Bookkeeping quotes for a growing company range from under $100 a month to well over $1,000, and that spread is not marketing noise. It reflects four genuinely different delivery models, and inside the outsourced tier, prices that scale with your expenses. Every figure below was read off the provider's own pricing page on July 17, 2026. Published prices drift, so re-check before you sign anything.
The four ways to get your books done, priced
There is no single market rate for bookkeeping, because the four delivery models are not the same product. What you are actually choosing is who does the work, and who checks it.
| Model | Published cost (July 2026) | What you get | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| DIY software | Xero $25–$90/mo; QuickBooks Online $38–$275/mo | A software seat. You do the categorizing, reconciling, and close. | Low transaction volume, and a founder with time to spend |
| Freelance bookkeeper | No standard published rate. Bench lists $55/hr for its hourly QuickBooks-certified option, plus $1,200 onboarding. | One part-time person, usually with no reviewer and no backup | Simple books, if you are willing to manage the person |
| Outsourced firm | $99–$1,500/mo published, depending on tier and expenses | A team, a defined close process, reviewer oversight, software usually included | Companies that need dependable, diligence-ready books |
| In-house hire | About $70,300/yr at the national median wage, once benefits are counted | A full-time employee, plus recruiting, benefits, and coverage risk | Later-stage companies with complex, high-volume books |
What outsourced firms actually publish
This is the outsourced tier as published by each provider. Read it slowly, because the tiers are not equivalent: some prices assume annual billing, one is AI-only, and most scale with your expenses rather than sitting flat.
| Provider and plan | Published price | What the price is tied to |
|---|---|---|
| Pilot, Essentials | $99/mo | Up to $100,000 in monthly expenses. AI-only, with support through in-app messaging. |
| Bench, Bookkeeping Grow | From $199/mo | Starting price, billed monthly. Annual billing saves up to 20%. |
| Pilot, Core | From $299/mo billed annually, or $399/mo billed monthly | Quoted at $9,000 in monthly expenses, and scales up from there. Adds a US-based bookkeeper. |
| Zinance, Starter | $349/mo | Expenses up to $3 million per year. |
| Bench, Bookkeeping Core | From $399/mo | Adds unlimited communication with your bookkeeping team. |
| Zeni, Starter | $549/mo, or $494/mo billed annually | Pre-revenue companies only. Priced on complexity, monthly expenses, and annual revenue. |
| Kruze, Basic | $650–$850/mo | Based on complexity. Accrual-basis books, dedicated accounting manager. |
| Zinance, Growth | $849/mo | Expenses up to $12 million per year. |
| Kruze, Founder Timesaver | $850–$1,500/mo | Based on complexity. Adds GAAP-compliant revenue recognition support. |
Three comparisons are worth making carefully. First, Pilot's $99 Essentials tier is the cheapest human-free option on the board: AI categorizes and reconciles, and a US-based bookkeeper who reviews and explains your books begins at Core. Second, Zeni's $549 Starter is restricted to pre-revenue companies, so the moment you book revenue the honest comparison is its Growth plan at $799/mo. Third, advisory is almost always priced separately from the books: Pilot's CFO service starts at $1,750/mo billed annually, and Zeni's CFO Lite starts at $1,599/mo plus a $2,000 setup fee.
One point of confusion worth clearing up: Bench is operating and accepting customers today, and its site notes it is now part of Mainstreet. If you have seen older reporting suggesting otherwise, it is out of date.
Any two bookkeeping prices are only comparable once you pin down three things: what expense or revenue band the price is quoted at, whether it assumes annual billing, and whether a human reviews the close. A headline number that fails all three tests is a starting price, not your price.
What actually drives your bill
Whatever model you pick, four variables move the number:
- Transaction volume. The number-one driver. More bank, card, and payment-processor activity means more to categorize and reconcile.
- Expense or revenue scale. Most firms tier on this, but on different axes. Zinance tiers on annual expenses, Pilot quotes against monthly expenses, Zeni prices on complexity plus expenses plus revenue, and Kruze prices on complexity.
- Number of accounts. Every extra bank account, credit card, and payment processor adds reconciliation work.
- Scope. Payroll, AP and AR, deferred revenue schedules, and accrual accounting all cost more than plain categorization. Kruze, for instance, only includes GAAP revenue recognition support from its Founder Timesaver tier up.
The real cost of an in-house hire
This is where founders most often misjudge the math. The national median pay for bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks was $49,210 a year, or $23.66 an hour, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (2024 median pay, published in the Occupational Outlook Handbook). That is the figure people anchor on, and it is the wrong one, because it is wages only.
The BLS Employer Costs for Employee Compensation survey for March 2026 puts wages and salaries at 69.9 percent of employer costs for private industry workers, with benefits making up the other 30.1 percent. That puts total employer cost at roughly 1.43 times wages. Applied to the national median, a bookkeeper runs about $70,300 a year, or roughly $5,900 a month, and that is before software, equipment, or the cost of recruiting. A single hire also has no backup when they are on leave, and no second pair of eyes on the close.
Why DIY and freelancers stop scaling
Once you raise money or take on outside lenders, your books stop being a tax formality. Investors want a monthly reporting package, your board wants to see runway, and your next round's diligence will scrutinize the reconciliations. A spreadsheet-plus-software setup that worked at ten transactions a month starts to crack, and it usually cracks in two predictable places: the monthly close starts slipping, and the chart of accounts drifts until nobody trusts the numbers.
That is the real cost of cheap bookkeeping. It is rarely the monthly fee. It is the founder hours, and the cleanup bill when a year of books has to be redone under deadline before a raise.
Where Zinance fits
Zinance is outsourced bookkeeping built for fast-growing companies, priced on annual expenses:
| Plan | Price | Covers |
|---|---|---|
| Starter | Starting at $349/mo | Expenses up to $3 million per year |
| Growth | Starting at $849/mo | Expenses up to $12 million per year |
| Enterprise | Custom | Expenses over $12 million per year |
Every plan includes daily bookkeeping, live runway and burn dashboards, team access over chat, email and Slack, and 1000+ customized KPIs with 100+ CFO reports. Zinance publishes a go-live of 7 business days, no long-term contracts, and that your books belong to you. When you need forecasting, board decks, or fundraising support, you can layer in a fractional CFO or tax without switching providers or re-onboarding your data.
Against the published ladder, Starter at $349/mo sits below every competing plan on this list that includes a human reviewing your books, and above the AI-only and lighter-touch tiers. Whether that is the right trade depends on your transaction volume and how much oversight your next diligence process will demand.