Best Church Accounting Software 2023 (2024)

Aplos plans range from $99 to 189 per month or more. You must ask for a quote for higher-tiered plans. Aplos offers key features for managing church finances. They include restricted fund allocation and budgeting, donation tracking, payroll management, online giving forms, financial and giving reports, event registration, accounts payable and receivable, pledge tracking, recurring giving, text and online giving and income and expense allocations.

Using Aplos’ CRM tools, you can create a member and donor database with profiles. Profiles house details including household relationships, group or ministry involvement, volunteer preferences, key dates and notes. You can also create people lists for member segments, such as those who’ve recently started tithing or joined a class. Automated reminders, email templates, letter-creation tools and bulk texting help you personalize outreach and donation requests.

Who should use it:

Large churches that are struggling to know and engage their tithing parishioners should consider Aplos for their church accounting needs.

PowerChurch offers both software packages for Windows PC installation and online software that can be used on any computer. Installed software is $395 per year. PowerChurch Online is $39.95 per month (or $455 per year). Additional add-ons cost more. For example, nursery or church event check-in stations are $14.95 per month. You must also pay $25 per month for every two users added above the included two-user limit.

PowerChurch offers full-featured accounting software with general ledger, bill pay, income management, payroll processing tax management, donor pledge and giving management, statement generation and printing capabilities. It also offers secure recurring gift and donor privacy features.

However, PowerChurch doesn’t just focus on the functionalities churches need for accounting. The software also offers an events calendar with events and membership management tools and record-keeping tools for church assets, sermons, libraries and even music.

Who should use it:

Churches looking for an all-in-one church-tailored platform for keeping church records, managing church events and membership, and performing all essential church accounting functions should consider PowerChurch.

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FreshBooks’ Lite Plan is $17 per month (50 percent off for the first six months during the current promotion) and offers unlimited expenses and invoices, five clients, credit card and bank transfer payment processing, sales tax reports and an iOS and Android app. Higher-tiered plans range from $30 to $55 per month (also 50 percent off for the first six months during the current promotion) and add features such as double-entry accounting, the ability to invite your accountant, more clients, recurrent billing, email templates and bill tracking and payments.

FreshBooks’ award-winning customer support means you never struggle to get assistance. You can expect a live human to answer the phone within two seconds, then zero hold time. Before a human answers, there are no endless runarounds with prerecorded messages and requests to push different buttons. When you email, you can expect a response within two hours. You can also seek support via live chat, webinars and a knowledge base.

One more notable feature is FreshBooks’ highly customizable invoices. Churches can use these invoices to earn added revenue for weddings, funerals and other events. The only downfall here is the limitations on the number of clients you can invoice at one time. However, you can delete a client to make room for more, then easily undelete recurring clients as you need to invoice them.

Learn more: Read our full FreshBooks review.

Who should use it:

FreshBooks is best for churches that need extra support as a result of little experience in church accounting or accounting software. It is also a great option for churches pulling in and needing to manage extra funds earned via paid events such as weddings or funerals.

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On Xero's Website

Xero’s $13-per-month Early plan, which is 50 percent off for the first three months during the current promotion, offers the ability to pay up to five bills, send quotes and 20 invoices, capture bills and receipts, and get a snapshot of short-term cash flow. Its second- and third-tier plans are $37 and $70 per month, respectively (which are 50 percent off for the first six months during the current promotion), and add bank and transaction reconciliation, support for multiple currencies, project tracking, expense claims and in-depth analytics. You can add payroll processing for $40 per month, plus $6 per employee.

For churches that manage projects, such as adding facilities to the church campus or responding to natural disasters, Xero’s $65-per-month Established plan offers unique value. It can track project expenses and perform in-depth financial planning for projects. Features include time tracking and reports, budget building and estimates, customized quotes (so donors know the need), cost linking to jobs and projects, and reports that show how every donor dollar is spent.

Learn more: Read our full Xero review.

Who should use it:

Churches that need to track expenses around projects for which parishioners or donors have earmarked their donations should consider Xero for their accounting software.

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Zoho Books offers a free plan for one user. With it, you can receive payments, automate payment reminders, send recurring invoices, track expenses and mileage, import bank and credit card payments, pull reports, customize invoices and manage contractors. Zoho’s paid plans range from $15 to $240 per month (if billed annually) and add features such as workflow automation, project-expense tracking, tax figuring, in-depth analytics and customizable reports.

Zoho Books’ standout feature is its automation capabilities. Churches can use this feature to save time (and, so, money), eliminate late fees and error-proof their accounting. You can set rules to automate your church accounting such as rules to automate payments, categorize transactions and auto-charge cards for recurring transactions. Other automation tools are sprinkled throughout the software. For example, plans offer automated tax calculations.

Learn more: Read our full Zoho Books review.

Who should use it:

Churches that want to save money and error-proof their accounting via easy-to-use intelligent automations should consider Zoho Books.

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Intuit QuickBooks’ Simple Start plan is $30 per month (which includes 50 percent off for the first three months during the current promotion) and offers expense tracking, invoicing and payment processing, tax deductions, reporting, receipt capture, mileage tracking, cash flow reports, estimates and the ability to manage contractor payments. Its higher-tiered plans range from $55 to $200 per month (also 50 percent off for the first three months during the current promotion) and have useful features such as added users, bill management, employee expense tracking and analytics.

QuickBooks for Church offers the ability to tag donor dollars for a committee, program or worship fund. The restricted fund dashboard gives the name of the donor, the ministry or project the donation is intended for, the donor’s contact information and the donation amount. Donors can send restricted funds via credit or debit card, ACH transfers, online or off-line. Expense tagging then allows churches to account for where donor dollars are spent.

Learn more: Read our full QuickBooks review.

Who should use it:

Churches that have multiple ministries to which donors contribute should consider QuickBooks’ church version for their accounting software.

Realm has three plans. In its most affordable plan, you can create church member and staff profiles and offer a selection of donation methods, devices and even schedules. You can also track donations on giving dashboards, enter and manage donor pledges and manage restricted funds. Its Connect plan further allows churches to engage members in personalized ways. Finally, its top-tier Multiply plan has tools to manage multi-campus church membership and funding.

Realm offers 30 customizable church- and ministry-specific report templates. You can save predefined church reports in the Realm ministry management software, then customize them and save them for reuse. Finally, Realm’s church accounting and payroll reporting software allows churches to select standard accounting reports, then customize them based on time periods, funds, core accounts and departments.

Who should use it:

Churches that rely heavily on reporting to inform staff and members on the church’s financial standing and spending should consider Realm’s accounting software.

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Wave Accounting stands out due to its free accounting tools. Its free plan offers unlimited income and expense tracking, key reports such as Profit and Loss reports, the ability to add unlimited collaborators, cash flow tracking and an intuitive dashboard. It also offers automated payment reminders, credit card, bank and Apple Pay payments or donations acceptance and a mobile app for depositing checks and finance tracking.

Wave’s free accounting tools make it best for startup churches with few employees and basic accounting needs. As churches grow, they can add a Payroll plan for $20 or $35 per month, depending on the state. To learn more about fulfilling their accounting responsibilities, growing churches can also access Wave’s accounting and payroll coaching services for a one-time fee of $329, bookkeeping support for $149 per month and tax services starting at $899.

Learn more: Read our full Wave Accounting review.

Who should use it:

Wave Accounting is best for very small churches with zero budget to cover accounting software.

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On Quicken's Website

Quicken offers plans ranging from $4.99 per month to $9.99 per month (40 percent off during the current promotion), billed annually. Its $4.99-per-month Deluxe plan is a desktop app for Windows and Mac with a mobile companion for iOS or Android devices. Its features include the ability to automatically categorize expenses and income, tag spending groups, create multiple budgets, track bills and subscriptions, project cash flow, track tax-related spending and transactions and access a variety of reports.

Quicken also offers other premium plans for under $10 per month. These plans have advanced church-specific features, such as calendar/fiscal year budgeting, free same-day online payments, free check generation to any United States address, customizable reporting and advanced tax reports. Quicken’s most affordable plans are appropriate for churches because its expensive plans add primarily non-church features such as rental property reports.

Learn More: Read our full Quicken review.

Who should use it:

Quicken is best for churches needing full-featured premium accounting software on a tight budget. It is also best for churches that use separate HR and payroll software or that have few employees for whom they must process payroll.

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On NetSuite's Website

NetSuite offers modules churches can use to create a custom digital solution that includes accounting software. As a tailored product, it requires churches to request a custom quote to learn pricing. Modules churches can choose from include accounting software, a customer relationship management (CRM) solution, automation capabilities, analytics and reporting, human resources (HR) software and an enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution.

For example, churches needing to track finances, manage donations and restricted funds and process payroll can buy accounting and human resource modules. They can add automation tools to save time and streamline processes. Churches wanting to gain an understanding of and engage a large body of parishioners and donors can add a CRM. Finally, churches that sell merchandise, such as books authored by pastors, can add a commerce-ready ERP.

Learn More: Read our full NetSuite review.

Who should use it:

Large churches managing large staff and church bodies and needing a tailored digital infrastructure should consider NetSuite.