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# Import from QuickBooks Desktop

Moving from QuickBooks Desktop means bringing your chart of accounts and your transaction history across, so every account starts in BooksGPT at the balance it had in QuickBooks. You do it with one report: the **General Ledger**, which lists every transaction in every account.

BooksGPT reads that report, checks that its debits and credits balance, and shows you how each account will be typed before anything posts. A report in a layout BooksGPT does not know skips that preview: BooksGPT checks every account against the report's own totals, then imports it. The company file itself (.QBW, .QBB or .QBM) cannot be uploaded: only QuickBooks can open it.

|| Only the workspace owner or a bookkeeper can import books.

## Import your full history

${youtube}[Watch: How to switch from QuickBooks and import your books into BooksGPT](LGWJphDEYg4)

### Export the General Ledger from QuickBooks Desktop

1. In QuickBooks Desktop, open **Reports** > **Accountant & Taxes** > **General Ledger**.
2. Set **Dates** to **All**.
3. Track Classes or Locations? Click **Customize Report** and add the **Class** (and **Location**) column.
4. Click **Excel** > **Create New Worksheet**. Before you export, open **Advanced** and set **Printing options** to **On Printed report and screen**.
5. Save it as a workbook (.xlsx).

Step 4 puts the report header, with its **Accrual Basis** line, at the top of the file, so BooksGPT can tell which basis it was run on.

The same steps are on the Import page under **How to export from QuickBooks Desktop**.

![The Import page with How to export from QuickBooks Desktop open under the drop zone](https://booksgpt.ai/help/import-from-quickbooks-desktop/export-guide-2026-10.png)

### Bring it into BooksGPT

1. Open **All pages** in the left sidebar, then click **Setup** and **[Import](https://app.booksgpt.ai/go/import)**. You can also drop the workbook into Copilot.
2. Drop the workbook on **Drop your books export here**, or click **Choose file**.
3. Read the preview. The green bar means debits and credits balance. Under **How your accounts will be typed**, check any account marked as needing review and change its type if it is wrong.
4. Click **Import N accounts** (the button counts your accounts).

![The preview for a QuickBooks Desktop General Ledger, with How your accounts will be typed and Import 34 accounts](https://booksgpt.ai/help/import-from-quickbooks-desktop/preview-2026-10.png)

||| Each Desktop import replaces the one before. If your books are too large for one file, or the preview asks for one file per year, export one calendar year per file and select all the yearly files together, never one year at a time.

### If BooksGPT asks Accrual or Cash

Accrual books record an invoice when you send it and a bill when you get it. Cash books record only payments. Your BooksGPT books come from an Accrual report.

When a file leaves out the basis line, BooksGPT asks which basis the report was run on. Answer the setting QuickBooks used, not the one you want. Not sure? In QuickBooks Desktop, read the line under the report title, or check **Customize Report** > **Accounting method**.

![Was this report run on Accrual or Cash? with an Accrual answer and a Cash answer](https://booksgpt.ai/help/import-from-quickbooks-desktop/basis-question-2026-10.png)

- **Accrual:** the report becomes your books. You review the preview before anything is imported.
- **Cash:** nothing is posted. BooksGPT checks the file against books you already imported and turns on Cash reports if they match.

Want Cash-basis reports too? See [Turn on Cash reports for books imported from QuickBooks Desktop](https://help.booksgpt.ai/en/article/turn-on-cash-reports-for-books-imported-from-quickbooks-desktop-s7vo0w/).

## Or import opening balances only

Use this when you want to start fresh on a date and leave the history in QuickBooks. You need a different report: a General Ledger that lists each account's balance **As of** one date, with no transaction lines.

||| Opening balances bring no transaction history, no profit and loss detail, and no individual unpaid invoices or bills. Once they are in, your full history can only come in by starting the workspace over, so decide before you import.

1. In QuickBooks Desktop, open **Reports** > **Accountant & Taxes** > **General Ledger**, run on Accrual, and set the dates to a single day: the last day before your BooksGPT books start. The header then reads **As of** that date. Do not add a Class column.
2. Export it the same way as the full history (**Excel** > **Create New Worksheet**, **Advanced** > **Printing options** = **On Printed report and screen**) and save the workbook.
3. Drop the workbook on the Import page or into Copilot. The card is titled **QuickBooks Desktop opening balances**.
4. Check each account's type and detail type.
5. If the report lists an **Other** balance under a parent account, choose whether it belongs to the parent or stays a separate subaccount.
6. Changed anything? Click **Update preview**.
7. Tick the currency box and the review box, then click **Import N accounts**.

A report that says Cash is refused, so export it again on Accrual.

## What your books now say

After a full-history import, your Balance Sheet and Profit & loss show the same figures QuickBooks shows for every date in the file, unless the preview said QuickBooks closed earlier years: then follow what it says to match those years' Profit & loss. After an opening-balance import, each account starts at its balance on that date. Either way, compare the Balance Sheet with QuickBooks on the same date.

Each line keeps QuickBooks' own memo, so you can still see which item a bill line was for.

## If something goes wrong

- **You uploaded the company file.** Export the General Ledger instead, as above.
- **Your bank feed already has transactions on those dates.** Unreviewed bank transactions wait in **Review inbox** under **On hold**, so nothing is counted twice. After the import, click **Exclude** on each one your imported books already have. Use **Post anyway** only for a transaction the books are missing: posting one they already have counts it twice.
- **The import stops because of bank transactions you already reviewed.** It says which dates. On **[Transactions](https://app.booksgpt.ai/go/transactions)**, put those back in review (untick **Mark as reviewed**, or undo the match), then import the same file again. If one is split, paired as a transfer, reconciled or in a closed period, contact support.
- **BooksGPT says the file looks like a Cash report.** Nothing was imported. Run the General Ledger again with **Accounting method** set to **Accrual**, and upload that file.

Use one workspace per company file. Coming from QuickBooks Online instead? See [Import from QuickBooks Online](https://help.booksgpt.ai/en/article/import-from-quickbooks-online-gsm4lq/).