- At a glance: Coupa alternatives compared
- Best overall Coupa alternative: Ramp
- Airbase
- Zip
- Mesh Payments
- Procurify
- Tipalti
- BILL Spend & Expense (formerly Divvy)
- SAP Ariba
- Why Ramp is the best Coupa alternative
- Choose the best Coupa competitor
Coupa is a well-known business spend management platform and one of the most widely used procure-to-pay tools, offering features for sourcing, purchasing, and payment workflows. But just because a tool is popular doesn’t mean it’s the right solution for you.
Currently, Coupa is rated 4.2 out of 5 stars on the software review website G2. Reviewers raise concerns about missing features and limited functionality for reporting, requisitions, in-app search, and more. Others mention data management issues.
With those concerns, how much does Coupa cost? Capterra research shows that a basic plan can start at $2,500 per month (or much higher from there). So, it’s easy to see why you may not feel it’s the greatest value for your money.
In this article, we compare some Coupa software competitors, including:
- Ramp
- Airbase
- Zip
- Mesh Payments
- Procurify
- Tipalti
- BILL Spend & Expense
- SAP Ariba
If you’re evaluating spend management and B2B procurement platforms, it’s important to compare features, pricing, and integration flexibility. To compile this list, we pair our own research into each product's capabilities along with customer feedback and data about each alternative on the software review website G2. Read on to learn which of the Coupa software competitors might be right for your business needs.
At a glance: Coupa alternatives compared
Platform | G2 Rating | Market Segment | Key Features | Minimum Cost |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Ramp | 4.8 | Startups | Corporate cards | $0 – Unlimited free tier |
Airbase | 4.7 | Mid-market | Procurement | N/A – All pricing is quote-based |
Zip | 4.6 | Mid-market | Procurement | N/A – All pricing is quote-based |
Brex | 4.7 | Small businesses | Expense management | $0 – Free Essentials tier |
Mesh Payments | 4.6 | Mid-market | Expense management | $0 – Free Pro tier |
Procurify | 4.6 | Mid-market | Procurement | N/A – All pricing is quote-based |
Tipalti | 4.5 | Small businesses | Procurement | $99/mo. for Starter |
BILL Spend & Expense (formerly Divvy) | 4.5 | Small businesses | Expense management | $0, but doesn't include AP/AR |
SAP Ariba | 4.1 | Enterprise | Procurement | N/A – All pricing is quote-based |
Best overall Coupa alternative: Ramp
We might be biased in how we view Ramp compared to Coupa, but we firmly believe that our customer testimonials and features back us up:
Ramp’s all-in-one finance operations platform empowers business-wide spend management from the earliest stages of the procurement process all the way through reporting.
An intuitive user interface and budget-friendly pricing model make Ramp the best option for businesses that don't require the complex strategic sourcing and RFP workflows provided by Coupa.
Meanwhile, more than 2,000 reviews on G2—including nearly 1,900 five-star reviews—have earned Ramp a top score of 4.8 out of 5 stars.
Key features
- Corporate cards for business spending: Easily issue physical and virtual corporate cards with pre-approved spending categories and limits on an individual basis
- Procurement management: Automate your entire procure-to-pay process to eliminate approval bottlenecks and prevent out-of-policy spending
- Vendor management: Keep track of all your vendor data, including contracts and usage rates, while leveraging Price Intelligence to ensure you’re getting the best deal on software
- Expense management: Automate your expense management process for card transactions, employee reimbursements, travel expenses, and more, with customizable guardrails to prevent out-of policy spend, incentivize employees to spend less, and speed up approvals for greater efficiency
- Bill pay automation: Automate bill entries, approvals, and payments with effortless accounts payable software
- Reporting: Get real-time insights into company spend by viewing all your company’s expenses in one place
Why customers choose Ramp vs. Coupa
Ramp ranks higher than Coupa in all seven criteria that G2 tracks in its reviews, including meeting customer requirements, ease of use, setup, administration, quality of support, being a good partner, and the direction of the product’s development. Other reasons that customers have chosen Ramp over Coupa include:
- Easier expense reports: Customers have found it much easier to generate expense reports using Ramp vs. Coupa, likely due to the ability to automatically generate reports from spending
- Extensive integrations: Ramp’s expense management platform integrates with the tools and software you’re already using—from your bank to your ERP, HRI, collaboration tools, and more—and facilitates a wider swatch of automation than Coupa
- Smart categorization: Ramp can automatically categorize your expenses, reducing the risk of employees making errors during expense submission and empowering more granular reporting
- Digital receipt management: With Ramp, your employees can automatically text or email images of receipts associated with business expenses, eliminating the risk of lost or damaged receipts—even on the go, thanks to our world-class mobile app
“Ramp is extremely user-friendly. The whole implementation was done by myself. It easily integrates with our accounting software and provides a variety of features for proper record-keeping. We were able to replace 3 different providers with Ramp, and now our AP, Employee Expenses Reimbursement, and Credit Cards are all in one place….And best of all, there is cash back when you use Ramp Card, which adds up so quickly and can be used in a variety of ways.”
– Verified Accounting Manager (small business)
Pricing
Many of Ramp’s expense management features are available for free. For greater personalization and control, you can sign up for Ramp Plus at a cost of $15 per user per month—much cheaper than Coupa, which can cost thousands per month for a basic package.
Airbase
Airbase is a spend management platform offering expense management, accounts payable automation, and corporate cards. Airbase has a G2 score of 4.7 out of 5 stars, compared to Coupa’s score of 4.2. It beats Coupa in all seven criteria measured by G2:
Key features
- Accounting automation capable of automatically categorizing spending, tracking payment dates, and creating amortization schedules
- Receipt management that gives employees multiple options to attach receipts to expense reports and uses OCR to extract information from receipts
- Fraud detection that lets you easily lock and unlock cards set spending controls and limits, and vet suspicious transactions
- Spend analytics and reporting to help you understand how and where your company spends its money
Why customers choose Airbase vs. Coupa
G2 users report switching to Airbase for its virtual cards, easy submissions process, and intuitive design as reasons they chose the software over Coupa. Most positive reviews mention how easy to use Airbase is.
Pricing
Airbase offers three pricing tiers: Standard, for businesses with up to 200 employees; Premium, for businesses with up to 500 employees; and Enterprise, for businesses with up to 10,000 employees. Pricing is provided on a quote-by-quote basis.
Zip
Zip is an intake-to-pay procurement orchestration platform for startups, mid-market, and enterprise companies. Zip currently has a G2 score of 4.6 out of 5 stars and outranks Coupa in all seven of G2’s criteria:
Key features
- Procure-to-pay platform that handles everything from PO creation to invoice processing, approvals, punchouts, receiving, and more
- Streamlined sourcing functionalities designed to process funding requests as efficiently as possible
- Corporate cards with configurable approval requirements, such as vendors, categories, and price limits
- Global payments that allow you to pay vendors in more than 140 countries and more than 40 different currencies while funding payments from more than 30 countries
Why customers choose Zip vs. Coupa
G2 users rate Zip favorably over Coupa due to how easy the software is to use and its feature set, customer support, customization options, and efficiency. One user notes that Zip is very receptive to suggestions about features they’d like to see added and that many requested items have been implemented.
Pricing
Zip states that pricing is dependent on an organization’s size, needs, and growth plans. You’ll need to agree to a demo to get an estimate on cost.
Mesh Payments
Mesh Payments is a travel and spend management platform for global enterprises. It currently has a score of 4.6 out of 5 stars on G2 based on more than 1,000 customer reviews. Customers have ranked Mesh Payments higher than Coupa in all seven of G2’s criteria:
Key features
- Expense management platform that can facilitate and track business spending on travel, software, and more
- Virtual and physical corporate cards with custom spend policies and approvals processes that you can tailor to individual employees
- Procurement solutions that can process purchase orders, pay vendors in local currencies around the world and integrate with your ERP
- Real-time reporting that provides instant transparency into business spend with custom reports, automatic receipt matching, and notifications about suspicious transactions
Why customers choose Mesh Payments vs. Coupa
G2 reviewers point to Mesh Payments’ receipt management functionality, virtual cards, and digital wallet integrations as pros of the product. They also state that the platform is intuitive and easy to use.
Pricing
Mesh Payments offers two pricing tiers. Mesh Payments Pro is free and provides basic functionality, while Mesh Payments Premium costs $10 per user per month and provides access to tools for spend management scalability. Custom pricing is also available with an Enterprise plan.
Procurify
Procurify is a spend management platform that offers businesses spending cards, accounts payable software, and, as its name suggests, procurement solutions. It has an overall G2 score of 4.6 out of 5 stars and is ranked higher than Coupa in all seven of G2’s criteria:
Key features
- Purchasing capabilities to create and manage funding requests, manage purchase orders, verify the delivery of goods and services, and submit expense reports for tracking and reimbursement
- Contract management to store supplier and vendor contracts, track contract spend and renewal notifications, and manage vendors
- Accounts payable to process invoices, manage bill pay, export AP reports, reconcile deposits and prepayments, and approve and schedule payments
- Physical and virtual spending cards with balance, activity, and fund management capabilities
Why customers choose Procurify vs. Coupa
G2 users rate Procurify very highly on its feature set, especially on its procurement software efficiency. They also note that it’s easy to set up and implement. Multiple reviewers specifically called out Procurify’s “product catalog” function as being a time saver for ordering frequently purchased products.
Pricing
Procurify’s pricing is tailored to each business based on size, type, and needs. You should request a quote for a more accurate idea of what you’ll be paying.
Tipalti
Tipalti offers global mid-market companies a powerful mix of accounts payable solutions and expense management features. It currently scores 4.5 out of 5 stars on G2 compared to Coupa’s 4.2 stars. Tipalti beats Coupa on all seven of G2’s criteria:
Key features
- Procurement management that empowers PO approval workflows and management, supplier management, and spend analytics
- Contract repository to manage contract details, including insights into contract statuses and renewal alerts
- Mass payments/global payouts to pay suppliers, vendors, freelancers, and contract workers around the world while complying with international tax requirements
- End-to-end AP automation, including invoice processing, payment reconciliation, expense management, and employee reimbursements
Why customers choose Tipalti vs. Coupa
Compared to Coupa, Tipalti is frequently praised for its payment processing capabilities as a top reason they like the software. They also note that Tipalti is helpful and makes their organizations more efficient, with solid customer support. Multiple reviewers say that Tipalti simplifies their approvals processes, allowing for more timely approvals.
Pricing
Tipalti’s platform fee starts at $99 per month under the Starter plan. Premium and Elite plans, which offer additional functionality, require custom pricing.
BILL Spend & Expense (formerly Divvy)
BILL Spend & Expense is an expense management platform. Formerly known as Divvy before being acquired by BILL.com in 2021, the platform allows businesses to issue corporate cards and track and manage spending. BILL Spend & Expense has a G2 score of 4.5 out of 5 stars and outranks Coupa on all the criteria that G2 measures:
Key features
- Expense management with automatic receipt matching and expense categorization
- Budget management with customizable spending limits and real-time tracking
- Unlimited virtual cards you can issue on a vendor-by-vendor basis to avoid overcharges and spending fraud, with the ability to freeze and unfreeze individual cards as needed
- Mobile app with the ability to issue and manage virtual cards, manage assigned budgets, spend, and track expenses on the go
Why customers choose BILL Spend & Expense vs. Coupa
G2 reviewers highlight BILL’s virtual cards, expense tracking, and management capabilities as top reasons they use the software. They also commend BILL’s customer support.
Pricing
BILL Spend & Expense is free to use on its own. But unlike most tools on our list, BILL Spend & Expense doesn’t include bill pay automation. The company offers separate accounts payable and receivable products in three pricing tiers: $45, $55, or $79 per monthly user.
SAP Ariba
SAP Ariba is a suite of cloud-based procurement tools offered by German parent company SAP for large and small businesses. It scores 4.1 out of 5 stars on G2 vs. Coupa’s 4.2 stars, but we chose to include it in this comparison because it’s a popular solution that warrants discussion.
SAP Ariba beats Coupa in four of the criteria measured by G2 and ties Coupa in another:
Key features
- Supplier discovery and onboarding to streamline your organization’s procurement activities
- Manage different sourcing event types and capabilities, from RFI to RFP, forward and reverse auctions, and tiered and mixed events
- Invoice and payment management to process invoices and purchase order management using two-way, three-way, or four-way matching
- Savings trackers that help you evaluate the effect of your sourcing programs and determine best next steps
Ariba vs. Coupa
One major advantage customers highlight with SAP Ariba is its supplier management and procurement management capabilities, stating that the software makes their organizations more efficient. Many reviewers point to SAP Ariba’s ability to automate procurement activities as a key benefit.
Pricing
SAP Ariba tailors pricing to each business, which means you’ll need to request a quote to get a sense of the costs. Pricing is available either by user or by blocks of 10 users.
Why Ramp is the best Coupa alternative
Managing employee expenses can be a time-consuming, error-prone process full of manual work and wasted effort. Collecting receipts, reviewing expense reports, and tracking down missing information takes valuable time away from more strategic priorities. Plus, a lack of real-time visibility into spending makes it difficult to control costs and keep budgets on track.
Ramp's expense management software solves these challenges by automating and streamlining the entire process from start to finish. With Ramp's AI-powered receipt matching, employees simply take a photo of their receipt, and Ramp automatically matches it to the corresponding transaction in real time. No more chasing down receipts or manually reconciling expenses.
Ramp also provides powerful expense policy controls that let you set granular rules and approval workflows to enforce compliance automatically. Want to limit hotel bookings to a certain star class? Set a rule and Ramp declines out-of-policy purchases at the point of sale. Need manager approval on expenses over $500? Build it right into your workflow so nothing slips through the cracks.
For finance leads, Ramp delivers a real-time view into every dollar of company spend as it happens. Ramp's reporting dashboard lets you drill down by merchant, category, department, or employee to spot trends and make more informed decisions. And with automatic general ledger syncing, reconciliation takes just a few clicks, saving hours of manual data entry each month. With Ramp, you gain the control and visibility you need to optimize spending and keep your business moving forward.
Choose the best Coupa competitor
Ramp’s all-in-one expense management software handles everything from corporate cards to procurement, expense management, vendor management, employee reimbursements, and more.
That makes Ramp a clear leader in the field, and it’s why we believe it’s the top alternative to Coupa. Check out our interactive demo to see for yourself.
FAQs
Don't miss these
“We’ve simplified our workflows while improving accuracy, and we are faster in closing with the help of automation. We could not have achieved this without the solutions Ramp brought to the table.”
Kaustubh Khandelwal
VP of Finance, Poshmark
“Our previous bill pay process probably took a good 10 hours per AP batch. Now it just takes a couple of minutes between getting an invoice entered, approved, and processed.”
Jason Hershey
VP of Finance and Accounting, Hospital Association of Oregon
“When looking for a procure-to-pay solution we wanted to make everyone’s life easier. We wanted a one-click type of solution, and that’s what we’ve achieved with Ramp.”
Mandy Mobley
Finance Invoice & Expense Coordinator, Crossings Community Church
“We no longer have to comb through expense records for the whole month — having everything in one spot has been really convenient. Ramp's made things more streamlined and easy for us to stay on top of. It's been a night and day difference.”
Fahem Islam
Accounting Associate, Snapdocs
“It's great to be able to park our operating cash in the Ramp Business Account where it earns an actual return and then also pay the bills from that account to maximize float.”
Mike Rizzo
Accounting Manager, MakeStickers
“The practice managers love Ramp, it allows them to keep some agency for paying practice expenses. They like that they can instantaneously attach receipts at the time of transaction, and that they can text back-and-forth with the automated system. We've gotten a lot of good feedback from users.”
Greg Finn
Director of FP&A, Align ENTA
“The reason I've been such a super fan of Ramp is the product velocity. Not only is it incredibly beneficial to the user, it’s also something that gives me confidence in your ability to continue to pull away from other products.”
Tyler Bliha
CEO, Abode
