How to Track Inventory in QuickBooks (and What to Do When It Falls Short)

If you’ve ever tried to keep your stock, spending, and sales in sync inside QuickBooks, you know the feeling. One moment you’re organized — the next, you’re staring at Inventory_FINAL_v5.xlsx wondering why the numbers don’t agree.

QuickBooks is excellent at what it was born to do: bookkeeping. But once you start tracking materials, batches, and in-house production, the seams start to show.

We talk to hundreds of small product-based businesses every year. The pattern’s the same:

QuickBooks almost works for me… until I try to track my materials.

You don’t need more accounting fluff. You need clarity — what’s in stock, what it really cost to make, and what’s about to run out.

Let’s walk through what QuickBooks handles well, where it struggles for makers, and how to fix the gaps without drowning in spreadsheets.

How QuickBooks Handles Inventory

QuickBooks does have inventory features — which ones you get depends on your plan and product.

QuickBooks Online

Inventory is available on Plus and Advanced. In these plans you’ll get:

• Quantities on hand that update when you buy/sell
• Low-stock alerts
• COGS posted on sale
• FIFO costing
• Basic item/valuation/profitability reports

If you resell finished goods, that can be enough.

If you make products, the cracks appear fast:

• No bill of materials
• No production tracking
• No way to turn fabric/beads/wood into finished stock inside QuickBooks Online

If your “real” stock lives in a Google Sheet while QuickBooks tracks sales, you’re not alone.

Also read: QuickBooks for Etsy Sellers: Why Self-Employed Falls Short (and What to Use Instead)

QuickBooks Desktop (Pro / Premier / Enterprise)

Desktop goes further for light manufacturing:

• Build Assemblies (Premier/Enterprise) to combine components into products
• Advanced Inventory (Enterprise Platinum/Diamond) for multi-location, serial/lot, barcodes, bins — and FIFO option

Costing, simply put:

• QuickBooks Online = FIFO
• Desktop = Average cost by default; FIFO available with Enterprise + Advanced Inventory
• Craftybase = Rolling average cost — a solid, maker-friendly fit for batch purchasing

No method is “right” for everyone. Pick one, understand how it affects margins/taxes, and be consistent.

QuickBooks POS (Point of Sale)

QuickBooks Desktop POS was sunset. If you relied on it for in-person stock updates, you’ll need a modern replacement going forward.

QuickBooks Plans & Pricing

Intuit runs promos constantly, but here’s the “sticker price” snapshot (USD) so you can place features:

• QuickBooks Online Simple Start — $38/mo(no inventory)
• QuickBooks Online Essentials — $75/mo(no inventory)
• QuickBooks Online Plus — $115/mo(basic product level inventory included)
• QuickBooks Online Advanced — $275/mo(inventory + more controls/automation)

Desktop Enterprise comes in Silver/Gold/Platinum/Diamond. Advanced Inventory (multi-site, serial/lot, barcodes, bins, FIFO) is part of Platinum/Diamond. Pricing varies by users/add-ons.

Quick take: If you don’t manufacture, QuickBooks Online Plus is the easiest “inventory-on” step. If you need multi-location, lots/serials, or barcode workflows on Desktop, look at Enterprise Platinum/Diamond.

Where QuickBooks Falls Short for Makers

Here’s the honest picture of where small manufacturers hit the wall with QuickBooks.

No recipe or bill of materials (QuickBooks Online). QuickBooks Online tracks finished goods — it doesn’t know that your soy candle is made from 150g of wax, 20ml of fragrance oil, and a wick. There’s no way to define a recipe, deplete raw materials when you run a production batch, or roll up the cost of those components into the finished product.

No COGS auto-calculation per batch. When you sell a product in QuickBooks Online, it records COGS based on the item’s purchase price — not what it actually cost you to make. Labor, overhead, and variable material costs per batch don’t enter the picture. That means the COGS figure on your P&L may be significantly understated, especially as material prices fluctuate.

No raw-material tracking (QuickBooks Online). You can track a jar of candles as inventory, but not the wax, dye, or fragrance used to make it. Makers who need to know when they’re running low on a raw ingredient — before they can fill the next order — have to maintain that data elsewhere.

No production tracking. There’s no concept of a manufacturing run, batch output, or work-in-progress. If you make 50 units on Tuesday, QuickBooks can’t record that production event or show you how it affected your component stock.

Multi-channel is messy. Etsy, Shopify, and Faire all need their own sync story. QuickBooks Online doesn’t natively pull orders from craft marketplaces, so you’re relying on third-party connectors — and reconciling inventory across channels manually.

For bookkeeping, QuickBooks shines. For day-to-day making, it’s like trying to pin a pattern while wearing oven mitts — technically possible, not ideal.

(And if you ever need help from Intuit, getting a human on the phone isn’t easy — here’s our guide on how to contact QuickBooks support.)

QuickBooks Inventory Features vs. What Makers Actually Need

Here’s a direct comparison so you can see exactly where the gaps are:

The gap isn’t a flaw in QuickBooks — it’s the wrong tool for one part of the job. QuickBooks is purpose-built for accounting, not manufacturing.

The Right Setup for Product-Based Businesses

The cleanest solution is to let each tool do what it’s built for: QuickBooks handles the books, a maker-ready inventory tool handles production.

That’s where Craftybase fits. It’s purpose-built for small manufacturers — the makers who buy raw materials in batches, make products from recipes, and need to know their true COGS before they can price confidently.

Here’s what that looks like in practice:

• Define your material recipes once — Craftybase deplete stock automatically when you record a production run
• Get rolling average COGS per product, calculated from your actual material costs
• Track raw material quantities and get alerts before you run out
• Sync Etsy and Shopify orders so your stock stays accurate across channels
• Push COGS and inventory valuations directly to QuickBooks Online — no manual journal entries

That last point matters for tax time. Craftybase’s QuickBooks COGS sync posts your cost of goods sold and inventory valuations directly to your QuickBooks account, keeping your books accurate without the month-end scramble.

Not sure which inventory tool to connect with QuickBooks? We compared 8 options — from Craftybase to Katana to Zoho — in our roundup of the best inventory software that integrates with QuickBooks.

Ready to connect the two? Start with our QuickBooks + Craftybase integration — beginning with QuickBooks PO Sync (PO export) so you stop retyping purchases.

When to Make the Switch

If your current setup involves:

• Copy-pasting between sheets
• Constant stock adjustments
• Guessing at COGS

…you’re at the integration point. That’s when a maker-first inventory tool starts paying for itself — in time saved, cleaner books, and way less stress.

The Takeaway

QuickBooks is a strong bookkeeping tool. For handmade sellers and small manufacturers, it’s half the story.

Once you start tracking materials, production, and true product costs, the picture clears up fast — and the “Am I even making money on this?” spiral finally stops.

See how Craftybase fills the gap

Frequently Asked Questions