QuickBooks hosting · Self-managed on your own Windows VPS

QuickBooks Enterprise hosting on your own Windows VPS

Run QuickBooks Enterprise or Desktop in multi-user mode on a Windows Server you control, with the company file and your team's desktops in one place. From $63.99 a month for one person: $55.99 for the server with Windows included, plus $8.00 per user. Bring your own Intuit licence.

qb-01
QuickBooks server · Server 2022 · us-east
Hosting on
Plan
8 vCPU · 16 GB
In the company file
5 of 5 users
  • Database serviceRunning
  • Last verify, 02:04No errors
  • QuickBooks backup, nightlyOK
  • Port 3389 to the internetClosed
markup on your QuickBooks licence, bring your own
$0
deploy to RDP login
55 s
uptime SLA, in writing
99.9%
for 3,000+ customers
15,000+ VMs
Plans and pricing

QuickBooks Desktop hosting plans and pricing

Priced by people, not per seat. One server, plus $8.00 a month for each person who signs in to it. Your QuickBooks licence stays with Intuit.

People in QuickBooks at once
5

QuickBooks plus Outlook, Excel and a browser per person: about 3 to 4 GB each, more for large company files.

Recommended
8 vCPU · 16 GB, RDS Session Host
$131.99 /mo
$91.99 server with Windows + 5 × $8.00 users
Deploy for 5 people
Common sizes, following Intuit's server memory guidance with room for the desktopsCompany files over 1 GB or heavy reporting: pick the next size up.
  • Just me

    4 vCPU · 8 GB · 120 GB NVMe, single user

    $63.99per month, including the $15.00 Windows licence and 1 × $8.00 user
    Deploy
  • 2 people

    4 vCPU · 8 GB · 120 GB NVMe, RDS Session Host

    $71.99per month, including the $15.00 Windows licence and 2 × $8.00 users
    Deploy
  • 5 peopleMost deployed

    8 vCPU · 16 GB · 180 GB NVMe, RDS Session Host

    $131.99per month, including the $15.00 Windows licence and 5 × $8.00 users
    Deploy
  • 10 people

    8 vCPU · 32 GB · 240 GB NVMe, RDS Session Host

    $232.99per month, including the $15.00 Windows licence and 10 × $8.00 users
    Deploy
  • 15 people

    16 vCPU · 32 GB · 360 GB NVMe, RDS Session Host

    $309.99per month, including the $15.00 Windows licence and 15 × $8.00 users
    Deploy
Every person working on the server carries a $8.00 Remote Desktop user licence from Raff, billed monthly and adjusted when you add or remove someone. The two Remote Desktop connections Windows Server includes are for administering the server, not for daily desktop work. QuickBooks licences are yours from Intuit; Windows licence $15.00 included in every server price.All 10 Windows plans ›
Which model fits

Self-managed QuickBooks hosting vs Intuit-authorized hosting

Same software either way. One is a seat you rent from a hosting company, the other is a server you own.

Who runs QuickBooks
Authorized hostThe hosting company, in their environment
RaffYou, on a Windows Server you administer
Price shape
Authorized hostPer user per month, advertised from $35 to $85, plus security and Office add-ons
RaffOne server from $55.99 plus $8.00 per user, so the server cost stops growing
QuickBooks licence
Authorized hostYours, or bundled by the host
RaffYours, from Intuit
Support
Authorized hostIntuit's hosting-program desk
RaffRaff Windows engineers for the server, sessions and backups; Intuit for the QuickBooks software
Proven
Authorized hostYes
RaffYes: customers in production on Raff for over a year, and free migration tests multi-user mode with your team before you move
Other software on the box
Authorized hostUsually a fixed app list
RaffAnything that runs on Windows Server
Data and backups
Authorized hostTheirs to manage
RaffYours: nightly backups, snapshots, your export

What you give up, and what you get

Intuit runs an authorized hosting program with providers such as Rightworks. Raff is not in it, and QuickBooks does not care.

It is proven here. Raff customers have run Desktop and Enterprise in multi-user mode for more than a year, and nearly every hosting provider runs QuickBooks on virtual machines like this one.It is a server you own. Install QuickBooks with your own licence, keep the company file where you can see it, and run Office and your other tools beside it.Support is split, not missing. Intuit keeps supporting the QuickBooks software under your subscription. Our Windows engineers keep the server, sessions, printers and backups running.Free migration, then 14 days to decide. We test multi-user mode with your own people before anyone moves, and you get your money back if it does not fit.

If your books are in Sage rather than QuickBooks, the server is the same shape and the page for it is Sage hosting.

QuickBooks server hosting on a Windows VPS, the honest guide ›
What it includes

What QuickBooks Enterprise hosting on Raff includes

The company file and the people using it, on one server

Multi-user QuickBooks breaks when the company file sits on one PC and everyone reaches it over the office network. Here the file, the Database Server Manager and every session run on the same server, on NVMe. Nobody waits on the office internet.

QuickBooks Database Server Manager scans a dedicated company-file folderPro, Premier and Enterprise, one version or several side by sideNightly QuickBooks backup plus a nightly backup of the whole server
How to set up a QuickBooks server, step by step ›
One server, everything close
Your team's desktops
RDS sessions, QuickBooks open
5 sessions
same server, no network hop
QuickBooks Database Server Manager
QuickBooksDB35, hosting mode on
Running
D:\QuickBooksCompanyFiles
.QBW, .ND and .TLG on NVMe
5.3 GB
02:00 nightly
Backups
.QBB to D:\Backups, VM backup to Raff storage
OK

QuickBooks remote access for your bookkeeper, your accountant and the office

Everyone signs in through a Remote Desktop Gateway with multi-factor authentication and opens QuickBooks in their own session. The outside accountant gets a user for month-end and loses it after. Port 3389 is never open to the internet.

Add or remove a user any day, the licence count follows on the next statementRD Gateway with MFA, cloud firewall default-deny, failed logins loggedMicrosoft 365 Apps beside QuickBooks with shared computer activation
Remote Desktop hosting plans ›
Sign-in
RD Gateway, HTTPS with MFA
Port 3389
Closed to the internet
Users
Add or remove any day
Office
Printers redirect through the session
Free migration

Move the company file off the office PC

From the PC under the bookkeeper's desk, an old office server, or a hosting provider you are leaving. We move the company files, verify them, set up users and printers, and the old copy stays untouched until your first month-end closes on the new server.

Office PC or serverRightworks, Ace, Summit and other hostsAzure or AWS VMQuickBooks 2019 to 2025
  1. 1
    Assess

    Send the QuickBooks edition and year, company file sizes and how many people work in them at once. We size the server.

  2. 2
    Build and Restore

    Windows Server, RD Gateway with MFA, QuickBooks installed with your licence, Database Server Manager scanning the folder, company files restored from a portable copy and verified.

  3. 3
    Verify and Cut Over

    Your bookkeeper runs a day on the new server. Everyone moves when you say so, and the old copy stays until the first close. QuickBooks multi-user on a Windows Server VPS

FAQ

QuickBooks hosting questions

Short answers. The long ones live in the multi-user guide.

QuickBooks server setup on a Windows VPS, the full guide

You pay for one server plus a Remote Desktop licence for each person who signs in. A Windows VPS sized for QuickBooks Enterprise starts at $55.99 a month with the Windows licence included, and each user adds $8.00. So one person is $63.99, five people on the most deployed size are $131.99 and fifteen are $309.99, all in. Your Intuit subscription is separate and stays with Intuit, at no markup. Intuit-authorized hosts advertise from about $35 to $85 per user per month before security and Office add-ons, and Intuit's own Enterprise-with-hosting bundle starts near $250 for a single user.

No, and it does not need to be for QuickBooks to run well. Raff customers have run Desktop and Enterprise in multi-user mode on Raff servers for more than a year, and a Windows VPS is one of the most common ways small businesses run QuickBooks today. What the authorized program adds is Intuit's hosting support desk. What you get here instead is a server you own, your own licence at no markup, roughly half the per-seat price, and Raff's Windows engineers on call for the server, sessions, printers and backups. Intuit still supports the software under your subscription. Migration is free, the uptime SLA is in writing, and the first 14 days are money-back.

Yes, and it is how most of the industry runs it. Pro, Premier and Enterprise install on Windows Server 2016 through 2022, all of them run under Remote Desktop Services, and Raff customers have run them in multi-user mode for more than a year. Nearly every QuickBooks host, authorized or not, runs QuickBooks on virtual machines. Intuit's published network guidance still calls virtual servers not recommended, which in practice means its help desk may point you back at the environment. That is what Raff's Windows engineers are for. Free migration tests multi-user mode with your own people first, and the first 14 days are money-back.

Not for Enterprise. Intuit stopped selling new subscriptions of QuickBooks Desktop Pro Plus, Premier Plus and Mac Plus to new customers in 2024, but existing subscribers can keep renewing, and QuickBooks Desktop Enterprise is still sold and updated every year. Each Desktop version is supported by Intuit for about three years after release. If you are on Enterprise, or on a Pro or Premier subscription you already hold, a server on Raff keeps it running for as long as Intuit supports your version.

On the server, open QuickBooks Desktop and go to File, then Utilities, then Host Multi-User Access. That starts the QuickBooks database service for your version. Then open QuickBooks Database Server Manager, add the folder holding your company files and scan it, which creates the .ND files that let other sessions open the file in multi-user mode. On a Raff server everyone works in a Remote Desktop session on that same machine, so hosting mode stays on and there are no workstation-to-server settings to maintain.

QuickBooks sets the ceiling: Pro allows 3 users, Premier 5, Enterprise 40 per company file. The server then needs room for each person's Windows session. Intuit's guidance calls for 8 GB of server memory at 5 users, 12 GB at 10 and 16 GB at 15, and each session adds Outlook, Excel and a browser, so plan about 3 to 4 GB per person. On Raff that is 8 GB for one or two people, 16 GB for up to 5, 32 GB for up to 10, and 16 vCPU with 32 GB for up to 15. Beyond 15, a second Session Host.

Two ways, and you should keep both. QuickBooks' own scheduled backup writes a .QBB file nightly to a folder on the server, which is the copy you restore into QuickBooks and the one your accountant can take. Raff's nightly backup then copies the whole server to separate storage, so a failed disk or a ransomware incident is a restore rather than a rebuild. Take a snapshot before every QuickBooks year upgrade, and verify the company file from inside QuickBooks after any restore.

Deploy a QuickBooks server in 55 seconds

From $63.99 a month for one person, with the Windows licence included and $8.00 per user after that. Your QuickBooks licence, 14-day money-back guarantee.