This page explains exactly how MTD Pick ranks HMRC-recognised MTD Income Tax software, what we weigh most heavily, and — just as importantly — what we don't weigh at all. We've published it so you can judge whether our rankings are fair, and so we hold ourselves to a clear standard.
The single rule that comes first
Every product on our rankings grid must be on HMRC's official MTD software list. If a tool cannot submit quarterly updates and your End of Period Statement directly to HMRC, it does not rank — no matter how good it is at everything else. HMRC recognition is a gate, not a score.
Scoring criteria and weightings
Within that gate, we score each product out of 5 using five criteria. The weights below reflect what actually matters to a UK sole trader or landlord who needs to stay compliant without becoming a bookkeeper.
| Criterion | Weight | What we ask |
|---|---|---|
| Ease of use for sole traders | 25% | Can a non-accountant set it up and submit a quarter without help? |
| MTD-specific feature coverage | 25% | Quarterly updates, End of Period Statement, digital records, and direct filing to HMRC. |
| Value for money | 20% | The real annual cost — including VAT and add-ons, not just the headline price. |
| Integration ecosystem | 15% | Bank feeds, payroll, and apps that reduce manual data entry. |
| Support and reliability | 15% | What happens when something breaks before a quarterly deadline. |
Products that offer a genuinely free, HMRC-recognised plan get a clear value-for-money advantage — which is why genuinely free options (like HMRC's own tool, QuickFile, and Zoho Books) rank highly for budget-conscious sole traders.
Personally tested versus verified from provider websites
We're upfront about how hands-on each review is. In general:
- Cloud accounting platforms (Xero, FreeAgent, QuickBooks, Sage, Sage Sole Trader, Zoho Books, QuickFile, Coconut, Pandle, Taxfix and similar) are tested hands-on in their live environments where possible — we set up real accounts, work through quarterly submissions, and use the features we then write about.
- Budget and bridging tools (such as 123 Sheets, AbraTax, Abridge, GoFile and VitalTax) are assessed from the provider's pricing pages and documentation, cross-checked against HMRC's official MTD software directory. Where a product wasn't fully hands-on tested in a paid period, the review says so and we always show the date the details were last verified.
Every review on the site carries a "Prices and features last verified on" line so you can see how recent our information is at a glance.
How we fact-check
- Pricing: checked directly against each provider's live pricing page.
- HMRC status: checked against HMRC's official software directory, not provider marketing.
- Features: verified hands-on or from the provider's own documentation.
- Dates: every check is recorded, and the visible "last verified on" date is updated whenever we change pricing, features, or HMRC status on a page.
How affiliate commission is excluded
Commission is never a ranking factor. It doesn't sit inside any of the weights above, and we have never accepted (and never will accept) payment for a ranking position or a positive review.
Two things make this enforceable rather than just a promise:
- The scoring criteria are fixed and published — there's no "commercial adjustment".
- Several of our top-ranked products have no consumer affiliate programme at all, including FreeAgent (ours is a direct, non-commissioned link), QuickFile and Pandle, whose partner programmes are accountants-only. If we ranked by commission, those products couldn't sit at the top — but they do, because the score is the score.
We earn money when you click an affiliate link and sign up for a product, at no extra cost to you. That relationship is disclosed on every page and explained in detail on our affiliate disclosure.
How often we update, and how we keep a log
Prices and features are re-verified at least monthly against the provider and HMRC. When something materially changes — a price rise, a new plan, a change to HMRC status — we update the review within two weeks, advance the "last verified" date, and note what changed in the review itself.
We don't silently edit. Where a fact on a page changes in a way a reader might rely on, we say what changed and when. This log doubles as our internal change record, so every score you see can be traced back to the information and date that produced it.
Questions or spotted an error?
If you think a score, price, or fact on this site is wrong, tell us — hello@mtdpick.co.uk. We verify every correction against the same sources we use for the original review, and we fix factual errors promptly. See our corrections policy.