3 Best Accounting Software & Tools 2023

We've switched business CPAs (Accountants) a handful of times over the past decade in business, as our personal and business needs have evolved over time.

Having tried everyone from the expensive big accounting firms, all the way down to the small boutique family offices, there has always been something missing.

Think of Gelt as the experience of the small boutique family office, with the experience of the big accounting firms (with the price somewhere in-between the two).

Gelt is a modern accounting firm that leverages modern software to do your business and personal taxes better.

They have a robust personal dashboard (similar to that of Compound), so you can aggregate all of your business and personal finances (even angel investment tracking), all in one place.

Their strategic help has easily saved us $20k in taxes, just on the advice we were given the first year. No other accountant has their own modern tech, nor have they been this helpful in actually working with the unique needs of our complex financial situation.

We find that teams based in the US tend to use QuickBooks Online, and businesses outside of the US tend to lean more toward Xero.

This is important because it means that the features QBO is building is more focused on things like US Sales Tax laws, while Xero may have more accounting features helpful outside of the US especially.

Also, accountants inside of the US are often more proficient with QBO as compared to Xero (although they should be familiar with both).

P.S. We highly recommend QBO over QuickBooks Desktop because of their robust API—you're not going to be integrating QuickBooks Desktop easily with anything.

Expense Management

Rating: _D-

Some people have mentioned that QuickBooks Online allows for some expense management features like virtual credit cards, that said, a tool like Bill Spend & Expense (formerly Divvy) does so much more for expense management than simply allowing for a one-off virtual card though. Unlike QBO, a proper expense management tool allows you to go deeper, as it ties in individual and team budgets (across the entire company), all to ensure your company only allocates what they have budgeted for.

Receipt Matching

QBO also does not have proper receipt matching that automatically ties the receipt from your email to the individual transaction.

Credit Card Rewards

QBO does not have credit card rewards with their virtual credit card solution either.

We find that teams based outside of the US tend to use Xero, and businesses inside the US tend to lean more toward QuickBooks Online.

This is important because it means that the features QBO is building is more focused on things like US Sales Tax laws, while Xero may have more accounting features helpful outside of the US especially.

Also, accountants outside of the US are often more proficient with Xero as compared to QBO (although they should be familiar with both).