inFlow Inventory vs Katana

inFlow Inventory

Stock levels update from sales and purchases across locations, transfers and full counts are supported, reorder points fire per product per location, and fulfilled sales push updated stock to all connected storefronts — the overselling problem I live with is addressed head on. Lots, serial numbers and expiry dates are tracked end to end, with an exportable lot movement history, expiry notifications and a write-off shortcut for expired stock. I found no public information on reorder suggestions driven by sales history, a stated costing method, stock transfers in transit or multi-entity stock, so it stops short of the audit-grade level.

Katana

Stock updates automatically as Shopify, Amazon and WooCommerce orders come in, and the depth is there for my mix: batches shown FIFO with expiry gating, serial numbers with adjustments recorded in item history, multi-bin locations, kits resolved through bills of materials, and reorder quantities computed from stock, forecast demand, safety stock and MOQ. I found no public information on stocktaking support or a stated inventory valuation method, which is what keeps the stock ledger short of audit-proof.

inFlow Inventory

Bin and aisle locations, goods receipt against purchase orders with lot and expiry assignment, route-sorted pick lists with bulk printing, and automatic allocations that stop two pickers taking the same units cover my daily shift, with scanning on phones, DYMO or Zebra printers or the vendor's own rugged scanner. Picking options steer which sublocation to draw from, including a first-expiring suggestion for dated goods. I found no public information on batch, wave or multi-order picking, putaway suggestions, packing verification, or pick and error rates per user and shift.

Katana

The Warehouse App gives me receiving tasks against purchase orders, picking and packing driven by order status, barcode workflows on any device with a camera, storage bins, and it records which operator received or packed each order — with pricing hidden from warehouse staff. I found no public information on batch or wave picking, putaway suggestions, or pick and error rates per user and shift, so this is mobile task management rather than a full warehouse management system.

inFlow Inventory

Labels are bought through ShipStation and EasyPost against my own carrier accounts (FedEx, UPS, USPS and Purolator are the named ones), with a claimed price comparison across carriers, saved parcel sizes, and a shipment confirmation email to the customer when the carrier collects. Returns are handled on the sales order with refund, credit and restock-or-discard, which is workable but manual. I found no public information on bulk label printing, tracking numbers written back to my shop, customs paperwork beyond a prefilled VAT/Tax ID, pickup points, or a self-service returns portal — the customs pack for Switzerland and the January returns wave are exactly where the pages go quiet.

Katana

The captured pages give no label creation, no customs documents and no carrier rules — their own shipping overview expects e-commerce platforms to handle direct-to-consumer shipping, with ShipStation, Shippo and 2Ship reachable as integrations and tracking numbers added back to sales orders. The returns side is real: a central returns tab linked to original orders, item-level reasons, selective restocking, Shopify return sync and automatic credit notes in QuickBooks Online, though I found no public information on a customer-facing returns portal or returns label flow.

inFlow Inventory

I found no public information on pallet, groupage or truckload freight, sea or air shipments, quotes or tenders, transport documents such as CMR, or emissions per shipment. The product pages position inFlow around inventory, orders and parcel labels, and the single freight reference I found is a cost-recording field on sales orders, which is bookkeeping rather than transport management.

Katana

I found no public information on pallet, groupage, truckload, sea or air freight booking, transport documents such as CMR, freight cost audit or CO2 reporting; the shipping and integrations pages I read cover parcel shipping through e-commerce platforms and partner tools only.

inFlow Inventory

Shopify, Amazon, WooCommerce, Squarespace and Square cover my shop and marketplace channels, QuickBooks Online and Xero cover the accounting side, and there is a documented REST API with read and write, key management and pagination, plus Zapier and an MCP server for automation. Exit is documented unusually honestly: self-serve exports to CSV, Excel or PDF for products, stock, customers, orders and purchase orders, with the exclusions (manufacture orders, attachments, most addresses) stated. Against that, the API sits behind a paid add-on on select plans, the support team cannot assist with API questions directly, and I found no public information on webhooks, EDI, or documented rate limits and versioning.

Katana

Connectors cover the channels I sell on — Shopify, Amazon, WooCommerce, BigCommerce, eBay — plus QuickBooks and Xero with purchase orders converted to bills in one click, an open API with keys and webhooks for real-time updates, Zapier, and even an MCP server for AI assistants. EDI appears as custom integrations their engineers build on the Advantage plan rather than a standard offering, and I found no public documentation of API rate limits and versioning or of a complete data export at the end of the contract.

inFlow Inventory

The contracting entity is Archon Systems Inc., an Ontario corporation, and all service data is hosted in Microsoft's North Central US Azure region in Illinois; I found no public information on an EU hosting option, and every recipient address on every label flows through that chain. The privacy policy does name Azure, points to a subprocessor list on the vendor's trust centre that is not among the pages I read, explains that I remain controller for my own data, and claims GDPR compliance with EU model clauses and an annually audited SOC 2. A solid paper trail, but with a Canadian entity and US hosting it sits at the basic level rather than a European one.

Katana

The contracting entity is Katana Technologies OÜ in Estonia, the terms contain an Article 28 processing contract, transfers rely on Standard Contractual Clauses or the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework, and a completed SOC 2 Type II audit is published with deletion timelines stated. Against that, the subprocessor list is only provided on request, and the captured pages give different pictures of where data lands — the privacy policy says the service is hosted in the EU while the terms allow systems and providers in the United States and other jurisdictions.

inFlow Inventory

The four inventory tiers are priced publicly — Lite 79, Core 229, Pro 389 and Max 539 EUR per month billed annually, with a stated annual saving of 20% — alongside member options of 2, 5, 10 and 20, unlimited products, sales, purchases and integrations on all plans, a required one-time 399 EUR onboarding, optional packages at 799 and 2299 EUR, extra training at 169 EUR per hour and the Stockroom add-on from 29 EUR per month. Before I could compute a real annual cost I would still need the API add-on's price, the plans that include lot tracking and single sign-on, hardware prices, VAT treatment and the tier price at each member count beyond the starting figures. The captured pages also give different figures for the currency — EUR on the pricing page, USD payable in the terms — so a European buyer should confirm that before signing.

Katana

The free tier is fully specified at zero dollars with no card, thirty SKUs and unlimited users, and the Core plan is public starting at $299 per month with the base fee including unlimited users and one location, taxes excluded and billing commitments from monthly to annual. But the per-sales-order usage fees, the per-location fee and the Advantage plan are not quantified on the captured pages, so I cannot compute my real annual cost at three hundred orders a day.