The Best Restaurant Accounting Software: Top 10 Compared for 2024

• Inventory Tracking: Stock quantities are automatically updated when items are invoiced, making it a more efficient and accurate restaurant accounting solution for managing inventory across multiple platforms like Shopify, Squarespace, BarCloud, and 2Ship.
• Invoicing: Create professional invoices, send them to clients, and accept online payments. The system tracks when clients view invoices, simplifying payment follow-ups. FreshBooks also integrates with payment gateways like PayPal for seamless online payments.
• Late Payment Reminders: For large bookings and restaurant buyouts, you can automate late payment reminders. Customize your messages, set a schedule, and let FreshBooks handle the rest.
• Expense Tracking: Log and categorize expenses in your restaurant. It automatically imports expenses from bank accounts or credit cards, simplifying tracking. Plus, you can categorize tax expenses and attach receipts for organized financial records.

FreshBooks offers four main pricing plans:

• Lite: The FreshBooks Lite plan is best for small restaurant businesses. It includes unlimited invoicing, estimates, and time tracking for accurate billing.
• Plus: The Plus Plan allows you to automatically capture receipt data, invite your professional accountant, and run financial and accounting reports.
• Premium: The FreshBooks Premium Plan is ideal for growing restaurants. It offers unlimited clients and recurring invoices for managing regular deliveries and subscriptions.
• Select: FreshBooks Select caters to established restaurants seeking more control over finances. It offers lower credit card processing fees and capped bank transfer charges, reducing operational costs. It also has a dedicated account manager who provides personalized support, ensuring your restaurant’s needs are met.

FreshBooks charges extra fees on top of their monthly subscription plans. These include fees for each credit card payment and possible charges if you make more than a certain number of monthly bank transfers.

You can try FreshBooks for free during their 30-day free trial or sign up and get 60% off your first 4 months.

FreshBooks accounting software is best suited for small to mid-sized restaurants with the ability to save customer cards for easy customer tab management.

• Inventory Management: Track ingredients, automate purchase orders, manage recipe costing, streamline inventory control, and reduce waste.
• Mileage Tracking: Simplify tracking mileage for expense reports through GPS tracking via the mobile app, manual entry, and inputting starting and ending odometer readings for company vehicle trips.
• Delivery Management (RouteIQ): Zoho integrates with RouteIQ to optimize delivery routes, consider real-time traffic conditions, and provide mobile apps for drivers.
• Reporting & Analytics: Generate customizable reports to track sales performance, identify trends, and make data-driven decisions about your restaurant business.

Zoho offers four paid plans with various features and a free plan perfect for businesses that are just getting started.

• Free: Forever free, this plan is perfect for startups and cafes with basic accounting needs. It allows for creating and sending invoices, managing bills, and tracking expenses.
• Standard: The Standard plan builds on the Free plan with features like purchase orders, sales tax tracking, customer credit limits, and basic inventory management.
• Professional: This is for established restaurants requiring advanced inventory management features like recipe costing and low-stock alerts. It also offers project tracking to analyze profitability by menu item or event.
• Premium: Designed for restaurant chains seeking advanced features like multi-location management, consolidated reporting, and advanced automation tools.

Zoho accounting is ideal for restaurants or food trucks that require integrated mileage tracking at an affordable price point.

• Real-Time Cash Flow Monitoring: Get a real-time overview of your restaurant’s financial health, including income, expenses, and cash flow.
• Simplified Record Keeping: Automate tasks such as bill payments, tax calculations, and invoice creation to minimize manual data entry.
• Integrated Payroll Management: Process payroll directly using Xero. It calculates taxes, deductions, and leave entitlements, saving you time and ensuring accuracy.
• Seamless Integrations: Xero connects with over 1000 hospitality apps, including inventory management, point-of-sale systems, and delivery platforms.

Xero offers tiered pricing plans to suit businesses of various sizes. When you sign up for a plan, you also get 70% off for your first six months.

• Early: The early plan is ideal for small restaurants and cafes just starting. It comes with basic features like invoicing, expense tracking, and financial reporting for up to 20 invoices and 5 bills per month.
• Growing: Suitable for small to medium-sized restaurants, catering companies, and food production businesses that require more advanced features like multi-user access, repeating invoices, and integrations with popular restaurant POS systems and HR software.
• Established: The Xero Established plan is designed for larger, more complex food businesses such as multi-location restaurant groups, food distributors, and manufacturers.

Xero is great for restaurant management because it’s easy to use, can automate many tasks, and works well with other restaurant apps.

• Inventory Management: Track inventory levels, manage recipes, and calculate both theoretical and actual food costs to identify areas for cost optimization and improve profitability.
• Vendor Contract Verification: Reduce payment errors with automatic invoice verification against pre-defined vendor contracts, ensuring you only pay the agreed-upon prices.
• Integrated Accounting: Manage all your restaurant’s financial operations within a single platform, including accounts payable and receivable, general ledger, and financial reporting.
• Customer Relationship Management (CRM): Build customer profiles, track loyalty points, and manage marketing campaigns to strengthen customer relationships and boost sales.

Restaurant365 provides three pricing tiers:

• Essential: Ideal for new restaurants, this plan offers core accounting features, inventory management, and POS integration to centralize finances and operations.
• Professional: Suitable for growing restaurants, this plan adds features like vendor contract verification and CRM tools to strengthen customer relationships and optimize costs.
• Custom: Restaurant365’s Custom plan offers tailored solutions with add-ons for specific business needs, allowing restaurants to customize their package further based on unique requirements and scale of operations

Restaurant365’s pricing plans may not be the most budget-friendly option compared to Zoho or QuickBooks.

Restaurant365 is a perfect fit for large restaurants, especially those growing or managing multiple locations that are prioritizing keeping accurate financial records.

• Cash-flow Management: Powerful cash-flow management tools allow food businesses to track income, expenses, and outstanding invoices in real-time.
• Reporting: QuickBooks provides various customizable reports, including profit and loss statements, sales reports, and inventory reports.
• Mileage Tracking: Automatically capture business trips and errands, such as delivering orders or picking up supplies. It uses GPS to track mileage and provides tips on choosing the best deduction method.
• Inventory Management: Automatic inventory tracking regulates cash flow, allowing food businesses to know what’s going out, coming in, and when supplies are running low.
• Project Profitability Tracking: Track costs and revenue associated with specific projects or events, such as catering services or product launches, which helps you monitor your profits and make better business decisions.
• Invoicing and Payment Processing: Create and send professional invoices, accept online payments, and track invoice status for efficient billing and cash collection

QuickBooks offers four subscription plans tailored to different restaurant businesses. At the moment you can get 70% off your first 3 months when you sign up to QuickBooks.

• Simple Start: This plan is ideal for brand-new restaurants or cafes with basic accounting needs. It is best suited for sole proprietorships or single-location startups with a single sales channel, such as in-person dining.
• Plus: Designed for growing food businesses that require inventory management, project profitability tracking, and budgeting. This plan connects all sales channels and includes 5 users.
• Advanced: The Advanced plan is perfect for larger food businesses needing advanced reporting, workflow automation, and dedicated support. It supports up to 25 users.

You can try QuickBooks for free for 30 days.

QuickBooks is best for small restaurant businesses looking for basic accounting features to handle their accounting needs.

• Tax Capabilities: Wave supports automated sales tax calculations and guides tax filings and payments. It also generates W2 and 1099 tax forms for employees and contractors, simplifying the tax preparation process.
• Mobile App Invoicing: Create invoices with the Wave mobile app and send them directly to clients from your phone or tablet, ensuring efficient invoice processing.
• Automated Bank Feeds: Seamlessly connect to business bank accounts and credit cards. This automatically imports transactions and eliminates the need for manual data entry.
• Double-Entry Accounting: Wave uses double-entry accounting, which is preferred by accountants and beneficial for tax purposes. This method ensures accurate financial records and provides a comprehensive view of a business’s financial health.
• Invoicing: The robust invoicing tool that allows users to create professional, customizable invoices and send them to clients via email. It supports recurring billing, payment tracking, and automatic late payment reminders, streamlining the invoicing process.

Wave offers two plans, a free plan and a pro plan with added functionalities.

• Starter: This plan is ideal for absolute beginners or restaurants on a tight budget. It allows you to create and manage invoices, bills, and essential bookkeeping records for free.
• Pro: The Pro plan is ideal for restaurants looking to simplify their financial processes. You get everything in the Starter plan plus valuable features like accepting online payments at a discounted rate, automatic bank transaction importing and categorization, and the ability to digitally capture receipts.

Wave’s pricing plans are budget-friendly, with a forever-free Starter plan ideal for absolute beginners.

Wave accounting software is best suited for small-scale food businesses due to its superb free plan that offers basic features for restaurant operations.

• Automated Payment Reminders: Set up automated email or SMS reminders for overdue payments, ensuring timely fee collection from your VIP clientele.
• Accounts Payable: Bonsai includes tools for managing accounts payable, enabling users to track and pay bills, and automating payment reminders.
• Client Management: Comprehensive client management system that streamlines client workflow, including CRM, proposals, contracts, and retainers.
• Automated Appointment Scheduling: Integrate your Bonsai calendar with your website, allowing VIP clients to book reservations based on your availability conveniently.
• Contract Management with Templates: Access a library of pre-designed contract templates to customize service agreements, membership terms, or event catering proposals.

Bonsai offers a 7-day free trial to test the software. If you sign up for a plan, you get your first two months free.

• Starter: Ideal for freelancers or solopreneurs dipping their toes into catering, this plan offers basic invoicing, expense tracking, and project management—perfect for managing finances for small-scale events.
• Professional: Get additional features like client portals, contract templates, and automated appointment scheduling. It’s suitable for growing catering businesses.
• Business: Advanced features like team collaboration tools and custom invoice branding. It’s perfect for established catering companies or VIP restaurants.

Optional add-ons:

• Team Seats ($10/month per user) for collaborative work
• Bonsai Tax ($10/month) to simplify tax preparation with expense tracking and write-off identification.

Bonsai’s accounting software shines for businesses that prioritize exceptional client experiences. Catering companies and VIP restaurants benefit most from its strengths.

• Payment Tracking: Robust payment tracking capabilities allow users to monitor payment statuses, track transaction history, and ensure timely payments to vendors and suppliers.
• Pay Over Time: Spread vendor payments over 12 monthly or 30 bi-weekly installments, ensuring smooth cash flow management without compromising vendor relationships.
• Free Bill Management: Organize and track all your bills in one place. You can simplify invoice management from various vendors, ensuring timely payments and avoiding late fees.
• Accounts Receivable: Melio supports accounts receivable functionalities, enabling businesses to send invoices, track customer payments, and manage receivables effectively.
• Payment Processing: Secure and convenient payment processing, offering multiple payment options, such as ACH transfers, credit/debit cards, and checks, to ensure flexibility and ease of transactions.

Melio keeps things simple with a pay-as-you-go pricing structure. You’ll only incur fees for specific transactions, with no monthly subscriptions or hidden costs. Here’s a breakdown of their charges:

• Free: ACH bank transfers and check delivery (for the first two checks each month).

Transaction Fees:

• Pay by card: 2.9%
• Instant transfer (up to $50): 1.5%
• Fast ACH bank transfer (up to $30): 1%
• Fast check: $20
• International payments: $20 flat fee

Melio is perfect for startups and small restaurants on a tight budget.

• Intelligent GL with AI: Swiftly improve your business strategy and operations without requiring manual input. This AI detection report works by analyzing several transactions in your restaurant to identify and indicate anomalies for specific activities, allowing you to audit your data continuously.
• Rich Dashboard and Reporting Insights: View real-time data and provide vital insights into your business’s performance. One of the best features of this report is the ability to modify the dashboard to your restaurant’s preferences.
• Automatic Order Management: The automated order management follows a single manual entry while every other output is generated automatically. Once you’ve inputted orders as they come in, Sage automatically categorizes the data, distributing them to order fulfillment, billing, revenue accounting, and all the other necessary places.

Sages offers three plans that you can upgrade or cancel at any time. When you sign up, you receive your first 2 months free.

• Accounting Start – This plan is suitable for home bakers, as this plan only allows one user access. It includes quick invoice creation and finance tracking.
• Accounting Standard – This plan is suitable for small restaurant businesses as it includes unlimited users, VAT calculation, and forecasting cash flow.
• Accounting Plus – This is the plan most small restaurant owners would choose as it includes inventory management and multiple-currency capabilities.

Sage is highly recommended for restaurants looking for dependable, versatile, and innovative accounting software that will work flawlessly with their restaurant management systems.

• Multi-Location Management: Quickly spot trends and financial performance of all your restaurant stores in just one place—the NetSuite reporting dashboard without paperwork or manual data entry.
• Customer Relationship Management: NetSuite’s CRM tool is in-depth and broad, providing valuable insight into your customers’ behavior. The guest service dashboard lets you better understand your restaurant’s guest behavior.
• Restaurant Inventory: Real-time monitoring of spending preserves your business’s profitability without waste. It tracks ingredient inventory from purchase to plate with various recipe types, multiple units of measure, transfers, and dashboard KPIs.

NetSuite only offers custom pricing due to its multitude of customization options. While there is no free plan, you can access its free product tour to understand its features in action without signing up.

NetSuite is suitable for restaurants with multiple locations that need to gain valuable financial insight from their different stores through automation.

Given the perishable nature of restaurant ingredients, robust inventory management is essential. Choose a restaurant inventory management software solution that helps track inventory levels, generates reorder alerts, and integrates with suppliers for seamless restocking.

Restaurant staff often have varied roles and compensation structures. Seek software that simplifies payroll calculations, manages tips and gratuities, and ensures compliance with labor laws and regulations. This feature reduces the risk of errors, ensures accurate compensation, and keeps you compliant with labor laws.

Detailed reporting capabilities provide insights into your restaurant’s financial health. You’ll want to ensure you can generate reports on sales, expenses, profitability by menu item, labor costs, and more. This feature allows you to identify trends, optimize pricing, control costs, and make informed decisions to improve profitability.

A seamless connection between the accounting software and restaurant POS systems is essential for accurate revenue tracking. Ensure the software integrates with your POS to reconcile sales data efficiently. This feature eliminates manual data entry, reduces errors, and provides real-time visibility into your restaurant’s performance.