If you're a freelancer, small business owner, or entrepreneur, then you already know the headaches that can come from creating and managing invoices. Without invoices, you won't get paid. They're pretty important!
But the thing is, not all invoicing solutions are equal. The best one for you will depend on your particular needs, how complex your invoices are, and your budget. The best invoicing apps usually come with a price tag.
If you don't want to pay, you'll want to look into one of the fantastic free invoicing solutions covered below. They're available on the web, for Android, and for iOS.
1. Invoice Ninja
If you're a freelancer or a small business owner and find that creating invoices on Google Docs or other similar tools isn't meeting your growing needs, Invoice Ninja offers an excellent solution.
As a free user, you can manage up to 20 clients and unlimited invoices, plus advanced features like time tracking, auto-billing, branded invoices, custom taxation settings, and the ability to accept deposits and partial payments. However, invoices have a "Created by Invoice Ninja" watermark.
Upgrading to the $10 per month plan allows you to manage unlimited clients, grants access to 10 professional invoice templates, a custom Invoice Ninja URL where clients can view and pay invoices, the ability to create custom invoices, auto-reminder emails, and much more.
Download: Invoice Ninja for Web | Android | iOS (Free, in-app purchases available)
2. Invoicely
Invoicely serves the same kinds of users as other invoicing apps: freelancers and small business owners who deal with complex accounting needs beyond simple invoices.
One of the more advanced features is managing multiple businesses with multiple team members and clients for each business, which comes in handy for serial entrepreneurs. You can also receive payments online directly to your invoice, which Invoicely uses to auto-update an invoice's paid status.
Free users get five invoices per month, while you can create unlimited business units to receive and manage payments. However, the free option ends here. To take stock of the notable advanced features, you need to pay $9.99 per month.
With the Basic plan, you get features like time tracking, taxes, mileage, customized branding, and online payment methods other than PayPal. While you're in the process of creating invoices, considering the most effective steps for crafting a professional invoice from scratch could be beneficial as well.
Download: Invoicely for Web | Android | iOS (Free, in-app purchases available)
3. Akaunting
Akaunting is a free web tool that lets you invoice, track expenses, and handle all your freelance or small business accounting needs right in the browser. It works well on PC, Android, and iOS devices.
Notable features include unlimited clients and invoices, billable expenses, inventory tracking for sales, dynamic reports, direct payment for invoices, per-client discounts, full accounting with deposits and transfers with bank accounts, and multilingual panels for admins and clients.
What's unique about Akaunting is that it's open-source, and you can download the software and host it on your own web server. You'd still access it using a web browser, but all the data remains with you. For privacy-minded folks who want remote invoice access, Akaunting is a smart choice.
Download: Akaunting for Web | Android | iOS (Free)
4. Wave Invoicing
If you're a small business in the USA or Canada, Wave Invoicing is the top invoice app for you. If you're not in these countries, and you sign up on Wave, it will connect you with one of their trusted partners in your country to help you out. Wave offers two of its features completely free, which include invoicing and accounting.
Notable invoicing features include auto-reminders for overdue clients, professional invoice templates, custom branding for your invoices, invoice sending and management on mobile devices, seeing when clients view an invoice, automatic cloud backups, and more.
You'll only have to pay if you want to use Wave's online payment processing or payroll management services. If you don't care about either of those, Wave is entirely free to use—and it's one of the best freelance tools that doesn't cost anything to use.
Download: Wave Invoicing for Web | Android | iOS (Free)
5. Zoho Invoice
Zoho Invoice is another completely free invoicing app, which also happens to be a trusted partner of Wave. Zoho Invoice was one of the company's first products; it's diversified over the years and now makes enough income elsewhere to offer Zoho Invoice at no cost. It also claims that it won't sell your data, so it's a win all around.
The only limitation you need to account for is that you can only generate up to 1,000 invoices per year. As a freelancer or small business, it's unlikely you'll reach that limit anyway—but if you do, you can contact Zoho's support team to discuss your options. If you're looking to grow your income as a freelancer, you might want to explore these excellent places to find new clients.
With Zoho Invoice, you can bill multiple clients, account for multiple currencies, automate payment reminders, collect payments directly (which makes this a great free billing app too!), log project time, and much more. You can do all of this from the website, or on the go through the handy Android or iOS app.
Download: Zoho Invoice for Web | Android | iOS (Free)
Which Free Invoicing App Is Best for You?
Let's be clear about one thing: whichever invoicing app you choose, you're trusting that it will do what it says and won't fail you. This is why we only recommend free invoicing apps for freelancers and small business owners without complex invoicing needs.
If your accounting is complicated, you should definitely pay for a robust invoicing solution. Getting an accountant can also help you focus your energy elsewhere, especially if you've begun earning a lot of money from your endeavors.
That said, if you're okay with free, then we highly recommend Invoicely (for basic and straightforward invoicing), Invoice Ninja (for growing freelancers and small business owners), or Akaunting (for privacy-minded folks). The others on this list, of course, will also do the job.