Brex vs Expensify pricing comes down to one fact before any table: Brex is free because your spend moves onto a Brex card, and Expensify charges for software on whatever card you already carry. Brex Essentials is $0 per user per month and Brex Premium is $12. Expensify Collect is a flat $5 per member per month and Control is $18 per member on an annual subscription, $36 for active members above your subscription size, with up to 50 percent off Control if you adopt the Expensify Card. Every figure here was read on brex.com, use.expensify.com and help.expensify.com on September 17, 2026.
The comparison gets misreported in both directions. Several vendor blogs still say Brex publishes no price; it does, and it prints $0 and $12 on brex.com/pricing along with the line that Brex LLC is a wholly owned subsidiary of Capital One. Other guides quote Expensify Control at $9 as if that were list; $9 is the fully discounted rate for companies whose Control spend runs on the Expensify Card, and the list rate is $18. Here is what each vendor actually publishes, then the math for a real team.
Brex vs Expensify pricing, side by side
| Cost line | Brex | Expensify |
|---|---|---|
| Entry plan | Essentials, $0 per user per month | Collect, $5 per member per month, flat, no annual commitment |
| Paid plan | Premium, $12 per user per month. Enterprise is custom | Control, $18 per member per month annual. $36 per active member above the subscription size or on pay-per-use |
| Card discount on software | None, the software is already $0 or $12 | Up to 50% off Control with the Expensify Card, $18 to $9 and $36 to $18 |
| Works with your existing cards | Brex card program | Yes, card feeds from any card on both plans |
| QuickBooks and Xero | Accounting integrations on Essentials | Collect |
| NetSuite, Sage Intacct, Workday, Certinia | Customizable ERP integrations on Premium and Enterprise | Control |
| Entities | Essentials up to two entities, one of them global. Premium multi-entity, US and international | Not listed by plan on the pricing pages |
| Bill pay | Automated bill pay on every plan. No Brex fee for ACH, checks, domestic or international wires from a Brex business account | Not an AP platform |
| Foreign card purchases | FX rate markup of up to 3% on card transactions that need currency conversion | No foreign transaction fees on the Expensify Card |
| Card rewards | Competitive card rewards, no rate printed | 1% cash back on every swipe, 2% above $250,000 a month, USD purchases on US cards |
| Card annual fee | No annual card fee listed | None |
If Ramp is also on your shortlist, the same comparison with Ramp's plans, platform fee and payment fees is on our Ramp vs Expensify pricing page, and the three-way view with Divvy is on Brex pricing.
Is Brex cheaper than Expensify?
On the software line, yes: $0 against $5 at the entry level, and $12 against $18 at the paid level. But Brex is $0 because Brex earns interchange when your company spends on Brex cards, so the real price of Essentials is adopting a new card program. Expensify Collect charges $5 and asks nothing about your card. For a company that will move its spend, Brex is cheaper. For a company that keeps its bank card, Brex Essentials is not an option at all and Expensify Collect is the cheaper published price.
Here is how that plays out for a US company with 25 people who file expenses, books in NetSuite, and a team that buys from overseas vendors on the card about $10,000 a month.
| Line | Brex Premium | Expensify Control (annual, sized at 25) | Expensify Control with full card discount |
|---|---|---|---|
| Software, 25 people | 25 x $12 = $300 a month | 25 x $18 = $450 a month | 25 x $9 = $225 a month |
| NetSuite sync | Included on Premium | Included on Control | Included on Control |
| FX markup on $10,000 of foreign card spend | Up to $300 a month | $0 on the Expensify Card | $0 on the Expensify Card |
| Monthly total | $300 to $600 | $450 | $225 |
| Annual total | $3,600 to $7,200 | $5,400 | $2,700 |
Two things jump out of that table. First, the FX markup is not a rounding error: at $10,000 a month of foreign card spend, a 3 percent markup costs as much as the Brex Premium software itself. Second, Expensify's card discount only counts if your people will actually carry the Expensify Card, which is the same card-switch decision Brex asks you to make, just with a $9 software price attached instead of $0. Read the two vendors as offering the same trade in different packaging: move your spend, and the software gets cheap.
How much does Brex cost per user?
Brex Essentials is $0 per user per month and includes accounting integrations, bill pay, reimbursements, real-time reporting, API access, up to two entities with one of them global, and free travel booking. Brex Premium is $12 per user per month and adds multiple customizable expense policies, dynamic expense review chains, multi-entity in the US and internationally, customizable ERP and HRIS integrations, live budgets and group travel rules. Enterprise is custom. Brex's support article on the cost of its services adds that software is billed in arrears net 30 or upfront, with overages by contract, and that Brex charges no fee for ACH, checks or domestic and international wires from a Brex business account.
How much does Expensify cost per user?
Expensify Collect is $5 per member per month, flat, with no annual commitment and no card requirement. It includes SmartScan receipt capture, card feeds from the cards you already have, approval workflows, direct sync to QuickBooks and Xero, and travel booking. Control is $18 per member per month on an annual subscription, with active members above the subscription size billed at $36, and pay-per-use Control is also $36. Control adds NetSuite, Sage Intacct, Workday and Certinia, multi-level approval chains, audit logs and advanced policy enforcement. Those last three are what a company subject to formal controls is really buying, and if you are mapping expense approvals to the obligations an auditor will test, it helps to track every obligation against the control that satisfies it before you pick the plan.
The overage rule deserves its own sentence. If you size an annual Control subscription at 20 members and 26 people file in a busy month, the extra six cost $36 each, double the rate, and Expensify bills that month at $360 plus $216, which is $576, rather than the $468 that 26 members at $18 would cost. Size the subscription to include the part-time and seasonal people who file once a quarter.
Does Brex charge foreign transaction fees?
Brex's cost-of-services article states an FX rate markup of up to 3 percent on card transactions that need currency conversion. That is a markup on the exchange rate rather than a line-item fee, so it does not show up on a statement as a separate charge, but at 3 percent it costs the same as a foreign transaction fee on a bank card. Expensify states that the Expensify Card has no foreign transaction fees. For a team that buys from overseas vendors, that single line can outweigh the software price difference, as the table above shows.
Which card has better rewards, Brex or Expensify?
Expensify prints its rate: 1 percent cash back on every swipe, and 2 percent for companies spending over $250,000 a month across cards, on USD purchases on US cards, with cash back applied first to the Expensify bill and then to your bank account. Brex's pricing page lists competitive card rewards on every tier and prints no rate. If you want a number you can put in a spreadsheet before the sales call, Expensify gives you one and Brex does not.
Brex vs Expensify for small business: which should you choose?
A 10-person company on QuickBooks Online that is willing to move its spend onto a Brex card pays $0 for Brex Essentials and gets bill pay, reimbursements and reporting included. The same company keeping its bank card pays $50 a month, $600 a year, for Expensify Collect. A company that buys internationally should count the Brex FX markup before deciding the $0 is cheaper. A company that is already in NetSuite is choosing between Brex Premium at $12 and Expensify Control at $18, or $9 with the Expensify Card, and at that point the decision is really about which card program your team will carry. Brex's own comparison page and Expensify's both argue their side well; the prices above are the ones they publish.
What if you do not want to switch cards at all?
Then Brex Essentials is off the table and the Expensify Card discount is too, and the honest comparison is Expensify Collect at $5, Expensify Control at $18, or an expense platform that never asks about your card. Expenditure runs on the Visa and Mastercard cards and bank accounts you already have. We read each receipt, code the charge to the right GL account from its context rather than copying last time's code, check it against your written expense policy as it lands, match it to the card transaction and sync one clean record into QuickBooks, Xero or NetSuite. We also watch spend across every card, vendor and subscription and flag duplicate tools, unused seats and price creep, which is the money neither Brex nor Expensify goes looking for.
Expenditure costs $20, $35 or $55 per seat per month billed yearly, with no active-member overage and no card requirement. That is more than Collect and we say so; what you pay for is GL coding and waste detection on every card you already carry. If you are weighing the wider field, our Expensify competitors roundup and the Brex competitors roundup cover the rest of the shortlist with prices read at source, and Expensify pricing walks through every Expensify rate in detail. We never move or hold your money, we are bank-grade secure with role-based access, and we never sell or train on your financial data. This is software and insight, not financial, tax or accounting advice.
Frequently asked questions
Is Brex still free after the Capital One acquisition?
Yes. Brex's pricing page, read September 17, 2026, lists Essentials at $0 per user per month and Premium at $12, and describes Brex LLC as a wholly owned subsidiary of Capital One. The Capital One deal closed on April 7, 2026 and the published prices did not change with it.
Does Expensify require the Expensify Card?
No. Both Collect and Control import card feeds from the cards you already have. The Expensify Card is optional, and its only pricing effect is the discount on Control, which takes $18 to as low as $9 per member per month and $36 to $18 for members above the subscription size.
Which is better for NetSuite, Brex or Expensify?
Both put NetSuite behind the paid tier: Brex Premium at $12 per user per month and Expensify Control at $18 per member per month annual. Brex lists customizable ERP integrations on Premium; Expensify names NetSuite, Sage Intacct, Workday and Certinia on Control. Price them at your headcount, then add the Brex FX markup if you buy abroad.
Brex vs Ramp vs Expensify: which is cheapest?
On entry plans, Brex and Ramp are $0 and Expensify Collect is $5 per member per month. On paid plans, Brex Premium is $12, Ramp Plus is $15 plus an unpublished platform fee, and Expensify Control is $18. Brex and Ramp are free because your spend moves to their cards; Expensify works on any card. The full Ramp comparison is on our Ramp vs Expensify pricing page.