SyncBooks vs QuickBooks Online: Multi-Company, Inventory and Switching
Where SyncBooks differs from QuickBooks Online for sellers who run several companies and hold stock, what to check before you choose, and how switching works.
QuickBooks Online is one of the most widely used accounting programs for small businesses in the US. Many accountants know it, and many apps connect to it. If you run one company and keep little or no stock, it may be all you need.
SyncBooks is built for a different shape of business: sellers who run several companies, hold inventory in warehouses, and sell across several channels. This post explains where SyncBooks differs, what to check in your current setup, and how switching works. QuickBooks plans and features change over time, so check their current plan details for anything that matters to your decision.
Several companies in one workspace
In SyncBooks, a workspace holds all your companies. Each company keeps its own books, chart of accounts, customers and suppliers, and you switch between them from one menu, with one login.
- One Home board across every company. Pick yourself in the company menu and Home totals key numbers across all your companies.
- Company groups. Group related companies, for example a family of brands.
- Intercompany sales on both sides. One company can sell stock that another company supplies, and SyncBooks records the internal sale in both sets of books.
- Settlements and the intercompany report. Record payments between your companies and see what each one owes the others.
- Group report. Combined figures for a company group, with the balances between them eliminated.
- Reporting currency. Companies that keep their books in other currencies are translated at the period end’s rate.
Every SyncBooks plan has all of these. Plans differ in how many companies they hold: see pricing.
What to check in QuickBooks Online: how each extra company is billed and signed into, and how you would combine the companies’ figures and record sales between them.
Inventory, down to the bin
Inventory in SyncBooks is part of the books, not an add-on beside them:
- Warehouses, aisles and bins, with transfers between them.
- Stock that belongs to one company while it sits in another company’s warehouse.
- FIFO, specific lot or moving average cost, and landed cost (freight, duty, broker fees) spread into the cost of the stock.
- Kits and bundles, serial numbers, and lots with expiry dates.
- Barcode scanning to receive, count and move stock.
- Reorder points, and a reorder list that makes draft purchase orders, one per supplier.
- A supplier portal where suppliers confirm your purchase orders and send their invoices.
Every shipment posts its cost of goods sold, and the inventory valuation report ties stock at cost to the inventory account.
What to check in QuickBooks Online: which plan you need for inventory, which costing methods it offers, and whether it tracks bins, lots, serials and kits or relies on a separate inventory app.
Sales channels and sales tax
SyncBooks is built to bring orders from Shopify, Amazon, eBay, Walmart and Newegg into one list, post each one to the company that sold it, and send shipments and stock counts back. Some of these connections open as each platform approves SyncBooks; contact us to check which you can connect today.
US sales tax comes from the states’ own Streamlined Sales Tax rate and boundary files, which SyncBooks keeps current every day. Tax is worked out line by line from the ship-to address, and tax on marketplace orders is assigned to the state the order ships to. SyncBooks prepares the figures; you file the returns.
Where QuickBooks Online may suit you better
We would rather you choose the right tool than switch and regret it. Today:
- Payroll. SyncBooks Payroll is an add-on that works out payroll with the 2026 federal tables and, so far, Pennsylvania and Texas. Other states wait for their tables. See payroll.
- Bank feeds. SyncBooks imports statements from any bank today. Daily bank feeds from US and Canadian banks through Plaid open soon.
- Apps. QuickBooks Online connects to a very large number of outside apps. SyncBooks connects to the services listed on our synchronizations page, plus a public API and webhooks for your own software.
- Your accountant’s habits. If your accountant only works in QuickBooks, ask them first. Accountants join SyncBooks free as collaborators, and see every company they serve in one Clients list.
Switching from QuickBooks Online
Moving your books is the hard part of any switch. SyncBooks makes it a checked, step-by-step job:
- Choose a cutover date, the day SyncBooks takes over your books.
- Export from QuickBooks Online and bring the files into SyncBooks: the chart of accounts, customers, suppliers, items, open invoices and bills, the year so far by month, and every balance on your cutover date.
- Check the preview. Everything is shown before anything is saved.
- Compare the trial balance. SyncBooks compares its trial balance with your old one, account by account, so you can see that everything arrived.
Customer, supplier, item and account lists can also be imported from CSV files in QuickBooks’ own columns. A direct connection to QuickBooks Online is built and opens once SyncBooks’ developer account with Intuit is approved; export files work today.
We help you get set up, by phone or email, including the move from QuickBooks. Read more about switching.
The short version
| If you… | Consider |
|---|---|
| Run one company with little or no stock | QuickBooks Online may be enough |
| Run several companies, or plan to | SyncBooks |
| Hold stock in warehouses, with bins, lots, serials or kits | SyncBooks |
| Sell on Shopify and marketplaces across several companies | SyncBooks |
| Need payroll in a state SyncBooks doesn’t cover yet | QuickBooks Online, or SyncBooks with another payroll service |