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Run a report in QuickBooks Online

by Intuit•4• Updated 2 weeks ago

Learn how to run a report in QuickBooks Online.

Financial reports give you a snapshot of your business. There are dozens of reports that tell you about different aspects of your business. Some focus on sales, others focus on your spending, and some look at parts of each.

Here's an overview of how to run basic reports.

And if you want more details, you can customize reports to focus on specific accounts or filter for specific things.

In this article, you'll learn how to:

Set up general report preferences
Run basic financial reports
Run reports for specific accounts
Manage reports
Do more with reports in QuickBooks

Some of your reports will look different depending on whether they're in the classic view or new enhanced experience. Learn more about the new enhanced experience.

Set up general report preferences

Before you get started, set up general report preferences:

Go to Settings and select Account and settings.
Select Advanced.
In the Accounting section, select the pencil ✎ icon.
Select the Accounting method dropdown, then select either Accrual or Cash.
Note: Reports default to the accounting method you set here.
Select Save, then select Done.

Run basic financial reports

Go to Reports (Take me there).
Use the Find report by name dropdown to search for reports by name. You can also browse the list.
Select the report to open it.

Note: If you change the dates or add customized filters to the report, select Run report to apply them. You can customize your reports in QuickBooks Online.

For specific reports in QuickBooks Online which are run based on a current or final date (for instance, Trial Balance and Balance Sheets) instead of a specific date range, the reports will be presented as a reflection of the end date, and QuickBooks Online will not take into account the starting date.

For the Trial Balance report, the report will be presented based on the current fiscal year, and dropdown individual row items will be reflected as such as well. Balance Sheet reports, however, present an entirety of the QuickBooks Online file's financial record.

Additionally, any reports that are being run with a date range that falls inside different fiscal years, when dropping down into individual row items, only the transactions from the latest fiscal year show.

Learn more about customizing financial reports.

Watch the below video for an overview on the reports feature in QuickBooks. Use the reports centre to gain additional insights about your business.

Run a report for a specific account

You can also focus on a specific account instead of running reports for everything.

Go to Settings , then select Chart of accounts (Take me there).
Find the account.
Select Run report in the ACTION column or from the Account history dropdown.

Manage your reports

Email a report

When you have a report open:

Select the More actions dropdown, then select Email report.
Enter or update the recipient's email address, subject, email body, and file name.
Note: To send a report to multiple email recipients, separate the email addresses with commas.
Select either Excel, CSV, or PDF for the file format.
Select Send email.

Export a report

When you have a report open:

Select the Export/Print dropdown.
Select either Export to Excel or Export as CSV.
Save the file.

Note: Export your report to Excel to change the font, colour, or further customize the visual appearance of your report.

Print a report or save as PDF

When you have a report open:

Select the Export/Print dropdown.
Select Print/Save as PDF.
Adjust your report print settings as needed.
Select Print.

Format a report

You can adjust the layout of your report before you print it.

Select the Export/Print dropdown.
Select Print/Save as PDF.
Select the Orientation dropdown.
Select Portrait or Landscape.

If the columns still don't fit:

Resize columns in a report.
Remove unnecessary columns.
Make the margins smaller.
Change the orientation to landscape.
Print on legal-size paper.
Scale the page by a percentage.
Check your printer setup properties to see if your printer driver supports scaling.

Use the smart page break option

Select the Smart page break checkbox to group related items together. This automatically breaks the page at logical areas for easier reading when you print a report.

Note: The option to print using smart page breaks varies based on the report you’re in.

Use the repeat header option

Select the Repeat header checkbox so the header appears on every page of the report you’re printing.

Update the header and footer of a report

Go to your browser settings to remove the QuickBooks Online URL and other information at the top and bottom of a report. You can view articles provided by Chrome, Firefox, and Safari for instructions.

Do more with reports in QuickBooks

Learn more about report features and specific reports to get the info you need:

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