Business Expense Categories
Turn on the categories your business actually spends money on, add any of your own, and download them as ready-made spreadsheet columns.
Downloads
What the two downloads are for
The category columns file is a single header row: one column per category you selected, ready to paste at the top of a spreadsheet or open as its own file. The category reference file is the opposite shape: one row per category, with its description and examples next to it, useful as a printed or saved key for whoever else looks at your books.
Nothing here is tax advice
These are common groupings used for everyday small-business bookkeeping, not a legal or tax classification for any one country. Whether a specific purchase belongs in a given category, and whether it’s commonly deductible, depends on your situation: check with your accountant before you rely on it.
Why categories instead of one long list
A single undivided list of expenses tells you how much you spent, not where it went. Splitting spending into categories is what lets you see that marketing crept up or that insurance is due for renewal, and it’s the same split most accounting software and most accountants expect an expense log to already be in.
Related tools
Next step
Take it further, in a spreadsheet
This tool hands you a set of category names, nothing more: you still total everything up yourself. The Small Business Expense Tracker logs every expense under categories like these and works out the total and the tax split for you, and the Small Business Finance Kit does the same alongside invoicing and profit and loss.
FreeFree Invoice Template
One invoice, built and ready to send. For your very first bill.
Get the free template →€4.95Small Business Expense Tracker
One workbook that logs expenses and totals the tax. For tracking spending on its own.
Get the Small Business Expense Tracker →€14.95Small Business Finance Kit
Every invoice, expense, and profit number in one workbook. For running the whole business.
Get the Small Business Finance Kit →