Frequently asked questions

Start at the top and work down: your name or business name, then your customer's name, then one line for what you're charging for. The creator labels every box, and the preview on the page shows the finished invoice building as you type — if it looks right there, it's right.

At minimum: who it's from, who it's for, an invoice number, the date, what was sold or done, and the total due. The creator includes all of these by default, and adds a due date, optional tax, and a notes field for payment details — you can leave anything optional blank.

Yes. Creating an invoice here and downloading the PDF is free, with no signup and no watermark. Every feature is free — there are no accounts and no paid plans.

Yes. Your entries stay in the creator — change anything and download again to get a corrected PDF. Keep the downloaded PDF as your copy; the site doesn't store your invoices.

In many places, yes — sole traders and individual freelancers invoice under their own name all the time, and forming a company is not a precondition for billing for work you did. The variations are local: some jurisdictions require a registration, a licence, or a tax number for particular trades or above certain earnings, and only your local rules can settle your case. The document itself simply needs your real name (plus any trading name), your address, and honest details. If you are about to invoice for the first time, a quick check of your tax authority's “starting in business” page is worth the ten minutes.

At minimum, in most places: it is clearly an invoice, it names the seller and the buyer, it carries a unique number and a date, it describes what was supplied, and it shows the amounts and the total. Where you are tax-registered, your tax number and the tax treatment usually become required elements too. The exact list is set by your jurisdiction's rules — our field-by-field guide covers what each element is and why it exists, and your tax authority publishes the authoritative version for where you live.

Start where you like — 001, 1001, or the year plus 001 (2026-001) — then count upward without gaps or repeats. There is no official starting point; the system matters, not the start. A year prefix helps future-you file by year, and plain sequential numbers are easiest to check for a missing document. Pick one pattern, write it down, and let the maker remember your details and rate between visits so the routine takes minutes.

Your real address — an invoice is a formal document, and both tax records and a client's accounts process expect the genuine one. If privacy worries you (a home address shared with every client), the common solutions are a trading address, a accountant's or registered-office address where your jurisdiction allows one, or a PO box where the rules accept it for invoices — they do not everywhere. What never works is inventing an address or omitting it entirely; a document that cannot be tied to a real person creates more problems than the one it solved.

Yes — that is the normal order of events. An invoice is the request that starts the payment process; it is issued when the work is done (or at an agreed milestone), carries a due date, and is settled afterward. Issuing it does not require the client to have paid anything first. The related timing questions — invoicing before the work, at delivery, or in stages — are worked through in the blog, because each has a right context.

Sequence and purpose. An invoice asks: it is issued when payment is due and starts the clock. A receipt confirms: it is issued when payment has arrived and closes the loop. One job, two documents — the same sale can produce both, in that order. If a client pays you on the spot, a receipt alone may be all the paperwork the moment needs; if they pay later, the invoice comes first. Our launch-day guide covers the surrounding records habits that keep the pair findable.

Only if your situation requires it — typically because you are registered for sales tax/VAT (voluntarily or because your earnings crossed the threshold) or because your jurisdiction taxes your kind of supply regardless. If you are not registered, you generally must not present a tax charge as if you were. This is the one area where “copy what others do” fails: your registration status is yours alone. Check your tax authority's threshold and rules for your trade; then set the maker's tax line accordingly (or leave it off) and keep the rate saved for next time.

The document does not change its skeleton: your details, their details (use the business name and address exactly as they give them), a clear description, and amounts in an agreed currency — state the currency on the document so the total is unambiguous. Cross-border work adds questions the invoice alone does not answer: whether tax applies to an exported service varies by both countries, and payment rails and fees are a separate arrangement to agree before the work. Get the currency and the payment method agreed in writing first; the invoice then records what was settled.