There are all kinds of useful apps out there for businesses, and among them are tools that handle recurring invoices. An invoice is a detailed document outlining a transaction, and without it, the validity of a deal can come into question. Recurring invoices are issued when the same item or service is sold repeatedly—usually at the same price. If you don’t want to manually issue the same invoice over and over again, you’ll need a billing app. But if you want the invoices to be tied to client logins and other features, you’ll need something more specific—like WHMCS.
Of course, WHMCS isn’t the only option. There are other similar apps out there worth considering.
This article breaks down the differences between WHMCS and two other popular billing systems: Blesta and Hostbill. But before we dive into the comparison, let’s take a quick look at each one to understand what they bring to the table.
WHMCS:
This is the most well-known billing app among the three, and with its popularity comes a wide ecosystem of plugins and add-ons. WHMCS stands out for its straightforward automation. Even people with no prior experience using billing software can pick it up fairly quickly. It’s compatible with nearly all major web hosting control panels and popular domain registrars, which means integrating it into your business workflow is pretty seamless. Customization is also relatively simple thanks to its modular API and ORM, making it easy to expand and well-documented for developers.
Blesta:
To us, this is WHMCS’s closest competitor, and for good reason. Blesta is genuinely impressive and has been steadily gaining traction—especially among hosting providers and freelancers. There are several standout features worth noting. One is the ability to manage multiple clients from a single dashboard, which is ideal if you’re juggling multiple customers every day. As for billing, it’s similar to WHMCS in that recurring invoices can be automated with ease. Blesta’s ticketing system is clean and user-friendly, making customer interactions smoother. Among its other features, the built-in fraud detection tool really stood out to us—it’s a must-have in today’s digital business environment.
Hostbill:
Hostbill strikes us as the most innovative of the three. It focuses on five core areas: Hosting Automation, Client Management, Help Desk System, Automated Billing, and Domain Management. One thing we really liked is its flexible and visually appealing order pages—they’re customizable and polished, which could help attract new customers compared to the more generic layouts seen elsewhere. Another plus: Hostbill supports multiple languages by default, which is especially helpful if your customer base is global. Unless your customers are from some unknown island in the middle of nowhere, they’ll have no problem understanding their invoices.
Now that you’ve got a general idea of what each app offers, you might want to visit their official websites for more detailed info. But based on our testing and feedback from users, here’s what we’ve observed:
- Go with WHMCS if you want access to more plugins, a larger user community, and stable, easy-to-understand standard features. WHMCS is the most popular of the three, and popular software tends to be the most complete and user-friendly.
- Choose Blesta if security is a bigger concern for you, especially if you’re dealing with clients in developing countries. Blesta comes off as the safest of the three overall.
- Pick Hostbill if your business is aggressive and expansion-focused. Its customizable, eye-catching order pages are a big plus, and the built-in multi-language support makes it ideal for international growth.
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Final Thoughts
To be honest, there’s no bad option among the three. But of course, they each have their weaknesses:
- WHMCS is arguably the most vulnerable to hacking.
- Blesta’s Domain Module Order Pages are a bit outdated.
- Hostbill suffers from limited third-party app integration.
That said, each system also has its own strengths. As we’ve outlined above, your decision should ultimately come down to which tool best supports your actual business needs. Only you know that.
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