Working With QBO Budgets

Many businesses create budgets to compare against their actual sales and expenses.

Create New Budget

Create New Budget From Scratch

1. Select Settings ⚙️ and then Budgeting.
2. Select the Add Budget Button in the upper right.

Copy An Existing Budget

Instead of starting from scratch, you can create a copy of an existing budget. This helps you jumpstart this year's budget using last year's data:

1. Select Settings ⚙️ and then Budgeting.
2. Find the budget you want to copy.
3. Select the Action ▼ dropdown and then Copy.
4. On the Copy Budget screen, enter the new budget name and fiscal year.
5. Select Create Budget.
6. Update the budget amounts as necessary.
7. Select Save or Save and close.

This saves the copy as a separate budget.

Edit Or Delete Budgets

Edit a Budget

If you need to edit a budget, make your changes in QuickBooks:

1. Go to Settings ⚙ and select Budgeting.
2. Find your budget on the list.
3. Select Edit.
4. Edit each account one month at a time.
5. To change the time period from month-to-month to quarterly or yearly, select the Gear ⚙ at the top of the budget. Then select Quarter or Year.
6. Select Save or Save and close.

Delete a Budget

If you decide to delete a budget, be careful. You can't recover deleted budgets:

1. Go to Settings ⚙ and select Budgeting.
2. Find your budget on the list.
3. Select the Action ▼ dropdown and then Delete.

Create Budget Reports

There are special budget reports that help you keep track of your budget goals.

1. Go to Settings ⚙ and select Budgeting.
2. Find your budget on the list.
3. Select the Action ▼ dropdown and then Run Budget Overview report or Run Budgets vs. Actuals report.

The Budget Overview report summarizes budgets by account. The Budgets vs. Actuals report summarizes accounts alongside your actual account totals. It also shows how much you're under or over budget.