Twelve subscriptions. Or one price. €141.56 to €375.32 per month for separate tools — against €24.90.
A business that needs accounting, POS, payroll, inventory, mileage log, tax filing and private finances usually rents eight to twelve separate products, each with its own login and its own version of reality.
| Area | Single-purpose tool per month |
|---|---|
| Accounting, cash-basis, VAT return | 19.90 – 39.00 € |
| POS with TSE incl. cash book | 35.90 – 49.80 € |
| Payroll | 5.95 – 89.95 € |
| Inventory & warehouse | 19.90 € |
| Mileage log, tax, documents, household, investments, property, communication | another 59.91 – 176.67 € |
| Twelve subscriptions together | 141.56 – 375.32 € |
| PilotOS Business Ultra – business and private | 24.90 € |
List prices of the providers, as of 2026. Third-party prices change; the full comparison with provider and plan for every line is on the German price comparison page. Savings: between €1,400 and €4,205 per year.
Why the sum is not the whole argument
Even at the same price, twelve programs would still mean twelve exports, twelve reconciliation spreadsheets and one question nobody can answer: which number is the current one? The comparison below is therefore less about money than about a single source of truth.
The counter-argument we will not hide
Single-purpose tools are often deeper in their one discipline. A dedicated payroll product handles more collective agreements; a specialised restaurant POS handles more service workflows. If that depth is what you need, a suite is the wrong answer regardless of price.
Questions about the comparison
Are the third-party prices binding?
No. They are list prices of the providers as of 2026, collected for an indicative comparison. Prices change; check the current figure with the provider before deciding.
What is not in the comparison?
Depth. A dedicated payroll product handles more collective agreements, a restaurant POS more service workflows. The comparison is about scope and count, not about who does each single job best.
Why is PilotOS cheaper?
Because one database replaces the interfaces between twelve products, and because there is no per-seat licence model: a second employee costs nothing extra. The trade is that you run and back up the system yourself.
How was the sum calculated?
Twelve list prices, grouped into eight tool lines, with provider and plan documented for every line on the German comparison page. No average, no estimate — the range is the cheapest to the most expensive sensible combination.
What the twelve tools cost you in time
The subscription price is the smaller number. The larger one is the work between the tools: exporting a journal so the accountant can read it, reconciling two bank feeds, copying invoice totals into a tax tool, and answering the question of which figure is current when two systems disagree.
That work does not appear on any invoice. It appears in the hours before a deadline, and in the moment an auditor asks for a continuous chain and there are three exports instead of one. A single database does not make the work disappear — it removes the interfaces where data gets lost.
Where a suite genuinely loses: depth. A dedicated payroll product handles more collective agreements, a specialised restaurant POS handles more service workflows, a tax tool covers more forms. If that depth is what your business runs on, the right answer is the specialist tool — and we will say so rather than sell you a suite that fits badly.
What a comparison of prices leaves out
It leaves out the switching cost: exporting history, retraining, the first month in which nobody trusts the new numbers. It leaves out the second subscription you keep because one tool does one thing better. And it leaves out the hours spent reconciling two systems that were never meant to meet.
A fair comparison would add those items to both sides. Ours does not, because they are individual — but the direction is clear: the more tools in the chain, the larger the invisible part.
What the table does show is the part that can be counted: twelve list prices, documented with provider and plan. Anyone deciding on price alone should read the bottom line; anyone deciding on effort should read the paragraph above it.