The best inventory management software, whether used on its own or with a point-of-sale (POS) system, should make it easy for businesses to track products, tools, and assets from production to sale. If you aren’t ready to invest in an inventory management system, consider the free options we explore in this guide.
While free inventory systems are more limited than their paid counterparts, we found free options with enough tools for small businesses to get started, forever-free subscriptions with options to upgrade, cloud-based functionality, and easy-to-use interfaces.
Based on our evaluation, the six best free inventory management software for small businesses are:
- Odoo Inventory: Best overall
- Square: Best for retailers
- Zoho Inventory: Best for large inventories
- Sortly: Best free inventory mobile app
- Backbar: Best for restaurants and bars
- SalesBinder: Best for small international businesses
Why You Can Trust Fit Small Business
The Fit Small Business editorial process follows strict standards to ensure our “best” answers are based on accuracy, clarity, authority, objectivity, and accessibility.
I have over five years of order and payment processing experience and have been evaluating, testing, and writing about point-of-sale and payment solutions, including inventory management software, for over two years. For this review, I evaluated around 15 free inventory management software across 25 data points including pricing, inventory features, ease of use, popularity, and value for money.
Payments Staff Writer at FitSmallBusiness
All the products that made our list had to include the following features in their free plans:
- Real-time tracking
- Inventory counts
- Barcode scanning
- Granular inventory (variants, modifiers)
- Basic reports
- Customer shipping information
- Knowledge base
- Unlimited locations (except for Zoho, which is limited to one location and one Shopify store)
Here is a breakdown of the other features available in each software’s free plan:
Odoo: Best Overall Free Inventory Management Software
Pros
- Unlimited products & locations
- Automated purchase orders (POs)
- Inventory forecasting
- Custom reporting, alerts, and automations
Cons
- Limited customer support
- Limited integrations
- POS, ecommerce, and other add-ons cost extra
Overview
Odoo, a fully open-source inventory system, takes the top spot for free inventory software because it offers so much in its free plan―even automated POs and expiration date tracking. It’s also completely unlimited, making it great for small businesses with huge inventories.
Odoo earned 4.6 out of 5. The biggest drawback to Odoo is it only has email and forum support, along with training videos. Most other systems on this list offer live support. Real-world customers like Odoo, but it does not rate as highly as Square or Zoho.
- Users: Unlimited
- Locations: Unlimited
- Items/Products: Unlimited
- Transactions: Unlimited
- Support: Community and knowledge base
- Integrations: Odoo apps, shipping apps, and application programming interface (API); will connect you to ecommerce apps
- Double-entry inventory for better tracking
- Barcode scanning
- Delivery orders
- Multiple locations
- Repair management
- Stock transfers
- Reports include scrap and waste
- Dropshipping tools
- Custom alerts (from low-stock to product or supplier notifications)
- Customer portal
- Smart scheduler to trigger operations based on product availability
- Automated POs
- Make-to-order tracking
- Real-time valuation
- Serial number tracking
- Product variants, expiry dates, measurements, unlimited custom fields
- First-in, first-out (FIFO), average cost (AVCO) method, and standard price costing
- Multiple valuation methods
- Custom reporting
- Inventory forecasting
Paid plans start at $31.10 per month
- Multichannel management
- Customer relationship management
- Website
- Ecommerce
- CRM
- Point of Sale
- Accounting
- Invoicing
- Maintenance
- Manufacturing
- Employees
- Email Marketing
- Field Service
- Appointments
- VOIP
Square: Best Free Retail Inventory Software
Pros
- Unlimited products, including variations
- Free, industry-specific POS systems for both retailers and restaurants
- Integrated payments with Square Payments
- Syncs across online, in-store, and mobile sales
Cons
- No custom reporting
- Only integrates with Square POS and Square Payments
- Cannot create POs in free plan
Overview
Square is best known for its POS capabilities for retailers and restaurants, but it also offers incredible inventory management tools in all of its POS accounts. With every Square for Retail account, retailers get live inventory tracking as they make sales, ecommerce integrations, mobile capabilities, POS, order management, product variants, and more.
With Square for Restaurants, you get menu management, order management, ingredient level tracking, online order and delivery management, and more.
Did You Know? Every Square account comes with access to Square Online, Square’s ecommerce website builder.
Square earned an overall score of 4.58 out of 5 on our evaluation, just below Odoo, which has more features for inventory management itself. Square, however, earned excellent scores for ease of use, pricing, and value.
Like Zoho, Square has an excellent mobile app, where you can conduct sales and also scan items and perform inventory counts.
- Users: Unlimited
- Locations: Unlimited
- Items/Products: Unlimited
- Transactions: Unlimited
- Support: Phone, knowledge base, email, and tutorials
- Integrations: Shipping, restaurant management, website builders, scheduling, marketing, health management, and service business apps
*Paid plans start at $60 per month for Restaurants, $89 per month for Retail (30-day free trial for paid plans)
- Automatic POs
- Cost of goods sold (COGS) tracking
- Smart stock forecasts
- Mobile app/mobile selling for Square Restaurants
- Advanced reporting
Zoho: Best Free Software for Managing Large Inventories
Pros
- Excellent mobile app
- Barcode, shipping, and PO generators
- Dropshipping tools
- Ecommerce integrations
Cons
- Sale and purchase order limits
- Lacks Bill of Material (BOM), pick lists, or bin ID support
- No forecasting, only supports FIFO costing
Overview
Zoho Inventory’s free plan came in third because it allows for unlimited products, has a strong range of integrations, and features like low stock alerts, kitting, and bundling options.
It also has shipping tools, allowing you to print packing slips and generate discounted shipping labels from major logistics providers like the United States Postal Service (USPS) and UPS right from your dashboard.
We rated Zoho Inventory 4.48 out of 5. It’s easy to use and has high real-world user ratings for its online program and its mobile apps. Plus Zoho CRM software surpasses Odoo’s free plan.
- Users: One
- Locations: One + One Shopify Store
- Items/Products: Unlimited
- Transactions: 50 orders per month
- Support: Chat, forum, email, and knowledge base
- Integrations: Ecommerce, shipping, payment gateways, accounting, CRM, API, and others
- Shipments module: Shipments have been moved from Packages for easier access
- Custom tabs in the client portal
- More customization tools
- Creating and assigning tasks
- Separate module of Purchase Receives
- Document attachment to shipments
- More shipping tools
- Ecommerce integrations with Shopify and Zoho ecommerce
- Serial and batch tracking
- Receive and make payments for orders and purchases via Stripe
- Item grouping and bundling
- Process returns
- Sales order management
- Invoicing
- Add and track customers
- Packaging and shipping
- Add credits to customer accounts and set credit limits
- Track shipments
- Create POs
- Barcode scanning
- Client portal
- Back orders and drop shipments
- Integrates with Shopify, Etsy, eBay, and Amazon
- PO templates
- Mobile app: 4.5 out of 5 on Android; 4.7 out of 5 on iOS
- SKU generator
- Set automated reorder points
*Paid plans start at $39 per month with monthly billing
(Discounts available with annual payment)
- Additional locations ($10 per location per month)
- Additional users ($3 per user per month)
- Shipping labels
- Shipment tracking
- Multiple currencies
- Custom views
- Batch and serial number tracking
- Automated workflows
- Customer portal
Sortly: Best Free Inventory App
Pros
- Built-in barcode scanning that supports quick response (QR) codes
- Can manage multiple warehouses
- Offline mode
Cons
- Low stock alerts only in paid plans
- No kitting capabilities
- No integration capabilities
Overview
Sortly is a cloud-based inventory management platform that provides activity tracking, multilocation tracking, barcoding, and audit trails. Its noteworthy feature, however, is its built-in barcode and QR scanner mobile app that works even in offline mode.
You can scan incoming and outgoing inventory even when your phone app doesn’t have a signal—Sortly will sync automatically as soon as you’re back online. Its offline abilities paired with its multilocation tracking make Sortly ideal for on-the-go inventory management across multiple locations. Note that Zoho also has an offline mode to its mobile app, but Sortly offers inventory for multiple locations.
On our inventory management evaluation, Sortly scored 3.94 out of 5. The absence of low-stock alerts, POs, and item limits, plus its lack of integration capabilities in the free plan prevented Sortly from earning high scores.
- Users: One
- Location: Unlimited
- Items/Products: 100
- Transactions: Unlimited
- Support: Knowledge base, tutorials, and email
- Integrations: None
- Add custom tags and notes
- In-app scanner
- File items into categorical folders
- Barcode auto lookup
- Bulk editing details
- Scan and connect third-party barcodes
- Basic comma-separated values (CSV) file and PDF reports
- Quick action scanner (check-in/out items)
- Support: help center, tutorials, and weekly onboarding seminars
- Add custom fields (limited to one)
- Attach up to eight photos per item
*Paid plans start at $49 per month (Discounts available with annual payment)
- API integrations
- Custom barcode generation
- QR code label generation
- Use external/handheld scanners
- More entries and custom fields
- Purchase orders
- Low-stock alerts
- In-app alerts
- Email alerts
Backbar: Best Free Inventory Software for Restaurants & Bars
Pros
- Unlimited items and inventory locations
- Specialized features for restaurants and bars
- One-click purchasing
Cons
- More detailed reports are only available on the free plans
- No forecasting tools
- Priority support on paid plans only
Overview
Backbar’s free plan is well-suited for one-location small to mid-sized bars and restaurants that need a straightforward, dedicated solution for managing their inventory and menu items. The free plan offers essential inventory management tools and purchasing functionality. It comes with a pre-existing database of alcohol products and beverages and it supports offline inventory mode.
Its higher-paid plans offer more advanced tools such as unlimited recipe builder, recipe costing and pricing, cost variance alerts, priority support, specific user permissions, and detailed custom reports.
- Users: Unlimited
- Location: Unlimited
- Items/Products: Unlimited
- Transactions: Unlimited
- Support: Knowledge base, tutorials, and email
- Integrations: Toast, Square, Clover
- Web and mobile offline inventory
- Multi-storage locations
- POS integrations
- Limited drink costing and pricing
- Recipe builder (max of 10 for free plan)
- Item transaction history (up to 6 months for free plan)
- One-click purchasing
- Invoice uploading
- Order reminders
- Inventory and ordering summary reports
*Paid plans start at $99 per month (Discounts available with annual payment)
- Multiple restaurant/bar locations
- Color-coded inventory
- Drink and recipe costing and pricing
- Unlimited item transaction history
- Usage reports
- Comparison reports
- Product level trend reports
- Pricing, pour costs, and profit reports
- Priority support
SalesBinder: Best for Small International Businesses
Pros
- Available in over 130 countries
- CRM included
- Barcode documents and items
- Paid plans are affordable
Cons
- No integrations in free plan
- Limited items
- Low-rate mobile app; iOS only
Overview
SalesBinder offers excellent inventory software that works in more than 130 countries and a wide array of currencies. Its intuitive interface also includes lots of room for customization so you can make it work how you need it to, wherever you are in the world.
Overall, SalesBinder scored 3.69 out of 5 in our evaluation. It performed well in the inventory features, expert score, and user experience categories. SalesBinder could’ve scored better if it had no product or user limits and allowed integrations in its free plan and if the mobile app scored better in user reviews. For large inventories, consider Odoo, Square, or Zoho.
- Users: One
- Location: Unlimited
- Items/Products: 100 active records (includes items, accounts, and orders)
- Transactions: Unlimited
- Support: Email and knowledge base
- Integrations: Paid plans only. QuickBooks, Xero, WooCommerce, Zapier, and more.
- 130 countries
- Language customization for documents
- Real-time inventory tracking by location
- Barcode generation and scanning
- Five photos per item description
- Reports (additional fee for profit analysis)
- Unlimited locations
- API access
- CRM
- Kitting/bundling
- Invoicing
- Custom fields
- Place sales orders
- Item variations
- Estimates
- Inventory and sales reports
- Place PO
- Vendor management
- Stock transfers
- Create packing lists
- Shipment tracking
- iOS Mobile app: 2.7 out of 5 in the app store
- Set user permissions
- Create and manage prospective custom
*Paid plans start at $9 per month (30-day free trial for paid plans)
- Additional users at $3 per user per month
- Kitting and bundling at additional $9 per month
- Integrations
- Phone and email support
How to Choose the Best Free Inventory Management System
You can choose from a number of free inventory management software options—to find a solution that matches your business, assess your needs, current systems, and future plans for growth. Make sure to test the systems as well.
Step 1: Determine Your Needs
Create a list of your must-have features. This should include the number of users, products, orders, and locations the software should be able to accommodate on its free plan.
For this list, also consider the type of inventory you’re tracking and what other information you need to track alongside it—variants, purchase orders, vendor information, individual parts, location within your warehouse, sales or use history, etc. This is where you may need to break up your list into must-haves and nice-to-haves. After all, we’re looking at free software, so there will be some limitations. Just consider what you are and aren’t willing to compromise on.
If the answer is you don’t want to compromise on anything, consider choosing paid inventory software. There are many options for under $100 per month.
Step 2: Consider Any Existing Systems & Software
If you have any existing software, like QuickBooks, an online store, or an order or invoicing system, ideally, your new inventory software will be able to work with it. Having data stored in two systems that don’t talk to each other can result in a lot of time spent manually reconciling records and opening yourself up to a lot of potential human error.
Your inventory software should at least have a one-way push or pull integration (where your inventory data will sync with your other systems, or your other systems will sync with your inventory system); even better would be a two-way sync where data is automatically pushed between both systems.
In addition to software, consider any workflows or procedural systems you may have in place. For example, your inventory receiving process, counting cycles, reporting, or restocking process. Your new software should make these workflows easier—not require you to do additional manual data collection or construct workarounds.
Step 3: Create a Shortlist & Test for Yourself
Once you know what features you need and how they should fit into your day-to-day operations, consider five to 10 systems that meet your basic requirements. Then, depending on your preference, either sign up and test-drive each software for yourself or inquire about a professional demonstration.
One of the benefits of free software is that anyone can sign up and use it, so you have nothing to lose by trying it out.
In my years of testing software, the general trend I’ve noticed is that the easier it is to use, the more limited it may be in terms of features or customization capabilities. On the other hand, incredibly feature-rich software can often have a steep learning curve. Consider which is more important to you—after all, a fancy feature is only helpful if you’re actively using it.
Step 4: Take into Account Future Growth
Finally, before settling on a software, consider where your business will be six months, a year, and three years from now. While you can always switch inventory systems, it is a giant pain to do so. Try to choose a software that can grow with you.
Methodology: How We Evaluated Free Inventory Software
We compared 15 of the best free inventory tracking software across 26 data points. The options we considered are forever-free inventory systems that also offer paid versions or add-ons at a price suited for small and midsize businesses (SMBs). We also prioritized software that is cloud-based and easy to use, and sought out software that can cater to a wide variety of industries—not just retail.
Click through the tabs below for a more detailed breakdown of our evaluation criteria.
40% of Overall Score
Having a forever-free plan was a must. We also prioritized software that includes pricing plans and add-on options to grow with your business and awarded points to systems that provide unlimited users and inventory items in their free plans.
Odoo was the only software to receive a perfect score here. SalesBinder and Sortly had the lowest scores because their free plan only includes one user and products are capped at 100.
25% of Overall Score
We looked for real-time tracking, low stock alerts, multilocation and warehouse tracking, mobile apps, and granular inventory tools like kitting and assembly. We also considered whether they provide POs, vendors, and centralized multichannel management.
Odoo and Zoho tied for the highest scores here, each earning a 4.5.
15% of Overall Score
The biggest factor for this portion of the evaluation is how easy the software is to use, from setup to day-to-day use. We looked for intuitive features and navigation, compatibility across devices, as well as the availability and quality of customer support.
Square and Zoho excelled here with 4.75 out of 5 each because of their user-friendly interface, multiple integrations, and online help documents.
20% of Overall Score
We reviewed the overall quality of each system’s features and any standout elements not otherwise accounted for. Then we considered our own experience testing the software, as well as the experiences and feedback of real-world users. Zoho, Square, and Sortly all fared well here with a 4.69.
*Percentages of overall score
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Here are some of the most common questions I encounter about free inventory management software.
Yes, Excel or any spreadsheet software can be used to manage inventory. However, it is best for individuals or small businesses with very simple tracking needs.
Possibly! If you’re just starting out, free inventory software is great for getting a sense of what your business needs are before investing in a software that may or may not work for your business.
Also, if you just need to do basic quantity tracking, a spreadsheet can easily fulfill this need.
Certain QuickBooks Online, QuickBooks Desktop, and QuickBooks Enterprise plans include inventory management features like automated stock-level tracking, cost of goods, purchase order creation, and vendor management.
Bottom Line
In our review, we found Odoo to be the best free inventory management software for small businesses. Its open-source, totally free system works great for small or large inventories and multiple locations, and it has an excellent set of features. You can even integrate it with your other software. Visit Odoo and try it for free today.
