Frappe Books vs FrontAccounting

Frappe Books is accounting software for small businesses, available free under the AGPL-3.0 license. It supports quotes, invoices, payments, bills, supplier payments and returns, alongside double-entry bookkeeping, journal entries and financial reports. Inventory tools track stock across locations, including batches, expiry dates and serial numbers, and the software supports point-of-sale transactions. Businesses in India can produce GSTR-1 and GSTR-2 reports for GST returns. Books User, Books Manager and System Manager roles control access to records, reports and settings. Company data stays in the database of the customer’s Frappe site, and the software runs on the customer’s own server. It is listed for Android, iOS, Linux, macOS, self-hosted use, web and Windows. On phones, it runs in a browser and can be added to the home screen, but an internet connection is required. The old desktop app is no longer supported. Frappe states that its quality and information security systems have ISO 9001:2015 and ISO 27001:2022 certifications and SOC 2 Type II attestation.

FrontAccounting is free, self-hosted web accounting software for small companies, covering accounting tasks across a broader ERP chain. It includes purchasing, sales, accounts payable and receivable, inventory, manufacturing, fixed assets, and a general ledger with budget. Sales tools include quotations, orders, delivery notes, invoices, credit notes, batch invoicing, point-of-sale definitions, and payment allocation. Purchasing includes purchase orders, goods receival notes, supplier price lists and payments, and transaction attachments. Inventory supports stock items, locations, transfers, reorder levels, average material cost, and barcode scanner entry; manufacturing includes bills of materials and work orders. It supports multiple companies and users with different privileges, along with backup, restore, and simple audit trails. Reports can be printed, emailed, converted to PDF, or exported to Excel or OpenOffice Calc. Multi-currency and GST/VAT support are listed. Installation requires a web server, PHP, and MySQL with InnoDB enabled; other database systems are unsupported. The software is web-only, and support requests are directed to its forum. The listed plan is free.