Is DATEV or Maxio better?

Neither clearly leads. DATEV starts at On request and Maxio at $599/month, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.

Which is cheaper, DATEV or Maxio?

DATEV starts at On request and Maxio at $599/month.

Does DATEV or Maxio run on more platforms?

DATEV runs on Windows, Web. Maxio runs on web, api.

What is DATEV best used for?

DATEV is most often used for a german gmbh that wants its steuerberater to keep doing the books but wants receipts to stop travelling in a shoebox, a payroll department that must file social insurance and wage tax returns to german statutory deadlines without an external bureau, an sme preparing an e-bilanz and audit-ready gobd document archive, a tax firm standardising dozens of client engagements on one chart of accounts and one document workflow. Of those, a german gmbh that wants its steuerberater to keep doing the books but wants receipts to stop travelling in a shoebox and a payroll department that must file social insurance and wage tax returns to german statutory deadlines without an external bureau are not what Maxio is typically brought in for.

What can DATEV do that Maxio cannot?

DATEV covers Unternehmen online, Lohn und Gehalt, Rechnungswesen, Jahresabschluss. Maxio covers Usage-based billing, Subscription management, Revenue recognition, SaaS metrics dashboards.

Accounting · head to head

DATEV vs Maxio

DATEV

Accounting

German accounting, payroll and tax software built around the tax adviser rather than the business

From: On request
Rated: -

Full review Website

Maxio

Accounting

Billing and financial reporting platform for B2B SaaS companies

From: $599/month
Rated: -

Full review Website

The short version

Each has a real cost: DATEV dATEV does not publish transparent per-customer pricing the way a SaaS vendor does; your real cost is buried in your tax adviser's fee note, so comparing it against Lexware or sevdesk on price is genuinely hard.; Maxio entry-level Grow plan starts at $599/month, making it costly for very early-stage startups.
They diverge on capability: DATEV covers Unternehmen online, Maxio covers Usage-based billing.
Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which DATEV and Maxio actually diverge.

Attributes where DATEV and Maxio differ
Attribute	DATEV	Maxio
Starting price	On request	$599/month
Pricing model	quote	subscription
Platforms	Windows, Web	web, api

Identical on both: free tier (No), 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 DATEV

Unternehmen online
Lohn und Gehalt
Rechnungswesen
Jahresabschluss
DATEV DMS
Meine Steuern
DATEV-Schnittstelle

Only in Maxio

Usage-based billing
Subscription management
Revenue recognition
SaaS metrics dashboards
Dunning and collections
Accounting and CRM integrations

What people use each for

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

DATEV

A German GmbH that wants its Steuerberater to keep doing the books but wants receipts to stop travelling in a shoeboxnot Maxio
A payroll department that must file social insurance and wage tax returns to German statutory deadlines without an external bureaunot Maxio
An SME preparing an e-Bilanz and audit-ready GoBD document archivenot Maxio
A tax firm standardising dozens of client engagements on one chart of accounts and one document workflownot Maxio

Maxio

Billing for B2B SaaS companies with complex contractsnot DATEV
Usage-based and hybrid pricing meteringnot DATEV
GAAP/IFRS revenue recognition for finance teamsnot DATEV
SaaS metrics reporting for investors and boardsnot DATEV

Where each one falls short

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

DATEV

DATEV does not publish transparent per-customer pricing the way a SaaS vendor does; your real cost is buried in your tax adviser's fee note, so comparing it against Lexware or sevdesk on price is genuinely hard.
The board has decided to wind down the Austria-specific portfolio: existing products remain usable to 31 December 2028, are free of charge during 2029, and cannot be used after 31 December 2029, so any Austrian entity on DATEV has a forced migration dated in advance.
It is built for German statutory practice, so a group with subsidiaries outside the DACH region will run DATEV for Germany and something else everywhere else, with a consolidation step in between.
Large parts of the suite are still Windows desktop software installed on a workstation or terminal server, which means IT overhead most companies no longer budget for when they think they are buying cloud accounting.
The lock-in is social as well as technical: because your adviser holds the installation and the history, changing accounting software usually forces you to change or retrain your adviser, which is a far bigger decision than a software migration.

Maxio

Entry-level Grow plan starts at $599/month, making it costly for very early-stage startups.
Pricing above the Grow tier requires a custom quote rather than transparent self-serve pricing.
Focused specifically on B2B SaaS billing, so it lacks general e-commerce checkout or consumer payment features found in platforms like FastSpring.
Advanced features like multi-entity support and expense amortization are gated behind paid add-ons.

Pricing, plan by plan

DATEV

On request

DATEV Unternehmen online$undefined/month
- Receipt and bank data exchange with your tax adviser
- Cash book and master data modules
- Ordered and usually rebilled through the adviser
DATEV Mittelstand$undefined/month
- In-house financial accounting and invoicing
- Payroll modules licensed separately
- Per-workplace licensing
Lohn und Gehalt$undefined/month
- German payroll runs and statutory electronic filings
- Priced by number of payslips
- Typically operated by the adviser on the client's behalf

Maxio

$599/month

Grow$599/month
- For businesses up to $100k in monthly billings
- Usage-based and recurring billing
- Automated invoicing and dunning
Scale$undefined/month
- For businesses over $100k in monthly billings
- Advanced revenue management add-ons
- Multi-entity support

Which should you pick?

Choose DATEV if

You need unternehmen online.
You work on Windows, Web.
You also want lohn und gehalt.

DATEV review

Choose Maxio if

You need usage-based billing.
You work on web, api.
You also want subscription management.

Maxio review

Questions people ask

Is DATEV or Maxio better?: Neither clearly leads. DATEV starts at On request and Maxio at $599/month, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, DATEV or Maxio?: DATEV starts at On request and Maxio at $599/month.
Does DATEV or Maxio run on more platforms?: DATEV runs on Windows, Web. Maxio runs on web, api.
What is DATEV best used for?: DATEV is most often used for a german gmbh that wants its steuerberater to keep doing the books but wants receipts to stop travelling in a shoebox, a payroll department that must file social insurance and wage tax returns to german statutory deadlines without an external bureau, an sme preparing an e-bilanz and audit-ready gobd document archive, a tax firm standardising dozens of client engagements on one chart of accounts and one document workflow. Of those, a german gmbh that wants its steuerberater to keep doing the books but wants receipts to stop travelling in a shoebox and a payroll department that must file social insurance and wage tax returns to german statutory deadlines without an external bureau are not what Maxio is typically brought in for.
What can DATEV do that Maxio cannot?: DATEV covers Unternehmen online, Lohn und Gehalt, Rechnungswesen, Jahresabschluss. Maxio covers Usage-based billing, Subscription management, Revenue recognition, SaaS metrics dashboards.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

DATEV: Can I buy DATEV directly without a tax adviser?

In practice, no for most of the range. Membership of the cooperative is restricted to the tax and legal professions, and companies get access through their adviser or as a client of one.

Maxio: What does Maxio cost?

Maxio's Grow plan costs $599/month for businesses with up to $100k in monthly billings. Businesses above that threshold need the Scale plan, which requires a custom quote from Maxio's sales team.

Source

DATEV: Is DATEV usable outside Germany?

It operates in Austria, Italy, Spain, Poland, Czechia, Slovakia and Hungary, but the depth is German. The Austrian product line is being discontinued with a hard end date of 31 December 2029.

Maxio: Is there a free plan?

No, Maxio does not offer a free plan. The Grow plan at $599/month is the entry point, with unlimited users included at no extra cost.

Source

DATEV: What is the DATEV-Schnittstelle everyone mentions?

It is the standard export format German invoicing and ERP tools produce so bookkeeping data can be handed to a DATEV-based adviser. Supporting it is effectively a requirement to sell accounting-adjacent software in Germany.

Maxio: What does Maxio integrate with?

Maxio integrates with accounting systems like QuickBooks, Xero, and NetSuite, CRMs including Salesforce, HubSpot, and Pipedrive, and 20+ payment gateways alongside its own Maxio Payments.

Source

DATEV: Does DATEV handle e-invoicing under the German B2B mandate?

Yes, the accounting and invoicing modules were extended for the XRechnung and ZUGFeRD formats that the German B2B e-invoicing rules require.

DATEV vs Maxio

DATEV

Maxio

The short version

Where they differ

What each one covers

Only in DATEV

Only in Maxio

What people use each for

DATEV

Maxio

Where each one falls short

DATEV

Maxio

Pricing, plan by plan

DATEV

Maxio

Which should you pick?

Choose DATEV if

Choose Maxio if

Questions people ask

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Related pages

More on DATEV

More on Maxio

Keep looking

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