If you run a one-person business or a small operation, you've probably landed on both Stintly and Wave while searching for a way to track work and get paid without paying a monthly software bill. Both are marketed as "free," and both aim at people who don't want the complexity of full accounting suites. But they take very different approaches. Wave is a cloud-based accounting and invoicing platform that lives in your browser. Stintly is a mobile-first app that works entirely offline with no account required. This comparison lays out where each one wins, honestly, so you can pick the right fit instead of switching twice.
Quick Comparison
| Feature | Stintly | Wave |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free (no paid tiers) | Free core + paid payroll/payments |
| Works Offline | Yes, 100% offline | No, requires internet |
| Account Required | No account, no signup | Yes, email account required |
| Best For | Solo operators, trades, mobile work | Desktop-based small businesses |
| Platform | iOS (App Store) | Web browser, limited mobile app |
| Key Features | Time tracking, invoicing, income & expense tracking | Accounting, invoicing, receipt scanning, payroll |
| Data Privacy | Data stays on your device | Data stored on Wave/H&R Block servers |
Pricing
Both apps advertise a free tier, and both deliver on that promise, so let's be precise about what "free" actually means for each.
Wave's core accounting and invoicing has genuinely been free for years, which is a real strength. You can send unlimited invoices and track income and expenses without paying. However, Wave makes money on the paid add-ons: payment processing charges per-transaction fees, and payroll is a paid monthly subscription. Wave was also acquired by H&R Block, and the free tier now shows promotional content and upsells. None of that makes Wave a bad product, but "free" comes with a business model attached.
Stintly is free with no paid tiers at all. There's no premium unlock, no per-invoice fee, and no subscription lurking behind a feature you'll eventually need. What you download is the full app. The trade-off is honest: Stintly doesn't process payments or run payroll, so there's nothing to upsell.
| Cost Over Time | Stintly | Wave (core) |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly | $0 | $0 |
| 1 Year | $0 | $0 (add-ons extra) |
| 3 Years | $0 | $0 (add-ons extra) |
The headline is the same on both sides for core use. The difference is that Stintly's free has no adjacent paid ladder, while Wave's free tier is the front door to paid payments and payroll.
Save money. Try Stintly free today. Download Stintly for Free — no account needed, works 100% offline.
Features
This is where the two tools genuinely diverge, and where your specific work matters more than any feature count.
Wave does more accounting. Wave is a proper double-entry accounting system. It reconciles bank transactions, generates accounting reports, scans receipts, and connects to payment processing so clients can pay invoices online by card. If you want your business to look like a small company with formal books, Wave gives you that depth for free. Its payroll add-on handles employees and contractors in supported regions. For a business with a bookkeeper or an accountant who wants clean ledgers, Wave is a strong, legitimate choice.
Stintly does the daily loop faster. Stintly focuses on the core cycle a solo operator actually repeats every day: track your time or jobs, log income and expenses, and send an invoice. It's built for speed on a phone. You open it between jobs, tap in what you did, and move on. There's no bank sync to babysit and no ledger to reconcile. For a landscaper logging a lawn on-site, a cleaner finishing a house, or a contractor closing out a job, that immediacy matters more than a balance sheet.
This is also why Stintly fits naturally alongside trade-specific tools. If your day is booking lawn jobs and managing route clients, LawnBook handles the lawn care and landscaping operations side, while Stintly covers the money and time. A residential or commercial cleaning crew can run scheduling in ShineBook and still lean on Stintly for invoicing. Landlords tracking rentals and tenant relations in KeyLoft, or contractors doing job costing and progress billing in TrestleBook, get the same benefit: a focused operations app plus a simple, offline money tracker that doesn't demand a login.
Where Wave wins on features: online card payments, formal accounting reports, receipt scanning, and payroll. Where Stintly wins: speed, offline reliability, zero setup, and no account.
Want to try Stintly for free? Download Stintly for Free — no subscription required.
Offline & Privacy
This is Stintly's clearest advantage, and it's not a small one.
Wave is web-based. If you're out of signal — in a basement, on a rural job site, in a parking garage, on a plane — you can't reliably log work or pull up an invoice. For office-based businesses this rarely matters. For mobile trades, it matters constantly. Wave's mobile app is also more limited than its full web experience, so the phone isn't a complete substitute for a laptop.
Stintly works 100% offline, always. There's no "sync pending" state, no waiting for a server, and nothing that breaks when the connection drops. You can run your entire day from a phone with airplane mode on and lose nothing.
Privacy follows the same line. Because Wave is a cloud service — now under H&R Block — your financial data lives on their servers under their terms. That's normal for cloud accounting and Wave is a reputable company, but it's a real consideration if your income and client details are sensitive. Stintly keeps your data on your device. Nothing is uploaded, because there's no account and no server to upload to.
If you never want to think about whether your income data is sitting on someone else's server, an offline-first, on-device app removes the question entirely.
The trade-off to be honest about: on-device data means backups are your responsibility, and there's no automatic multi-device cloud sync. For a solo operator on one phone, that's usually a fair exchange for privacy and reliability.
Who Should Use Wave
Wave is the better pick if any of these describe you:
- You work primarily from a desk with reliable internet.
- You want real double-entry accounting and formal financial reports.
- You need clients to pay invoices online by credit card.
- You run payroll for employees or regular contractors.
- You have a bookkeeper or accountant who wants reconciled books.
Wave earned its reputation by giving small businesses free accounting that used to cost real money. If you need accounting depth and online payments, it's a genuinely good, free-to-start option and there's no shame in choosing it.
Who Should Use Stintly
Stintly is the better pick if this sounds like your day:
- You work on the move — job sites, client locations, the road.
- You want to log time and expenses in seconds, not manage books.
- You don't want another account, password, or subscription.
- You care about keeping your financial data on your own device.
- You're a solo operator or a small crew, not a company with payroll.
Stintly's sweet spot is the freelancer, tradesperson, or small-business owner who is their own everything — the one who does the work, sends the invoice, and tracks the money, usually from a phone, often without a signal. It won't replace an accounting department. It replaces the messy notes app, the spreadsheet you forget to update, and the invoicing tool you have to log into.
The Bottom Line
Both apps are free and both are honest about it, so this isn't about price — it's about how you work. Choose Wave if you need accounting depth, online card payments, or payroll and you mostly work from a desk with a connection. Choose Stintly if you want to log work and send invoices fast, offline, with no account and no data leaving your phone.
Most solo operators overestimate how much accounting machinery they need and underestimate how often they're offline or in a hurry. If that's you, start with the simpler tool. You can always add heavier accounting later if the business grows into it — but many never need to.
Ready to switch? Download Stintly for Free — it takes 30 seconds and costs nothing.