Once your aggregate turnover crosses ₹5 crore in any financial year since 2017-18, a B2B invoice only counts as a valid tax invoice after it gets an IRN (Invoice Reference Number) from a government Invoice Registration Portal. If your turnover is ₹10 crore or more, you have 30 days from the invoice date to get that IRN. Most Indian billing apps can do this, but plan pricing varies a lot. TallyPrime (with active TSS) and Zoho Books from Standard (₹749 a month, billed annually) include e-invoicing with no per-invoice fee. Marg charges ₹0.15 for each e-invoice or e-way bill through its wallet. myBillBook only offers it on Pro Max.
Key Takeaways
Who Has to E-Invoice in October 2026
| Your situation | What the rule says | Since |
|---|---|---|
| Aggregate turnover above ₹5 crore in any year from 2017-18 | E-invoice every B2B invoice, export invoice, credit note and debit note | 1 August 2023 (Notification 10/2023-CT) |
| Aggregate turnover of ₹10 crore or more | The IRP rejects documents more than 30 days old | 1 April 2025 (GSTN advisory, 5 November 2024) |
| Turnover has since dropped below ₹5 crore | The obligation continues | Applies to any year since 2017-18 |
| Selling only to consumers (B2C) | Outside the e-invoice mandate | Not applicable |
| Bank, NBFC, insurer, GTA, passenger transport, cinema admissions, SEZ unit | Exempt as an entity | Notification 13/2020-CT, as amended |
Turnover is calculated on your PAN across all states, not for each GSTIN. A business with ₹3 crore in Maharashtra and ₹2.5 crore in Karnataka under the same PAN is above the threshold. No new turnover threshold has been notified in 2026, though articles predicting a cut appear every few months. Confirm with your CA before acting on one.
E-Way Bill Rules Your Software Must Handle
E-way bills apply whatever your turnover. A ₹40 lakh trader moving a ₹60,000 consignment needs one too.
| Rule | Detail | Since |
|---|---|---|
| Consignment value | E-way bill usually needed above ₹50,000 | Long-standing (states vary for intra-state movement) |
| Validity | 1 day per 200 km for normal cargo | 1 January 2021 |
| E-invoicing businesses | The e-way bill must carry the IRN for B2B and B2E supplies | 1 March 2024 (NIC advisory) |
| Document age | You can only generate an e-way bill for documents dated within the last 180 days | 1 January 2025 |
| Extensions | No extensions beyond 360 days from the original generation date | 1 January 2025 |
| Two-factor login | Mandatory for all users on the e-way bill and e-invoice portals | 1 April 2025 |
| Ship-To GSTIN and e-way bill closure | Announced for 1 August 2026, then put on hold on 29 July 2026 | No new date announced |
Software that generates the e-way bill straight from an e-invoice, filling in the IRN, distance and transporter details automatically, saves the most manual work.
How Billing Software Connects to the IRP
There are three ways an invoice reaches the portal. Your choice determines how much manual work is left.
Direct API through a GSP. The software sends the invoice to the IRP and prints the IRN and signed QR code on it automatically. Zoho is itself a GST Suvidha Provider (GSP), so Zoho Books needs no third party. TallyPrime uses Tally as the GSP. Vyapar and BUSY ask you to enter GSP credentials. BUSY’s setup guide names Webtel and Pinnacle as example providers. Ask whether the GSP fee is included in the plan or charged separately.
JSON export and upload. The software creates a file, you upload it to the portal, then import the IRN back. TallyPrime supports this without TSS. It works for a few invoices a week but gets tedious beyond that.
Directly on the portal. You type the invoice on the IRP itself or prepare it in GePP. This is free, with nothing to integrate.
Five IRPs are authorised: NIC (einvoice1 and einvoice2), Cygnet (einvoice3), ClearTax (einvoice4), EY (einvoice5) and IRIS (einvoice6). NIC’s portal is free. Most billing apps send invoices to NIC by default. Larger businesses sometimes keep a second IRP as a backup.
Which Billing Software Handles E-Invoicing and E-Way Bills
All rows were checked on 19 October 2026. Prices exclude 18% GST unless noted.
| Software | Cheapest plan with e-invoicing | E-way bills | Per-document fee |
|---|---|---|---|
| Zoho Books | Standard, ₹749/month billed annually (₹899 monthly) | All plans, including Free | None listed |
| TallyPrime | Silver, ₹22,500 one-time or ₹8,100 a year rental; online e-invoicing needs active TSS | Generated with or after the e-invoice | None (“no additional charges”) |
| myBillBook | Pro Max, from ₹570/month billed annually | Unlimited on Pro Max; not on Plus (₹3,490/yr) or Pro (₹3,990/yr) | None listed |
| Vyapar | Tier not stated by Vyapar; desktop plans run ₹3,799 to ₹9,999 a year | 10 a month on desktop Silver; unlimited from Gold (₹4,099/yr) | None listed; uses your GSP login |
| BUSY | Magic Smart, ₹8,000 per 360 days (up to 10,000 documents); also BUSY 21 Standard, ₹16,500 one-time | Same limits as e-invoices | GSP set up separately |
| Marg ERP | Any licence plus Marg Wallet | Via wallet | ₹0.15 per e-invoice and per e-way bill; ₹5 per bulk import over 25 bills |
| GimBooks | Regular + E-Invoice, ₹9,440/year including GST | Separate bundle: ₹10,620/yr, or ₹14,160/yr with e-invoicing (incl. GST) | None listed |
| Swipe | Paid plan price not shown on Swipe’s site; first 3 e-invoices free | 3 free e-way bills, then paid | Not published |
| Refrens | Accounts Pro (price on Refrens’ site) | Accounts Pro | Not published |
| ClearTax | Quote, priced by GSTINs and volume | Yes | Quote |
Notes on Each Tool
Zoho Books is the easiest to set up if you aren’t tied to Tally. Because Zoho is a GSP, you create API credentials for Zoho on the e-invoice portal and the upload works straight away. It validates invoices before upload, supports several GSTINs and handles recurring e-invoices. The Free plan already generates e-way bills, so a business below ₹5 crore can stay free and upgrade to Standard when it crosses the threshold, without migrating.
TallyPrime is the default when your CA already works in Tally. E-invoicing has no extra charge, but online generation stops if TSS lapses. Without TSS, you fall back to exporting JSON files. Tally’s FAQ notes two problems. It doesn’t warn you when an e-way bill fails, so check the e-way bill report daily, and it doesn’t flag invoices with more than 1,000 line items, which NIC rejects.
myBillBook handles everyday billing well on Plus and Pro, but neither plan includes e-invoicing or e-way bills. If you’re close to ₹5 crore, compare Pro Max’s price (₹570 a month on annual billing, which includes three users) with the cost of switching software later.
Vyapar runs e-invoicing through your own GSP login and can create the e-way bill on the same screen. Its desktop Silver plan caps e-way bills at 10 a month, which a distributor sending goods daily will exceed in two weeks. Vyapar doesn’t say which tier includes e-invoicing, so confirm before you pay for a device licence.
BUSY generates e-invoices and e-way bills automatically after you save a voucher, once a GSP is configured. The Magic plans set clear yearly limits (10,000, 20,000 or 50,000 documents), which is helpful for planning volume. Ask BUSY or your dealer whether the GSP account costs extra.
Marg ERP charges per document instead of by plan. At ₹0.15 each, a business issuing 300 e-invoices and 150 e-way bills a month spends about ₹810 a year from its wallet, on top of the Marg licence. That’s very low for distributors and pharma wholesalers, who are Marg’s main users.
GimBooks is the only tool here that sells e-invoicing and e-way bills as separate add-on bundles. That suits a business that only needs one of them. A trader below ₹5 crore who moves goods every day needs only the e-way bill bundle.
Swipe gives you three free e-invoices and three free e-way bills to try, with bulk generation and checks on PIN codes and missing fields. The paid plan price isn’t on Swipe’s public pages, so get it in writing.
ClearTax is one of the five authorised IRPs, as well as a software vendor. It’s priced for firms with several GSTINs that need reconciliation across ERPs, not for a single shop.
What 300 E-Invoices a Month Costs in Year One
Take a trading firm with ₹6 crore turnover, one GSTIN and three users, issuing 300 B2B invoices and 150 e-way bills a month.
| Option | Year-one cost (excl. GST) | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Marg ERP | Licence plus about ₹810 in wallet usage | Fees scale with volume |
| myBillBook Pro Max | About ₹6,840 | ₹570 × 12; includes 3 users |
| BUSY Magic Smart | ₹8,000 | 5,400 documents a year is well within the 10,000 cap; check GSP cost |
| TallyPrime Silver rental | ₹8,100 | Single user; Gold (multi-user) is ₹24,300 |
| Zoho Books Standard | ₹8,988 | ₹749 × 12; 3 users |
| GimBooks Regular + E-Way Bill + E-Invoice | About ₹12,000 (₹14,160 incl. GST) | Both bundles needed |
Above about 1,000 documents a month, check volume limits and support response times more closely than price. A rejected IRN at month-end costs more than the difference between any two plans in this table.
The Free Route: NIC Portal and GePP
You can e-invoice without buying software. NIC’s IRP charges nothing. GePP, the Excel-based GST e-Invoice Preparation and Printing tool, lets you enter invoices, create the JSON, get the IRN and print the e-invoice. It holds 10 invoices at a time, needs one copy for each GSTIN, and doesn’t check GSTINs or HSN codes. That makes it workable for about 10 to 12 B2B invoices a day. Beyond that, the time spent re-keying invoices costs more than a ₹749 plan.
The e-way bill portal is also free. A business issuing a handful of e-way bills a week can manage there and use free billing software such as Zoho Invoice for the invoices.
What to Check During a Free Trial
- Create one invoice and confirm the IRN and QR code print without leaving the app.
- Create the e-way bill from that e-invoice and check the IRN fills in automatically.
- Cancel a test e-invoice within 24 hours, then raise a credit note against a second one.
- Upload a deliberately wrong HSN code and see whether the software warns you before the IRP rejects it.
- Ask whether the GSP fee, extra GSTINs and extra users are included in the quoted price.
- Check whether your CA can log in and reconcile the IRNs against GSTR-1.
Related Reading
For full billing software comparisons, including offline use, inventory and per-device pricing, see best billing software for small business in India. Pharmacies can see billing software for medical stores. If you collect payments online too, payment gateway charges in India breaks down MDR and GST on fees.
