FreshBooks vs Wave: Free Bookkeeping Breaks at Time Tracking

Wave Starter is the lower-cost choice for a solo service business that sends fixed-fee invoices and can enter bank transactions manually. FreshBooks becomes easier to justify when billable hours need to become invoice lines. TechRepublic’s comparison identifies built-in time tracking as a FreshBooks advantage and notes that Wave has no built-in time tracker. Its older subscription prices are unsuitable for a current budget.

Client count can force the decision before time tracking does. The FreshBooks pricing table shows normal U.S. monthly prices of $23 for Lite, with a five-client invoicing limit; $43 for Plus, with a 50-client limit; and $70 for Premium, with unlimited billable clients and project profitability. All three include time tracking. Additional team members cost $11 per person monthly, while standard U.S. card payments through FreshBooks Payments cost 2.9% plus $0.30 per transaction.

What Wave’s free plan covers

The Wave plan and payment schedule lists Starter at $0 with unlimited estimates, invoices, bills and bookkeeping records. Pro costs $19 a month in the U.S. or $190 with annual billing; its Canadian subscription is CAD $25 monthly or CAD $250 annually. Starter allows manual transaction entry. Pro adds automatic bank imports, transaction categorization, receipt capture and access for additional users. A bank must support Wave’s connection for automatic imports to work.

A free subscription does not make card acceptance free. For eligible U.S. Visa, Mastercard and Discover payments, Starter’s listed rate is 2.9% plus $0.60 per transaction. Pro waives the $0.60 fixed portion for the first ten cumulative eligible transactions in each monthly subscription period; subsequent transactions use the Starter fixed fee. That benefit saves at most $6 in a month under these terms, so bank automation, receipts or shared access must account for the rest of Pro’s subscription price. Online payment acceptance is subject to eligibility.

Where time and project work change the calculation

Wave can hold the revenue and expenses from an hourly engagement, but preparing an invoice from a separate time log requires another tool or manual entry. FreshBooks’ invoice instructions describe pulling unbilled time and related expenses from client projects into an invoice. The selected entries are then marked as billed, which helps prevent the same hours from being invoiced twice.

That workflow matters when a consultant bills many short sessions or an agency collects hours from several people on one client project. FreshBooks offers project-based time and billing on its lower plans, but its dedicated project profitability view is a Premium feature. Plus is the middle ground for a business that has outgrown Lite’s client limit or needs accounting reports, bank reconciliation and accountant access. A team seeking a profitability view should price Premium even if Plus has enough client capacity.

Three businesses at ordinary U.S. prices

These are illustrative calculations, not customer bills. Each business receives one eligible $1,000 card payment per active client every month for a year. The comparison uses normal month-to-month subscriptions, standard eligible card rates and any specified FreshBooks team-member charges. It excludes promotions, tax, other add-ons and the cost of any separate time-tracking product. Checks, bank payments and different card types would change the totals.

A new freelancer

Suppose a freelancer has three fixed-fee clients and receives three card payments monthly. Wave Starter has no subscription charge; its modeled processing fees total $1,065.60 for the year. FreshBooks Lite costs $276 in subscriptions and $1,054.80 in card fees, for $1,330.80 overall. The difference is $265.20. Lite fits within the client limit and supplies time billing if the work changes, but those features bring little value to this freelancer’s stated fixed-fee workflow. Wave Pro would add a subscription without reducing enough fixed card fees to pay for itself in this case.

A 20-client consultant

Suppose a consultant invoices 20 clients, each paying by card once a month. Lite’s client limit makes FreshBooks Plus the relevant plan. Plus costs $516 in subscriptions and $7,032 in modeled processing fees, or $7,548 for the year. Wave Starter totals $7,104. Wave Pro totals $7,260 after its $228 subscription and the fixed-fee waiver on the first ten eligible monthly payments. Plus therefore costs $444 more than Starter or $288 more than Pro. For an hourly consultant, the relevant question is whether generating invoices from tracked work and keeping projects together is worth that difference.

A small agency

Suppose an owner and three additional staff serve 40 clients, each making one eligible card payment monthly. Wave Pro’s modeled annual total is $14,364, including its subscription. It provides access for collaborators, but the agency still needs another way to record billable hours. FreshBooks Premium costs $840 for the base plan, $396 for the additional team members and $14,064 in card fees: $15,300 altogether. The $936 difference pays for an integrated time-billing workflow and access to project profitability. If the agency only needs tracked hours on invoices, Plus accommodates 40 clients and lowers the FreshBooks subscription cost, though it lacks that profitability view.

Annual billing and Canadian prices

Subscription frequency changes the annual comparison. The FreshBooks price schedule lists annual U.S. charges of $248.40 for Lite, $464.40 for Plus and $756 for Premium, below twelve ordinary monthly payments. It lists separate Canadian monthly prices of CAD $26, CAD $42 and CAD $72, respectively. Those annual rates should be compared with Wave’s annual Pro price if paying upfront is acceptable; the scenarios above consistently use monthly billing to show the continuing cost after introductory offers.

For a fixed-fee practice that can handle manual entries, Wave Starter keeps software spending at zero before payment fees. Wave Pro addresses bank imports and shared access without adding built-in time tracking. FreshBooks is the stronger fit when hours and project expenses must flow into client invoices; its client limits determine the entry plan, and Premium becomes relevant when the business needs project profitability. Canadian buyers need the CAD subscriptions and local payment terms rather than a conversion of the U.S. card-fee examples.