Is Basware or Lago better?

Neither clearly leads. Basware starts at On request and Lago at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.

Which is cheaper, Basware or Lago?

Lago has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at On request for Basware and Free for Lago.

Does Basware or Lago run on more platforms?

Basware runs on Web, iOS, Android. Lago runs on Web, Cloud, Self-hosted, On-premise, VPC.

Can I use Lago for free?

Yes. Lago has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Basware starts at On request.

What is Basware best used for?

Basware is most often used for a multinational needing compliant electronic invoicing across italy, poland, france and mexico without building each mandate itself, a shared service centre processing hundreds of thousands of invoices a year that needs touchless processing rates measured and improved, a group standardising accounts payable across subsidiaries running different erp systems, a finance function trying to capture early payment discounts that are currently lost to slow approval cycles. Of those, a multinational needing compliant electronic invoicing across italy, poland, france and mexico without building each mandate itself and a shared service centre processing hundreds of thousands of invoices a year that needs touchless processing rates measured and improved are not what Lago is typically brought in for.

What can Basware do that Lago cannot?

Basware covers Invoice capture, Matching, Approval workflow, E-invoicing compliance. Lago covers Real-time usage metering, Multiple pricing models, Automated invoicing, Prepaid credits.

Accounting · head to head

Basware vs Lago

Basware

Accounting

Invoice automation and e-invoicing compliance across a large number of national mandates

From: On request
Rated: -

Full review Website

Lago

Accounting

Open-source billing infrastructure for usage-based models

From: Free
Rated: -

Full review Website

The short version

Only Lago has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
Each has a real cost: Basware the e-invoicing compliance breadth that justifies the price is worthless to a company operating in a single country, where cheaper AP automation tools will do the same work.; Lago free tier limited to 10,000 entities per month with 5M event cap
They diverge on capability: Basware covers Invoice capture, Lago covers Real-time usage metering.
Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Basware and Lago actually diverge.

Attributes where Basware and Lago differ
Attribute	Basware	Lago
Starting price	On request	Free
Pricing model	quote	Freemium with optional paid tiers
Free tier	No	Yes
Platforms	Web, iOS, Android	Web, Cloud, Self-hosted, On-premise, VPC

Identical on both: 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 Basware

Invoice capture
Matching
Approval workflow
E-invoicing compliance
Supplier network
Payment execution
Spend analytics
ERP integration

Only in Lago

Real-time usage metering
Multiple pricing models
Automated invoicing
Prepaid credits
Entitlements
Multi-currency support
Payment orchestration
Revenue analytics

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Basware

A multinational needing compliant electronic invoicing across Italy, Poland, France and Mexico without building each mandate itselfnot Lago
A shared service centre processing hundreds of thousands of invoices a year that needs touchless processing rates measured and improvednot Lago
A group standardising accounts payable across subsidiaries running different ERP systemsnot Lago
A finance function trying to capture early payment discounts that are currently lost to slow approval cyclesnot Lago

Lago

Building usage-based billing for high-volume APIs and infrastructurenot Basware
Implementing metered billing for AI and tokenized servicesnot Basware
Creating subscription and hybrid pricing modelsnot Basware
Managing multi-currency billing for global companiesnot Basware
Maintaining billing infrastructure without vendor lock-innot Basware

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Basware

The e-invoicing compliance breadth that justifies the price is worthless to a company operating in a single country, where cheaper AP automation tools will do the same work.
Implementation is a substantial integration project involving ERP connectors, supplier onboarding and country-by-country compliance configuration, and it is priced and timed accordingly.
The user interface is dated next to newer accounts payable products, and approvers outside finance find it unintuitive, which slows the very cycle times the system is bought to improve.
Supplier onboarding onto the network is the hidden effort: the touchless processing rate depends on how many suppliers actually send electronic invoices, and that is a change management programme, not a software setting.
Growth by acquisition, including Glantus, has left overlapping analytics capability and integration work still in progress, so buyers should check which components share a data model today.

Lago

Free tier limited to 10,000 entities per month with 5M event cap
No specific pricing published for Pro annual plan or Scale plan
Self-hosted and on-premise deployments require engineering resources
Community support only on free tier
Scale plan requires annual contracts and sales engagement

Pricing, plan by plan

Basware

On request

Basware$undefined/year
- Invoice automation, matching and approval
- E-invoicing compliance across national mandates
- Supplier network connectivity

Lago

Free

Build (Free)Free
- 10,000 managed entities per month
- 5M usage events per month
- 1K events per second rate limit
Pro$399/month
- 10,000 entities included (graduated pricing to 100K)
- 25M usage events included (to 500M with graduated rates)
- 10K events per second (upgradeable to 100K)
Scale$null/custom
- Custom entity and event volumes
- 50K events per second (upgradeable to 100K)
- RBAC and SSO (SAML)

Which should you pick?

Choose Basware if

You need invoice capture.
You work on Web, iOS, Android.
You also want matching.

Basware review

Choose Lago if

You need real-time usage metering.
You want to start without paying.
You work on Web, Cloud, Self-hosted, On-premise, VPC.
You also want multiple pricing models.

Lago review

Questions people ask

Is Basware or Lago better?: Neither clearly leads. Basware starts at On request and Lago at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Basware or Lago?: Lago has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at On request for Basware and Free for Lago.
Does Basware or Lago run on more platforms?: Basware runs on Web, iOS, Android. Lago runs on Web, Cloud, Self-hosted, On-premise, VPC.
Can I use Lago for free?: Yes. Lago has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Basware starts at On request.
What is Basware best used for?: Basware is most often used for a multinational needing compliant electronic invoicing across italy, poland, france and mexico without building each mandate itself, a shared service centre processing hundreds of thousands of invoices a year that needs touchless processing rates measured and improved, a group standardising accounts payable across subsidiaries running different erp systems, a finance function trying to capture early payment discounts that are currently lost to slow approval cycles. Of those, a multinational needing compliant electronic invoicing across italy, poland, france and mexico without building each mandate itself and a shared service centre processing hundreds of thousands of invoices a year that needs touchless processing rates measured and improved are not what Lago is typically brought in for.
What can Basware do that Lago cannot?: Basware covers Invoice capture, Matching, Approval workflow, E-invoicing compliance. Lago covers Real-time usage metering, Multiple pricing models, Automated invoicing, Prepaid credits.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Basware: Should we buy Basware if we only operate in one country?

Probably not. Its main advantage is multi-country e-invoicing compliance. In a single jurisdiction, cheaper AP automation gives you the same result.

Lago: Can I use Lago open-source for free?

Yes, Lago is open-source under the AGPLv3 license and can be self-hosted. The cloud-based Build plan is also free with limits of 10,000 entities and 5M events per month.

Source

Basware: Does it handle mandatory e-invoicing regimes?

Yes, and that is the core reason to choose it. It covers a wide set of national mandates as a service rather than an integration project you run yourself.

Lago: What payment providers does Lago integrate with?

Lago integrates with Stripe and Adyen for payment processing. It is not a payment processor itself but orchestrates payments through these providers.

Source

Basware: What drives the price?

Invoice volume, number of countries and modules. It is quoted, and implementation with ERP connectors and supplier onboarding is separate.

Lago: Does Lago support multiple currencies?

Yes, Lago supports multi-currency billing with automatic currency conversion for global businesses.

Source

Basware: What determines the return?

The share of invoices arriving electronically. Touchless rates depend on supplier adoption, so budget for a supplier onboarding programme, not just the software.

Basware vs Lago

Basware

Lago

The short version

Where they differ

What each one covers

Only in Basware

Only in Lago

What people use each for

Basware

Lago

Where each one falls short

Basware

Lago

Pricing, plan by plan

Basware

Lago

Which should you pick?

Choose Basware if

Choose Lago if

Questions people ask

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Related pages

More on Basware

More on Lago

Keep looking

Other head to heads