Prices taken from each vendor's official pricing page in September 2026, linked in the table so you can check them. Rates change, and several of these companies do not publish theirs: where there is no figure, we say so.
Before recommending anything, here is what almost no comparison says: most companies looking for this software do not need it.
A 13-week cash flow forecast is a thirteen-column table. Money in, money out, and the weekly bridge to closing cash. That fits in a spreadsheet and works fine for years. What kills a forecast is never the tool — it is that nobody updates it on Mondays.
That said, there is a point where the spreadsheet stops paying for itself. This guide is about identifying that point and, if you have reached it, telling you what to buy.
When the spreadsheet stops being enough
Four signals. One is enough to start looking; two means the spreadsheet is costing you more than it saves.
1. More than two or three bank accounts. The real cost of the spreadsheet is not building it, it is keying in transactions every week. With one bank that is half an hour. With five banks and two entities it is half a morning — and one morning a month already pays for any of these subscriptions.
2. More than one person touches it. The moment two versions of the file exist, the forecast stops being reliable and the argument about which copy is current begins. That argument is how forecasting systems die.
3. You need real scenarios. What if the big customer moves from 60 to 90 days, if sales drop 15%, if the capex slips. In a spreadsheet you do that by duplicating tabs, and by the third duplicate nobody knows which one is live.
4. Someone outside has to read it. A lender, an investor, a board. At that point format starts to matter as much as content.
The options, by what they actually cost
Level 0 — The spreadsheet: $0
A company with one or two bank accounts, one person responsible and no transaction on the horizon has no reason to pay for anything. Thirteen columns, one row per line item, and the discipline to refresh it on Mondays.
Where it breaks: when the manual work of entering transactions passes an hour a week, or when two people need it open at once.
Level 1 — What you may already be paying for
Before buying anything, check whether your accounting software already includes it — but check the detail, because this is where most comparisons get it wrong.
QuickBooks bundles its Cash Flow Planner at no extra cost on most plans. Two exclusions worth knowing: it is not available in QuickBooks Online Accountant, nor in any version with multicurrency switched on. If you operate across currencies, this option is out.
Xero includes cash forecasting in every business plan, not only the higher ones. What changes is the horizon: 30 days on Early, 60 on Growing, 180 on Established. And that is the detail that decides it: thirteen weeks is 91 days, so only the Established plan covers this article's use case. Early and Growing fall short by definition, however much you are already paying for them.
Level 2 — Specialist tools with published pricing
| Tool | Published price | Connects to | Fits |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fathom | A$59/month for one company; far cheaper by volume (A$315 for 10, A$450 for 25, A$805 for 50). Excludes GST | QuickBooks, Xero, MYOB, Excel | Accounting firms with multiple clients |
| Cash Flow Frog | $55/month list price up to $1M revenue (about $33 billed annually) | QuickBooks, Xero, Sage Intacct, Odoo, Zoho Books, FreshBooks | Growing company with no appetite for an implementation |
| Float | $130/month on Essentials ($105 billed annually), for companies under £2M; above that, $265 | Xero and QuickBooks Online; Sage Intacct announced | Anyone already living inside Xero or QBO |
| Dryrun | Not published: you have to request a quote | QBO, Xero, Sage Intacct, Dynamics 365 Business Central | Mid-market with an ERP and a finance team |
Fathom shares its name with an unrelated AI meeting-notes tool: the treasury one is fathomhq.com.
What separates these four is not the forecasting — they all do that — it is where they get their data. If your accounting does not sit in QuickBooks or Xero, Float is out from the start no matter how much you like it. Starting the comparison with price instead of integration is the most common mistake here.
Level 3 — Corporate treasury, no public pricing
Agicap, Embat, Sage XRT and Kyriba play a different game: connections to hundreds of banks, multi-entity, multi-currency, payment approval workflows. None publishes rates — they are negotiated — and Agicap requires a twelve-month minimum commitment.
The warning here is not the licence price, it is the cost of implementing it and keeping it alive. These tools assume someone inside the company administers them. If that person does not exist, in six months you own an expensive licence producing reports nobody reads.
The decision table
| Your situation | What to use | Approximate annual cost |
|---|---|---|
| 1-2 banks, one person, no transaction ahead | Spreadsheet | $0 |
| Accounting in QuickBooks or Xero, basic needs | What your software already includes | $0 extra |
| 3-5 banks, scenarios, two people | Cash Flow Frog or Float | $400 – $1,600 |
| Accounting firm serving several clients | Fathom, on volume pricing | A$190 – A$380 per client per year |
| Mid-market with ERP and finance team | Dryrun or corporate tier | Quoted |
| Multiple entities, currencies, many banks | Agicap, Embat, Sage XRT, Kyriba | Quoted |
Three questions to ask in the demo
Every tool demos well. These three separate the ones that will work from the ones that end up abandoned:
1. How does an uninvoiced receivable get in? That is half of a cash forecast: the confirmed order that has not been invoiced yet. Many tools only read issued invoices, which leaves out exactly what matters most.
2. What happens when a customer pays late? The tool should learn from actual payment behaviour, not from agreed terms. A customer on 60-day terms who pays at 85 needs to appear at 85, or the forecast lies systematically.
3. How much manual work is left each week? Make them answer in minutes. If the answer is vague, it is because the number is higher than they want to say.
What we would do
Build the forecast in a spreadsheet first, always. Even if you intend to buy software afterwards. Two practical reasons: you find out which data you are actually missing before paying for a tool that assumes you have it, and you go into the demos knowing what to ask.
The sequence that works is: spreadsheet for a quarter, see what hurts, then buy the tool that removes that specific pain. The reverse — buy first, then work out what you needed — is how most of these subscriptions end up on the expense line with nobody logging into the platform.
In one sentence
The best 13-week cash flow forecasting software for most SMEs is a spreadsheet someone updates every Monday; paid software starts paying for itself when the manual work of maintaining it passes an hour a week, and the question that decides which to buy is not what it costs but whether it connects to the accounting system you already have.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best 13-week cash flow forecasting software?
For most small and mid-sized companies it is a spreadsheet, updated weekly. Paid tools start to pay for themselves when the manual work of maintaining the forecast passes roughly an hour a week — typically at three or more bank accounts, or when more than one person needs to work on it. Among paid options with published pricing: Cash Flow Frog at $55 a month up to $1M of revenue, Float at $130 a month on Essentials, and Fathom at A$59 a month for a single company, falling sharply on volume plans. Dryrun does not publish pricing. Agicap, Embat, Sage XRT and Kyriba serve multi-entity treasury and quote individually.
Do I need special software for a 13-week cash flow forecast?
No. A 13-week forecast is a thirteen-column table — money in, money out, and the weekly bridge to closing cash — and it works in a spreadsheet for as long as one person can keep it current. Software solves the data-entry problem, not the discipline problem. If the forecast is failing because nobody refreshes it, a tool will not fix that.
How much does cash flow forecasting software cost?
Published prices in September 2026: Fathom A$59 per month for one company excluding GST, with volume plans at A$315 for ten companies and A$805 for fifty; Cash Flow Frog $55 a month list price up to $1M of revenue, around $33 billed annually; Float $130 a month on Essentials for companies under £2M, $265 above that. Dryrun does not publish pricing. QuickBooks includes its Cash Flow Planner on most plans, though not with multicurrency enabled, and Xero includes forecasting on every business plan — but only the Established plan reaches 180 days, which is what a 13-week horizon needs. Corporate platforms — Agicap, Embat, Sage XRT, Kyriba — do not publish rates; Agicap requires a twelve-month minimum.
What should I check before buying a cash flow tool?
Start with the integration, not the price: if your accounting is not in QuickBooks or Xero, several of these tools are out regardless of cost. Then ask three things in the demo — how an uninvoiced but confirmed order gets into the forecast, whether the tool learns from actual payment behaviour rather than agreed terms, and how many minutes of manual work remain each week.
Is a 13-week forecast better than a monthly one?
For cash, yes. Thirteen weeks covers a full quarter, long enough to capture tax deadlines and payroll cycles, while the weekly grain exposes the specific weeks where payments collide. A monthly forecast can show a healthy month-end balance while hiding a mid-month week where payroll clears before a large customer pays.