Inventory is a list of goods in stock i.e. total amount of materials contained in a unit/store. Inventory management is the management of that list of material in stock. Efficient inventory management means that there should be constant inflow and outflow of material, it should be a consistently controlled process so that inventory should not become too high or too low. Buffer stock should be kept in order to meet the uncertainties in the market i.e. in the demand of goods as well as to meet the time lag from supplier to user. Inventory can be of different types like raw material inventory, work in progress inventory, finished goods inventory and goods for resale inventory. Different components of an inventory management system are barcode scanner, barcode printer, barcode label, inventory software etc. Inventory management software works along with barcode for inventory tracking and control. These software provide business solutions for managing inventory, sale, purchase and shipping etc. Below is the compiled list of top five freeware inventory management software.
1. Pos Maid
Pos Maid is free software for inventory management and control which is very helpful in merchandise retail sale like in provision store, super market store, electronics goods store etc. POS stands for Point of Sale. This program has many good features like you can easily fill in your inventory and has complete control over it; customer and employee management, financial report generation, account management, low stock alerts etc. This software is recommended for small business stores.
- Our Rating:
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- Pros: Building inventory database is very easy with Pos Maid and it automatically generates stock reports.
- Cons: Doesn’t work well for big business owners.
- OS: Windows 7 32-bit and 64-bit, Vista, XP
2. inFlow Inventory Free Edition
inFlow Inventory Free Edition is a free inventory management software which keeps your business organized and manages all your cumbersome paper work easily. This program keeps full track of inventory from purchase till sale. Its features include product and customer management; issue invoice and create purchase order; multiple units measurement, creates business documents, automatically assembles finished products and updating inventory; barcode scanner for accurate inventory management and much more.
- Our Rating:
- Download inFlow Inventory Free Edition
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- Pros: Easy and simple interface, customizable, full support included.
- Cons: Doesn’t support large business, limited to small business.
- OS: Windows 7, Vista, XP, server 2003
3. ABC Inventory Software
ABC Inventory Software is a freeware inventory management application which should be an absolute choice for small and middle level business groups because it works like a professional. This program is jam packed with multiple features like purchase order management, complete inventory track along with barcode, sale and shipping order management, scheduling warehouse appointments, automatic stock report generation, sale quotations, unlimited database record, mailing labels and so on.
- Our Rating:
- Download ABC Inventory Software
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- Pros: This program has full online support, attractive interface and is a very reliable product.
- Cons: It is a complex program as it is loaded with features, so can be bit complicated to operate initially.
- OS: Windows 7, Vista, XP, server 2003
4. BS1 Enterprise Accounting Free Edition
BS1 Enterprise Accounting Free Edition is a freeware program for inventory control and management which is useful for small business section. This program has a very simple interface with very easy to use design. It has different department like accounting, distribution and manufacturing department which have further sub terms like sales orders, purchase orders, accounts payable, accounts receivable general ledger, inventory and much more.
- Our Rating:
- Download BS1 Enterprise Accounting Free Edition
- Home Page
- Pros: The program is intuitive plus very simple and easy to use.
- Cons: Not meant for middle and upper level business segment and interface is not very sleek.
- OS: Windows 7, Vista, XP, server 2003
5. Chronos eStock Card Inventory Software
Chronos eStock Card Inventory software is a freeware inventory management application which keeps the complete track of your sales, purchase and warehouse inventory. It supports barcode system. Its features include detail inventory tracking, customizable interface, email alerts, complete inventory management, stock transfer, report generation, multi currency conversion and many more.
- Our Rating:
- Download Chronos eStock Card Inventory Software
- Home Page
- Pros: Simple interface, screen layout can be customized, good online support.
- Cons: Bit slow in screen to screen movement.
- OS: Windows 7, Vista, XP, server 2003
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{ 17 comments… read them below or add one }
Thanks. This is a genuinely helpful article.
Thanks for mentioning inFlow – it’s much appreciated!
Just wanted to also let you know that we do work for big businesses as well. For example, we have a well known computer part manufacturing company as well as a large jewelry company as clients. Using multi-user mode with inFlow makes it very scale-able where you can have multiple people working with the same data in real time.
If anyone has anymore questions regarding our software, please feel free to get in touch here.
Great article. Very informative. I’m just curious why my company, Spiceworks, didn’t make the list since we have a very popular inventory management app that also includes network monitoring, help desk functionality, software auditing, and more.
Feel free to reach out if you have any specific questions. I look forward to being featured on your site in the future!
We have a manufacturing unit of gases like oxygen ,carbon dioxide and acetylene so we need to maintain a stock of item and equipments etc etc….
So i just need to know which will be suitable for us
What you are looking for is probably more advanced than the most of the inventory systems out there since most of those are designed for retail. I honestly doubt that you will find a suitable solution which is free.
I am looking for a RMS/POS software for a school district. I am in the purchasing/receiveing dept. and we are looking for software for our warehouse supplies. Any help is appreciated.
HI,
Im looking for free bussinnes software for textile industry?
Do you know of any good inventory products for consignment company?
We sell second hand kids clothes, we have clothes that we purchase and resell but we are also looking into consignment but would need a way to manage the clothing other people would send us to sell on the site
Hi
We have a small spy shop and need a realiable inventory and management software. More than that, since our products are electronics, we will need a separate entry for products that have serial numbers. So if the category is “surveillance” and the sub category is “night vision cameras”, there will be a need to input a serial number to the specific product. Any suggestions?
Great article! Thank you for choosing our software Chronos eStockCard as one of the Best Free Inventory Management Software. We will take note on the issue that you mentioned here. Feel free to contact us if you have any question. Thank you.
Good afternoon. My husband has made & sold lamps out of our garage for a few years (word of mouth). He has researched & discovered that selling “lamp parts” only is more cost effective & more profitable. He has collected lamps/lamp parts for over 10 years and has a huge collection of parts. What would be a good software to track inventory, sales, purchases, etc? Thank you for your assistance.
sir,
i want to know what will be the best procedure to mainatin stores inventory management system of a beverages based company. only discuss of raw material, spares etc.
my company is small business which imports products from Asia and do distribution to retail stores and products are larger pcs and need multi location stocking
I have software for full accounting sale purchase etc . I need warehouse inventory locations mainly please suggest what programme could be suitable
The purchasing department is looking for an inventory software. I have installed Inflow which is doing 80% of what was expecting. we are not using the purchasing and sales features of Inflow. we only need the Inventory and Reports.however, some features are we need are actually missing like product issue, to whom it was issue, etc. which product can best suit me.
Thanks
Hi Roy
The “to whom it was issued” could be solved by actually “selling” the item to someone internally. We have several companies that set up an internal tracking system that way. You can also add “sales reps” to specific orders if that helps: here.
Matt,
It worked.
Cheers mate.
I work for a NFP that’s looking to add some sort of POS/inventory software. Is there any software out there that can retain data for both your organization AND your customers? (credit, purchase history, etc.) We service a limited number of people (less than 150), each of which we have information and :”account numbers” for. It would be great to track their information on a POS system rather than continue to use spreadsheets.
Thanks!