Best Budgeting and Forecasting Software (2026): Top 10 Compared

Centage is the current name of the product previously sold as Planning Maestro and, before 2018, Budget Maestro.

The budgeting page describes the workflow the product is designed for. Finance assigns budgets to department owners inside the platform, routes them through approval chains, and tracks submission status with an audit trail. Budgets can start from industry templates, be copied forward from the prior year or be cloned across entities. Consolidation across entities and currencies runs automatically.

Documented integrations include QuickBooks, Sage Intacct, NetSuite and Blackbaud. The pricing page lists SOC 2 Type II compliance.

The main fit is a mid-market company whose finance team spends several weeks each year assembling a budget from department spreadsheets and wants a fixed-scope implementation rather than a consulting project.

The vendor describes three processes it supports: budgeting with financial analytics, rolling forecasts and longer-range strategic planning.

PlanGuru sells cloud budgeting and forecasting software to small businesses, nonprofits and their advisers. The product imports up to five years of actual results from QuickBooks Online, Xero or Excel and forecasts up to ten years ahead. The income statement, balance sheet and cash flow statement are linked, and the cash flow statement is solved automatically. Users choose from more than 20 standard forecasting methods, build custom ones with a formula builder, and can forecast from non-financial data and KPIs.

Budget-versus-actual reports and rolling forecasts are refreshed monthly after a new import. The Analytics plans add interactive dashboards, and the Multi-Unit plan consolidates departments, divisions or locations.

The fit is an owner, controller or nonprofit finance lead who wants a structured three-statement budget without building one in a spreadsheet.

Fathom is a financial analysis, reporting and forecasting product used heavily by accounting firms. The vendor states that more than 99,000 businesses use it to forecast, report and consolidate.

The forecasting module builds budgets and three-way cash flow forecasts from a company's latest financials or an existing budget. Scenarios cover best, worst and middle cases, and every figure can be traced back to its source. The vendor's FAQ states that forecasts use the indirect method and run up to three years ahead.

Budgets feed into management reports, KPI analysis and targets, so a firm can show planned-versus-actual performance in a branded report. The Pro plan also includes consolidations of up to 300 entities across currencies, benchmarking and an AI commentary writer.

The fit is an accounting or advisory firm that wants one tool for reporting and forecasting across many clients. A single business can use it too, though the plan structure is built around portfolios.

Jirav sells an all-in-one forecasting, budgeting, reporting and dashboard product to three groups named on its home page: small and midsize companies, accounting firms and venture-funded businesses.

The planning engine is driver-based and forecasts the income statement, balance sheet and cash flow together. Users can build annual budgets, rolling and long-range forecasts, and several scenarios based on leadership input. Workforce data and accounting data connect through integrations, with Google Sheets and Excel also supported.

The published pricing is wholesale pricing for firms. Controller Essentials is aimed at firms starting advisory work, with historical financials, KPIs, budget-versus-actual analysis and an AI auto-forecast. CFO Enterprise adds custom budgets, long-range forecasts, workforce planning and bottom-up scenario models.

The clearest fit is an outsourced accounting or fractional CFO firm that wants a standard planning product it can resell under its own brand.

LivePlan is a business planning application that also handles the forecast and budget behind the plan. The vendor states that it has served more than 1.5 million businesses.

Both plans build a projected profit and loss, balance sheet and cash flow forecast without a spreadsheet, with guidance and examples at each step and lender-ready statements.

Premium adds the features that matter most for running a budget. It allows up to ten forecast scenarios, budget-versus-actual dashboards with more than 20 trend reports, and automatic analysis of variances between forecast and actual results. Once QuickBooks or Xero is connected, the profit and cash forecasts update as actual results arrive.

The fit is a founder or owner who has outgrown a template spreadsheet but does not have a finance team. Companies with several department budget owners will find the FP&A products on this page better suited.

Datarails builds its planning product around Excel. Budget owners can edit in Excel desktop or web, and the platform supplies version control, audit trails, comments and approval workflows behind the spreadsheet.

For budgeting, finance splits templates by department and keeps central oversight. Budget owners return their numbers with a one-click submit button, and supporting files can be stored next to the report they support. Forecasting covers rolling forecasts that update automatically, scenario modelling, and cycle cloning to create a new scenario from an existing plan.

Datarails also sells month-end close, cash management, spend and an AI layer. Its higher tiers bundle these modules. A buyer looking only for budgeting and forecasting should check which tier covers the required users and integrations without paying for modules outside that scope.

The fit is a finance team whose models already work in Excel and whose main problem is collecting, versioning and approving department inputs.

Cube positions itself as a finance layer for teams that keep working in spreadsheets. Data from accounting, CRM, HR and payroll, and payment systems flows into a central model, and users reach that model through Excel, Google Sheets, the Cube web app, Slack and Teams, presentation tools and BI tools.

Its product menu lists annual budgeting, scenario planning, headcount, revenue, cash flow and vendor or expense planning, along with variance analysis and executive reporting.

Pricing differs from most products here because users are not the meter. Every tier includes unlimited users and dimensions, so a budget cycle that adds dozens of department contributors does not raise the licence count. The tiers differ instead by workflow automation, collaboration integrations and support.

The fit is a finance team that wants to keep spreadsheet skills and models while bringing many budget owners into one governed process.

Drivetrain describes itself as an AI-native business planning platform for budgeting, reporting and forecasting. Its FAQ states that mid-market and enterprise companies use it, and that it is built for teams that have outgrown spreadsheets.

The budgeting page sets out a four-part workflow. Department heads enter their numbers through their own budget templates, with role-based access and in-product comments. Inputs pass through approval workflows and roll up into one consolidated budget, with version control so earlier iterations can be compared or restored. Once the board approves the budget, it is locked and actuals flow in from connected systems, so budget-versus-actual reports update without a monthly rebuild. Re-forecasts and what-if scenarios run against the locked budget, and AI drafts variance commentary.

The fit is a finance team that collects budgets from many owners and pulls actuals from several systems beyond the general ledger.

Abacum markets an AI-native FP&A platform covering budgeting and forecasting, scenario planning, headcount planning, revenue planning and reporting. The vendor states that it connects to more than 700 source systems.

Its budgeting page addresses the collection problem directly. Budget owners work in one model at the same time, without lockouts, and each sees only the lines they own; the vendor cites Clearlink running 50 to 75 contributors this way. Leadership sets targets by department or driver, owners build the detail underneath, and the variance between the two updates live during the cycle. Owners who prefer Excel can submit through an Excel connector, and formulas in the platform follow Excel conventions.

Based on its own customer data, the vendor cites budget cycles shortened from ten weeks to four.

The fit is a growing company with a dedicated FP&A function and a budget process that involves many department heads.

Board sells a planning platform that spans finance, supply chain, retail merchandising, sales and HR. On the finance side it covers planning, budgeting and forecasting, management reporting, cash flow forecasting, long-term and capital planning, and close and consolidation. The vendor states that it was named a Leader in the 2025 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Financial Planning Software.

The planning, budgeting and forecasting page describes an integrated view of the profit and loss, balance sheet and cash flow, tied to defined drivers. Budgets and forecasts can use unlimited dimensions, so profitability can be analysed by cost centre, product or other variables down to detailed level. Embedded machine learning looks for correlations in financial, operational and external data to support forecasts, and workflows support monthly forecast cycles.

The fit is an organisation whose budget depends on operational plans, such as demand, supply or merchandise plans, and that wants both on one platform. A small or single-entity finance team will find the lighter products on this page closer to its needs.