QuickBooks Online vs. Desktop - Comparing interface and features after converting

all right if you have recently upgraded or downgraded whichever way you want to see it from QuickBooks desktop into QuickBooks Online this video is good for you the other group of people that I would love for this video to be useful for is for folks that maybe are thinking about going from QuickBooks desktop to QuickBooks Online so first of all I have this article and I'll go ahead and copy and paste that link to the article in the description below where I can explain a bullet point by bullet point all the things are you going to lose in the process of going from QuickBooks desktop to QuickBooks Online so if you have QuickBooks Pro premier enterprise or accountant and you convert it to QuickBooks Online there's a whole bunch of things that you would number one loose in the process and number two features are not gonna be there anymore so I'll put the link in the description below so you can check that out the other piece is if you have not set up your QuickBooks Online account free trial I'll also put a link to a special link that will give you a 50% discount for the first year that you sign up and it's actually the best deal in town so if you haven't set up your QuickBooks Online account use that link and I'll take you to the setup process so in this video let me can explain feature by feature the difference between QuickBooks Online and QuickBooks desktop and I can't really go into the entire list that are having the article for example just because it's it would just be a way too long of a video but let me go over all in a very high level what's the difference between the two so first of all when you first log in to QuickBooks Online this is what it looks like this is called a dashboard basically it has a couple of graphs here in the front that gives you invoices expenses profit and loss and some balances here on the right-hand side on the QuickBooks desktop it's a little bit different you actually get the home screen with all the icons you can click on the insights tab that will give you a similar information I would probably say or argue that part of the the part of the inspiration for the quickbooks online dashboard probably came from QuickBooks desktop in both you can't really change much you can change some of the dates there is a gear button on the desktop where you can pick and choose what you don't want to see on the online you can hit the drop-down and choose the days where you can't really change what this graphs look like this these are just standard graphs that you have to deal with now this these are balances on the Left right side of the screen and QuickBooks Online in QuickBooks desktop you can see them by clicking on view balances so if you're used to seeing those balances there you would definitely notice them now on the right hand side of the dashboard now in QuickBooks desktop if you use the top icon bar instead of the left icon bar and we're gonna go back to the home page maybe you're used to seeing the balances here on the right hand side of the screen so that would give you an idea more or less how those work now I'm gonna go into back into the left icon bar so we can compare the left navigation bar in QuickBooks desktop which is that big green I mean blue bar on the left hand side and it has a couple of commonly accessed features like income tracker bill tracker you have customers you have bender you have employees reports that sort of thing when you're going to QuickBooks Online is very similar we got the we got the sales tab that takes me to all of my sales related transactions you get this here which is similar to the income tracker so this right here is called the sales transaction screen if you go into QuickBooks and you click on income tracker you're gonna also notice that you know part of the inspiration that look-and-feel and QuickBooks desktop on the income tracker looks a lot like the income tracker in quickbooks online you get a list of all the transactions that comprise that income if you click on any of these color buttons you can filter that same thing with QuickBooks desktop you can click on any of these and they filter so those two things are extremely similar on the same sales tab you can click over to invoices and this invoice section which is kinda like the income tracker but just solely invoices that looks very similar in the QuickBooks test desktop world so if I click on customers and then I click here assess transactions and then you click on invoices I would get to a similar sort of invoice listing type of screen now if I actually click on customers that's what we in QuickBooks Online this would be the Customer Center which has all the customer information and open balances that would be similar as clicking on customers here and I'll close I'm going to close the left navigation bar to give me a little bit more real estate and organize the screen here so if I click on any of these customers it will show me here on the right-hand side the history of all the transactions related to that customer and it will work the same way in QuickBooks Online so if I click on any of these particular customers I will see the history within that customer so from that perspective those two things are very similar just a little tab icon there that opens up the Customer Center so I can see my left navigation bar my list of customers and then all the detail of each customer and that act that little option there that opens and closes makes it even more similar to QuickBooks desktop because you get a left navigation bar the customer list and all the transactions related to it now so that's that's a pretty much all the stuff in their sales there's a tab here called products and services which in the QuickBooks desktop world it says it's called item list so if I click on item list there it will take me to the list of all the items which are the products and services that I buy and sell if I click on any of those items it'll take me to the Edit item screen where I can select the item name description price and account and it will work the same way in QuickBooks Online if I click on edit on any of them it takes me to a similar screen where I can change the name the account and price associated with it so from that from that perspective it's just very similar I can I can make a duplicate here in QuickBooks Online and then if in QuickBooks desktop I could also right-click and duplicate so the item list would be very similar from that perspective although QuickBooks desktop there's a lot more features related to inventory let me click on on the expenses tab here in QuickBooks Online and that would take me to all my expense transactions QuickBooks desktop doesn't have anything really similar to that there's this option called the bill tracker which actually shows me purchase orders bills and stuff like that but in here it shows me all expense transactions so from that perspective I think this expense transactions tab is actually kind of an edge is a little bit better than QuickBooks desktop closest thing to that I will be clicking on vendors and then clicking on transactions you minimize this and then clicking on checks and you can see all the checks for all the vendors across the board or I can click on credit card activity and I can see all the credit card activity with all the vendors across the board and then bills and I can see them all but in QuickBooks Online there's sort of all lumped together which is actually a really cool thing so I would say this particular feature is better in QuickBooks Online now if I click on Bender's this will take me to my vendor Center up here you see this bar where I can click on purchase orders open bills that would be what the bill tracker will be like so if I click on bill tracker that would be very similar to this I would probably argue the functionality it's pretty much identical so that could be benders bill tracker that's right there so you got the bill tracker and the vendor Center all sort of splice into one if I click on any of these specific vendors it will take me to the history of that vendor so that would be the equivalent of me clicking on vendors or here vendor Center so with the equivalent of me doing that and going into the vendor Center and then going into vendors minimize this again and I clicking away in any specific vendor and seeing all the history of that specific vendor that would be the same thing as here now there's this little tap button here just like in the customer side where I can open up the vendor list and then I would make it a lot to QuickBooks desktop so that's what I've been there list looks like now if I click on workers and employees that would be similar to going into employees an employee center now the the experience in QuickBooks desktop versus QuickBooks Online and payroll it's very very similar quickbooks desktops a lot more powerful when it comes to paychecks and job costing and stuff like that but that would be the closest we can get to the employee center would be that workers employees tab and when i click on reports the experience in quickbooks online is actually pretty neat now it's very visual very easy to work with the way the closest thing to that reports tab would be the report Center which is a feature in QuickBooks that stuff that I actually don't use a lot just because it takes a while to load so as you can see I just clicked in it it takes a while to load and you have all the reports and QuickBooks desktop have this sort of visual preview and you can't and they and they are organized by category so I think QuickBooks that stuff's a lot sort of a lot better when it comes to this report Center if I go to a specific report so for example I'm going to go into the profit and loss the interface is similar we have date range we have columns by we have comparing to a previous period switching from cash to accrual and a customize button that allows me to do some light customization in QuickBooks desktop we pull up a profit and loss report just so you can get an idea more or less we have the date range we have the cash and accrual toggle we can click on customize report and we can do the the comparative periods okay so all that stuff is available and what really makes a huge difference is in this filters tab where you see all these fields that we can do filters for and then if I actually go to a filter here notice that I'm extremely limited in what fields I can filter in QuickBooks Online which actually takes me to one of the most important pieces of the differences between the two in the surface it looks like there the same in terms of the basic reports profit and loss balance sheet and that sort of thing but when it comes to customizing reports QuickBooks desktop is leagues away from QuickBooks Online just much more powerful a lot more functions but the look and feel is very similar you can save customized reports and quickbooks online you can also click on memorize and do the same thing in QuickBooks desktop so functionality wise they're very head-to-head with those reports but that's the key component in in terms of customization that's gonna be much better in the desktop side when I click on taxes that would take me to sort of like the payroll taxes and sales taxes in this case only sales taxes are enabled in QuickBooks desktop we have sales taxes as well yes we have the sales tax Center and we have very similar functionality I would still say QuickBooks desktops a little bit more powerful but QuickBooks Online is bringing in some automated rate calculation and stuff like that that's gonna make it in the long run a lot more a lot more a lot more powerful when I click on accounting that's gonna take me to my chart of accounts my child of accounts in QuickBooks Online is searchable I'm I can create accounts I can delete account I can merge accounts I can reconcile we have running balances in here it's gonna be very similar in QuickBooks desktop so if I click on the chart of accounts I have all my accounts here I can search I can edit any of these accounts and I changed the type the description just I can do here under the quickbooks online or dislike' I have about the same functionality QuickBooks desktop has the register balance what QuickBooks Online has both the downloaded bank balance and the QuickBooks balance so that gives you a little bit of an edge but on at all oh the chart of accounts actually a very similar feature when you've got a reconcile that that's gonna be a lot different I actually like the reconciliation feature in QuickBooks Online better let me just show you real quick what that looks like so you get debits and credits sort of on the same line and you have one check mark for both we're in QuickBooks desktop the experience is a little bit more sort of old-style so if I go to reconcile for example I'm just gonna pick up a date here I had to reconcile my checks on the left and my the process on the right and it and it is just a little bit always cool when it comes to that perspective it works really well in desktop but I really like the way QuickBooks Online I combine the two into just the same lines I like your filtering so I could just show payments reconcile that I can just show the faucets reconcile that and and you also get something that you don't get with desktop which is a clear date and the clear that is awesome if you're downloading things on the bank and it checks clear you'll be able to know by comparison that the difference between the actual check date and the clear date so I find those two things to be just particularly better in QuickBooks Online so let's go on to the quick create button this is where you can find all the transactions invoices estimate sales receipts I mean you find that stuff here as well so if I click click on customers I can see invoices sales receipts estimate so all that stuff is in there the one area that's worth noting is that QuickBooks Online doesn't have sales orders and QuickBooks desktop does so that's actually one of the major features in QuickBooks desktop especially for inventory people that makes a huge difference but in terms of those basic functions invoices estimates and sales receipts is pretty much identical one place where QuickBooks desktop really stands out is the customization overall of the overall looking field in way so there is some editable functionality in QuickBooks Online where you can change a little bit of the look and feel the invoices but just QuickBooks desktop it's just way more powerful so I'm gonna open up an invoice real quickly to show you so I'm gonna go to invoice and then I'm gonna go to formatting and customize data layout and the layout designer see you got this full designer feature where I can move around some of these boxes and I can customize specifically where all these things are so it's actually a lot more powerful in the QuickBooks desktop tool because in QuickBooks Online I really can't move anything around like I could change the color of the look and feel and I can either remove some fields and some margins but I don't have the amount of flexibility in terms of overall controlling the look and feel of the printed forms in QuickBooks Online as I have in QuickBooks desktop so a couple of things worth noting in the QuickBooks Online side we can collapse that left navigation bar by clicking on those three lines just like we can do it on the desktop side okay so you can see we can collapse those two if I click on the gear menu and then I count in settings I have a lot of Preferences that I can tweak and change in the accountant settings it's not as powerful as QuickBooks desktop though but this is where we go to change all the options that I want to turn off and on same thing in QuickBooks desktop I go to edit preferences and then I go through all the different preferences here and turn things off and on I'm not gonna get into the specifics about what's different in the settings but that's more or less navigationally how you will get to that now the search feature in QuickBooks Online is just much more powerful and better because when you click on search you get a full search box and then you have a recent transactions list something you really don't get with QuickBooks desktop if you go to edit and find you do have a really powerful advanced advanced fine feature where you can run a lot of filters and look for transactions but quickbooks online as well if I click on advanced search notice that I can I can search by any of these criteria transaction type reference notice I can have tons of criteria if I click on add filter and I can I can add more criteria they ring and things like that so there there is just a lot of things that we can search in the search box now in terms of what you have access to you notice that you have just a few fields that you can access you have all the transaction types and then a few fields with QuickBooks desktop it feels like there are more filters and more options for searching and and dissecting data but I think in practical matters I think I found the QuickBooks Online search to be just faster for most of the things that were searching and of course that recent transactions list it's just really awesome QuickBooks desktop doesn't give you that I mean there is a report called where is it the journal so we go to accounting and taxes and journal it will show you all the most recent transactions but it just feels a lot more cumbersome because it's more of a report than the the drop-down that shows me all the recent transactions now on the gear menu we can do other things like going into our attachments our current transactions QuickBooks labs which will be all the new things that they add along the way budgeting and import data now QuickBooks desktop when it comes to accountant Edition and enterprise is just miles away in terms of functionality with data import QuickBooks desktop has tons of great things like batch enter the batch would classify a feature and QuickBooks desktop it's better we have batch voiding the lead we have badge merge just QuickBooks desktop hands down just more powerful on the import side QuickBooks Online does have a couple of import feature like you can import customer lists vendor list accounts on products and services something the QuickBooks tester has been able to do forever but the single most important thing when comparing the two and where they're really truly different is on the banking side quickbooks online banking is extremely powerful the bank rules are also extremely powerful QuickBooks desktop does have the bank feeds feature where you can go and deal with some of the transactions I get downloaded through the bank but the interface is it's a little bit outdated it's a little bit clunky the rules there are rules I can you can actually create some of the rules but the rules are very limited in terms of what you can use to discriminate and dissect data in terms of automatically classifying things this is the one place hands down QuickBooks Online has just much stronger personality or functionality than desktop and I just think that will continue being that way that maybe the edge that QuickBooks Online will always have on QuickBooks desktop now adding users and QuickBooks Online click here manage users is extremely easy you don't need to install anything QuickBooks Online essentials gives you three users right off the bat QuickBooks Online Plus gives you five users right off the bat plus two accountants and you can add and for a little bit extra fee up to 25 users with a QuickBooks desktop adding users usually means you have to buy a new license if you're working with enterprise I mean this gets pretty costly one thing that is just important to point out the the users feature in QuickBooks desktop it's a lot more powerful especially when it comes to QuickBooks Enterprise so when you're editing the functionality of what you can access of what you can't access in QuickBooks Enterprise is extremely comprehensive has a lot of moving parts in terms of what you can tell QuickBooks to give the user access to or not where QuickBooks Online is just really weak in that area when you create a user I'm gonna create a custom user for example there's only really limited functionality you can say yes the user can have access to customers or vendors and really that's it so there's really no comparison when it comes to the user functionality of QuickBooks a desktop and online so just really important pull the article here please visit this article I list bullet point by bullet point every single difference between QuickBooks desktop and online especially for folks transferring over and comparing converting over and I need you to go through that list before you do the conversion make sure you know what you're getting yourself into make sure you know what you're losing I also do least kind of like great things about QuickBooks Online like its cloud-based more powerful bank feeds is some easy multi-user access easy accountant access easy collaboration mobile apps support which we didn't mention QuickBooks Online has some great virtues but if you are converting from QuickBooks Online to QuickBooks desktop I can certainly see why you would have some anxiety about understanding the differences and understanding on whether or not you should do such a conversion so hopefully you like this video hit like add some comments below subscribe to the channel all that stuff let me know if this was complete let me know if this type of video that you'd like to see in the future what else would you like to see in terms of comparing the two platforms thanks

Channel: Hector Garcia CPA

Views: 37,262

Keywords: quickbooks, tutorial, 2018, desktop, online, pro, premier, enterprise, accountant, bookkeeping, accounting

Id: KO_uZsXs7d0

Length: 23min 0sec (1380 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 02 2018