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There are seemingly countless expense reporting software solutions available, so figuring out which is best for you is tough. You want to enable employees to easily submit expense claims, capture receipts and expense details digitally, and automate approval workflows—but now need to figure out which tool is the best fit. In this post, I make things simple, leveraging my experience as an HR specialist and using dozens of different expense reporting tools to bring you this shortlist of the best expense reporting software overall.

What is Expense Reporting Software?

Expense reporting software is a digital tool designed to streamline the process of recording, tracking, and managing business expenses. It allows employees to input their expenses, attach receipts, and submit reimbursement requests efficiently. Expense reporting tools automate approval workflows, enforce company expense policies, and generate detailed expense reports, making it easier for organizations to monitor spending, ensure compliance, and simplify the reimbursement process.

Overviews of the 10 Best Expense Reporting Software

Here are brief descriptions of the top best expense reporting software that made it into my shortlist, showing what they do best, plus screenshots to showcase some of the features. I’ve also included an additional 10 options below if you’d like a few more choices to consider.

Best accounting software for small business owners or self-employed professionals

  • 30-day free trial
  • from $22.50/month
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Rating: 4/5

QuickBooks is a proven accounting solution that does a lot of the hard work of tracking expenses. The software helps you enter bills and purchases, then match them to transactions. You can then view how much you're spending in each expense category from your dashboard.

For small businesses, QuickBooks offers a simple, low-cost expense reporting solution. Receipts are sorted automatically and you can reclassify transactions in bulk. You can keep tabs on your cash flow easily through their dashboard.

QuickBooks online costs from $11/user/month and offers a free 30-day trial. Solo entrepreneurs can also take advantage of a special self-employed plan which costs $7.50/user/month.

Best employee expense tracking software for billable service organizations

  • Free demo
  • Pricing upon request
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Rating: 4/5

NetSuite's PSA expense management solution helps professional services organizations automate business processes. This suite of products is designed to be flexible, easy to implement, and simple to maintain. Additional components can be added as business needs change.

Reducing expenses is an important goal in a billable service organization. The NetSuite expense management component optimizes expense reporting accuracy and enables better monitoring. It also ensures timely submission and automates the entire expense management process.

Oracle offers customized pricing upon request. A free product tour is also available.

Best for streamlining expense management

  • Pricing available upon request

I chose Emburse because it offers a seamless and efficient way to manage expenses. With Emburse, users can easily create, submit, and approve expenses anytime, anywhere, on any device. What makes Emburse stand out is its ability to streamline expense management processes, making them more manageable for everyone. The tool is best for streamlining expense management because it simplifies complex processes, increases policy compliance, and expedites reimbursements.

Key features include virtual and physical cards with spending rules, mobile receipt capture and reminders, role-based permissions and approval flows, automatic expense categorizations, world-class fraud protection, and Apple Wallet and Android Pay integration. These features work together to improve accuracy, enforce spending policies, and provide businesses with better control and visibility over their expenses.

Emburse provides important integrations with NetSuite, Sage Intacct, QuickBooks, Xero, Salesforce, Chrome River, and Certify. These integrations allow users to seamlessly connect their expense management processes with other essential business systems, enhancing efficiency and data accuracy.

Best expense reporting software for small business and individuals

  • 30-day free trial
  • $4.50/month
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Rating: 5/5

FreshBooks is a cloud-based accounting software that businesses can use to report their expenses. This software is designed to help small businesses and self-employed individuals manage their expenses through its dashboards and reports. FreshBooks is primarily known for its time-tracking and invoicing features, but it also offers expense reporting features that can help track a business’s billing and expense information and view them through a dashboard or reports.

The platform tracks expenses automatically when users connect their bank accounts or credit cards to FreshBooks and scan receipts using a mobile device. Scanning receipts ensures that businesses won’t lose a single receipt if they scan all the paper receipts they get when they don’t pay using a debit or credit card that’s connected to FreshBooks. Using the software, businesses can have an easy time with tax time, mark expenses as billable, keep track of overall spending, and monitor the company’s budget.

FreshBooks also has other features useful for expense tracking, including multi-currency expenses, auto-categorization, tax-friendly categories, easy recurring expenses assignment, automatic imports, a mobile application for snapping pictures of receipts, and secure receipt storage in the cloud. Using FreshBooks allows users to track their expenses on the go since users can use the FreshBooks mobile app to snap a picture of the receipt and access the receipts through the cloud or the dashboard.

Best expense management software for end-to-end travel management

  • Free demo available
  • From $45/user/month
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Rating: 4.5/5

Zoho Expense offers a full range of customizable expense reporting features. These include conversion of receipts to expenses claims, report submission approval, and corporate card reconciliation. In addition, this SaaS software also supports multi-level approval, spending rules, budgeting, and analytics.

You can also manage all stages of employees’ business trips and make bookings for flights and accommodation. Other features include setting pre-travel approvals, reimbursing on time, and facilitating the reporting of expenses anywhere.

Zoho Expense costs from $45/user/month. A free plan for up to three users is also available, as well as a free demo.

Best expense management software for spend management

  • Free demo available
  • Pricing upon request
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Rating: 4.5/5

Happay is a cloud-based expense management system designed for larger businesses. This expense tracking software uses AI and machine learning to automate expense claims management, employee reimbursement, and compliance monitoring.

Their expense management software also includes several useful features for tracking travel expenses. Employees can capture and submit expenses, plus track fuel purchases and toll payments automatically. The system also supports mileage tracking using a Google Maps-based route tracker.

Happay's expense management system helps with workforce management by highlighting errors or inaccuracies to facilitate better spend management. This means no more unauthorized travel bookings, late submission of expense reports, or deviation from expense policies. As a result, management gains greater control over costs, and team members are reimbursed faster, creating a better employee experience.

Happay offers customized pricing upon request. A free demo is also available.

Best expense software for encouraging cost-conscious booking decisions

  • 7 days free trial
  • From $4.99/user/month
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Rating: 4.4/5

ITILITE is a SaaS-based integrated travel and expense management platform. Employees can scan paper receipts and file expenses wherever they are using the mobile expense tracker app. The automated receipt reading using OCR scanning also ensures accurate expense filing.

Expense policy violations and duplicate bills are easily identified, while customized dashboards give managers access to over 100 spend management reports. They also offer over 50 easily configurable multi-level approval flows and complex policy checks so you can stay on top of your employee spending.

ITILITE uses a rewards-based approach that incentivizes employees to choose lower-cost travel options. The software gives employees access to affordable rates through integrated supplier relationships.

ITILITE costs from $4.99/user/month and offers a free 7-day trial. A free demo is also available.

Best expense reporting within a resource management platform

  • Free trial available
  • From $370 /month (for up to 10 users)
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Rating: 4.5/5

Projectworks is a resource management software that combines expense reporting with time tracking, invoicing, and forecasting. The software helps users manage expenses in the context of the projects, people, and clients they're related to. This centralizes the management of human, time, and fiscal resources.

The software allows employees to enter their costs while employers access to up-to-date records in real time. Features like automated currency conversion and flexible tax rules facilitate expense management across locations. Users can connect costs like hosting fees, contractor invoices, and travel expenses directly to the relevant projects, and link expenses with invoices. The tool's approval process enables managers and other stakeholders to review each expense submission before approval.

This system offers a variety of reports that give insights into spending across departments and projects. Dashboards give businesses an overview of all their expenses, helping them identify trends in spending and set budgets accordingly. The automated categorization feature lets users identify and classify expenses into relevant categories for easier tracking and organization, and reduces human error by automatically sorting out ambiguous or inappropriate categorization entries. The platform allows users to set up recurring payments and bulk upload data into the system, so they don’t have to manually add every entry each time they make a purchase or payment.

The platform integrates with other software like Azure DevOps, Hubspot, Jira, MYOB, QuickBooks, and Xero. Additional integrations can be accessed through a paid Zapier account.

Pricing is available upon request, and users can access a free trial via the website.

Best accounting tool for automated expense data entry

  • Free trial with 25 credit + free demo
  • From $12/user/month
Visit Website
Rating: 3.7/5

AutoEntry is an automated data entry platform that reduces the time spent entering receipts, expenses, and other accounting information. Data is automatically extracted and published to any major accounting platform. Key features include item capture, document scanning, purchase order matching, bank account integration, and intelligent analysis.

Using AutoEntry helps to eliminate lost documents and reporting errors. This gives managers and accounts payable more time to focus on core business issues. AutoEntry also remembers how invoices and receipts are analyzed to improve efficiency on future expenses.

AutoEnty costs from $12/user/month and offers a free trial with 25 credits and a free demo.

Best for automatic expense categorization

  • From $99/user/year

ABUKAI Expenses is a business productivity software with expense reporting capabilities to help you quickly create expense reports from transaction receipts. You can use ABUKAI to scan invoices which the software then transforms into digital data for more accurate record-keeping. ABUKAI also automatically posts expenses into your company’s accounting or ERP software to ensure that all expenses get accounted for. The software helps you separate reimbursable from company-paid expenses so you can mark out-of-pocket expenses and request for reimbursement later on.

ABUKAI Expenses is an If you want to make expense tracking more efficient using automatic categorization, then ABUKAI Expenses is an excellent choice for you. ABUKAI automates expense tracking to help you save time so you can attend to other aspects of your business. With the help of ABUKAI, there’s no need to manually type the details of receipts because the software handles it for you. Aside from saving time, this automation feature also reduces the likelihood of clerical errors that will affect the accuracy of your expense records. ABUKAI also automatically categorizes expenses making it easy for you to determine where your funds are going to create action plans that will help you save money.

ABUKAI has a free version, but the paid version's pricing starts at $99/user/year.

The 10 Best Expense Reporting Software: Pricing Comparison Chart

This comparison chart summarizes basic details about each of my top expense reporting software selections. You can view pricing details and the availability of free trials or demos side-by-side to help you find the best software for your budget and business needs.

Tools Price
QuickBooks Online from $22.50/month
NetSuite Pricing upon request
Emburse Pricing available upon request
Freshbooks $4.50/month
Zoho Expense From $45/user/month
Happay Pricing upon request
ITILITE From $4.99/user/month
Projectworks From $370 /month (for up to 10 users)
AutoEntry From $12/user/month
ABUKAI Expenses From $99/user/year
Preview Image - <h2 class="c-block__title b-summary-table__title c-listicle__title h3" > Compare Software Specs Side by Side</h2>

Compare Software Specs Side by Side

Use our comparison chart to review and evaluate software specs side-by-side.

Compare Software

Other Expense Reporting Software Options

Here are a few more expense management software options that didn’t make the top list:

  1. ProjectCompanion

    Best Windows-based expense management solution

  2. Bx

    Best free productivity platform for mobile expense reporting and accounting

  3. Expensify

    Best for synching expense reports to accounting software

  4. Gorilla Expense

    Best expense software for automatic expense report creation

  5. Nexonia

    Best expense software for flexible approval workflows

  6. Xero

    Best expense reporting software for global companies

  7. Acumatica Cloud ERP

    Best expense management software for automatically generating expense receipts using smart matching technology

  8. Avaza

    Best for a unified work management solution

  9. Timesheets.com

    Best for an easy-to-use system

  10. SutiExpense

    Best for detecting fraud with AI

Selection Criteria for Expense Reporting Software

Wondering how I selected the best expense reporting software for this article? Here’s a summary of my evaluation criteria: 

  • User Interface (UI): I've chosen software with a straightforward expense reporting process built-in to save time and improve productivity for busy executives and other frequent users.
  • Usability: I've selected expense reporting software that all levels of users - from employees to accounts payable staff and other finance team members - will find intuitive and easy to use.
  • Software Integrations: I look for easy integration with everyday business tools such as email, accounting software, and project management tools. 
  • Value for Price: My priority here is finding expense reporting software that packs in a wealth of features at an affordable price.

Expense Reporting Software: Key Features

I also assessed these key features when making my final selections for this list:

  • Receipt scanning or receipt capture: 48% of finance professionals note that this is one of the most compelling features for expense management software.
  • Direct deposit capabilities: 36% of finance professionals note that this is one of the most compelling features for expense management software.
  • Mobile expense reporting: An easy way for employees to report business expenses and upload receipts from their mobile devices while on the go.
  • Compliance management: Helps companies stay compliant with the latest rules from local, state, and federal tax agencies. 
  • Automated tax calculation: Features for including taxes such as GST or VAT where required.
  • Integrated corporate credit card management: Built-in control of credit cards issued to employees.
  • Multi-currency capability: Useful for dealing with travel expenses from overseas business trips or billing from foreign suppliers.
  • Categorization of expenses: The ability to allocate receipts into a designated expense category in accordance with your company's expense policy.

Frequently Asked Questions about Expense Reporting Software

Still not sure if expense reporting software is exactly what you need? Here are some answers to frequently asked questions I’ve received on this topic:

What is expense reporting software?

Expense reporting software provides an easy way for employees to submit expense receipts and certify expense claims. These tools also help finance teams administer expense reports, check for fraud, and reduce inaccuracies.

It’s becoming increasingly common for US organizations to offer additional compensation, like well-being programs and additional financial incentives to their employees. Expense reporting software helps you track, manage, and reimburse all your complex expenses.

What is the best accounting system for small business?

The best accounting and expense reporting software for a small business is one that fits the size, nature, and requirements of the company. There are many tools on the market, all with different features and capabilities. Many of these offer free plans or free trials, so you can easily experiment to find out which is the best match for your specific needs. Managing expenses is just one part of the financial equation. To fully automate your financial operations, consider coupling this with a top-tier payroll software solution.

What Do You Think About These Expense Reporting Software?

What’s hot and what’s not in the world of expense reporting software? We’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments section below. And if you’d like to hear our thoughts, be sure to sign up for our newsletter. You’ll get illuminating insights from the biggest brains in the business. Don’t miss out!

By Kim Behnke

Kim Behnke is an HR Tool Expert & Writer for People Managing People. She draws on her 9 years of human resources experience and her keen eye for systematic processes to support her analyses of the top HR tools on the market. She is passionate about maximizing efficiencies and streamlining workflows to ensure internal systems run smoothly. Kim's HR experience includes recruitment, onboarding, performance management, training and development, policy development and enforcement, and HR analytics. She also has degrees in psychology, writing, publishing, and technical communication, and recently completed a Certified Digital HR Specialist program through the Academy to Innovate HR. When away from her desk, she can usually be found outside tending to her ever-expanding garden.