Accounting · head to head
Airbase vs Medius Expense
Airbase
Accounting
Spend management combining corporate cards, bill payment and expense claims, now part of Paylocity
- From
- $29/month
- Rated
- -
Medius Expense
Accounting
Expense management, formerly Expensya, now the expense module of the Medius spend platform
- From
- On request
- Rated
- -
The short version
- Each has a real cost: Airbase card issuing and bill payment are built around United States entities and United States bank accounts, so a group with subsidiaries abroad keeps running local card and payment processes alongside and does not get the single ledger of spend that justified the purchase.; Medius Expense the Expensya name is being retired, so contracts, logins and support articles change identity mid-relationship and internal documentation has to be rewritten.
- They diverge on capability: Airbase covers Corporate cards, Medius Expense covers Receipt OCR.
- Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.
Where they differ
Only the attributes on which Airbase and Medius Expense actually diverge.
| Attribute | Airbase | Medius Expense |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | $29/month | On request |
| Pricing model | subscription | quote |
| Founded | 2017 | Unknown |
Identical on both: free tier (No), platforms (Web, Ios, Android), user rating (Not yet rated), category (Accounting).
What each one covers
Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.
Only in Airbase
- Corporate cards
- Virtual cards per vendor
- Bill payment
- Expense reimbursement
- Unified approval policy
- Purchase intake and procurement
- Automated coding
- Receipt collection
Only in Medius Expense
- Receipt OCR
- Mileage and per diem
- VAT recovery
- Card reconciliation
- Approval workflows
- AP suite integration
What people use each for
The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.
Airbase
- A company that has outgrown one shared company card and needs per person and per subscription cards with real limitsnot Medius Expense
- A finance team where supplier invoices arrive in an inbox and approval is whoever replies, with no record afterwardsnot Medius Expense
- A controller trying to close the month without rebuilding card and expense coding from statements every timenot Medius Expense
- An organisation that wants spend approved before it is committed rather than discovered when the invoice arrivesnot Medius Expense
Medius Expense
- A French or Spanish employer needing VAT-compliant receipt capture in local formats and languagesnot Airbase
- A company already running Medius for supplier invoices that wants employee spend on the same platformnot Airbase
- A finance team with heavy mileage claims needing statutory rates applied without spreadsheetsnot Airbase
- A group consolidating several country expense tools into one European platformnot Airbase
Where each one falls short
Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.
Airbase
- Card issuing and bill payment are built around United States entities and United States bank accounts, so a group with subsidiaries abroad keeps running local card and payment processes alongside and does not get the single ledger of spend that justified the purchase.
- The value depends on nearly all spend flowing through the platform, which makes partial adoption almost worthless and means the rollout is a change management exercise across every budget holder rather than a finance department deployment.
- Paylocity's acquisition in 2024 reorients the roadmap towards a human capital management suite, so expense reimbursement is likely to be well served while procurement and the more finance specific features compete for attention with payroll and HR priorities.
- Pricing combines a platform fee with tiering on features and users, and part of the economics rests on interchange rebates from card spend, so a company that puts most of its spend on transfers rather than cards pays the fee without earning the offset.
- The general ledger sync is a mapping you own, so a chart of accounts change, a new department dimension or a ledger migration means reworking the coding rules, and a bad mapping quietly posts correct approvals to the wrong accounts.
Medius Expense
- The Expensya name is being retired, so contracts, logins and support articles change identity mid-relationship and internal documentation has to be rewritten.
- It is now a module inside an accounts payable suite, so expense-specific roadmap items compete with supplier invoice work for engineering time.
- Pricing is not published and is discounted against bundling with Medius AP, which makes standalone expense quotes less competitive than they look.
- Strength is concentrated in Europe and the Maghreb; North American and Asian tax and mileage handling are thinner than the European coverage.
- It does not issue cards, so real-time spend controls are absent and it relies on card feed reconciliation after the fact.
Pricing, plan by plan
Airbase
$29/month- StandardFree
- Corporate cards
- Expense reports
- Bill pay
- Premium$10/month
- Advanced approvals
- NetSuite sync
- Procurement
- Enterprise$undefined/month
- Custom workflows
- API access
- Dedicated support
Medius Expense
On request- Medius Expense$undefined/year
- Per-user subscription, quoted not published
- Tiering by feature set and entity count
- Implementation and OCR configuration fees
Which should you pick?
Choose Airbase if
- You need corporate cards.
- You work on Web, Ios, Android.
- You also want virtual cards per vendor.
Choose Medius Expense if
- You need receipt ocr.
- You work on Web, iOS, Android.
- You also want mileage and per diem.
Questions people ask
- Is Airbase or Medius Expense better?
- Neither clearly leads. Airbase starts at $29/month and Medius Expense at On request, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
- Which is cheaper, Airbase or Medius Expense?
- Airbase starts at $29/month and Medius Expense at On request.
- Does Airbase or Medius Expense run on more platforms?
- Airbase runs on Web, Ios, Android. Medius Expense runs on Web, iOS, Android.
- What is Airbase best used for?
- Airbase is most often used for a company that has outgrown one shared company card and needs per person and per subscription cards with real limits, a finance team where supplier invoices arrive in an inbox and approval is whoever replies, with no record afterwards, a controller trying to close the month without rebuilding card and expense coding from statements every time, an organisation that wants spend approved before it is committed rather than discovered when the invoice arrives. Of those, a company that has outgrown one shared company card and needs per person and per subscription cards with real limits and a finance team where supplier invoices arrive in an inbox and approval is whoever replies, with no record afterwards are not what Medius Expense is typically brought in for.
- What can Airbase do that Medius Expense cannot?
- Airbase covers Corporate cards, Virtual cards per vendor, Bill payment, Expense reimbursement. Medius Expense covers Receipt OCR, Mileage and per diem, VAT recovery, Card reconciliation.
Answered from the vendors’ own pages
Airbase: Does it work for companies outside the United States?
Partially. Some international spend and reimbursement is supported, but card issuing and the payment rails are strongest for United States entities. Confirm coverage for each country you operate in before assuming it replaces local processes.
Medius Expense: Is Expensya still available?
Under that name, no. The product continues as Medius Expense, with the branding cutover on 30 September 2026 and no change to features or data.
Airbase: Does Airbase replace our accounting system?
No. It manages spend and pushes coded transactions into the ledger. QuickBooks, NetSuite or whatever else you use stays.
Medius Expense: Do I have to buy Medius AP as well?
No, but the commercial terms improve materially if you do, which is worth testing during negotiation.
Airbase: What changed after the Paylocity acquisition?
Ownership and roadmap direction. The product continues, now positioned alongside Paylocity's payroll and HR products. If procurement is your main reason to buy, ask directly about investment in that module.
Medius Expense: Does it issue corporate cards?
No. It reconciles existing card feeds rather than issuing its own cards.
Airbase: How is it priced?
A platform subscription with tiers, plus usage and user dimensions, partly offset by rebates on card spend. Because the rebate depends on card volume, model your own mix of card versus transfer spend before accepting a payback figure.
Airbase: Can we use it for accounts payable only?
You can, but the approval consistency argument weakens considerably. Most of the reported benefit comes from cards, bills and reimbursements sharing one policy and one coding process.
Airbase: Will our auditors accept the approval records?
The per transaction record of approver, receipt and coding is generally what auditors want to see for spend testing. Agree the sampling approach with them early, particularly around any spend that still happens outside the platform.
Related pages
More on Medius Expense
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