The Open Invoices Report in QuickBooks Online

The Open Invoices report lists every unpaid or partially paid invoice as of a date you choose, with the balance still owed on each one. It is the plain, invoice-level view of your receivables, without aging buckets or per-customer totals, showing each open transaction and what remains due on it. When you want a clean list of exactly what customers still owe, invoice by invoice, this is the report to run.

What the Open Invoices report shows

Each row is an open transaction, grouped by customer, showing the date, the transaction type, the invoice number, the due date, the original amount, and the open balance. Fully paid invoices drop off, so what is left is the set of invoices with money still outstanding. A partially paid invoice appears with its remaining balance in the open-balance column, which is what makes this report a reliable working list for collections: it tells you which invoices to follow up on and how much to ask for on each. In a straightforward invoice-only setup, the open balances generally agree with your accounts receivable and with the Customer Balance Summary, which rolls the same open invoices up into one figure per customer. Differences usually trace to unapplied payments, credits, or journal entries posted to accounts receivable.

A snapshot as of one date

This is an as-of report, and it does not vary with the cash or accrual accounting method. It shows the invoices that were open as of the report date, so a run on a later date drops anything that has since been paid and adds newly issued invoices that remain unpaid. Because it is a point-in-time list, the date you run it for is part of the record, and an Open Invoices report as of a year-end preserves exactly what was outstanding at that close.

Why a CPA or auditor asks for it

An accountant uses Open Invoices to see the transactions that make up accounts receivable without the aging layer on top. It is a direct list they can tie to your Balance Sheet and test invoice by invoice, confirming that each open balance is genuine and that nothing is stuck from a keying error. For your own collections it doubles as a call list. Where the A/R Aging Detail adds how overdue each invoice is, Open Invoices keeps the view simple when the age is not the question and you just need the balances.

How to run and export the Open Invoices report in QuickBooks Online

1. Go to the Reports menu and type "Open Invoices" into the report search box, then open it.
2. Set the report date to the as-of date you want the open balances measured against. For an archive, run it as of each fiscal year-end so you keep the list of what was outstanding at each close.
3. Run the report and compare the total to the accounts receivable line on your Balance Sheet for the same date; if they differ, look for unapplied payments, credits, or journal entries posted to accounts receivable.
4. Use the export control at the top of the report to export it to Excel or PDF. The file downloads to your computer.

Because it is a snapshot, an All Dates run does not preserve where things stood at each year-end, so running it as of each year-end is what keeps the history. The Excel export is usually easier to work with than a PDF when the list is long, because you can sort and filter it.

Keeping the Open Invoices report after you cancel

The Open Invoices report is one we include on request, and you can also export it yourself while the company is still open. It is worth keeping because a cancelled paid QuickBooks Online company stays read-only for 12 months and is then permanently deleted, a trial only 90 days, and the IRS generally expects business records to be kept for at least three years, and longer in some situations. Once the company is deleted, the exact list of what was still owed on a given date goes with it.

Frequently asked questions

How is Open Invoices different from the A/R Aging Detail?

Both list unpaid invoices, but the A/R Aging Detail groups them into aging buckets to show how overdue each one is, while Open Invoices lists them by customer with the balance due, without organizing them into aging buckets. Use Open Invoices when you want the balances plainly, and the aging detail when the age of each invoice is the point.

Does Open Invoices show partially paid invoices?

Yes. A partially paid invoice stays on the report with its open balance reduced to the amount still owed, shown alongside the original invoice amount, so you can see both what was billed and what is genuinely still outstanding.

Why keep an Open Invoices report if I have the invoices themselves?

The report captures which invoices were still open as of a specific date and the balance on each, which the invoices alone do not tell you once payments are applied and balances close. For a year-end reconciliation, a collections question, or an audit of a past period, a saved Open Invoices report gives you a fixed copy instead of relying on live books that may no longer be available.