Free TMS for Trucking: What Is Actually Free in 2026

There is no full-featured trucking TMS that stays free. The one published $0 tier is RTS ProTransport Basic, and it covers driver and truck profiles, IFTA reporting, and document storage. QuickBooks sync and real-time load alerts are not on it. Spreadsheets are the other free option, and they work until the paperwork outgrows them. Truxello does not have a free plan. The trial is 14 days with no credit card, then $29 a month for the first truck.

We sell Truxello, so this page is explicit about the free offer we cannot beat. Prices below were taken from each vendor’s site in October 2026.

The direct answer

“Free TMS” usually means one of three different things, and mixing them up is how carriers get surprised at checkout.

• A free tier stays at $0 as long as you stay inside its limits.
• A free trial ends on a date. After that you pay or you stop.
• A directory listing can be years out of date. If the vendor’s own pricing page disagrees with Capterra or a roundup, believe the vendor.

The one $0 tier

ProTransport, owned by RTS, publishes four tiers: Basic at $0 a month, Premium at $125 a month flat, and Enterprise and Legacy at custom pricing. Basic includes driver and truck profiles, IFTA, and document storage. If that is the whole job, it is cheaper than anything else in this category, including us, and you should use it.

The limits are the point. Automatic WEX fuel imports and driver pay statements are on Premium at $125. QuickBooks integration and real-time load alerts are on the custom-priced Enterprise tier. A carrier who needs those is not on a free plan. They are on a plan whose price they have not been quoted yet.

Two practical cautions, both from public information rather than from us:

• ProTransport sits inside RTS, which sells factoring and fuel cards. That is a feature if you already use RTS. It is a reason to read the terms if you do not.
• At least one public review described being charged after an unmonitored trial and refused a refund. Before you start anything that can convert, get in writing what becomes paid, when, and how you cancel. That advice applies to every trial on this page, including ours.

The longer comparison is the ProTransport alternative page. Above about eight trucks, Premium at a flat $125 is cheaper than Truxello’s per-truck price. Under that, the free tier is the only ProTransport price that beats a paid TMS, and only if its feature list covers you.

Spreadsheets

For a brand-new authority with a few loads a week, a spreadsheet is a reasonable TMS. It costs nothing, you already know it, and you are not locked in. It fails in specific places: the rate confirmation gets retyped, the invoice goes out late or with the wrong reference number, fuel receipts live in the truck, and IFTA becomes a reconstruction project every quarter. Those failures are annoying at five loads a month and expensive at twenty.

If you are in the first weeks of a new MC, software is not the bottleneck. Freight is. Keep the stack cheap until trucks are moving, and read how to get loads with a new MC authority before you shop for a TMS.

Free trials, which are not free plans

A trial is only useful if you can run real freight through it. Fourteen days is enough for a week of loads, one invoice, and a look at how fuel lands. It is not enough to see a quarterly IFTA filing unless you are already near a quarter boundary. TruckingOffice’s 30 days is the longest no-card trial in this table. TruckLogics lists 7 days on its pricing page. Some third-party sites list a longer TruckLogics trial. Believe the vendor’s page.

Truxello’s trial includes every feature, because there is one plan. When it ends, the account goes read-only until you subscribe. Nothing is deleted on day 15. There is still no free plan after that, and anyone telling you otherwise is quoting a listing we do not control.

Offers that look free and are not

• AscendTMS “free basic.” Directories still describe a free tier for up to two users, and an older Premium price. AscendTMS’s own pricing page shows $69, $119, and $149 per user per month, with no free tier. Trucks are free on those plans because the meter is on office users, which is a different deal from $0.
• A low monthly price with a setup fee. ITS Dispatch starts at $50 a month for one or two trucks and adds a one-time $125 setup fee on carrier plans. The first invoice is not $50.
• Annual billing described as free months. Truxello’s annual plan is two months off, which is a discount, not a free product. You are still paying for ten months.
• A free driver app. An app without dispatch, invoicing, and settlements is a messaging tool. Truxello’s driver app is free, and the TMS it connects to is not.
• Enterprise “free demos.” A demo is a sales meeting. It is not time on the software with your own loads.

The full price table, including the products that will not publish a number at all, is what a trucking TMS actually costs.

If you only need IFTA

Buying a TMS to file one quarterly return is the expensive way to solve a narrow problem. Two cheaper paths:

• ProTransport Basic includes IFTA at $0, with the limits above.
• Truxello IFTA is a separate app, not the TMS. It is free to start and $7.99 a month, for iPhone and iPad, and it tracks fuel stops and the quarterly return. It does not dispatch loads or send invoices. It lives at truxello.com/ifta.

If IFTA is one job among dispatch and invoicing, it belongs inside the TMS. Truxello builds the report from the miles on the loads you already ran and the gallons from EFS, WEX, or Comdata imports. That is included at $29. It is not a reason to expect the TMS itself to be free.

When free stops being the cheap option

A missed detention line, an invoice kicked back for the wrong reference number, or a weekend rebuilding IFTA costs more than $29. That is the whole case for paying. It is also a case you should be able to see, which is why a no-card trial matters more than a permanent free tier that cannot invoice.

Run one week on the tool you are considering. If ProTransport Basic covers the week, stay there and pay nothing. If you spend the week retyping rate cons and assembling invoice packets, the free option was not free. Truxello after the trial is $29 for the first truck, $15 for each truck from 2 to 10, and $12 after that, with office users and loads unlimited.

Questions about free trucking software

Is there a free TMS for trucking companies?

ProTransport Basic is $0 a month for profiles, IFTA, and document storage. It does not include QuickBooks sync or real-time load alerts. Spreadsheets are the other free option. A TMS that dispatches, invoices, and syncs to accounting has a price.

Which trucking TMS products have a free trial?

TruckingOffice, 30 days, no card. Truxello, 14 days, no card. TruckLogics, 7 days. ITS Dispatch has none. Enterprise products generally offer a demo instead of a trial.

Does Truxello have a free plan?

No. The 14-day trial includes every feature and does not ask for a card. After that the first truck is $29 a month. There is no load cap and no free tier hiding behind a directory listing.