6 Best Free Inventory Management Software for 2023
Brigitte is a retail specialist and staff writer with brick and mortar management experience. She is versed in retail sales analysis, merchandising, and buying with an emphasis in retail sales and marketing across platforms. She has a BA in writing from Washington University, St. Louis.
Meaghan has provided content and guidance for indie retailers as the editor for a number of retail publications and a speaker at trade shows. She is Fit Small Business’s authority on retail and ecommerce.
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 evaluations, the six best free inventory management software for small businesses are:
- Odoo: Best overall
- Square: Best for retailers and restaurants
- Zoho Inventory: Best for large inventories
- ABC Inventory: Best for manufacturing and repair shops
- SalesBinder: Best for small international businesses
- Sortly: Best mobile inventory app with barcoding and scanning
Prefer to use a spreadsheet to track your inventory for free? Download our free inventory management workbook to track on-hand stock, sales, and purchase orders (POs) as well as to calculate inventory turnover and set up low stock alerts.
Mục lục bài viết
Free Inventory Management Software Compared
Provider
Users
Items/Locations
Paid Plans
Low Stock Alerts
Multichannel Management
Integrations
Unlimited
Unlimited / Unlimited
$31.10 to $46.80 per month
✓
Paid plans only
✓
Visit Odoo
Unlimited
Unlimited / Unlimited
$60 per month
✓
✓
✓
Visit Square
2
Unlimited/1 + 1 Shopify store
$79 to $399 per month
✓
✓
✓
Visit Zoho
1
Unlimited / Unlimited
$435 to $1,835 (one-time)
✓
✕
✕
Visit ABC Inventory
1
100 / Unlimited
$9 to $99 per month
✓
✓
Paid plans only
Visit SalesBinder
1
100 / Unlimited
$49 to $149 per month
Paid plans only
Paid plans only
✕
Visit Sortly
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
Odoo: Best Overall Free Inventory Management Software
Overall Score:
4.38
/ 5
RATING CRITERIA
Pricing
Inventory features
Ease of use
Expert score
User score (average)
Pros
- Unlimited products and locations
- Automated purchase orders (POs)
- Inventory forecasting
- Custom reporting, alerts, and automations
Cons
- Limited customer support
- Limited integrations
- POS and ecommerce tools cost extra
Odoo review
What’s Included for Free
- 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
Paid plans start at: $31.10 per month
Odoo review
Visit Odoo
Odoo, a fully open-source inventory system, takes the top spot for free inventory management 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; for a small fee, you can tie the inventory software to Odoo’s dozen other sales and marketing tools. Odoo also integrates with ecommerce systems.
Odoo earned 4.38 out of 5. It had a perfect score on pricing because it offers so much free. The inventory tools are excellent, but a few, such as multichannel management and customer relationship management (CRM), require another Odoo app. It also took a big hit for only having email and forum support, but it does offer training videos. Real-world customers liked it, but it did not rate as highly as Square or Zoho, which brought the expert score down.
The dashboard shows you the pending actions. (Source: Odoo)
Odoo makes it easy to track expiration dates by lot or serial number. (Source: Odoo)
Set order points and automate POs or requests for quotes. (Source: Odoo)
- 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
Odoo’s pricing is a little different than your typical inventory management software. Rather than having tiered plans by features, Odoo gives you access to all the features in the inventory app (or any Odoo app you choose to sign up for first) and will only start charging you a monthly fee if you add Odoo apps.
Upgrading to the paid plan ranges from $31.10 per user, per month to $46.80 per user, per month.
Odoo’s other apps are*:
- CRM
- Sales
- Manufacturing
- Accounting
- Project
- Helpdesk
- Planning
- Website and ecommerce
- POS
- Website builder
- Marketing
- Spreadsheets
- Reporting
- Timesheet
- Recruiting
- Sign
*Odoo apps will only integrate with each other until you subscribe to the Custom plan ($46.80 per user, per month) and get access to API integrations
It is time to upgrade from Odoo’s free plan when your needs grow and you need the support of another Odoo app.
Square: Best for Retailers & Restaurants
Overall Score:
4.35
/ 5
RATING CRITERIA
Pricing
Inventory features
Ease of use
Expert score
User score (average)
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
Square POS review
What’s Included for Free
- 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
Square POS review
Visit Square
Square is best known for its POS capabilities for retailers and restaurants, landing it at the top of our lists of the best POS systems, best free POS systems, best POS system for retailers, and best free restaurant POS. However, Square also offers incredible inventory management tools in all of its POS accounts.
With every Square for Retail account, retailers get live inventory tracking as you make sales, ecommerce integrations, mobile capabilities, POS, order management, product variants, and more. Also from Square, with Square for Restaurants, you get menu management, order management, ingredient level tracking, online order and delivery management, and more.
Did you know?
For every Square account, you also get access to Square Online, Square’s ecommerce website builder that you can then integrate seamlessly with your Square account.
Square earned an overall score of 4.35 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 our expert value score. The only things that kept Square from scoring higher were the lack of kitting abilities; limited customer service hours; and advanced reporting, vendor management, and POs locked behind a paywall. Like Zoho, Square has an excellent mobile app, where you can conduct sales and also scan items and perform inventory counts.
Easily add products and product variants to save yourself time and energy.
(Source: Square)
Add detailed product information for every piece in your inventory. (Source: Square)
View all your sales history and see what inventory is performing and which isn’t moving with Square free reporting features. (Source: Square)
- Create product or item categories
- Automated low stock alerts
- Download reports or export to a printable spreadsheet
- Unlimited products, users, and transactions
- Import and manage products in bulk
- Create product variants like size and color
- Fully integrated payment processing
- POS
- Create and track customer profiles
- Track inventory between location and sales channels
- Inventory reports broken down by item or category
- Mobile POS app
- Inventory counts with barcode scanning via mobile app
- Product variants
- Automated daily inventory reports
- Add and track item modifiers like colors and sizes
- Add pictures, descriptions, and stock keeping unit (SKU) numbers to each item
- Menu management
- Online order management
- 86ing
- Table management
- Ingredient level tracking
- Time-sensitive item availability
The free version of Square’s retail POS doesn’t include advanced inventory tools like kitting, automatic POs, COGS tracking, or smart stock forecasts. For Restaurants, the biggest things left out of the free plan are the mobile app/mobile selling and advanced reporting. If you find yourself needing any of these tools consider upgrading to a Square for Retail or Square for Restaurants Plus plan for $60 per month, per location.
You can check out our Square for Retail and Square for Restaurants review to learn more, or visit Square to sign up.
Zoho: Best for Single-location Businesses With Large Inventories
Overall Score:
4.30
/ 5
RATING CRITERIA
Pricing
Inventory Features
Ease of Use
Expert Score
User score (average)
Pros
- Excellent mobile app
- Kitting abilities
- Shipping management 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
What’s Included for Free
- Users: Two
- 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
Paid plans start at: $79 per month with monthly billing
Add-ons
- Users: $3 per month, per user
- Warehouses: $10 per month, per warehouse
- Orders/shipping labels: $6 per month, per 50 orders plus 50 shipping labels
- Advanced autoscans: $8 per month, per 50 scans
Visit Zoho
Zoho Inventory’s free plan came in third because it allows unlimited inventory, a strong range of integrations, low stock alerts, kitting and bundling options, and shipping tools, allowing you to print packing slips and generate discounted shipping labels from major logistics providers like United States Postal Service (USPS) and UPS right from your dashboard. Zoho is our top-rated inventory software for all small businesses, and its mobile app also makes it the best choice for entrepreneurs who do their work on the go.
We rated Zoho Inventory 4.3 out of 5. Unlike Square, Zoho’s free plan limits users, locations, monthly sales orders, shipping labels, and shipment tracking. Its CRM software surpasses Odoo’s free plan. Plus, it’s easy to use and has high real-world user ratings for its online program and its mobile apps.
Create and send purchase orders right from your Zoho Inventory account.
View all your current sales, orders, and an inventory overview on your home page. (Source: Zoho)
Choose from Zoho’s rich menu of reports so that you can better understand your business and how it is performing in every aspect. (Source: Zoho)
- 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; 4.6 out of 5 on iOS
- SKU generator
- Set automated reorder points
Zoho Inventory has limits on sales orders, even with its paid plans. If you need to track multiple warehouses, support multiple currencies, and perform custom views for your workflows, then upgrading to its first paid tier will suffice. The base plan starts at $79 a month with a 1,500 monthly order limit, three users, and two warehouses. Additional warehouses cost $10 per month, and additional users are priced at $3 per month. Higher tiers include batch and serial number tracking and automated workflows.
ABC Inventory: Best for Repair Shops & Manufacturing
Overall Score:
3.58
/ 5
RATING CRITERIA
Pricing
Inventory Features
Ease of Use
Expert Score
User score (average)
Pros
- Includes repairs, leasing, and asset management
- Multiple languages and currencies
- Supports kitting
- Includes manufacturing functions like machine assembly orders and parts consumption
Cons
- PC-only
- Older, more complex interface
- Forum customer assistance only
What’s Included for Free
- Users: One
- Location: Unlimited
- Items/products: Unlimited
- Transactions: Unlimited
- Support: Forum
- Integrations: None
Paid plans start at: $435 (one-time fee)
Visit ABC Inventory
Although a locally installed system with an older interface, ABC Inventory by Almyta Systems offers an excellent choice for budget-conscious manufacturers or repair shops with simple needs. It has features like unlimited custom fields, 10 custom drop-down lists for extra properties, and up to 20 levels in its bill of materials (BOM).
ABC Inventory offers dozens of features specifically for manufacturing inventory, such as work orders, approvals, repair and maintenance orders, and special serials for manufacturing or engineering. Neither Zoho nor Square come equipped with these manufacturing-specific tools.
In our evaluation, ABC Inventory earned 3.58 out of 5. It did well in pricing because it lets you track unlimited products by location but took a huge hit in ease of use for its dated interface and lack of live customer support. The software can only be installed on PCs and cannot integrate with any other programs automatically. If you need an option with more included integrations, Square is your best bet.
ABC Inventory allows you to categorize your items, and assign a unit ID, weight, price, and stock quantity. (Source: Almyta Systems)
Create custom invoices with your logo. (Source: Almyta Systems)
The free and paid editions of ABC inventory are the same except you cannot tie workstations together with the free version. (Source: Almyta Systems)
- Unlimited companies, warehouses, locations, currencies, logos
- Multiple languages with translations (pop-up or in-field)
- Export data to Microsoft Excel, Word, HTML, and text
- Warehouse appointments, invoicing, shipping
- Positive/negative adjustments
- Barcode scanning
- Inventory repairs
- Inventory leasing
- Forecasting
- Fast browse and advanced search
- Create sales and shipping orders
- Work orders
- Tangible and intangible asset management
- Create and manage warehouse appointments
- Port-to-port operations
- Manage repairs and leases
- Create and manage work orders
- Submit and manage purchase orders
ABC Inventory’s free version comes with every tool, making it a great option for a small business with a single workplace. However, you need the paid version if you want to use the software across multiple workstations. You will also need to purchase one of Almyta Systems’ licenses if you want customer support of any kind. Purchased licenses also include free add-ons and lifetime updates. Pricing starts at $435 (a one-time fee).
SalesBinder: Best for Small International Businesses
Overall Score:
3.52
/ 5
RATING CRITERIA
Pricing
Inventory Features
Ease of Use
Expert Score
User score (average)
Pros
- Available in over 130 countries
- CRM included
- Barcode documents and items
- Paid plans are affordable
Cons
- No included integrations in free plan
- Limited items
- Low-rated mobile app; iOS only
What’s Included for Free
- Users: One
- Location: Unlimited
- Items/products: 100 active records (includes items, accounts, and orders)
- Transactions: Unlimited
- Support: Phone and email, business hours (Pacific time), and knowledge base
- Integrations: QuickBooks, Xero, WooCommerce, Zapier, and more
Paid plans start at: $9 per month
Visit SalesBinder
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. SalesBinder’s free plan does not allow integrations—look at Zoho or Odoo for that. Its free plan also limits monthly records, which it counts as inventory items, accounts, or orders—no other inventory tracker on our list sets limits this way. However, SalesBinder does offer robust features for recording and tracking inventory and strong sales and CRM features.
Overall, SalesBinder scored 3.52 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.
As you set up your account, you will be able to set the language and time zone based on your location anywhere in the world. (Source: SalesBinder)
With SalesBinder you cannot only create and manage customers and vendors on your account, you can also create prospective customers to help you keep growing.
(Source: SalesBinder)
Create product categories with set markups and custom fields to make managing your stock easier. (Source: SalesBinder)
- 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: 2.3 out of 5 in the app store
- Set user permissions
- Create and manage prospective custom
SalesBinder’s free plan includes all the features of the paid plans, except for integrations and limits to records and users—if you need more, the paid plans are among the most affordable we’ve seen. The paid plans range from $9 per month (for one user, 2,500 records, and no integrations) to $99 per month (for 100,000 records, 50 users, and unlimited integrations). This makes it a great pick for small businesses with limited customers and inventory or those that are just starting out.
Sortly: Best Mobile Inventory App With Barcoding & Scanning
Overall Score:
3.30
/ 5
RATING CRITERIA
Pricing
Inventory Features
Ease of Use
Expert Score
User score (average)
Pros
- Built-in barcode scanning that supports quick response (QR) codes
- Can manage multiple warehouses
- Has offline mode, allowing you to scan incoming and outgoing items even without internet access
Cons
- Low stock alerts only in paid plans
- No kitting capabilities
- No integration capabilities
Sortly review
What’s Included for Free
- Users: One
- Location: Unlimited
- Items/products: 100
- Transactions: Unlimited
- Support: Knowledge base, tutorials, and email
- Integrations: None
Paid plans start at: $49 per month
Sortly review
Visit Sortly
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 3.3 out of 5. The absence of low-stock alerts, POs, item limits, plus its lack of integration capabilities in the free plan prevented Sortly from earning high scores. However, Sortly user interface is cloud-based and modern, setting it apart from ABC Inventory.
Get an overview look at your inventory on your Sortly dashboard. (Source: Sortly)
Use Sortly on your mobile device or desktop, with or without an internet connection. (Source: Sortly)
File your items into folders to make managing your stock easier.
- 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
Sortly provides in-depth access to its barcode scanning system even on its free plan. However, upgrading to its Ultra plan ($149 per month) will allow you to have API integrations, generate custom barcodes, and use external/handheld scanners. The less expensive Advanced Plan ($49 per month) has low-stock alerts and more entries and custom fields. For already established businesses with existing systems and software, I would recommend signing up for one of Sortly’s paid plans.
How We Evaluated Free Inventory Management Software
We only considered forever-free inventory systems that also offer paid versions or add-ons at a price suited for small and midsize businesses (SMBs). In this evaluation, we prioritized those that are cloud-based and easy to use. We sought a range of inventory management software, not just those in a POS system or that work for retail.
Click through the tabs below for a more detailed breakdown of our evaluation criteria.
40%
Pricing
30%
Inventory features
15%
Expert score
15%
Ease of use
40% of Overall Score
We prioritized software that includes pricing plans and add-on options to grow with your business. We also awarded points to systems that provide unlimited users and inventory items in their free plans. Odoo got a perfect score here.
30% of Overall Score
We looked for real-time tracking, low stock and reorder alerts, multilocation and warehouse tracking, mobile apps, and granular inventory management (kitting and assembly, variants, and more). We also considered whether they provide POs, vendor, and centralized multichannel management. Finally, we examined whether each system has CRM functionality or integrates with popular CRM software. Zoho took the lead here, followed by SalesBinder.
15% of Overall Score
We gave full points to cloud-based platforms, offer 24/7 customer support, and provide online training, forum, or help documentation. We also considered its integrations with popular accounting, ecommerce, marketplace, and POS software. Square and Zoho tied for first here.
15% of Overall Score
We reviewed the overall quality of each system’s features and standout qualities to determine if it offers good value for its price point. Then we considered our own experience and those of real-world users. Zoho took the lead, followed closely by Square and Sortly.
*Percentages of overall score
Bottom Line
In our expert review, we found Odoo to be the best free inventory management software for small businesses. Its open-source, totally free system works great for 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 sign up today.
Visit Odoo
