GlassJar is cloud accounting software for startups that need proper double-entry books from the beginning without buying a finance stack sized for a much larger company.
Every transaction type is entered from one screen, each user chooses which reports appear on their dashboard, and role-based permissions let a founder and a bookkeeper work in the same books without sharing a login.
Early-stage companies tend to end up in one of two bad places. Either the books are a spreadsheet that somebody will have to unpick before a raise, or they are in software built for a fifty-person company and nobody on the team knows how to use it. Both cost more later than getting it right early.
Books Someone Will Eventually Audit
Startup books get looked at by people who did not create them. An accountant at year end, a fractional CFO, a diligence process. What matters is not how fast you entered a transaction but whether the trail holds up when somebody follows it.
GlassJar is double-entry underneath, with bank connections and reconciliation, bills, expenses, and activity logging. It produces the statements those people ask for rather than an export you then have to rebuild. Coming from something lighter? The Wave comparison covers what changes when a side business becomes a company with investors.
The Founder Is Doing This at Eleven at Night
For the first year or two, bookkeeping is a founder task squeezed between everything else. Every extra screen between deciding to record something and having recorded it is a reason it does not get done, and unrecorded transactions are the thing that makes January expensive.
In GlassJar, any transaction type is entered from one screen. It is the same short interaction whether you are logging a subscription, a contractor invoice, or a journal entry.
Bring In a Bookkeeper Without Handing Over Everything
Most startups bring in outside help before they hire finance internally. That usually means sharing a login, which is both a security problem and a source of confusion about who changed what.
Every GlassJar plan includes more than one user, and role-based permissions let you give a bookkeeper the access they need without opening up everything else. Leave a note on a transaction and they see it next time they are in the books.
Reporting You Can Take to a Board
The reports a startup actually runs are a small set, and they are not the same set a retailer runs. Most software shows you everything and lets you find yours.
GlassJar lets each user choose which reports appear on their dashboard. Budgeting and variance reporting are included, and tracking categories let you cut the numbers by whatever dimension your business actually turns on.
What GlassJar Does Not Do Yet
The October 1, 2026 release does not include payroll. It also does not include sales tax automation, contractor payments, inventory, or estimates.
For a startup, payroll is the one to pay attention to. GlassJar suits you if you have not hired yet, or if you run payroll through a dedicated provider and want your accounting separate from it, which is how most funded startups operate. If you need accounting and payroll in one system on day one, GlassJar is not that yet.
Who This Is For
GlassJar suits an early-stage company that wants real books from the start, that has one or two people touching the accounting, and that would rather not spend the first year fighting software designed for a finance department. It is a weaker fit if you hold inventory, need automated sales tax filing across states, or want payroll inside the same product. Earlier than that, or still working alone? The freelancers and self-employed page is the better fit.
Start With Books You Will Not Have to Redo
Start a free 14-day trial. No credit card required.