Accounting · head to head
Circula vs Spendbase
Circula
Accounting
Expense, travel and employee benefit management for German speaking finance teams
- From
- €15/month
- Rated
- -
Spendbase
Accounting
SaaS and cloud spend management that charges a share of the savings it finds rather than a licence
- From
- Free
- Rated
- -
The short version
- Only Spendbase has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
- Each has a real cost: Circula the module pricing stacks: expenses at fifteen euro per licence plus ninety nine euro for cards plus a hundred and forty nine euro for accounts payable means a fifty person company pays well over a thousand euro a month before add ons.; Spendbase charging a share of savings gives the vendor an interest in defining savings generously, and the customer cannot verify a counterfactual price it never saw.
- They diverge on capability: Circula covers German per diem engine, Spendbase covers Subscription visibility.
- Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.
Where they differ
Only the attributes on which Circula and Spendbase actually diverge.
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 Circula
- German per diem engine
- Receipt capture and OCR
- Corporate credit cards
- Employee benefits
- Accounts payable
- Mileage and travel
- DATEV and ERP export
- Approval workflows
Only in Spendbase
- Subscription visibility
- Discount marketplace
- Virtual cards
- Cashback
- Renewal management
- Savings-share billing
What people use each for
The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.
Circula
- A German company that must apply statutory per diem rates and meal deductions correctly to avoid payroll tax exposurenot Spendbase
- A finance team wanting card spend, expense claims and benefits in one DATEV exportnot Spendbase
- An employer offering the tax free monthly benefit allowance and needing auditable records of itnot Spendbase
- A mid sized business replacing spreadsheet mileage claims with rule enforced distance calculationsnot Spendbase
Spendbase
- A startup with no procurement function that wants renewal dates and subscription owners in one placenot Circula
- A company with heavy Azure or cloud spend that can use pre-negotiated credit allocationsnot Circula
- Issuing virtual cards per subscription so a forgotten trial cannot renew silentlynot Circula
- A finance lead who wants software cost reduction without hiring anyone to do itnot Circula
Where each one falls short
Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.
Circula
- The module pricing stacks: expenses at fifteen euro per licence plus ninety nine euro for cards plus a hundred and forty nine euro for accounts payable means a fifty person company pays well over a thousand euro a month before add ons.
- A minimum of ten licences excludes small teams, and the flexible licensing model for occasional claimants makes monthly cost harder to forecast than a flat per seat price.
- Strength is in German tax rules, so companies with significant operations outside the DACH region gain little from the feature that justifies the price.
- The accounts payable module includes only a hundred invoices per month, so invoice heavy businesses face metered overage on top of the platform fee.
- Card issuing carries a per card transaction ceiling and depends on partner issuing, so high value procurement spend can hit limits that a bank issued corporate card would not.
Spendbase
- Charging a share of savings gives the vendor an interest in defining savings generously, and the customer cannot verify a counterfactual price it never saw.
- The savings share is reported at around 25 percent but is not published on the pricing page, so the actual commercial terms only appear in a contract.
- Spendbase is both a banking provider and your software negotiator, so a company using both concentrates operating cash and vendor relationships in one small, young company.
- Banking is delivered through partners rather than held directly, meaning deposit protection and service continuity depend on those partners rather than on Spendbase.
- It is scoped for startups and small companies, so organisations needing approval workflows, purchase orders or ERP integration will find it thin against a real procurement platform.
Pricing, plan by plan
Circula
€15/month- Employee and Travel Expenses$15/month
- Per licence, billed annually
- Minimum 10 licences
- OCR receipt capture
- Credit Cards$99/month
- Platform fee, unlimited cards
- Per card spend limits
- Transaction limit of EUR 750,000 per card
- Accounts Payable$149/month
- Platform fee
- Includes 100 invoices per month
- Supplier invoice capture and approval
- Benefits$1/month
- Per licence
- Tax free benefit allowances
- Mobility and meal benefits
Spendbase
Free- Digital bankingFree
- No monthly fee per user
- Up to 100 virtual cards
- EUR and GBP account details
- Spend management$undefined/year
- Everything in the free tier
- Reported share of roughly 25 percent of savings achieved
- 200 percent return guarantee against a deposit
Which should you pick?
Choose Circula if
- You need german per diem engine.
- You work on Web, iOS, Android.
- You also want receipt capture and ocr.
Choose Spendbase if
- You need subscription visibility.
- You want to start without paying.
- You also want discount marketplace.
Questions people ask
- Is Circula or Spendbase better?
- Neither clearly leads. Circula starts at €15/month and Spendbase at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
- Which is cheaper, Circula or Spendbase?
- Spendbase has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at €15/month for Circula and Free for Spendbase.
- Does Circula or Spendbase run on more platforms?
- Circula runs on Web, iOS, Android. Spendbase runs on Web.
- Can I use Spendbase for free?
- Yes. Spendbase has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Circula starts at €15/month.
- What is Circula best used for?
- Circula is most often used for a german company that must apply statutory per diem rates and meal deductions correctly to avoid payroll tax exposure, a finance team wanting card spend, expense claims and benefits in one datev export, an employer offering the tax free monthly benefit allowance and needing auditable records of it, a mid sized business replacing spreadsheet mileage claims with rule enforced distance calculations. Of those, a german company that must apply statutory per diem rates and meal deductions correctly to avoid payroll tax exposure and a finance team wanting card spend, expense claims and benefits in one datev export are not what Spendbase is typically brought in for.
- What can Circula do that Spendbase cannot?
- Circula covers German per diem engine, Receipt capture and OCR, Corporate credit cards, Employee benefits. Spendbase covers Subscription visibility, Discount marketplace, Virtual cards, Cashback.
Answered from the vendors’ own pages
Circula: Does Circula calculate German per diems automatically?
Yes, by destination country and trip duration, including meal and accommodation deductions, which is the main reason DACH finance teams buy it.
Spendbase: Is Spendbase free?
The card and banking tier is genuinely free with no per-user fee. The spend management service is paid from a share of the savings it finds, reported at around 25 percent.
Circula: What does it actually cost for fifty employees?
Roughly seven hundred and fifty euro a month for expense licences alone at the fifteen euro rate, before the ninety nine euro card platform fee and any accounts payable module.
Spendbase: How is a saving calculated?
The methodology is not published. Agree the baseline, the measurement period and what counts as a saving in writing before signing.
Circula: Is there a minimum commitment?
Yes. A minimum of ten licences and annual billing on the published rates.
Spendbase: Does Spendbase hold my money?
Banking is provided through regulated partners including Moorwand in the UK and EEA and Sutton Bank in the US, with Mastercard issuing the cards.
Spendbase: Is it suitable for an enterprise?
No. There are no purchase orders, approval hierarchies or ERP integration; it is built for startups.
Related pages
Other head to heads
- Circula vs Zoho Expense
- Circula vs Moss
- Circula vs Pleo
- Circula vs Expensify
- Circula vs Rydoo
- Circula vs SAP Concur
- Circula vs Ramp
- Circula vs Airbase
- Circula vs Spendesk
- Circula vs Soldo
- Circula vs Fyle
- Circula vs Divvy
- Circula vs Billin
- Circula vs Billit
- Circula vs Carta
- Circula vs Causal
- Circula vs Conta
- Circula vs Conta Azul
- Circula vs Brex
- Circula vs Cledara
- Circula vs Mesh Payments
- Circula vs Tropic
- Circula vs Kodo
- Circula vs Medius
- Circula vs sevdesk
- Circula vs Workiva
- Circula vs Xero
- Circula vs Yooz
- Spendbase vs Zoho Expense
- Spendbase vs Moss
- Spendbase vs Pleo
- Spendbase vs Expensify
- Spendbase vs Rydoo
- Spendbase vs SAP Concur
- Spendbase vs Ramp
- Spendbase vs Airbase
- Spendbase vs Spendesk
- Spendbase vs Soldo
- Spendbase vs Fyle
- Spendbase vs Divvy
- Spendbase vs Billin
- Spendbase vs Billit
- Spendbase vs Carta
- Spendbase vs Causal
- Spendbase vs Conta
- Spendbase vs Conta Azul
- Spendbase vs Brex
- Spendbase vs Cledara
- Spendbase vs Mesh Payments
- Spendbase vs Tropic
- Spendbase vs Kodo
- Spendbase vs Medius
- Spendbase vs sevdesk
- Spendbase vs Workiva
- Spendbase vs Xero
- Spendbase vs Yooz