TapTax vs Zoho
A tax app, or an MTD module inside a business suite
Zoho is a large international business-software suite whose accounting product carries MTD for Income Tax. HMRC grades it well on most axes and marks two cells not included: foreign property, and bridging. Those two cells decide most of this comparison.
Estimate your self-employed tax in seconds
See what you would owe for the year, then file the real figures with TapTax in a couple of taps.
Total turnover before expenses
Under £1,000 we use the trading allowance automatically
Estimated tax bill
£6,872
15.3% effective rate for 2026/27
- Income tax
- £5,286
- Class 4 NI
- £1,586
Take-home pay
£32,128
after tax, NI and expenses
This is an estimate using HMRC-confirmed rates for 2026/27, not your official tax calculation. TapTax is MTD-compatible, so you can connect to HMRC and file the real figures in a couple of taps.
This is not really a comparison between two tax products. It is a comparison between a tax product and a business-software suite that happens to contain one.
Zoho sells dozens of applications covering CRM, email, projects, inventory, expenses and accounting, and it is the accounting product that carries MTD for Income Tax in the UK. HMRC's listing points at exactly that: the Making Tax Digital page of Zoho Books. So the real question is not which app files better, it is whether you want your tax obligation to live inside a suite you also run the rest of your business on.
HMRC's grades answer part of that, and they contain two cells that will decide it outright for some people. Zoho is graded not included on foreign property, and not included on bridging.
One more thing before the detail, because it is unusual for a comparison page to say it. We have no verified price for Zoho's UK MTD offering, so this page contains no Zoho price at all. The reasoning is in its own section below.
- HMRC grades Zoho ready on 9 of the 16 tax-return items, with 6 more in development and partnership income not included.
- Zoho is graded not included on foreign property, so it covers two of the three business income sources rather than all three.
- It is also graded not included on bridging, so the intended route is that your records live in Zoho rather than in a spreadsheet.
- It is graded ready on a free version, native digital record-keeping, agent software, HMRC Assist and both standard and calendar update periods, with apps declared on both mobile platforms.
- Our August 2026 research produced no verified UK MTD price for Zoho, so this page makes no price claim about it. TapTax pricing is our own published pricing. The TapTax annual figures are its published annual-plan prices, £49 for Starter and £99 for Pro, rather than twelve times the monthly rate.
How HMRC's own directory grades Zoho
HMRC publishes a feature grid for every listed product using its own three-state scale of ready now, in development, or not included. We scraped all 127 listings on 9 August 2026.
- Free version: yes
- Android; Apple iOS: yes
- Sole trader income: yes
- UK property income: yes
- Foreign property income: no
- Keeps digital records: yes
9/16 tax-return items ready, 6 more in development.
HMRC MTD for Income Tax directory, scraped 9 August 2026. Feature flags are vendor-declared. Vendor site
Graded not included on foreign property and on bridging. Listed as a desktop and web browser product with apps declared on both mobile platforms. No verified UK MTD price as at our August 2026 research.
HMRC lists what each vendor declares. Feature flags, mobile-app support in particular, are vendor claims rather than verified facts, and listings change. Check with the vendor before you buy. Data: HMRC find-MTD-software service (tax.service.gov.uk), scraped 9 August 2026.
Read the ready column and it is a strong entry. Free version, native digital record-keeping, agent software, HMRC Assist, standard and calendar update periods, sole trader income, UK property income, and 9 of the 16 return items. Nine puts Zoho in the top cohort of a directory where most products cannot complete a single item.
Zoho clears three of the four filters, then stops
There is a useful way to read this directory that no vendor will show you. Take the four things that matter to someone who wants to file from a phone without paying, apply them in sequence, and watch the field collapse.
Free version, apps on both stores, native digital record-keeping. That is three filters, and this is what survives them.
13of 127 (10%)are free, on both app stores and keep digital records nativelyHMRC MTD for Income Tax directory, scraped 9 August 2026Zoho is in that group. Now add the fourth filter, all three business income sources.
3of 127 (2%)are free, on both app stores, keep digital records and cover all three income sourcesHMRC MTD for Income Tax directory, scraped 9 August 2026Zoho is not, and foreign property is why. It is the single grade that removes it, and it is worth being precise about how narrow this capability is across the whole market.
63of 127 (50%)handle foreign property incomeHMRC MTD for Income Tax directory, scraped 9 August 2026| Product | Free | Sole trader | UK property | Foreign property | Mobile app | Return items |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Zoho | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Not included | Android; Apple iOS | 9/16 |
| Clear Books Free | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Not included | Android; Apple iOS | 15/16 |
| DIY Tax | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Android; Apple iOS | 3/16 |
| Monzo | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Not included | Android; Apple iOS | 0/16 |
| Self Assessment Direct | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Android; Apple iOS | 9/16 |
| CIS Invoice | Ready now | Ready now | Not included | Not included | Android; Apple iOS | 0/16 |
| Abridge (MTD for Excel/Sheets) | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Android; Apple iOS | 15/16 |
| FreeAgent | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Not included | Android; Apple iOS | 15/16 |
| Sage Sole Trader & Landlord Free | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Not included | Android; Apple iOS | 0/16 |
| PaTMa Property Manager | Ready now | Not included | Ready now | Not included | Android | 0/16 |
| RentalBux Free | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Android; Apple iOS | 15/16 |
| Pandle | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Not included | Android; Apple iOS | 0/16 |
| Coconut Free | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Not included | Android; Apple iOS | 0/16 |
| Tide Accounting | Ready now | Ready now | Not included | Not included | Android; Apple iOS | 0/16 |
| Tax Mouse | Ready now | Ready now | Ready now | Not included | Android; Apple iOS | 0/16 |
- Income sources (MTD ITSA)
- The three kinds of business income HMRC grades on the software directory: sole trader, UK property and foreign property. They are not the same thing as the 16 tax-return items, and HMRC never grades them as in development, so a product either reports an income source today or it does not. If you have income from a source your software is graded not included on, no amount of workmanship elsewhere in the product helps: you need a second tool or a different one.
The price we did not publish, and why
Every price on this site is read from the vendor, recorded with the month it was checked, and cited from a dated research note. Our August 2026 pricing pass covered the dedicated MTD challengers, the landlord platforms and the Excel bridging tools. It did not produce a verified UK MTD for Income Tax price for Zoho.
So there is no Zoho price on this page, no estimate, no "from" figure and no inference from a suite plan that may or may not be the one carrying the MTD module. A wrong price on a comparison page is worse than no price, because a reader will act on it and only discover the error at checkout.
What we can report is the directory grade, which is a different thing: HMRC records Zoho as offering a free version. That tells you a free version exists. It tells you nothing about what it includes, and free tiers in this market are conditional far more often than not. Read Zoho's own UK pricing, and read it for the conditions rather than the headline. Our guide to what MTD software actually costs sets out the traps to look for.
A directory can tell you a free version exists. It cannot tell you what the free version withholds. Those are two different questions and only one of them is answered by a tick.
Pricing in detail, checked August 2026
| TapTax Free | TapTax Starter | TapTax Pro | Zoho | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost | £0 | £4.99/mo | £9.99/mo | Not verified at August 2026 |
| Approx. annual cost | £0 | £49 | £99 | Not verified at August 2026 |
| Free version | Yes, permanent | n/a | n/a | Ready (HMRC grade); conditions not checked |
| Quarterly MTD updates | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Return items ready | 6 to 8 of 16 (our estimate) | 6 to 8 of 16 (our estimate) | 6 to 8 of 16 (our estimate) | 9 of 16 (HMRC grade) |
| Return items in development | n/a | n/a | n/a | 6 (HMRC grade) |
| Sole trader income | Yes | Yes | Yes | Ready (HMRC grade) |
| UK property | Yes | Yes | Yes | Ready (HMRC grade) |
| Foreign property | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not included (HMRC grade) |
| Digital record-keeping | Yes | Yes | Yes | Ready (HMRC grade) |
| Bridging from a spreadsheet | No, by design | No, by design | No, by design | Not included (HMRC grade) |
| Agent software | No | No | No | Ready (HMRC grade) |
| HMRC Assist | No | No | No | Ready (HMRC grade) |
| Calendar quarters | Yes | Yes | Yes | Ready (HMRC grade) |
| Mobile app | iOS and Android | iOS and Android | iOS and Android | Android and iOS declared |
| HMRC directory status | Not listed; recognition in progress | Not listed; recognition in progress | Not listed; recognition in progress | Listed |
Feature grades in the Zoho column are HMRC's own, from the 9 August 2026 scrape, not the vendor's marketing. TapTax pricing is our own published pricing. There is no Zoho price in this table because we have not verified one.
Where Zoho genuinely wins
Breadth, and the suite argument, which is real if it applies to you.
If your business already runs invoicing, expenses, inventory or CRM inside Zoho, then adding the tax obligation to a system you have already learned, already trust and already pay for is a genuinely strong reason to stay. Nothing TapTax does beats not adding a tool. Zoho is also graded ready on agent software, so an accountant can work in it with you, and on HMRC Assist, which TapTax does not offer.
On return items it is ahead of us: 9 against roughly six to eight, and its ready set covers employment PAYE, state pension income and the High Income Child Benefit Charge, which are common and awkward. It is listed with HMRC today and TapTax is not.
Where TapTax fits better
Two of Zoho's grades, and one difference of shape.
The first is foreign property. If you have an overseas rental, Zoho is graded not included and the decision is made for you. TapTax reports all three income sources including the per-property detail for foreign property, and only a minority of the listed products are graded ready on all three, so it is a scarce combination in the market generally.
The second is Construction Industry Scheme, which Zoho lists as in development rather than ready. If you are a subcontractor with CIS deductions, an in-development grade is a commitment for the 2026-27 return, not something you can file with.
The difference of shape is that a suite is a large thing to run for a small job. A sole trader filing four quarterly updates and a final declaration does not need CRM, inventory or project modules, and general accounting software asks you to think in ledgers and journals rather than in transactions. TapTax is built the other way round: open banking pulls transactions in as they happen, AI categorisation proposes the treatment, receipt capture works from the camera, CSV import with presets for 16 UK banks covers what the feed misses, and the quarterly update becomes a review on a phone.
Work out your position first with the sole trader tax calculator, which includes Class 4 NIC.
Who should choose which
Already running the business on Zoho. Stay on Zoho, assuming no foreign property and no CIS. Adding a second system to save a small subscription is usually a bad trade.
Has an overseas rental. Not Zoho. It is graded not included on foreign property, and only a minority of the directory covers it at all.
A CIS subcontractor. Not Zoho today. CIS is graded in development, which is an intention rather than a capability.
Wants records to stay in a spreadsheet. Neither of these. Zoho is graded not included on bridging and TapTax does not do bridging by design. Look at the bridging tools instead.
Wants the tax job done from a phone with the data arriving by itself. TapTax, for open banking, AI categorisation and receipt capture, on a free tier that costs nothing to test.
Wants a known price before committing. TapTax publishes £0, £4.99 and £9.99 a month. We could not verify Zoho's, so check Zoho directly rather than trusting a third-party figure, including ours.
Must file a live submission this week. Zoho, or another listed product. TapTax's recognition is in progress and we will not tell you otherwise.
The bottom line
Zoho grades well on the directory and the suite argument is legitimate: if the rest of your business already lives there, the cheapest tax software is the one you do not have to add. Nine of 16 return items, native record-keeping, agent access, HMRC Assist and calendar quarters is a stronger entry than most products manage.
The two not-included cells are where it stops. Foreign property rules it out for anyone with an overseas rental, and no bridging rules it out for anyone committed to a spreadsheet. TapTax covers all three income sources and is built as a tax app rather than an accounting suite, with the year's data arriving automatically instead of being entered. On return items we are behind, and TapTax is MTD-compatible and going through HMRC's recognition process rather than listed today.
Every product on HMRC's list, with its real grades, is in the MTD software directory, and the whole picture is in our analysis of all 127 HMRC-listed MTD tools.
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