Best Purchase Order Software for Mid-Market Companies (2026)

For many mid-market companies, the purchasing process can be chaotic and fragmented; from facing surprise invoices landing in your inbox to navigating through messages across multiple channels like email and Slack.

And as you scale, the problems only intensify. The manual systems currently supporting your 50 employees won’t withstand an employee count of 250. Suddenly, relying on spreadsheets or fractured systems to track everything leads to your finance team focusing on reactively investing spend instead of managing it proactively.

And the right PO software helps you control spend so that it’s not only intentional, but fits with pre-approved budgets, while flowing seamlessly into your ERP.

Legacy purchase order software vs modern, cloud-based solutions

Legacy PO systems were slow, standalone layers with limited visibility and agility. If you wanted to see how a purchase affected your budget, you had to export a CSV and spend many hours in Excel.

But modern, cloud-based purchase order software has evolved into an integrated part of the procure-to-pay ecosystem. Modern solutions are helping procurement and finance teams move away from siloed tools toward a unified workflow orchestration.

Such platforms empower the user with native AI that automates all the tedious tasks, like data entry and three-way matching. While at the same time connect approvals, requests, and payments in one place.

Why mid-market companies need PO software (not just enterprises)

There are some common scaling problems facing your mid-market company. Here’s how purchase order software helps solve them.

Departments committing spend without finance visibility

Without a formal PO process, department heads can commit to spend. So they can easily sign a £30,000 marketing agency contract without anyone in finance knowing about it. Until the invoice lands in their inbox. PO software pushes all purchasing activity through a pre-defined workflow, so no one is able to sporadically sign up with suppliers and commit to spend.

Budget tracking done outside the system

If budgets live in spreadsheets and spend only lives in the bank account, no one ever gets a real-time insight into committed vs. actual spend. With modern software, users can view the budget and its impact at the moment of request. This helps reduce the risk of overspending by giving visibility into budget impact before commitments are made.

Multiple entities using different approval rules

There are many procure-to-pay challenges facing growing companies. From managing different VAT rates and currencies to implementing local approval hierarchies across entities. All this is impossible without a centralised system that is built to handle multi-entity complexities.

Increased audit requirements

As you scale, audit requirements become more complex. You shift from simple local compliance requirements to multi-jurisdictional. You need a digital paper trail that shows auditors exactly who requested funds, approved them, and received every item or service.

Finance teams acting reactively instead of proactively

If you’re still chasing invoice documents or asking for context on a purchase at month-end, your finance team is reactive. PO software helps finance set specific rules and controls around spend and how it’s captured, automatically enforcing compliant spend. This means finance teams can focus on strategic tasks like forecasting and managing spend more proactively.

Key criteria to consider when evaluating purchase order software

When mid-market companies start comparing purchase order software, the decision is rarely about ticking off the longest feature list. What matters more is how a system supports finance operations as the business scales, from budget ownership and approvals to visibility across entities.

The criteria below highlight the key decision factors finance teams typically consider when evaluating PO software. They are intended to help you frame your evaluation and prioritise what matters most for your organisation before looking at specific features or vendors.

• Budget visibility timing – when finance teams and budget owners can see committed spend, whether at the request stage or only once an invoice is received
• Approval flexibility – how easily approval workflows adapt across departments, entities, roles, and range from finance to procurement
• ERP and accounting integrations – the depth and reliability of native integrations with core finance systems
• Multi-entity and multi-currency support – whether the platform can support growth across entities, regions, and currencies without added complexity
• Implementation and adoption complexity – how quickly teams can roll out the system and see value without heavy change management

Not every organisation will prioritise these criteria in the same way. The right solution depends on which factors matter most for your operating model, growth stage, and internal ownership between finance and procurement. Understanding these priorities makes it easier to assess which capabilities a PO system needs to deliver in practice.

Must-have features in purchase order software 2026

Once you’ve clarified what matters most to your organisation, the next step is understanding what modern purchase order software should be capable of delivering in practice. These features represent the core capabilities that support the evaluation criteria above and help ensure the software can be used effectively across finance, procurement, and the wider business.

Core PO capabilities

Centralised purchase requests. A single place where every spend request comes through.
Configurable approval workflows. The ability to route requests based on departments, project, or amount.
Policy enforcement. Automated proactive checks that stop any request that violates company spending policies.

Finance-critical features

Real-time budget checks. With the help of visual indicators, see how much budget remains before approving spend.
Two-way and three-way matching. Automatic invoice, PO, and receipt note matching with automated discrepancy thresholds to ensure you only pay for what you ordered and received.
Clear digital audit trails. Every action associated with a purchase has a time stamp.

Automation and AI

Automated approval routing. Using AI, the system can learn your organisational structure to instantly route requests to the right person.
Spend anomaly detection. Algorithms will flat duplicate requests or spot unusual pricing.
Predictive budget alerts. You’ll get notifications to warn you if you’re close to overrunning your budget.

Integrations that add value

You need your PO software to seamlessly integrate with your existing tech stack to take advantage of two and three-way matching, enjoy real-time synchronisation of your master data, ensure you’re audit-ready, and eliminate ghost accruals.

Make sure your PO software integrates with:

ERPs. Has native integrations with leading ERP software like NetSuite, Dynamics, and SAP.
Accounting software. Can connect with top accounting software like Xero, QuickBooks, and Sage.
Spend management. Either connects with or offers built-in spend management under the same roof. Combining POs with corporate cards and expense management gives you a 360-degree view of corporate spending across every entity.

Best purchase order software for mid-market companies

So, what are your top options? Here are four leading software choices.

Precoro: procurement-focused PO automation

If you’re not looking for an all-in-one solution, Precoro offers a fantastic procurement solution for vendor management and complex catalogues. Although you can connect your tools with Precoro and manage the approval and tracking side of spend, you can’t see spend the second someone raises a PO, or pay your invoices directly in the app.

Top features: Vendor portal, inventory and warehouse management, RFP management, and custom fields for items.
Best for: Procurement-driven organisations, i.e. you have a dedicated procurement head driving the purchasing strategy.

Procurify: user-friendly for growing teams

If you’re looking for a tool everyone can use immediately, Procurify is known for its intuitive platform. You might be looking for a more structured PO process after historically using spreadsheets; if so, Procurify could be a contender.

Top features: Mobile app requests, physical asset tracking, basic budget visualisations, centralised contract management, and a comprehensive ‘receiving’ module.
Best for: Teams moving away from manual spreadsheets for the first time.

Coupa: enterprise-grade procurement platform

A source-to-pay market leader, Coupa is a go-to choice for global enterprises with dedicated procurement departments.

Top features: Competitive bidding, supplier risk scores, pricing benchmarking, deep supply chain analytics, and global compliance.
Best for: Large enterprises with complex, global supply chains.

Payhawk: finance-led spend control

If you’re looking to automate the entire procure-to-pay process, then Payhawk could be a good option. Purchase orders are just one part of the financial lifecycle you can manage fully from within the same system.

Once you receive an invoice, AI kicks in and automatically performs two-way or three-way matching, significantly reducing the manual workload you usually face at month-end.

Top features: Unified AI-native platform, multi-entity support, real-time budget tracking, and seamless native ERP integrations.
Best for: Mid-market finance teams looking to replace several disconnected tools with a single source of truth.

So, how does purchase order software improve finance operations?

The more the details in your purchase order are correct, the better your final financial reports. If you know what you’re buying, how much it costs, and who’s paying for it, this structured process ensures your budgets are accurate, there are no surprise invoices, and having data laid out like this makes auditing so much easier.

So, purchase order software:

Reduces maverick spending. Because there’s a clear process, there’s no room for error. Employees can’t buy items without approval. Digital spend policies keep them focused.
Faster approval cycles. Requests don’t sit in an inbox for days or weeks; they get automatically routed to the appropriate approver.
Cleaner audits. Every time employees spend, it’s linked to a request, followed by an approval, and an invoice. Nothing goes undocumented.
Better forecasting. See what spend you’re committed to next month, and what you paid last month.

A modern PO workflow in four steps

Step one: Request

First, an employee submits a request in the Payhawk app, then the system instantly checks if there’s enough budget remaining for that department.

Step two: Approval

The finance manager, team leader, or whoever is responsible for approving the expense gets a notification (on desktop or app). They can approve this based on access to real-time budget data.

Step three: Purchase

A PO is generated and sent to the vendor.

Step four: Reconciliation

When the invoice arrives, Payhawk’s AI matches it to the PO and pushes the data to an ERP, like NetSuite, for one-click payment.

Let’s see how this works in practice.

Aventum Group has more visibility and control because of Payhawk PO features

Manual processes stand in the way of mid-market company growth, which is exactly what was happening at Aventum Group. Before Payhawk, Aventum’s supplier payments needed multiple approvals across different platforms, which caused delays and inefficiencies.

But with everything centralised in Payhawk, they now save hours each week. They’re utilising PO insights to improve cost optimisation, putting them in a better position to negotiate bulk discounts and improve cash flow.

Tim Green, Head of Finance Transformation at Aventum Group, explains:

The PO features have given us a lot more visibility and control. Now, with the approval workflows in PO, we can embed the controls in-house and give our procurement manager complete control.

With Alex Curme, Group CFO, adding:

It’s now much easier to spot opportunities for cost-saving and find discounts that help the bottom line!

Research shows that companies taking advantage of automated invoice approval workflows, e-payments, and data capture can reduce processing costs by up to 80%. And this reduction for a mid-market company can mean a huge boost in operational efficiency.

Future trends in purchase order software

The landscape has already seen a significant shift in recent years, from static record-keeping to dynamic, real-time spend management. PO software currently has the ability to add real business value to the modern finance team, and its abilities are only going to become more proactive.

A focus on AI-driven approvals and routing will continue to help identify historical patterns, assess vendor risk, and analyse current budget health. According to Gartner research, although 58% of finance functions were using AI in 2024, AI adoption has slowed over the last few years. But there’s good news on the horizon: of the finance teams currently using AI, 23% are feeling more optimistic about its future in finance. As AI in finance evolves, its performance improves, and barriers such as complexity and data challenges become less of a concern, adoption can increase.

AI can help understand low-risk, recurring purchases that already meet your company policies and pre-approve them. It’s exciting developments like this that allow your finance team to focus on more productive tasks.

The combining of POs, cards, and AP is something more organisations will look to adopt in 2026. Organisations are facing a race to close the visibility gap created by siloed systems. 73% of businesses still use paper to process and pay suppliers, which means no visibility into upcoming payments and plenty of room for manual data errors.

Having everything in one system means that as soon as you approve a PO, the system can intelligently issue a virtual card or schedule a bank transfer. Saving admin time, reducing the risk of overspending, empowering employee spend, and generating a clean audit trail.

Other trends emerging include embedded payments, continuous spending controls, predictive budget forecasting, and anomaly detection. Purchase order software will only become an even more strategic partner to both finance and procurement teams.

Choosing the right purchase order software

You need a solution that offers a perfect balance of control and agility. You need a system that offers intelligent features but can scale with you as you grow, adding and managing multiple entities effortlessly.

To find the best fit, follow these four steps:

Audit your current workflow

Pinpoint the bottlenecks and go from there. Are your approvals too slow? Or invoice matching prone to mistakes? Once you know these, you know which features you’ll most benefit from.

Check integration depth

Look for a solution that offers native, two-way integrations to ensure your tech stack is seamlessly connected.

Prioritise user adoption

Doesn’t matter how great the tool is, if users don’t use it, it’s a waste of money, and you still have those fragmented processes.

Think about the bigger picture

Can the PO tool handle your expenses and corporate cards, too?

FAQs

What is a purchase order?

A purchase order (PO) is a legally binding document sent to a seller from the buyer outlining the price, quantities, and types of products or services.

Do mid-market companies really need purchase order software?

Yes, once you have multiple entities or departments, manual tracking becomes significantly more challenging, which can easily lead to overspending and make it difficult to reconcile.

Who should own PO software: finance or procurement?

Although procurement teams will use it to manage vendor relationships, ownership typically sits within the finance team to ensure budget compliance across the organisation.

How long does implementation usually take?

Modern cloud-based purchase order software can typically be implemented in a matter of weeks, depending on company size, integrations, and approval complexity.

Can PO software prevent budget overruns?

Yes. You can access real-time budget data to make decisions before anyone makes a commitment to spend.