change or add entries from the previous year.

For me an administrator must have the ability to close a period so that no changes are made. User growth is also very limited.

The lack of audit trails for transaction entries is also a case of imperfection at Wave . Admittedly, it is possible to generate transactions, then generate reports, then cancel the transactions, etc.

But there is no proof that these changes are made yes or no, because the software is unable to remember its categorizations.

The keyword search function is absent from Wave in the transactions section and sometimes it makes us lose a lot of time.

It's everything I need in one place. As a small business, Wave is the best solution for me. I can invoice my clients for free, and easily keep my finances up-to-date making tax season worry free.

Wave no longer integrates with CapitalOne Spark Business accounts, so I have to manually upload two bank statements every month into Wave; One for my checking and one for my savings account, both of which are Spark.

It was free to use the accounting services
I was able to invoice customers using Stripe as a Payment Gateway which was great value
The Design and User Interface is very professional compared to others that I have seen
The Payment Gateway was also very professional when sent to customers, it added to the credibility of the business

My particular Bank would not allow me to sync my account with Wave, but that was a local issue not a general issue.
I was very very happy with the invoicing. but I always felt that the ledger views were not as robust.

It is so easy to use, and customized specifically for small business owners. I absolutely LOVE the invoice feature - it's the primary feature that I use - and it just works so well. My completed payments rate is 100% and I believe is at least in part due to how easy the process is to view/pay invoices.

Sometimes I wish the payment speed was faster after a client makes a payment, but then they introduced instant deposits and I'm happy to pay the small fee to get my money faster!

I loved Wave Accounting. There was seldom any problems and they had some great ideas on how to do things like bank recons, which are much easier than other accounting software.
And all for free. Can't beat that.

They were taken over by H&R Block and then it was downhill from there!

For a business owner, Wave Accounting is an amazing product. Basic features are free. This helps save money and it is easier to use than products like Quickbooks or Sage.

I wish some of the invoicing search features would be a little easier to use.

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!

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 is free, and packed with features one would typically pay for in other premium products. Wave is the perfect accounting solution for small businesses. For starters, it offers all the essential features ANY business needs... plus more. Manage estimates, invoices, and statements with ease. It even supports recurring invoicing, manage payments, and build a massive library of products and services to choose from for your estimates and invoices. Wave even manages receipts, bills and vendors to track expenses. Like more control than just simple single entries? Wave supports traditional double-entry accounting as well, for increase control of your business accounting needs. Need to accept credit card payments? Wave has a built-in merchant account feature that let's you collect payments online through your invoices. Make email invoices, or attach them as PDF files. And when you get paid, Wave notifies you. Funds are transferred to your connected business account in a couple of days. Reporting? Wave has you covered. All essential reports are available at your fingertips: financial statements, taxes, customers, vendors, and other general reports. And if your business has employees, Wave can handle your payroll. But this feature is a premium... everything else is part of your free account.

On the positive side, this software's functionality is almost up to par with other options that cost a lot of money. Wave is free and for that price what they offer is unbeatable. It is a fully featured accouting software, as it is a web app, it means multiple people can use it simultaniously and it also works great for a virtual team. I like that it is made with non-accountants in mind. For example, when entering transactions there are "Accounts" - but these are only Accounts as a nun-accountant will understand: Cash, Bank, Owners Investment etc. - everything else is called "Categories". This makes it easier for someone not too versed in finances to understand - but behind the scenes Categories are Accounts, just like they always were (e.g. Office Supply Expense Account) - small and simple changes like this make it very easy to use even for a financial analphabet. Two mobile apps compliment the accounting software, one for writing invoices on the go, the other for scanning and (auto)recording expense receipts.

On the downside, and this can be a big one, you are not able to properly close a period. This means anyone with permission to enter transactions can go and change entries from last year, or add some. This can make things really messy and I hope they add a function where an administrator can close a period such as a month, so that no more changes can be made. Further, you can add other users, but the type of users are quite limited. I wish this could be controlled on a more granular level, e.g. there is the option to add a 'viewer' who cannot edit anything. The next level is somoene who can enter all types of transactions (you can turn of access to bank entries and writing invoices) but it would be nice if there was one where I can let someone add receipts with the mobile app but not do anything else.

Wave is a great piece of accounting software that rivals Quickbooks and Xero. The biggest winner, which it obvious to anyone who has researched Wave as an accounting platform for their small business: it’s FREE! Both Quickbooks and Xero have fairly low-cost pricing models for small businesses that range all the way to fairly high-cost for larger businesses. Wave, on the other hand, is specifically tailored to the small business, and offers only features popular with those businesses. But, because of this, their base accounting software is completely free. Their only products you would be billed for would be payroll or credit card processing, both of which are priced competitively to Quickbooks/Intuit’s and Xero’s offerings as well.

Wave also offers a lot of the same features, including automatic bank and credit card feeds, customized charts of accounts, multiple businesses on one account, smart expense categorization (software learns over time), and more.

Wave does have its limitations and is more basic than Quickbooks or Xero, especially to us accountants who can see the glaring differences. However, even as an accountant and bookkeeper, I recommend Wave to a lot of my smaller clients whose biggest consideration is cost, simply because you can’t beat free. Plus, a lot of the additional features that offerings like Quickbooks or Xero feature, smaller businesses will not always utilize anyway, so Wave fits them perfectly. All-in-all, there are no large drawbacks.

This app has everything I need to do my small business bookkeeping, financial tracking, and reports. It is so easy to access on any device. Super useful for someone who's used to on-the-go applications like me. I can easily make an invoice anywhere I go because of the accessibility feature. I can also duplicate and change dates if I need to in order to make recurring invoices. There is a self-help that you can simply search for tips and strategies with very detailed and easy-to-follow instructions. Even non-professionals can simply rely on this app to calculate income and expenses. It auto-generates reports for income reports and balance sheets. I love how easy it is to enter my data or purchase receipts information and sort them by category. The best part is I can simply link my bank account to it so sorting income and expenses is a breeze! Editing is also a great feature for varying monthly income. Honestly, this is all you need to do your bookkeeping! You don't need a professional account or bookkeeper to catch up on your reports. This will surely save you from being audited. Reports are generated instantly so you need to wait longer.

I think maybe create a formula for reimbursement instead of multiple strategies to enter reimbursement. This will save entrepreneurs from getting to multiple entryways.

Wave allows me to keep track of finances for multiple enterprises - self-employment business, a non-profit, and personal finances. Each account was set up using the Wave wizard and very few changes have been made to the overall function beyond that. The non-profit I manage has a series of account codes that were easily added and applied to transactions. I use multiple income streams for my business and they are all imported automatically. Wave charges for things like payroll administration, credit card processing and bank transfers - all at industry standard rates - and that's how they keep the base platform free.

The mobile expense app helps me keep track of receipts and does a really excellent job of deciphering receipts, even in multiple languages and currencies! The mobile invoice app is great for sending quick invoices or following up with clients on payment.

Also allows viewing and reporting for authorized agents who can't change any data - a needed feature for the separation of financial powers required with most non-profit setups. My accountant can take a peek too.

One feature that is present in most accounting systems is the ability to categorize an expense as a reimbursed expense and then assign it to an invoice - at cost or with a markup. With Wave, I needed to set up a separate "reimbursed expenses" account and then - via double entry - add the expense onto invoices with a "reimbursed expense" account code. If entered at cost, the balances zero out in the reporting. If there is a markup, the income category is "reimbursed expense", which isn't helpful for year-end accounting.

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