Plaidvs
QuickBooks
QuickBooks: Smart, simple online accounting software for small business
Plaid
The safer way to connect financial accounts
As of 30 August 2026, Plaid starts at $29/month. Plaid enables applications to connect with users' bank accounts, providing access to financial data for budgeting, payments, and lending applications. Softwr lists it under Accounting. Plaid is made by Plaid Inc, launched in 2013, available on API, Web, iOS, Android.
Overview
What Plaid does
Plaid enables applications to connect with users' bank accounts, providing access to financial data for budgeting, payments, and lending applications.
What people use it for
- Connecting bank accounts to an application for balances and transactions
- Verifying account ownership and income for payments or lending
Related searches
The honest half
Where it falls short
Concrete and checkable, so you can decide whether any of them matter to you. This is the half of a review a vendor will not write about Plaid.
- No dollar amount is published for any product, and the pricing page states no per request rate or minimum commitment
- Three different billing models apply depending on the product, being one time per connected account, monthly per connected account, and per successful API call
- That mix means total cost depends on which products are combined rather than on a single unit
- Discounted rates require the Growth plan, which is a 12 month commitment
Cross-shopped
What people choose instead of Plaid
Each pairing was judged by two reviewers asking whether a buyer would genuinely weigh the two against each other. The ones that failed were deleted rather than published.
- PlaidvsRamp
Ramp: The corporate card that helps you spend less
- PlaidvsAirbase
Airbase: The first all-in-one spend management platform
- PlaidvsMelio
Melio: Simple business payments
Pricing
What Plaid costs
Taken from the vendor's own pricing page. Prices move, so check before you buy.
Pay-as-you-go
Free
- Bank connections
- Transaction data
- Account verification
Capabilities
Features
Bank account linking
Transaction data
Identity verification
Income verification
Asset reports
Venmo
Integration with Venmo
Robinhood
Integration with Robinhood
Coinbase
Integration with Coinbase
SOC 2
SOC 2 security feature
ISO 27001
ISO 27001 security feature
Bank-level encryption
Bank-level encryption security feature
Api support
Available on api
Answered, with sources
Questions people ask
Each answer names the page it came from, so you can check it rather than take our word for it.
How much does Plaid cost?
Plaid does not publish per request rates. It offers Pay as You Go with no upfront commitment, a Growth plan on a 12 month commitment with discounts, and a Custom plan priced on volume. Figures come from its sales team.
SourceHow does Plaid bill for its products?
Plaid uses three billing shapes: one time fee products charged once per connected account, subscription products charged monthly per connected account, and per request products charged a flat fee for every successful API call.
SourceCan I test Plaid for free?
Yes. Plaid's Limited Production service allows up to 200 API calls with each available product using live data, before any commitment. Plaid is also free for the consumers whose accounts are connected.
SourceBehind it
Who makes Plaid
- Company
- Plaid Inc
- Based in
- San Francisco, CA
Timeline
Plaid over time
Keep looking
Where to go from Plaid
- Plaid alternativesEvery product people weigh against it
- Plaid pricingPlans, floors and what the tiers exclude
- Plaid badgesWhich rules it meets, and the figure behind each
- All Accounting softwareThe full category
- Best Accounting softwareThe shortlist, and how it was cut
Best Accounting software for
Compare Plaid with
- Ramp
- Airbase
- Melio
- QuickBooks
- Mercury
- Wise Business
- Brex
- Spendesk
- Stampli
- Cledara
- Fyle
- Tipalti
- BlackLine
- Chargebee
- FloQast
- Hnry
- Lemon Squeezy
- Cledara
Other Accounting software
Spend management combining corporate cards, bill payment and expense claims, now part of Paylocity
From $29/mo15 researched notesCloud accounting from Intuit with country specific editions, seat caps by plan and payroll charged separately
From $30/mo16 researched notesSoftware subscription management with a virtual card per application, priced from £100 a month
From £100/mo12 researched notesReal-time expense management that works with your cards
From $11.99/month per active user13 researched notesClose automation that sits on top of your ERP, covering reconciliations, journals and close task control
From $29/mo15 researched notesMerchant of record for digital products, so the platform is the legal seller and carries the sales tax registrations
15 researched notesSoftware subscription management with a virtual card per application, priced from £100 a month
From £100/mo12 researched notes
Softwr does not host reviews and shows no star rating for Plaid, because a rating we did not collect is not ours to publish. What is here is the pricing and platform detail from the vendor’s own pages, limitations we could state concretely, and alternatives a reviewer confirmed people weigh against it. Tell us if any of it is wrong.
More on Plaid
Plaid alternatives
What people switch to, and what they give up
Plaid pricing
Every tier, and where the cost actually lands
Compare Plaid
Put it head to head with anything we hold
Plaid badge
Its rating, and an embed for your own site
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