Xero is a genuinely good product, and on price the gap is narrower than most comparison pages admit. Priced on Xero's new rates from 1 October 2026, here is where each one wins — by seat count, by number of companies, and by where your QuickBooks file is coming from.
Try BizBooks Pro FreeOn 1 October 2026 Xero raises every US plan, for new and existing subscribers alike: Early $25 → $27 a month, Growing $55 → $59, Established $90 → $97. In the same change Xero removes its multi-organization discount, so a second business on Xero now costs a second full subscription. Its 90%-off introductory promotion runs until 30 September 2026. Every Xero figure below uses the 1 October prices, because that is what anyone deciding now will actually pay. Source: Xero's US pricing-plans update page, read 25 September 2026.
Most pages that compare a desktop product to Xero quietly pick Xero's top plan and stop there. We used to do it too — this page compared us against Established and ignored the plan most small businesses actually buy. Here are all three rungs, so you can find yours.
At one user, Professional is $168/year cheaper than Xero Growing and $624/year cheaper than Established. Over five years, with our rate locked and Xero's not, that is $2,700 against $3,540 or $5,820 — and those Xero totals assume October's prices hold for five years, which is generous to Xero, since this is a price increase for existing subscribers too.
Xero includes unlimited users on every plan, including Early at $27/month. BizBooks Pro Professional includes one user seat, and additional seats are $120/year each. So against Xero Growing at October's price: at one user we are $168/year cheaper, at two users we are $48/year cheaper ($660 against $708), and at three or more Xero is cheaper than we are ($780 against $708, and widening). If you have three people entering transactions, run that number before you read another word of this page.
Two things soften it and neither cancels it. An outside accountant or bookkeeper who connects to your books remotely as your advisor does not consume a seat — that access is free, and up to two advisors can be paired at a time. And your $540 covers five companies, where Xero bills a separate subscription per organisation and, from 1 October, no longer discounts the second one — so a two-entity business is comparing $540 against $1,416. But if what you need is three people typing into one company file, say so out loud and price it properly.
The comparison above starts at our Professional tier because that is the like-for-like match on capacity. But plenty of people arrive here pricing the bottom rung against the bottom rung — BizBooks Pro Basic at $299/year against Xero Early at $27/month — and on that pairing we do not want you to find out the answer somewhere else.
At October's price Early is $324/year against Basic's $299, so for a single user Basic wins by $25 a year and $1,495 against $1,620 over five years. But Early includes unlimited users, and Basic includes one seat with $120/year for the next. A two-person business on Basic pays $419 against Early's $324. If you are two people, invoicing modestly, running one set of books, Xero Early is the cheaper choice and we would rather tell you than have you work it out after you have paid us.
Here is where it turns, and it turns hard. Xero Early is not a small version of Xero — it is a metered one. It stops you at 20 invoices and 5 bills per month. Send a twenty-first invoice in March and you are on Growing at $59/month, which is $708/year against our $540, and the five-year comparison inverts immediately. And one Xero subscription covers one organisation: a second business is a second full subscription, with no multi-organization discount from 1 October, while Basic carries two companies and Professional carries five for one price.
So the honest summary of the entry rung is this. Under 20 invoices a month, one company, two or more people typing: take Xero Early. One person, or over 20 invoices a month, or a second set of books, or you want the file on your own machine rather than in someone's cloud — the arithmetic moves to us and stays there, because our rate is locked for twelve years and Xero is raising every plan on 1 October 2026. See what Basic and Professional actually include →
Xero's strongest move against a QuickBooks user is not its software. It is that Xero pays to move your books for you. Since March 2026 its preferred migration partner is Q2X, and the base conversion is fully subsidised by Xero (Q2X values it at $250). Q2X states that all historical data is migrated — customers, vendors, chart of accounts, invoices, bills, payments, journal entries, items, classes and more. That is a real, generous offer, and if you are on QuickBooks Online it is hard to beat. We are not going to pretend otherwise.
The free conversion is built for QuickBooks Online. Desktop costs extra, and Enterprise is not supported.
Q2X's own terms: "If you have QuickBooks Desktop, additional fees apply" (its Desktop-to-Online migration support is $100), and "QuickBooks Enterprise is not supported." Its published does-not-convert list includes projects, budgets, integrations, recurring schedules, bank rules, terms, time activities, purchase orders and tax agencies, with attachments and tracked inventory listed as coming soon.
We take QuickBooks Desktop — Pro, Premier and Enterprise — and QuickBooks Online directly, in one hop. You can run the import yourself: it reads IIF, CSV, XLSX, QIF, QFX and QBO, auto-maps your accounts, customers, vendors, items and classes, checks for duplicates before it commits, and can roll a whole import back. Or hand it to us, free: we bring your balances across as of a fiscal year end you choose, then every transaction since then in full detail, inside your own installation, and give you a tie-out report showing every account, your A/R and A/P and your bank balances next to what QuickBooks said.
Read what actually transferred when we tested every alternative's QuickBooks Desktop path →
So the honest split is this. On QuickBooks Online with a long history you want moved line by line: Xero's free Q2X conversion is the stronger offer. On QuickBooks Desktop or Enterprise, or if you want to see the numbers agree before you commit: that is where we are built to win. Either way, check the result against your old balances. The tie-out report is our way of doing that check for you.
| Feature | BizBooks Pro | Xero |
|---|---|---|
| Price (Annual) | $540 — locked 12 years | $708 Growing / $1,164 Established (from 1 Oct 2026) |
| Free done-for-you QuickBooks migration | ✓ Desktop (incl. Enterprise) and Online, with a tie-out report | ⚠ Online free and all history; Desktop extra fees; Enterprise not supported |
| User seats included | ⚠ 1 (extra seats $120/yr) | ✓ Unlimited, every plan |
| Outside accountant / bookkeeper access | ✓ Free, does not use a seat (up to 2) | ✓ Free |
| GAAP & IFRS Double-Entry | ✓ Both Standards | ⚠ IFRS-focused |
| Unlimited Invoices | ✓ Every plan | ⚠ Growing and up (Early caps at 20/mo) |
| Bill Tracking | ✓ | ✓ |
| Bank Reconciliation | ✓ | ✓ |
| Automatic Bank Feeds | ✓ Two networks, all plans — US institutions | ✓ Broader international coverage |
| Financial Reports | ✓ | ✓ |
| Multi-Currency | ✓ | ✓ |
| Inventory | ✓ Every plan, no item limit — reorder points and Shopify sync included | ⚠ Capped at 4,000 items; purchase orders, reorder lists and store sync need the paid Inventory Plus add-on (not offered on Early) |
| Online Payments | ✓ (Stripe) | ✓ |
| 12-Year Price Lock | ✓ | ✗ |
| Desktop App (Local Data) | ✓ | ✗ (Cloud only) |
| Install on as many of your own machines as you like | ✓ No device count | ✓ Browser, any device |
| Multi-Company (Same Account) | ✓ 5 on Professional, 30 on Enterprise | ✗ One subscription per organisation |
| Works with no internet connection | ✓ | ✗ Cloud only |
| Mobile app (iOS / Android) | ✗ Browser access only | ✓ |
| Third-party app marketplace | ⚠ Small and growing | ✓ Large ecosystem |
| Self-Learning AI Assistant | ✓ Community-powered | ⚠ JAX (cloud-only) |
Pro, Premier and Enterprise files come across in one hop, not via QuickBooks Online first. Do it yourself, or let us do it free and hand you a tie-out report of every balance against QuickBooks.
A desktop install with a local PostgreSQL database. It opens with the internet down, which one of our customers needed literally — he moves data between his office and his bookkeeper by file, on purpose.
Xero raises every plan on 1 October 2026, existing subscribers included; Established goes to $97/month. Our annual rate is locked for twelve years at purchase, so the five-year number on this page is the number you will actually pay.
Xero charges a full subscription per organisation, and drops its multi-organization discount on 1 October 2026. Professional holds five companies for $540, Enterprise thirty, and entities under common ownership are exempt from the count entirely, however many the group holds.
Three cases, and none of them are close.
You need three or more people entering transactions. Xero includes unlimited users on every plan and we charge $120 per additional seat. At three users Xero Growing is cheaper than Professional, and the gap widens from there. Buy Xero.
You are on QuickBooks Online and want every past transaction moved line by line. Xero's free Q2X conversion migrates all of your history. Ours brings balances at your cutover date plus two years in detail, with a tie-out report. If the full transaction history in the new system matters more to you than the proof, their offer is better than ours.
You run your business from a phone, or your workflow depends on a specific third-party app. Xero has native mobile apps and a much larger marketplace. We are a desktop product with browser access, and our integration list is short. Check whether the app you rely on is on our list before you decide.
What is left is the case we are built for: a business leaving QuickBooks Desktop, one or two people in the books, more than one entity, and a preference for owning the data file. If that is you, the arithmetic and the migration both point our way.
Import your QuickBooks file yourself, or book a free white-glove migration and check our tie-out report before you pay anything. No credit card required.