Most people meet this problem on migration day. The file has been fine for years, the new QuickBooks Online company is already set up, and the import stops because of a number nobody mentioned until now. The number is real, it is easy to check in advance, and the figure you will find quoted online is very often out of date.
Check your own number first
QuickBooks Online limits an import by target count, not by how many megabytes the file takes up. In Desktop:
- Open Product Information. Press F2 or Ctrl+1 on Windows, or Cmd+1 on Mac.
- Find Total Targets, under File Information.
- Confirm the count. Intuit's current instruction is to confirm that count is below 4,000,000.
Do that before anyone creates the Online company, not on the day you plan to move.
If the import has already stopped
Intuit publishes the errors its import shows, and only one of them is about size. The wording on screen tells you which problem you have, so here they are by the message you will see.
Your file is too big to export
This is the size limit. Desktop Enterprise, Pro Plus and Premier Plus from the 2022 release on, and Desktop for Mac, are all capped at 4,000,000 targets. Check your count the way described above. Intuit's fix is to condense the file, which has costs of its own, covered further down.
Please delete all employees already entered in QuickBooks Online
The Online company already has employees, and the import can't replace them because they are tied to payroll items, year-to-date history and other payroll setup. If any of them have paychecks or pay history, Online won't let you delete them, and Intuit's answer is a new Online company with no payroll set up.
There was a problem checking this company for import eligibility
Usually a sign-in or setup problem on the Online side. The causes Intuit lists: you aren't a primary admin, company admin or accountant on the Online company, you didn't sign in to it before importing, or its setup interview isn't finished. Finish the setup, sign in as an admin, save the company address again, and retry. If it still fails, Intuit's answer is a new Online account, with the old subscription cancelled first.
The same page gives one more cause: trying to move more than 60 days after the subscription started. Intuit's time-limit article says 90. Until the two agree, treat the shorter number as the one to beat.
We can't export your data. It may be on a network drive
The company file is on a drive other than your computer's own C: drive, or it is open in multi-user mode. Copy it to the C: drive, open it from there, switch to single-user mode, and export again.
Export QBDT data to QBO: ERROR
The path to the company file is more than four folders deep. Copy the file into a new folder directly on the C: drive and export from there.
Error: FAILED
Desktop isn't on the latest release. Update it and try the move again.
Error in processing data for QuickBooks Desktop for Mac
The Mac edition isn't on the latest release. Update it and restart. If the error comes back, run Desktop's Verify and Rebuild utilities to check the file for damage.
You can't import because the QuickBooks Online company has been canceled
The Online subscription has lapsed. Resubscribe from Billing & subscription in the Online company's account settings, then import again.
The number you found online is probably wrong
Three different limits are live on Intuit's own properties right now.
- 350,000. A conversion checklist still hosted by Intuit tells accountants to verify the count is below 350,000.
- 750,000. Community answers from 2023, one of them from an Intuit moderator. Other posters in the same threads split that figure by plan.
- 4,000,000. The current help articles, flat, whatever plan you are moving to. Three separately maintained pages say it the same way.
If you are working from a number you found in a forum, check it against a current help article before you act on it.
There is a deadline as well as a limit
One limit has nothing to do with size. Once a QuickBooks Online company exists, you have 90 days to import your Desktop data into it, or 180 days if an accountant created the company. After that, Intuit's documented routes are importing your data manually from Excel, or cancelling the QuickBooks Online account, creating a new one, and moving the data again. The clock runs whether or not your file is oversized, so a file that needs weeks of work before it can be imported is a file with two problems rather than one.
What condensing actually costs
Condensing is Desktop's own tool for making a file smaller: File, then Utilities, then Condense Data. It works by removing detail, either older closed transactions or unused list entries. Two things are worth knowing before anyone runs it.
It cannot be undone. Intuit's wording is blunt: once you condense your company file, it can't be undone. Take a backup you keep somewhere else first.
It changes what your reports can tell you afterwards. Intuit lists the effects itself:
- Item-based reports come back blank, because the item data behind the condensed transactions is gone.
- Cash-basis reports for the condensed period are no longer accurate.
- Sales-tax liability reports show incorrect data.
- Reconciliation reports for that period may be incorrect, because the checks and deposits behind them no longer exist.
The other route: lists and balances only
Intuit's import also offers an option to bring only your lists and balances: customers, vendors, chart of accounts, employees and items, with no transaction history at all. It keeps you under any limit by definition, because almost nothing comes across, and Intuit does not spell out what the balances themselves contain. What you give up is every historical transaction, which means the Desktop file stays the only place your history exists. Keep it, and keep a way to open it.
When the file is a long way over
Intuit's documentation covers running the condense utility once. It does not say what to do when the count is still over the limit afterwards, and people do get stuck exactly there. If one condense does not bring a file under the limit, that usually means the volume is in the current year, which condensing does not reach: it works on closed transactions on or before a date you choose. At that point another pass is not the answer. The route is a different migration, one that brings the transaction detail across outside Intuit's own import. That is the kind of migration I do.
Ten Rivers Systems handles technical setup, configuration, and data migration only and does not provide accounting or tax advice. I am not an accountant or tax adviser. How you keep your books and what you owe stays between you and your own professionals.
Common questions
How do I check whether my QuickBooks file is too big to convert?
In QuickBooks Desktop, press F2 or Ctrl+1 on Windows, or Cmd+1 on Mac to open Product Information, and read Total Targets under File Information. Intuit's current limit is under 4,000,000 targets. The limit counts targets, not megabytes, so the file's size on disk does not answer the question.
Why do I keep seeing 350,000 or 750,000 as the limit?
Both numbers were current once and both are still discoverable. A conversion checklist on Intuit's own site still says 350,000, and community answers from 2023 say 750,000. The current help articles say under 4,000,000, on three separate pages.
Is there a time limit as well as a size limit?
Yes, and they are separate. Once a QuickBooks Online company is created you have 90 days to import Desktop data into it, or 180 days if an accountant created the company. After that, Intuit's documented routes are importing the data manually from Excel, or cancelling the account and starting again.
