Wave migration. Honest math.

Stop the Wave clock.

On June 1, 2026, Wave moves legacy free accounts onto paid Starter ($19 per month). For most Wave users that is $1,140 over five years for software that was free yesterday. BooksGPT is $189 once. We will help you bring your books over before the clock hits zero.

Wave Starter starts billing in June 1, 2026 at 12:01 AM ET

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Start the 15-minute migration Book a concierge call

What actually changes on June 1

The clean version of the math.

Wave Pro is a reasonable product at $19 per month, and the team there has been transparent about why they need to charge. If a recurring subscription is what your business needs, stay. If it is not, here is the alternative side by side.

Wave Starter, after June 1, 2026Subscription, billed monthly

The free version becomes a paid one.

$ 19 per month, per business

5-year total$1,140 Bank connections, invoicing, and basic reports stay roughly the same as before. Wave Pro adds receipt capture and bills.

Recurring monthly charge, forever.
Manual categorization. Rules-based only.
P&L only on Starter. Cash Flow and Balance Sheet on Pro.
No Schedule C, 1120-S, or 1065 mapping.
No multi-state sales tax. No 1099-NEC batch.

BooksGPT SoloLifetime license. AI accountant included.

One lifetime price.

$ 189 once. lifetime.

5-year total$189 AI categorization runs nightly. Reports live. Schedule C ready at year-end.

One charge. Stripe. Done. Save $951 over 5 years.
AI auto-categorization at 99.9% on our eval.
P&L, Balance Sheet, Cash Flow, live.
Schedule C handoff at year-end, one click to your CPA.
30-day money-back. No questions, no hoops.

Where Wave wins: if you primarily invoice and need integrated card payments under a single brand, Wave Pro keeps that tight. If you have a true free tier need and your business is below 100 transactions per year, Wave Starter is still a reasonable choice. Pick the right tool for your shape of business.

The 15-minute migration

Four steps. None of them painful.

We have done this for 800-plus Wave customers since announcement day. The steps below are exactly what we will walk you through, in order, on a concierge call. Or do it yourself. Either works.

01 ~3 min

Export your Wave data

Wave, Settings, Data Export. You get 4 CSVs: Transactions, Invoices, Customers, and Chart of Accounts. Download all four to one folder.

02 ~2 min

Drop the 4 CSVs in

Drag all four into the BooksGPT Migration Wizard. It detects each one by header, parses it, and shows you a preview. No manual mapping yet.

03 ~7 min

Auto-map COA and opening balances

The AI proposes a chart-of-accounts mapping from Wave to BooksGPT, and a Dec 31 opening-balance entry. You confirm or override. The only step that needs your brain.

04 ~3 min

First reconciled month

Link your bank, run the first nightly close, tie the bank statement to the penny. Confirm. Cancel Wave when you are ready. Your books are live in BooksGPT.

Migration Wizard, step 2 preview

4 of 4 detected. 0 errors.

transactions.csv3,418 rows. Date range: Jan 1, 2024 to May 20, 2026.

3,418 rows

Parsed

invoices.csv187 invoices, 42 customers, status preserved.

187 rows

Parsed

customers.csv42 customers, contact details, payment terms.

42 rows

Parsed

chart_of_accounts.csv28 accounts, auto-mapped to BooksGPT default COA.

28 rows

Parsed

The 6 questions we hear most

Wave migration, answered.

Anything not covered here, email [email protected]. Real humans, real responses, usually within the day.

What exactly is changing at Wave on June 1?

Wave is moving accounts that were on the legacy free plan onto a paid plan called Starter, priced at $19 per month. Wave Pro at $34 per month is also available. The change affects long-standing free customers. New customers signing up after the announcement date were already paying. Wave has been clear about why they need to charge. If you are happy paying, no action needed. If you would rather buy books software once, this page is for you.

What carries over from Wave, and what does not?

Carries over: every transaction in your history, your chart of accounts (re-mapped to BooksGPT's default), customer list with contact details and payment terms, invoice list with status, and open bills. Does not carry over: Wave's bank rules (the AI re-learns these in two weeks), saved invoice templates (we provide new ones), and any direct connection to Wave Payments (you will re-link via Stripe).

Will I lose history if I switch?

No. Your full Wave history transfers in step 2 of the migration. Every prior transaction lands in BooksGPT with its original date, amount, and category. If anything fails to import (rare, but possible on very old CSVs), the wizard flags it and lets you correct before commit. Your prior Wave account stays available as a read-only archive as long as you want it, even if you cancel paid billing.

What about Wave Payments? I take cards through them.

Wave Payments is a Stripe re-seller for most US accounts. After migration, you re-link directly to Stripe in BooksGPT. Same Stripe account, same payouts, slightly better rates because there is no middleman. If you used Wave-branded checkout pages, those will need to be updated to point at your new invoicing URLs. We will help you reissue them on the concierge call.

What if I just want to keep paying Wave?

Then keep paying Wave. Honestly. Wave is a fine product, the team has been transparent about the change, and $19 per month is not unreasonable for what you get. We sell BooksGPT because we think the lifetime model is better for the long run, but if a monthly subscription is what fits your business, stay. We will be here when that changes.

Can you help me migrate on a call?

Yes, free. The concierge migration is a 30-minute screen-share where one of our customer success engineers walks you through steps 1 to 4 in real time. You do not have to know which CSV option to pick or which gotcha applies to your shop. Book at [email protected]. We have 14 slots a day open through July.

Before June 1. Bring your books over.

15-minute migration. 30-day money-back. Or book a concierge call and we will do it with you.

Get BooksGPT, $189 Email [email protected]