Looking for a mileage tracker app? We have reviewed and compiled a list of the top options to help you find the best mileage tracker app for your business.
If you drive a lot for work, then accurate mileage tracking is essential for getting all your deductions and reimbursements. Fortunately, there are many different mileage tracking apps available to suit the needs of both individuals and companies. In this guide, we round up the six best mileage tracking apps for personal and business use to help you figure out which one is right for your needs.
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| Starting price for paid plan | Automatic mileage tracking | Trip categorization | Customization | Forever free plan | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| QuickBooks Online | Starts at $30 per month | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Try QuickBooks |
| Zoho Expense | Starts at $3 per month | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Try Zoho |
| Hurdlr | Starts at $8.34 per month | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Try Hurdlr |
| Everlance | Starts at $10 per month | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Try Everlance |
| FreshBooks | Starts at $17 per month | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Try FreshBooks |
| MileIQ | Starts at $5.99 per month | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Try MileIQ |
QuickBooks is the industry standard accounting software that needs no introduction. While it’s known for its accounting and bookkeeping features, it also offers mileage tracking on all paid plans. The mobile app has GPS capabilities that automatically track mileage, and QuickBooks will also generate mileage reports to show you what’s deductible and what’s not.
For more information, read the full QuickBooks Online review.
Zoho is known for its colorful, user-friendly interfaces, and its expense management app is no exception. Zoho Expense is easy to navigate, though it may present a bit of a learning curve to users who haven’t previously used a Zoho app before. It also has super affordable pricing plans and a forever free tier of service, making it a great choice for freelancers and other small-business owners on a budget.
For more information, read the full Zoho Expense review.
Hurdlr is another mileage and expense tracking app that offers affordable pricing plans as well as a forever free plan. The free plan offers unlimited and semi-automatic mileage tracking, while the paid plans offer additional features like automatic expense tracking and real-time tax calculations. Hurdlr doesn’t really have approval workflows, making it a good choice for freelancers and other small-business owners who don’t need to worry about reviewing employees’ drives.
Everlance combines mileage tracking and expense management, making it a great choice for those specifically looking for a travel expense tracker. The app automatically starts tracking a trip as soon as the car starts moving and classifies trips as it learns your drives. Sort expenses with a single swipe, and store photos of receipts in the cloud so you never have to worry about losing them.
For more information, check out our roundup of the best expense tracking apps, which features Everlance.
FreshBooks is accounting software that is a more affordable competitor to QuickBooks, and it also includes tools for mileage and expense tracking. This makes it an all-in-one solution for service-based contractors, freelancers and other small-business owners looking for single software that will meet multiple needs. While more expensive than some standalone mileage trackers on this list, FreshBooks offers much more functionality, so it’s good value for the money.
For more information, read the full Freshbooks review.
If you are looking for a mileage tracking app for both personal and business use, definitely consider MileIQ. It features multiple pricing plans for both individuals and teams, so you can choose the one that fits your needs and budget best. The pricing plans are also quite affordable, on par with some of the other cheaper options on this list. You should know that this app is designed purely for mileage tracking only, so it doesn’t include expense tracking or accounting features.
Most mileage tracking apps offer automatic tracking, meaning they start tracking your trip automatically once your vehicle is in motion. Automatic tracking offers various degrees of accuracy depending on which app you choose — some take up to a quarter mile to engage, which can cut into your deductions if you take lots of short trips. Most apps also allow you to manually input a trip after the fact, in case you forget to turn on GPS tracking.
The best mileage tracking apps don’t just let you select whether or not a trip is business or personal; they let you assign it to one of multiple companies. This is especially helpful if you own or work for more than one business and make driving trips for all of them. More advanced mileage tracking apps will learn your driving behavior over time and start to automatically categorize trips based on time of day and frequent locations, saving you manual work.
Mileage tracking apps come preloaded with the default deduction rates that apply in your country. However, many apps also allow you to set your own custom deductions, add company reimbursement information, add multiple vehicles, mark your favorite locations and more. These customizations mean that you won’t have to enter the information manually each time you log a trip.
Tax compliance is one of the major reasons for mileage tracking. That’s why it’s important that whatever mileage tracking app you choose makes it easy to generate a mileage report, download it in Excel or another format, and share it with your accounting team or the IRS. Many apps also generate visual reports so you can check on the status of your deductions and reimbursements throughout the year.
If you’re a freelancer in business for yourself, then this feature won’t matter as much to you. But if you’re a business owner with multiple employees who track their miles, then you might want their mileage logs to be passed to an administrator or supervisor before approving them for reimbursement. Not all mileage tracking apps give you the ability to set up approval workflows, so if this matters to your business, then you should prioritize it in your search.
When choosing a mileage tracking app, consider your budget as well as your needs. A freelancer or solopreneur will be looking for something different (and likely have a different budget) than a company that needs mileage tracking for an entire fleet of door-to-door salespeople.
Forever free apps are available, but they typically have limited features and cap the number of drives you can log each month. However, Forever free plans are helpful if you want to test an app for a more extended trial before committing to a monthly or annual paid plan.
While there are a few standalone apps that only offer mileage tracking, many of them bundle it together with other features like expense tracking or even a full-blown accounting suite. It may actually be more affordable and less complicated in the long run to choose an all-in-one software like QuickBooks or FreshBooks. If you anticipate needing other software besides just mileage tracking, be sure to compare all the plans and really crunch the numbers before making your final selection.
To determine the best mileage tracking apps, we factored in user reviews and product documentation. We considered features such as automatic mileage tracking, trip categorization, customization, mileage reports and approvals. We also weighed other factors such as pricing, user interface and customer support.
