How to run the trial balance (detailed and by level)

What is it for?

The trial balance shows, account by account, the balance at the start of the period, the period's debits and credits and the balance at the end. It is the first check of any closing: if an account has a balance it should not have (a bank in credit, a customer in credit, a transit account that did not end at zero), you see it here before it reaches the balance sheet or the return.

Running the trial balance creates and changes no journal entries: it only reads what is posted.

When to use it?

• At the end of each month, before closing VAT and submitting the periodic VAT return.
• To send a period's balances to the certified accountant, the bank or Management, as a PDF or a spreadsheet.
• To look for an account with an odd balance and see the journal entries that caused it.
• To see the balances by account and by class, the report many accountants call the detailed trial balance (balancete analítico: opening balance, debits, credits and closing balance of each account).

Where to find it?

Accounting › Review › Trial balance (in the Books and trial balances group).

Before you start

• Your profile is Accountant. With it you can do every step of this article, including the exports (tested with the Accountant profile). Management and the Auditor also have the menu; the Billing profile does not have the Accounting app.
• The period's journal entries are posted. Drafts are not included unless you ask for them (step 4).
• In the example, Empresa Demonstração, Lda, on 29/10/2026, with fiscal year 2026.

How to use it

1. Open Accounting › Review › Trial balance. The trial balance opens on the current fiscal year (Year, 01/01/2026 – 31/12/2026), with one line per chart of accounts class and the Opening balance, Movements of the period and Closing balance columns, each with Debit and Credit.

2. Choose the period. Month, Quarter and Year change the length of the period; the ‹ and › arrows move backwards and forwards; the list next to them picks the month, quarter or year. With Month it opens on the current month (in the example, October 2026) and with Quarter on the current quarter (Q4 2026, 01/10/2026 – 31/12/2026). For a month or quarter, the Opening balance already includes the movements of the earlier months of the fiscal year.

3. Check the badge next to the title: Debits = credits. Also check the last line, Total: the debits and credits of each pair of columns are equal (in the example, €219,500.00, €633,431.68 and €392,894.57).

4. For more detail, click More filters. The most used options:

   • Unfold all opens every class down to the accounts; to open only one, click the triangle to the left of the class.
   • Level, with Unfold all ticked, shows the trial balance only down to that level. With 2, class 2 opens into 21 Clientes, 22 Fornecedores, 23 Pessoal, 24 Estado e outros entes públicos… In classes 1 and 5, level 2 shows 11 Caixa, 12 Depósitos à ordem, 51 Capital subscrito and 56 Resultados transitados.
   • Movements: Of the period or Accumulated in the year.
   • Account entries shows, under each account, the journal entries that moved it (date, document number and description), with the Document link to open them.
   • Include drafts adds the journal entries not yet posted (see “Important notes”).
   • Variant: General, VAT or Withholdings and stamp duty.
   • Variation (Δ and Δ %) vs comparison shows the difference from the previous period. The comparison is switched on with Compare with previous period, in the period bar, outside More filters.

   The other options in the panel are From and until (dates of your choice), Default period, Hide accounts without values (ticked by default), By tax, Accounts from and until, Exclude accounts (for example 2432, 62*), Control line (total debits = total credits) (ticked), Companies, Group accounts by hierarchy (ticked), Show amounts in (Units, Thousands, Millions) and Journals.

5. To take the trial balance out, click Export PDF, or click Export and choose Export with options…, Export XLSX, Export CSV (PT format), Export CSV (technical) or Print. The file comes out with the period and options shown on screen.

6. If you will use the same options again, click Save options. Copy link copies the address of the trial balance with the chosen options, to send to a colleague; Reset goes back to the original options.

Expected result

• The badge says Debits = credits and the Total line has debits equal to credits in each pair of columns.
• The PDF has the company name, the tax number (NIF), the period, the date and the name of the user who issued it (“Issued … by …”), and the same amounts as on screen. In the example (Empresa_Demonstracao_Lda_Balancete_2026-01-01_2026-12-31.pdf), the lines of the 8 classes and the total are the same as on screen, and so are the XLSX and the CSV (PT format) (checked one by one).
• No journal entry is created: the trial balance only reads.

Important notes

• In the balances, the total is not the sum of the classes. Each class shows the net balance of its accounts; the Total line adds up the balance of each account. That is why, in the example, the classes' opening debit balance (€209,804.16) differs from the total (€219,500.00); the screen itself says so on the total line. In Movements of the period, the total is the sum of the classes (€633,431.68).
• Drafts change the figures. With Include drafts ticked, the example's movements go from €633,431.68 to €637,794.55. Do not send a trial balance with drafts to third parties without saying so; untick the option before exporting.
• Class 8 in the fiscal year after the closing of the result. In the example, the 2025 result was closed (entries APR/2025/00001 and APR/2025/00002, dated 31/12/2025, which move classes 6 and 7 to 811 and 811 to 818 Resultado líquido, €31,104.16 in credit) and appropriated in 2026 (MISC/2026/00013, dated 02/01/2026, “Aplicação do resultado de 2025”: 818 in debit and 561 Resultados transitados in credit, €31,104.16). The 2026 trial balance shows class 8 RESULTADOS with €31,104.16 in credit in the Opening balance, €31,104.16 in debit in Movements of the period and €0.00 in the Closing balance, which is the real balance of 818.
• The Account link opens the account form, not the journal entries. To see an account's journal entries, use Account entries in More filters or the general ledger.

Detailed trial balance

The detailed trial balance, in the sense of balances by account, is this report. The trial balance by cost centre (analytic accounting) is another screen, in Review › Books and trial balances, explained in How to use cost centres.

Common problems

The trial balance only shows the Total line with zeros

• Cause: the chosen company has no journal entries posted in the period. In a company with no journal entries at all, the trial balance shows only Total at €0.00 and the Debits = credits badge (seen in an empty demo company).
• What to do: check the company in the top-right corner and the period. If the journal entries exist but are in draft, post them, or tick Include drafts only to check.

An account does not appear

• Cause: Hide accounts without values is ticked and the account has no balance or movements in the period, or the account is in Exclude accounts or outside Accounts from and until.
• What to do: in More filters, untick Hide accounts without values and clear the account filters.

Opening the account form shows “The 2-digit account 62 does not exist in the chart of accounts…”

• Symptom: on the account form (Account link), a yellow banner: “The 2-digit account 62 does not exist in the chart of accounts of Empresa Demonstração, Lda. An account under an unknown prefix may be rejected by the SAF-T; create the parent account 62 or check the code.”
• What to do: it does not affect the trial balance. Before generating the accounting SAF-T, talk to the certified accountant about the parent accounts of the chart.