The 7 best self-employed accounting software platforms

1 of 3

Xero: Limited Time — 95% Off for 6 Months

Visit Xero

2 of 3

Sage: Try out an AI-powered assistant FREE

Visit Sage

3 of 3

Compare software deals to find the best option

Compare Costs

Zoho Books is the best accounting software for the self-employed thanks to its easy-to-use interface, simple invoicing system, and option for a free plan. We worked alongside our research department, conducting in-depth analysis into seven top accounting software platforms, testing them across 1,512 areas of investigation.

As we reach the start of the new tax year, the best way for the self-employed to remain on top of their bookkeeping is with the best small business accounting software.

We compare the strenghts and weaknesses of the top options, so you can find out which is the best choice for your specific needs in 2026.

Compare self-employed accounting software

0 out of 0

• backward
• forward

		Rating	Price from	Free trial
FEATURED PROVIDER	BEST OVERALL
Xero	Zoho Books	FreeAgent	QuickBooks	Sage	FreshBooks	Clear Books
4.3	4.8	4.5	4.5	4.2	4.2	4.0
£7/month (+ VAT)	Free	£10/month (+ VAT) £5/month for 6 months (+ VAT)	£10/month (+ VAT) Get 90% off  QuickBooks for a year	£18/month (+ VAT) 90% off the first three months	£15/month 50% off for 3 months	Free

Zoho Books

• Starting price from: Free
• Free trial: 14 days

• Easy-to-use platform that's simple to navigate
• Excellent free plan for solopreneurs and micro-businesses
• Mobile app for real-time financial management

Summary Zoho initially made its name from CRM systems, but has been providing accounting software since 2011. Zoho Books stands out for its clean and modern interface, and seamlessly aligns with the broader Zoho products. While the platform is geared towards small businesses, we would also recommend it to sole traders, as the tools can be used by inexperienced users.

Show moreless

Is Zoho Books a good choice for the self-employed?

Zoho Books ranked as the most user-friendly platform in our comparative analysis of  seven top accounting platforms. Its self-help page is also very easy to use with handy how-to guides if you get stuck.

The other benefit is that Zoho Books is just one part of the wider Zoho Ecosystem, so you can seamlessly connect Zoho CRM or Zoho Mail to run your operation smoothly (though these apps will have an extra cost attached).

We really love the design of the Zoho Books interface, which makes it a pleasure to use. Source: Startups.co.uk

I found the invoicing system to be exceptionally simple. Zoho Books keeps things clean and simple, which is well suited to non-experienced users, so it should be simple to pick up quickly and get to grips with.

How much does Zoho Books cost?

Zoho Books stands alongside Clear Books as the only two software providers on the roundup that offer a completely free plan (we also named it our top choice for free accounting software).

But if you want more organisational ability, including custom reports, the Standard plan is only £12 + VAT per month.

0 out of 0

• backward
• forward

	Plan	Cost
Free	Standard	Professional	Premium
Free	Paid monthly: £12/month (+ VAT) Paid yearly: £10/month (+ VAT)	Paid monthly: £24/month (+ VAT) Paid yearly: £20/month (+ VAT)	Paid monthly: £30/month (+VAT) Paid yearly: £25/month (+ VAT)

What are the standout features?

• Customer portal, so your clients can view and manage their transactions.
• Excellent cross app integration allowing you to easily connect your accounting software to the rest of the Zoho suite, such as Mail and CRM.
• AI-powered assistant Zia is built into the Zoho platform, allowing for automations and insights.

What are the disadvantages of Zoho Books?

• The hours for live chat and phone help are limited to 9am to 6pm, which isn’t ideal if you don’t work within traditional business hours. Xero, by comparison, has 24/7 online support.
• Zoho Books has limited connectivity to third-party applications, especially compared with some competitors, like Xero and QuickBooks. Though there are some third-party applications you can connect, like Dext, the market leader in receipt capture technology.
• Zoho Books can be particularly restrictive with transaction caps: for example, 1,000 sales invoices and 1,000 purchases.
• Without the paid add-on, the receipt capture technology can be a little basic.

Expert opinion: Dan Heelan on Zoho Books

I think the quirk of Zoho is that it’s potentially awesome if you are in the eco system, if not it’s just ‘solid’. Care also needs to be taken when looking at monthly subscriptions. The free subscription makes for a great headline (and is a pretty good plan for a time), but would suit only the small business where activity levels and needs are low.

Dan Heelan Accountant and Business Services Director at Heelan Associates Ltd

FreeAgent

• Starting price from: £10/month
• Free trial: 30 days

• The only software we tested that gives you built-in tax forecasting and planning tools at no extra cost
• Helpful cash flow alerts about potential surpluses and shortfalls
• Free plan available with certain qualifying banks

Summary Originally launched in 2007, FreeAgent is based in Edinburgh and now helps over 200,000 small businesses. It was acquired by NatWest Group in 2018. Our recommendation is that FreeAgent is best suited to freelancers, sole traders and novice accountants. It’s a good middle ground for those who need a feature-filled system that’s not overly complex.

Show moreless

Is FreeAgent a good choice for the self-employed?

FreeAgent is an excellent choice if you qualify for a free plan. If you sign up for a NatWest or Mettle (and make one transaction per month) business bank account, you get access to a comprehensive software platform free of charge.

FreeAgent excels at simplifying complicated financial tasks. The well-labelled headings like “Bills” and “My Money” make navigating easy for novices, and the dashboard reminders are particularly useful.

FreeAgent has a clear user interface, which makes navigating around the platform easy. Source: Startups.co.uk

It strikes a balance between simplicity and functionality, with tasks like quickly adding clients, managing expenses, and setting up automatic reminders being handled with ease.

How much does FreeAgent cost?

Presuming that you’re not getting it for free or using the cheapest plan, aimed at landlords, FreeAgent starts at £19 per month for the Sole Trader plan, so it’s a pretty costly option for the self-employed.

While competitors like Xero and QuickBooks offer similarly priced or cheaper plans with more features, FreeAgent has one major advantage: multi-currency support. On other platforms, this feature is typically gated behind expensive, premium tiers.

You can also pay £6 + VAT per month to seamlessly connect FreeAgent to Amazon UK Marketplace, which can streamline operations for online sellers.

0 out of 0

• backward
• forward

	Plan	Cost
Landlord	Sole Trader	Partnership/LLP	Limited Company
Paid monthly: £10/month (+ VAT), currently 50% off for your first six months Paid yearly: £100/year (+ VAT), currently 50% off for your first year	Paid monthly: £19/month (+ VAT), currently 50% off for your first six months Paid yearly: £190/year (+ VAT), currently 50% off for your first year	Paid monthly: £27/month (+ VAT), currently 50% off for your first six months Paid yearly: £270/year (+ VAT), currently 50% off for your first year	Paid monthly: £33/month (+ VAT), currently 50% off for your first six months Paid yearly: £330/year (+ VAT), currently 50% off for your first year

What are the standout features?

• User-friendly templates for both invoices and estimates.
• The traffic-light system for bank transactions where they are categorised as “Explained”, “Unexplained”, “Manually added” or “Marked for approval”.
• The smart receipt capture that clearly guides you through the next steps.
• Tools for streamlining your processes such as tax reminders and end-of-year reports.
• Automated invoice reminders, to send out to your customers so you can get paid on time.

What are the disadvantages of FreeAgent?

• In general, we felt an improved onboarding experience would massively benefit FreeAgent. While 24/7 help is available, the guide link is tricky to find, and it takes you to an external knowledge base which feels a little disjointed.
• There are some small issues we found a little unintuitive, for example it’s not ideal that the default time unit was set to hours.
• FreeAgent provide autofill when you are manually entering a bill (but it will for receipt capture or clearing down your bank account).

Expert opinion: Dan Heelan on FreeAgent

Overall, FreeAgent offers strong functionality and great guidance for new users, but its higher cost and learning curve may deter the budget-conscious or users focusing on higher levels of transactions. But if you bank with NatWest, Royal Bank of Scotland, Ulster Bank or Mettle, it’s amazing value for money as it’s a fully fledged product, for free!

Dan Heelan Accountant and Business Services Director at Heelan Associates Ltd

QuickBooks

• Starting price from: £10 (self-assessment only)
• Free trial: 30 days

• Great bank reconciliation feature
• Predicts your transaction categorisation
• Custom reports and templates tailored to your business’ needs

Summary Part of the American multinational company Intuit Inc., QuickBooks is accounting software specifically designed for SMEs. It currently has 6.5 million subscribers worldwide. We think its intuitive layout combined with detailed features makes it suitable for more advanced business operations. It’s more suited to those working in accountancy rather than small business owners themselves, due to the complexity of the software and steep learning curve.

Show moreless

Is QuickBooks a good choice for the self-employed?

QuickBooks is the best choice for self-employed business owners who are frequently on the move, thanks to the excellent mobile app. For example, its receipt capture tool can scan and read your receipts from the mobile app, and can automatically track mileage.

QuickBooks is particularly useful for connecting to other business apps, with over 750 third-party integrations. QuickBooks is a market leader, so software developers will build with the brand in mind.

With QuickBooks, you can modify your reports and tailor them to your needs. Source: Startups.co.uk

While there was a steep learning curve (especially compared with FreshBooks), all of the essential features were logically categorised, which made navigation easy.

How much does QuickBooks cost?

QuickBooks’ Sole Trader plan starts at a very competitive £10 per month, and there’s currently a promotion where you 90% off your first six months. You can find out more details in our full QuickBooks pricing guide.

You can also get a 10% saving if you opt to pay annually instead of monthly. However, currently you can’t choose an annual subscription from sign-up, you need to switch to an annual plan once you’ve already set up your account.

0 out of 0

• backward
• forward

	Plan	Cost
Sole Trader Plus	Simple Start	Essentials	Plus	Advanced
Paid monthly: £10/month (+ VAT) You can currently get 90% off for the first 12 months	Paid monthly: £16/month (+ VAT) You can currently get 90% off for the first 12 months	Paid monthly: £38/month (+ VAT) You can currently get 90% off for the first 12 months	Paid monthly: £56/month (+ VAT) You can currently get 90% off for the first 12 months	Paid monthly: £123/month (+ VAT) You can currently get 90% off for the first 12 months

What are the standout features?

• Value for money, with the Essentials plan being one of the best options for sole traders in terms of features versus cost, including multi-currency.
• Standout bank ‘reconciliation’ function that gives you confidence that all the numbers add up (especially as automatic links to your bank can fail).
• Extensive customisation so you can tailor the menus to your liking, and you also get access to extensive, customisable reports.
• AI-powered bank feeds take the manual effort out of categorising your expenses, freeing up your time for more high value tasks.

What are the disadvantages of QuickBooks?

• There’s a reasonable time investment to master all of QuickBooks’ quirks and complexities. In the long run, you’ll get a lot out of it, but it shouldn’t be the first choice for those who need a quick and simple platform, like FreshBooks (you can find out more in our breakdown of QuickBooks vs FreshBooks).
• One important area to note about QuickBooks is the automated suggestions for account codes and categorisation. New users might be tempted to assume they’re accurate, but our external accounting expert found them to be frequently incorrect.

Read next: our full review of QuickBooks.

Expert opinion: Dan Heelan on QuickBooks

Whilst QuickBooks takes a little time to get used it, with a great mobile app and an impressive list of features vs investment on any plan, it’s one of the best all round choices you could make for your accounting needs.

Dan Heelan Accountant and Business Services Director at Heelan Associates Ltd

Xero

• Starting price from: £16/month
• Free trial: 30 days

• Easiest interface for quickly dealing with your bank transactions
• Well-thought out plans and growth path
• Connect with over 1,000 possible integrations

Summary Based in New Zealand, Xero was founded in 2006 and now boasts 4.2 million subscribers. Xero is tailored mostly towards experienced professionals and accountants, predominantly positioning itself towards high-turnover businesses with long-term client bases. We wouldn’t recommend it to new users.

Show moreless

Is Xero a good choice for the self-employed?

Xero is best suited to self-employed business owners who have plans for future growth. The upgrade path for Xero’s software plans works very smoothly, with its range of plans staggering features cost-effectively.

A sole trader could start out on the Ignite plan, but upgrade seamlessly to the Grow plan if they needed to add more than 10 bills, without losing any of their MTD history or audit trails.

Xero is a more complex software than a simple solution like Zoho Books, but arguably less so than QuickBooks. Source: Startups.co.uk

All the plans have a solid set of features, but Xero  boasts the largest amount of external plug-ins (over a thousand). Xero also provides a designated, reliable client portal, and I found the bills tool very easy to use, as it offers:

• Straightforward client creation
• Simple description entry
• Flexibility over currency settings

How much does Xero cost?

While this isn’t the most beginner-friendly option, like Zoho Books,  Xero’s worth the money if you need something more heavyweight with scalability. 

In April 2025, Xero also introduced Simple, it’s new, budget-friendly plan for sole traders that is MTD for Income Tax ready.

0 out of 0

• backward
• forward

	Plan	Cost
Simple	Ignite	Grow	Comprehensive	Ultimate
Paid monthly: £7/month (+ VAT) Buy by 31 March 2026 to get 95% off for the first six months	Paid monthly: £16/month (+ VAT) Buy by 31 March 2026 to get 95% off for the first six months	Paid monthly: £37/month (+ VAT) Buy by 31 March 2026 to get 95% off for the first six months	Paid monthly: £50/month (+ VAT) Buy by 31 March 2026 to get 95% off for the first six months	Paid monthly: £65/month (+ VAT) Buy by 31 March 2026 to get 95% off for the first six months

What are the standout features?

• The bank ‘feed’, which leads our expert accountant to consider Xero’s bank transactions to be the best book-keeping experience of any software on the market
• Connectivity, as it is simple to add third-party apps, and with new data analytics tool powered by Syft (a company acquired by Xero), you can see how well your business is performing in greater detail
• Reporting, where Xero provides a comprehensive list of options, which is ideal for growing businesses.
• Receipt capture, because Xero owns Hubdoc, which means you’ll be supplied with a fully separate app to capture receipts, read the data and suggests categories.

What are the disadvantages of Xero?

• Xero comes with a learning curve, and many of our testers found the system to be old-fashioned and difficult to use (however, the platform has been recently updated and it looks a lot more modern).
• One potential downside for business owners is that multicurrency functionality is only included in the more costly Comprehensive plan. This could be a frustrating cost jump if you don’t need the other extra features in the plan, and both QuickBooks and FreeAgent provide this function much cheaper.

Expert opinion: Dan Heelan on Xero

Xero is (now) easy on the eye and simple to navigate, especially with its new upgraded tool bar functionality. It also has arguably the best, easiest to use, ‘bank transaction categorisation’ features of all the offerings. Xero also connects to a large amount of other applications, which means for any growing business Xero is a superb choice.

Dan Heelan Accountant and Business Services Director at Heelan Associates Ltd

Sage

• Starting price from: £18/month
• Free trial: First month free

• A quick, no-nonsense experience
• Customisable themes and logos to establish a strong brand identity
• Reassurance of a long-standing accounting brand

Summary Based in Newcastle upon Tyne, as of 2017 Sage is the UK’s second largest technology company, the largest supplier to small businesses and has 6.1 million worldwide customers. Its accounting software is best suited for service-based businesses, like builders, contractors and handymen. While it’s good for managing quotes and invoicing, it may lack the functionality needed by more established businesses.

Show moreless

Is Sage a good choice for the self-employed?

Sage offers a traditional, no-frills bookkeeping experience that is particularly effective for freelancers in service-based roles, thanks to:

• Customisable invoicing
• Customisable profit and loss statements
• Strong invoice workflows and quoting

Sage is good contractors and handymen as its fast and easy to manage, without much lag, with seamless invoice management.

Sage provides branding tools, like themes and logos, for your external documents. Source: Startups.co.uk

Sage is a standout in carbon footprint reporting: while competitors rely on third-party apps, Sage Accounting customer get access to Sage Earth Carbon Accounting. With emissions data becoming increasingly required for UK government contracts and consulting bids, Sage Earth is a key tool in 2026.

How much does Sage cost?

For sole traders who are VAT-registered (or a director-only limited company), then you’ll need to look at Sage’s Accounting Start plan, which costs £18 per month (so it’s on the more expensive side of the spectrum).

Sage is a solid product overall, but you’ll paying for brand name recognition, to some extent. You can read more in our complete guide to Sage’s pricing.

0 out of 0

• backward
• forward

	Plan	Cost	Features
Accounting Start	Accounting Standard	Accounting Plus
£18/month (+ VAT) 90% off for three months	£39/month (+ VAT) 90% off for three months	£59/month (+ VAT) 90% off for three months
Create and send unlimited sales invoices Submit VAT returns 24/7 support	Advanced reporting capabilities Unlimited users Cash flow statements	Support for multiple currencies Inventory management

What are the standout features?

• Sage has its own receipt capture software, AutoEntry, which effortlessly feeds into you bookkeeping records.
• Sage Copilot, its new AI-powered assistant, is considered to be one of the better early AI products, according to our expert accountant.
• Unlimited sales invoices are provided on the entry level plan, which is great value for money.
• Easy connectivity, as Sage painlessly connects to big-name apps like Stripe, PayPal and GoCardless.

What are the disadvantages of Sage?

• Completing expense reports was an area I found slightly frustrating. It might not be the best fit for users that need to upload a large volumes of expenses.
• Our expert accountant found that the mobile app offered by Sage was quite lightweight in terms of functionality, with QuickBooks providing the strongest option.

Expert opinion: Dan Heelan on Sage

Sage, a stalwart of the accounting software world, has been providing bookkeeping and account solutions since the 1980s, so it knows its users. Its software is very user-friendly, fast and easy to move round.

Dan Heelan Accountant and Business Services Director at Heelan Associates Ltd

FreshBooks

• Starting price from: £16/month
• Free trial: 30 days (if another business is added, this gets another 30 day free trial)

• Get support at any hour from the 24/7 customer support chatbot
• Precise time tracking for billable hours
• Intuitive, user-friendly interface

Summary Based out of Toronto, Canada, FreshBooks is designed primarily for SMEs. To date, over 30 million people have used FreshBooks in over 160 countries. It’s certainly geared towards the needs of small businesses and sole traders, but high-level accountants and larger operations may find it too limited.

Show moreless

Is FreshBooks a good choice for the self-employed?

FreshBooks includes an unlimited time-tracking feature on all its plans, in addition to mobile mileage-tracking, making it a good choice for service-based businesses. You’ll also be able to manage your budget and billing for projects, even on the Lite plan.

FreshBooks is intuitive, user-friendly, and has an appealing interface (especially compared with a software like Clear Books). For more details, you can read our full FreshBooks review.

I found the FreshBooks interface to be user-friendly, giving us quick and easy access to the critical features we needed. Source: Startups.co.uk

The vertical navigation bar (seen above) was a highlight, which made it fast to find key features, like invoicing. Crucially, if you do find yourself running into any problems you can get support at any time of the day or night from the 24/7 chatbot.

How much does FreshBooks cost?

FreshBooks’ Lite plan starts from £16 + VAT per month, which is about average when compared with competitors’ similar plans.

However, I would flag that the Lite plan is missing the standard account reports you’d expect from this price level. There’s no Balance Sheet, which is a critical document for a business owner, and there’s also no bank reconciliation.

0 out of 0

• backward
• forward

	Plan	Cost
Lite	Plus	Premium
Paid monthly: £16/month (+ VAT) Paid yearly: £192.22/year (+ VAT) Currently 50% off for three months	Paid monthly: £30/month (+VAT) Paid yearly: £360/year (+VAT) Currently 50% off for three months	Paid monthly: £42/month (+ VAT) Paid yearly: £504/year (+ VAT) Currently 50% off for three months

What are the standout features?

• Project and time tracking included on all plans – this functionality is FreshBooks niche in the accounting software space

What are the disadvantages of FreshBooks?

• FreshBooks’ messaging system feels cumbersome and tricky to use and, considering your clients need to use it for it to work, this could cause some issues.
• While the user support chatbot is available round the clock, the phoneline is only open from 1pm until 12am, and is focused on sales calls rather than help for existing customers.
• Because FreshBooks has some limited features, like the cap on client numbers, most self-employed business owners will likely need one of the premium plans, which might not make the most financial sense.

Expert opinion: Dan Heelan on FreshBooks

FreshBooks is ideally suited to smaller business and sole traders as there are limited reporting and customisable elements. Having to pay £8 per month for every extra team member you want to add means the subscription could get costly very quick as you grow. This said, if you NEED time tracking as a key function, this is worth investigating.

Dan Heelan Accountant and Business Services Director at Heelan Associates Ltd

Clear Books

• Starting price from: Free
• Free trial: 30 days

• Well-designed search function enables easy access to important information
• Efficient and easy customisation, such as quote creation
• Easily create new projects with helpful pop-up feature

Summary Started in 2008, ClearBooks is a UK based accounting software firm specifically designed with small businesses in mind. Freelancers, as well as small businesses, could benefit from ClearBooks, mainly thanks to its easy-to-use project creation.

Show moreless

How much does Clear Books cost?

Crucially, if you want MTD VAT and CIS submissions, you’ll need to pay for the Medium plan, which is a heftier £31 + VAT per month. This won’t be ideal for sole traders looking to do a VAT return for the cheapest price possible.

Additionally, the way the features are bundled into the plans doesn’t always make it clear to business owner which tier will be right for them. This doesn’t make Clear Books the best for scalability, so Xero will be a stronger option.

0 out of 0

• backward
• forward

	Plan	Cost
MTD Income Tax	Small	Medium	Large
Free	Paid monthly: £15/month (+ VAT), currently £7.50/month (+ VAT) for the first three months Paid yearly: 10% off Paid every two years: 20% off	Paid monthly: £31/month (+ VAT), currently £15.50/month (+ VAT) for the first three months Paid yearly: 10% off Paid every two years: 20% off	Paid monthly: £41/month (+ VAT), currently £20.50/month (+ VAT) for the first three months Paid yearly: 10% off Paid every two years: 20% off

What are the standout features

• The end-of-year submission on the free MTD plan is the biggest benefit of the no-cost plan, and not a feature you generally see on free tiers.
• The “pop-up” project creator, which is very user friendly.
• Submit MTD VAT returns directly to HMRC, but only on the Medium plan.
• Straightforward customisation tools mean can toggle different features to suit your needs.

What are the disadvantages of Clear Books?

• There was quite a steep learning curve when getting to grips with Clear Books – more so than more user-friendly options, like QuickBooks and Zoho Books, and even more so than Xero, but we’d say it’s worth the time investment.
• Clear Books interface does feel a little dated. For example the bank reconciliation and categorisation felt clunkier than any of the slicker competitors.
• If you do run into difficulties, another limitation of the platform is the support hours. Support is only available 9am to 5pm on weekdays, so if you need support outside of traditional working hours, you’ll be out of luck.

Expert opinion: Dan Heelan on Clear Books

Clear Books focuses on convenience which does add a degree of simplicity – with easy pop-ups and customisable dashboards adding further support and assurance to a novice user. AI-powered smart coding and build in receipt capture, again, keeps things efficient.

Dan Heelan Accountant and Business Services Director at Heelan Associates Ltd

How do I choose the best self-employed accounting software?

One thing to keep in mind when dealing with the top tier accounting software platforms: they’re all going to have certain features you would expect, and many will offer similar levels of functionality. This would include:

• Dashboard analytics showing you cashflow and payments
• A mobile app to let you manage your accounts on the move
• Compliance with MTD for Income Tax 

So, you can at least be confident that if you’re choosing from the top tier platforms you can’t necessarily go wrong: it’s more about finding the platform that’s best suited to your business and workflow.

While you need to keep overheads low, don’t just automatically go for the budget option. It might be missing a critical feature you’ll need, like the ability to calculate Construction Industry Scheme (CIS) deductions, for example.

These are the top five factors you should look for in accounting software for the self-employed:

1. Usability: you’re a one-person-band, and so you’ll need software that’s quick and easy to use.
2. The key features: make sure it’s equipped to handle easy and customisable invoicing, clear expense tracking, reliable tax management and detailed financial reporting.
3. Mobile app: the self-employed often find themselves rushing around, so you’ll want a well-designed mobile app to stay on top of your accounts, and ideally handle autonomous reconciliation and MTD filing.
4. Seamless bank integration: connecting your accounting software with your bank will make your life so much easier and import transactions much faster.
5. Scalability: you need a platform that can grow alongside you, so you don’t need to go through the hassle of buying a new license if you outgrow your plan.

How we research and test accounting software

To ensure our recommendations are as useful and accurate as possible, our in-house research team carried out thorough product testing of seven top accounting software platforms.

This amounted to 37 user tests, with a total of 57 hours of actual testing. We completed a massive 555 tasks as part of this process.

These tasks were separated into the six categories we felt were the most essential to accounting software for self-employed people in the UK.

Each of these was then given an appropriate weighting that related to how crucial they are for freelancers, sole-traders and the self-employed:

• (20%) The core accounting tools and features of the software.
• (20%) The tools that equip you for financial planning and visibility over your finances.
• (15%) How efficiently the software helps you run the daily operations of your business, including integrations and mobile apps.
• (15%)What help and support the platform offers, and what hours these are accessible in.
• (15%) The price of the software, including hidden fees and extra costs.
• (15%) And finally, the usability of the platform.

It was the result of this analysis and weighting that determined our overall ranking.

What’s the best accounting software for Making Tax Digital for Income Tax?

For all self-employed users of Making Tax Digital, your software will need to be capable of:

• Creating, storing and correcting digital records of your income and expenses relating to self-employment and property
• Submitting your quarterly updates to HMRC
• Submitting your final declaration by 31 January the following year

All our recommendations for the best self-employed accounting software are MTD-ready. You can use any of our above recommendations to keep digital records and submit the required quarterly updates to HMRC:

• Zoho Books: one of the easiest platforms to get to grips with, and provides a free tier.
• FreeAgent: if you qualify for a free plan, then you get access to an impressively comprehensive MTD-ready accounting software for no cost.
• QuickBooks: while it doesn’t have a free tier, QuickBooks does come with a first-class mobile app that self-employed clients can use to manage their accounts on the move.
• Xero: has a low-cost starter tier specifically for sole traders and landlords, and a great range of plans to support ambitious businesses, as well supporting foreign property as an income source.
• Sage: in addition to the main range Sage Accounting software plans, there’s also Sage Sole Trader Free, a no-cost MTD-ready option for simple needs (you can create and send five invoices per month).
• FreshBooks:* a solid option for self-employed business owners who need to be MTD-ready but also require unlimited time-tracking.
• Clear Books: provides a completely free MTD for income tax software for the self-employed, so it’s a solid MTD-ready option for basic needs.

*We would note that FreshBooks confirms it’s MTD for ITSA-ready on its website, but during our research we couldn’t currently find it through HMRC’s tool for selecting approved software. There could be a few different reasons to explain this, but we’d recommend checking with HMRC directly for clarity. 

You can find more information in our guide to MTD-compliant software, and you can also jump over to our recommendations for the best free MTD-ready software.

What should I do next to be ready for Making Tax Digital?

If you’re self-employed and you’re unsure if you need to be MTD-ready, this will depend on your qualifying income. The current thresholds for MTD for ITSA qualifying income are:

• Over £50,000 in 2026
• Over £30,000 in 2027
• Over £20,000 in 2028

If your tax return for 2024/2025 shows your qualifying income to be over £50,000, then you’ll need to be MTD-ready by April 6th 2026. 

For more details about record-keeping to maintain MTD compliance, we recommend jumping over to our essential Making Tax Digital for Income Tax guide.