ZATCA Wave 25 pulls every Saudi business above SAR 187,500 into Phase 2 e-invoicing by 1 February 2027. We compare Wafeq, Qoyod and Zoho Books on published prices, then price the four costs the comparison articles leave out.
On 24 July 2026, ZATCA halved the e-invoicing threshold to SAR 187,500. Any Saudi business whose VAT-subject revenue passed that mark in 2022, 2023, 2024 or 2025 has to connect its invoicing system to the Fatoora platform by 1 February 2027. Three products take most of that shortlist: Wafeq, Qoyod and Zoho Books. This compares what they cost, and what the switch costs on top.
What does ZATCA Wave 25 actually require?
Wave 25 is not a new rule. It is the same Phase 2 integration requirement pointed at a much wider group of taxpayers. Phase 1 asked you to issue a structured electronic invoice. Phase 2 asks your software to talk to the regulator directly.
In practice your system has to do four things. It generates the invoice as UBL 2.1 XML. It signs that invoice with a cryptographic stamp tied to a certificate ZATCA issues you. It embeds a TLV-encoded QR code. Then it transmits the document to the Fatoora platform, either for clearance before the invoice reaches your customer or for reporting shortly after.
Wave 24 covered revenue above SAR 375,000 and closed on 30 June 2026. Wave 25 halves that figure and closes on 1 February 2027. The years that count run from 2022 to 2025, so one strong year in the past is enough to put you in scope. A café billing SAR 16,000 a month now sits inside the mandate.
If you already run compliant software, this is a certificate and configuration exercise. If you run spreadsheets or an offline desktop package, it is a migration.
How much does accounting software cost in Saudi Arabia?
Published monthly prices, taken from each vendor's own page (Zoho, Wafeq):
| Product | Entry plan | Next plan up | Top published plan | Users on entry |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Zoho Books | SAR 69 | SAR 129 | SAR 799 | 3 |
| Wafeq | SAR 99 | SAR 119 | SAR 199 | not published |
| Qoyod | about SAR 99 to 299 | rises with invoice volume | quoted on request | not published |
Zoho Books also runs a free tier, capped at SAR 200,000 of annual revenue with one user plus an accountant and 1,000 invoices a year. For a business that has only now crossed the Wave 25 line, that tier is often the honest starting point.
Qoyod appears as a range for a reason. It prices by invoice volume rather than a flat seat price, and it moves plan selection into signup instead of publishing a full public table. You will not know your number until you have told it your volume.
Wafeq bills twelve months for the price of ten on annual terms, and Zoho discounts annual billing too. On a three-user setup the gap between Zoho Standard and Wafeq Plus is roughly SAR 50 a month. That is not the number that decides this.
How do Wafeq, Qoyod and Zoho Books differ in practice?
Wafeq was built in the Gulf for Gulf accounting. Its Phase 2 integration is native rather than bolted on, and its bilingual invoice output does not need a template rebuild. The Starter plan is invoicing only, so a business that wants a real general ledger begins at Plus or Premium. User limits are not published, which is worth asking about before you commit.
Qoyod is the Saudi-first option that most Saudi accountants already recognise. That matters more than a feature grid does. When your external accountant knows the product, month-end stops being a translation exercise. Its invoice-volume pricing suits a business with high order values and few invoices, and penalises the opposite shape.
Zoho Books is the cheapest credible entry and the deepest product here. It is also the only one attached to a wider suite you may already run, so CRM and inventory can share a single customer record. The trade is that Zoho is a global product with a Saudi edition. The RTL interface and the KSA VAT group are real, but you are one market inside a large roadmap.
None of the three is a bad choice for a business under SAR 5 million in revenue. This decision is rarely settled on features.
Which one should a Saudi small business pick?
Take Zoho Books if you are newly in scope, watching cost closely, and want room to grow into inventory or CRM later. The free tier under SAR 200,000 makes year one nearly costless, and Standard at SAR 69 covers three users.
Take Qoyod if your accountant is Saudi and already works in it, or if your invoice count is low against a high average value. Familiarity to the person filing your returns is a saving no comparison table prices.
Take Wafeq if you trade in more than one Gulf market, or if you want Gulf-native accounting rather than a localised global product. It is also the stronger pick when a finance team rather than the owner will live in the software daily.
Skip QuickBooks and Xero. Neither carries ZATCA Phase 2 compliance in Saudi Arabia without a third-party connector, and that connector becomes one more vendor, one more invoice and one more thing that breaks.
What does the monthly figure leave out?
The subscription is the smallest number in this decision. Four costs sit on top of it, and the comparison articles ranking for this query price none of them.
The Phase 2 onboarding itself. Some vendors bundle it into the subscription. Others treat it as a setup engagement and bill it separately, and that fee can reach into the low thousands of riyals. Get it in writing before you sign. It is the largest variable here.
Opening-balance migration. Someone has to move your chart of accounts, outstanding invoices, supplier balances and fixed-asset register into the new system. On a business with a few years of history that is days of work, not hours. Doing it badly is how a VAT return goes wrong six months later.
The certificate work. Phase 2 needs a cryptographic identity issued through the Fatoora portal and tied to each device or branch that issues invoices. Multi-branch retailers find this out late. A five-branch operation is five onboardings.
Your accountant's hours. If your external accountant does not know the product, you pay for their learning curve. In year one this cost often exceeds the software.
A realistic first-year budget is the subscription plus a one-off implementation cost that is usually a multiple of it. Anyone quoting the monthly fee as the total is quoting the easy half.
Is ZATCA certification enough on its own?
No, and this is where the shortlist gets shorter. The regulator maintains a list of solution providers whose software has passed compliance testing. Being on that list proves the product can produce a conforming invoice. It does not prove the product will hold your accounting.
Certification says nothing about three things that decide daily use. Whether the Arabic interface is usable by a storekeeper rather than a bookkeeper. Whether the product survives a slow connection in a shop, which is what determines if staff keep using it. Whether you can export your data cleanly when you leave.
Test that last one first. Run a full export during the trial, before your history is inside. A product that makes leaving difficult will make leaving expensive.
When is a custom build the right answer?
Almost never for the ledger itself. General ledgers are a solved problem, and Wafeq or Qoyod or Zoho will out-feature anything built to order.
The build question arrives one layer up. A Saudi retailer running four branches, a Salla storefront and a delivery channel does not need a new ledger. It needs invoices, stock counts and payments from those channels to land in the ledger without a person retyping them. That integration layer is custom work, and it is where the real operating cost sits.
The same pattern holds in Lebanon. Our comparison of accounting software for Lebanese SMEs landed on the same conclusion: the package is cheap and the plumbing is not. The Saudi version is stricter, because ZATCA-ready POS selection has to line up with the ledger rather than sit beside it.
What should you actually do this week?
- Check whether you are in scope. If VAT-subject revenue passed SAR 187,500 in any year from 2022 to 2025, you are, and 1 February 2027 is your deadline.
- Open a free trial of Zoho Books and one of Wafeq. Issue a real invoice in Arabic in both. That hour will tell you more than any comparison table.
- Ask each vendor one question in writing: what does Phase 2 onboarding cost, and is it included?
- Ask your accountant which product they already work in. A clear preference deserves real weight.
- Count your invoicing devices and branches. That number drives your implementation cost, not your revenue.
Do not wait for January. Certificate issuance and testing are the steps that slip, and they slip worst when every other business in the Kingdom is doing them at once.
Sources
- ZATCA: criteria for taxpayers in Wave 24 of the Integration Phase
- EY: Saudi Arabia announces Phase 2 e-invoicing integration waves
- Zoho Books Saudi Arabia pricing
- Wafeq pricing
Need Fatoora integration done before February?
Choosing the package is the easy half. Voxire builds the layer that makes it work: moving opening balances across without breaking your VAT history, wiring a Salla or POS channel into the ledger, and handling certificate onboarding for every branch that issues an invoice. We scope it as a fixed price, so the implementation cost is a number you see before you commit.
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