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Accounting · head to head

Money Forward Cloud vs Soldo

Money Forward Cloud logo

Money Forward Cloud

Accounting

Japanese cloud accounting, payroll and back office suite built for Japanese tax law and filing

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Soldo logo

Soldo

Accounting

Prepaid company card and spend control platform for European businesses

From
£21/month
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Money Forward Cloud the product, its help documentation and its support operate in Japanese, so a finance function without a fluent Japanese reader cannot run it unaided regardless of any English language marketing, and hiring for that is the real cost of adoption.; Soldo cards are prepaid, so if the central wallet runs low the cards decline in front of a supplier, and treasury has to keep an idle float funded rather than using a credit line.
  • They diverge on capability: Money Forward Cloud covers Japanese consumption tax handling, Soldo covers Prepaid company cards.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Money Forward Cloud and Soldo actually diverge.

Attributes where Money Forward Cloud and Soldo differ
AttributeMoney Forward CloudSoldo
Starting priceOn request£21/month
Pricing modelquotePer user per month
PlatformsWebWeb, iOS, Android

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 Money Forward Cloud

  • Japanese consumption tax handling
  • Qualified invoice support
  • Electronic record keeping
  • Bank and card feeds
  • Automated journal proposal
  • Invoicing
  • Payroll
  • Attendance and leave

Only in Soldo

  • Prepaid company cards
  • Card-level budgets
  • Receipt capture
  • Accounting export
  • Multi-currency wallets
  • Approval workflows

What people use each for

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

Money Forward Cloud

  • A Japanese small or medium company moving off desktop bookkeeping and needing qualified invoice and electronic record keeping compliancenot Soldo
  • A Japanese subsidiary of a foreign group that must file locally in Japan while reporting upward in the group's own systemnot Soldo
  • A growing Japanese company that wants payroll, attendance and social insurance administration in the same suite as the ledgernot Soldo
  • A tax accountancy practice standardising its client base on one cloud product with a practitioner access rolenot Soldo

Soldo

  • A construction firm giving site managers fuel and materials cards with hard per-card limitsnot Money Forward Cloud
  • A marketing team issuing virtual cards per subscription so a cancelled tool cannot keep billingnot Money Forward Cloud
  • A UK company that cannot get approved for a credit-based corporate card programmenot Money Forward Cloud
  • A multi-entity European business needing EUR and GBP wallets without conversion on every purchasenot Money Forward Cloud

Where each one falls short

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

Money Forward Cloud

  • The product, its help documentation and its support operate in Japanese, so a finance function without a fluent Japanese reader cannot run it unaided regardless of any English language marketing, and hiring for that is the real cost of adoption.
  • The tax logic is Japanese, so it cannot serve as the accounting system for entities filing anywhere else, and a group with Japanese and foreign entities ends up running two ledgers with a manual consolidation between them.
  • Modules are licensed separately with per user and per employee components, so accounting, payroll, attendance, expenses and invoicing bought together cost several times the headline accounting plan and the bill grows with every hire.
  • Bank connectivity in Japan relies substantially on scraping and delegated access rather than on a standardised open banking interface, so feeds break after bank site changes and reconciliation stalls until the connector is fixed.
  • In Japanese small business the tax accountant usually chooses the bookkeeping software, and practitioners are divided between Money Forward, freee and Yayoi, so picking it when your accountant works in another product means either paying them to learn it or changing accountant.

Soldo

  • Cards are prepaid, so if the central wallet runs low the cards decline in front of a supplier, and treasury has to keep an idle float funded rather than using a credit line.
  • The plan fee covers only three users, and per-user charges plus physical card fees mean the real monthly cost is several times the advertised headline for a team of twenty.
  • It does not extend credit, so it gives no working capital benefit and no card rewards of the kind US charge card issuers use to offset their cost.
  • Sole traders and some business types are not accepted, which catches out small consultancies expecting to sign up online.
  • Coverage is European; a company with US or Asian subsidiaries will need a second card programme and a second expense workflow for them.

Pricing, plan by plan

Money Forward Cloud

On request

No published plan breakdown. See the Money Forward Cloud review.

Soldo

£21/month
  • Standard$21/month
    • Three users included
    • Around £7 per additional user per month
    • Physical card issuance fee around £5, virtual around £1
  • Plus$33/month
    • Three users included
    • Around £11 per additional user per month
    • Advanced approval and multi-currency features
  • Enterprise$undefined/month
    • Quoted pricing
    • Custom card volumes and entity structures
    • Dedicated account management

Which should you pick?

Choose Money Forward Cloud if

  • You need japanese consumption tax handling.
  • You also want qualified invoice support.
Money Forward Cloud review

Choose Soldo if

  • You need prepaid company cards.
  • You work on Web, iOS, Android.
  • You also want card-level budgets.
Soldo review

Questions people ask

Is Money Forward Cloud or Soldo better?
Neither clearly leads. Money Forward Cloud starts at On request and Soldo at £21/month, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Money Forward Cloud or Soldo?
Money Forward Cloud starts at On request and Soldo at £21/month.
Does Money Forward Cloud or Soldo run on more platforms?
Money Forward Cloud runs on Web. Soldo runs on Web, iOS, Android.
What is Money Forward Cloud best used for?
Money Forward Cloud is most often used for a japanese small or medium company moving off desktop bookkeeping and needing qualified invoice and electronic record keeping compliance, a japanese subsidiary of a foreign group that must file locally in japan while reporting upward in the group's own system, a growing japanese company that wants payroll, attendance and social insurance administration in the same suite as the ledger, a tax accountancy practice standardising its client base on one cloud product with a practitioner access role. Of those, a japanese small or medium company moving off desktop bookkeeping and needing qualified invoice and electronic record keeping compliance and a japanese subsidiary of a foreign group that must file locally in japan while reporting upward in the group's own system are not what Soldo is typically brought in for.
What can Money Forward Cloud do that Soldo cannot?
Money Forward Cloud covers Japanese consumption tax handling, Qualified invoice support, Electronic record keeping, Bank and card feeds. Soldo covers Prepaid company cards, Card-level budgets, Receipt capture, Accounting export.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Money Forward Cloud: Can I use it if I do not read Japanese?

Not realistically on your own. The interface, support and the tax concepts themselves are Japanese. Companies that succeed with it have a bilingual bookkeeper or an English speaking tax accountant operating it.

Soldo: Is Soldo a credit card?

No. It is prepaid electronic money. You fund a wallet and cards spend from it, so there is no credit line and no interest-free period.

Money Forward Cloud: Does it handle the qualified invoice system?

Yes. Capturing and validating supplier registration numbers and retaining invoices in the required form is one of the main reasons Japanese companies moved to it around the 2023 introduction.

Soldo: What licence does Soldo hold?

Soldo is authorised as an electronic money institution, including UK, Irish and Italian entities, which is why it can issue cards without a sponsor bank in those markets.

Money Forward Cloud: How does it compare with freee?

Both are Japanese cloud suites covering similar ground. freee is often described as easier for non accountants, Money Forward as closer to conventional bookkeeping and preferred by many tax accountants. The practical tiebreaker is which one your accountant already uses.

Soldo: What does it really cost for twenty users?

Take the plan fee, add the per-user rate for the seventeen users beyond the included three, then add card issuance fees per physical card.

Money Forward Cloud: Can it file my corporate tax return?

The suite supports the bookkeeping and much of the preparation, and there are filing oriented products in the family, but Japanese corporate tax filing is normally done by a licensed tax accountant. Treat it as the record keeping layer, not the filer.

Money Forward Cloud: Is it usable for a company outside Japan?

No, not as an accounting system. Its value is the Japanese tax and filing logic, and none of that applies elsewhere.

Money Forward Cloud: What does it cost to add payroll?

Payroll is a separate module with its own subscription and a per employee element, as are attendance and expenses. Price the whole stack for your headcount rather than the accounting plan alone.

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