Accounting applications are a must-have for any businesses’ financial well-being (or personal finance for that matter). The de facto standard for small to medium business is probably Intuit’s Quicken. But because one application rules the board, doesn’t mean there are not other, quality applications available that can handle the same task. One such application is GnuCash. The biggest difference between GnuCash and Quicken is the price. GnuCash is GPL software and is free for the taking.

Specifications

Who’s it for?

GnuCash is for any individual, SMB, or enterprise needing double-entry financial accounting software that is cost effective, feature-rich, reliable, and works across platforms.

What problem does it solve?

GnuCash enables the user to handle simple to complex financial/accounting tasks with a single, well supported tool. GnuCash allows you to track bank accounts, stocks, income, and expenses. With GnuCash you can track multiple accounts which is perfect for tracking the spending of multiple-department businesses.

Standout features

  • Checkbook style registry
  • Double entry accounting
  • Full suite of standard and customizable reporting and graphing tools
  • Income/Expense account types
  • Multiple currency support
  • Online banking support
  • Stock and mutual fund portfolios
  • Customer/Vendor tracking
  • Invoicing and bill payment
  • Tax and billing terms
  • QIF and OFX import
  • HBCI support
  • Transaction matching
  • Statement reconciliation
  • Transaction search
  • General ledger

What’s wrong?

There is one big complaint with GnuCash and that is it currently has no means to work with a tax application. Many business (and home) users need integration with tax software so tax time is not such an issue. This is where applications like Quicken steal the show. In order for GnuCash to gain more success it will have to have better integration with standard tax tools.

Competitive products

Bottom line for business

If you are looking for outstanding double-entry accounting software, with loads of features, but do not depend upon your financial software to interact with your tax software, GnuCash might well be the solution for you. With plenty of features to appeal to all levels and needs, GnuCash is the finest of all the GPL accounting software. If, however, you need tax integration, you might have to look elsewhere.

User rating

Have you encountered or used GnuCash financial accounting software? If so, what do you think? Rate your experience and compare the results to what other TechRepublic members think. Give your own personal review in the TechRepublic Community Forums or let us know if you think we left anything out.