Start fresh vs import from Xero

Nightbooks supports two starting points, chosen during onboarding. Both end in the same place — a full double-entry ledger — they just differ in where your history comes from.

Start fresh

Best if you are new to accounting software, or happy to leave history behind. Nightbooks seeds a standard New Zealand chart of accounts with GST rates configured. Your books begin from your first bank feed transaction, or from opening balances if you enter them.

• Fastest way to a working set of books — you can be reconciling within minutes.

• Bank feeds typically backfill up to 24 months of transactions, so you still get meaningful history.

• No dependency on the state of any previous system.

Import from Xero

Best if you have existing books you want to keep. Nightbooks connects to Xero (read-only), imports your chart of accounts, contacts, invoices, payments, bank transactions, journals and opening balances, then verifies the result against your Xero trial balance to the cent.

• You choose a cutover date: history before it is summarised into opening balances, everything after imports in full detail. See Choosing your cutover date.

• After importing you choose how to run: switch fully to Nightbooks (native) or keep Xero as the book of record while you trial Nightbooks alongside it (mirror). See Native vs Xero mirror mode.

• The import is repeatable — you can re-sync to pick up changes made in Xero before you switch.

If you are unsure, start fresh — you can create another organisation later and run an import when you are ready. Nothing about the choice is locked in at the account level.