# Switch from FreshBooks to QuickBooks Online

- Author: SimpleBankConvert (https://simplebankconvert.com)
- Published: 2026-10-17
- Category: Switching accounting software
- Canonical: https://simplebankconvert.com/blog/switch-from-freshbooks-to-quickbooks-online

> How to switch from FreshBooks to QuickBooks Online: export clients, invoices and expenses, choose a conversion date and bring in bank activity.
To switch from FreshBooks to QuickBooks Online, download your client list, items, unpaid invoices and year-to-date reports first. Pick a conversion date, import clients and items into QuickBooks, then enter open invoices and opening balances as of that date. Bank activity after the date comes from bank files or a bank feed, not from FreshBooks.

## What a FreshBooks to QuickBooks Online move can carry

A FreshBooks to QuickBooks Online move carries lists and balances well, and finished history poorly. Client and item lists go across as spreadsheets. Unpaid invoices and account balances go across as of one date. Paid invoices, old expenses and past reports are better kept as saved files than rebuilt line by line.

That split follows from how QuickBooks Online takes data in. [Intuit's common questions on importing data](https://quickbooks.intuit.com/learn-support/en-us/help-article/import-export-data-files/common-questions-importing-data-quickbooks-online/L4OYJRFdj_US_en_US) lists the types it accepts from a spreadsheet. Those include customers, vendors, products and services, invoices, expenses, journal entries and bank data. Files can be CSV, Excel or Google Sheets, with fewer than 1,000 rows each.

Think of the move in three layers:

- **Lists**: clients become QuickBooks customers, and your FreshBooks items and services become products and services.
- **Balances on the conversion date**: what each bank account holds, what clients still owe and what you owe suppliers.
- **Activity after the date**: everything new, recorded in QuickBooks from day one.

FreshBooks is built around invoicing and time, while QuickBooks Online keeps a full ledger. Owners often switch when they need things like a balance sheet their accountant can work from. If you kept part of your records in spreadsheets alongside FreshBooks, the advice on [moving spreadsheet bookkeeping to QuickBooks](/blog/switch-from-excel-bookkeeping-to-quickbooks) covers that half.

## FreshBooks clients, items and reports to download first

Before you change anything, download every FreshBooks list and report you may need later. Look for the export or download option on each list and report screen. Save the client list, the items list, unpaid invoices, and profit and loss and expense reports for each year you used FreshBooks.

A practical download list:

1. **Client list** with names, emails, addresses and phone numbers.
2. **Items and services** with names, descriptions and rates.
3. **Unpaid invoices** as of the conversion date, with invoice numbers, dates and amounts due.
4. **Profit and loss** for each full year and for the current year up to the conversion date.
5. **Expense report** for the same periods, for your records and your accountant.
6. **Invoice PDFs** for any client who may dispute or ask about an old bill.

Store these files in one folder outside both programs, named by year. They are your record of the FreshBooks years. Once the subscription lapses, getting them back may take a support request, or may not be possible at all.

If you use FreshBooks for time tracking or projects, export those reports too. Treat the old time entries as records to keep, not data to import.

## Which conversion date fits a FreshBooks to QuickBooks Online move?

The best conversion date for a FreshBooks to QuickBooks Online move is the first day of your financial year. A month start also works if the year is well under way. The date marks where FreshBooks stops being the record and QuickBooks begins, so pick a day you can get a bank statement balance for.

A year start keeps the current year's reports in one program. That makes the tax return simpler, because the preparer works from one profit and loss. A mid-year start splits the year. That is fine, but add a note to your year-end folder that the first months live in FreshBooks.

[Intuit's guide to entering an opening balance](https://quickbooks.intuit.com/learn-support/en-us/help-article/bank-deposits/enter-opening-balance-account-quickbooks-online/L7NcxTbuu_US_en_US) gives the rule for bank accounts. The opening balance is the amount on the day you start tracking in QuickBooks Online, taken from the bank statement. The same page warns that adding earlier transactions on top of that balance counts the money twice.

An example: a freelancer switches on 2026-07-01. The June bank statement closes at 8,420.15. That figure becomes the checking account's opening balance, dated 2026-07-01. Every bank line from July onward goes into QuickBooks. Nothing from June or earlier does.

## Importing FreshBooks clients and items into QuickBooks Online

FreshBooks clients go into QuickBooks Online through the customer import, which matches your spreadsheet columns to QuickBooks fields. [Intuit's guide to importing customers and vendors](https://quickbooks.intuit.com/learn-support/en-us/help-article/customer-list/import-customers-vendors-email-contacts-quickbooks/L12erg8Db_US_en_US) accepts CSV, Excel or Google Sheets, up to 2 MB or 1,000 rows per file.

Tidy the client file before you upload it. Intuit's page sets several rules:

- Column headers go in row 1, and contacts sit on the first sheet.
- No formulas, blank rows or error cells.
- Each name must be unique across customers, vendors and employees.
- Names can't contain colons or quotation marks.
- Each contact can carry only one email address.

### Example: mapping a client export

The table shows how five typical columns from a client export might map. The column names on the left are examples; use the headers in your own file.

| Client file column | QuickBooks Online field | Note |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Organization | Company name | Also used as the display name |
| First name, Last name | First name, Last name | Optional for business clients |
| Email | Email | First address only |
| Phone | Phone | Any format |
| Address 1, City, State, Zip | Billing address fields | Map each part to its own field |

The import steps are short: Settings, Import Data, Customers, upload the file, match each field and review the list before you import. Re-importing does not overwrite existing customers, so fix mistakes in QuickBooks rather than uploading the file again.

Items and services follow the same pattern through the products and services import. Keep the item names the same as in FreshBooks, so old invoice PDFs and new QuickBooks invoices read alike.

## How should open FreshBooks invoices reach QuickBooks Online?

Open FreshBooks invoices should reach QuickBooks Online as real invoices, one per unpaid bill, dated with their original dates. That way each client's payment, when it arrives, has an invoice to settle against. A handful can be typed in. A long list can go through QuickBooks' invoice import from a spreadsheet.

Keep each invoice's original number and date. Enter only the amount still due, not the original total, if a client has paid part of it. Put the original amount in the memo, so the client's statement makes sense to them.

The income on these invoices was already counted in FreshBooks. Entering them in QuickBooks as fresh sales would count it a second time in your books. The usual fix is to post them to an income account your accountant agrees on for opening items, or to enter the total receivable as part of opening balances. Ask your accountant which they prefer before you start, since both affect the opening balance sheet.

Supplier bills you have not yet paid work the same way, in reverse. Enter each one with its original date and amount due, so the payment has something to clear.

## FreshBooks expenses or bank lines as the QuickBooks source

For the period after the conversion date, use bank lines as the QuickBooks source, not exported FreshBooks expenses. The bank shows what actually cleared, in the amounts that will appear on the statement you reconcile against. Expense records from FreshBooks are useful as a reference for categories, not as the import file.

Bank lines reach QuickBooks Online in three ways:

- **A bank feed**, connected from the day after your conversion date.
- **A CSV or QBO download** from your bank, uploaded to each account.
- **A PDF statement**, for months the bank no longer offers as a download. The upload screen can read a PDF statement and show its lines for you to review, or you can convert the PDF into a CSV or QBO file first and check it in a spreadsheet.

That conversion step is where SimpleBankConvert fits. It is being built to turn a PDF bank statement into a CSV or QBO file that QuickBooks Online's upload accepts, and it is not open for accounts yet. You can [add your name for early access](/get-started).

If you write paper checks, the check numbers matter for matching. A plain bank CSV often drops them, so check what the bank's file includes. For QuickBooks Desktop users the steps differ, and [importing checks into QuickBooks Desktop](/blog/import-checks-into-quickbooks-desktop) covers how numbers carry across there.

Owners weighing Xero instead of QuickBooks face the same choices about lists and balances. The short guide to [switching from Wave to Xero](/blog/switch-from-wave-to-xero) shows how that cut-over looks on the Xero side.

## FreshBooks payments that land twice in QuickBooks Online

FreshBooks payments land twice in QuickBooks Online when a client pays an old invoice and the deposit is added as new income. The income was already counted when the invoice was raised in FreshBooks. If QuickBooks has no open invoice to apply the payment to, it records a second sale.

Catch it with three habits:

1. **Enter every unpaid invoice before the feed starts.** Then each deposit in the first weeks can be matched to an invoice rather than added.
2. **Match, do not add, on the bank review screen.** When a deposit equals an open invoice, choose the match.
3. **Watch payment processor deposits.** If clients paid through a card processor, the deposit may be one lump that covers several invoices less fees. Record it as one payment against several invoices, with the fee as an expense.

A quick monthly check shows whether anything slipped. Compare the income total in QuickBooks for the first month with the total of invoices you raised in that month. If income is higher by the amount of an old invoice, a FreshBooks-era payment was added as a sale. Reverse the deposit and match it to the open invoice instead.