The decision in brief
Our assessment
Shortlist Katana when sales, materials, and manufacturing need one operational view. Price the required manufacturing and traceability features before comparing its base subscription with another product.
What to know about pricing
Core · per account · Public monthly starting price; confirm configured quote
Core excludes some manufacturing/traceability/warehouse capabilities. Usage, locations and onboarding can increase the total; do not compare an add-on price as a standalone subscription.
Compare the full cost of your workflow, including seats, order volume, add-ons, and implementation where applicable. A starting price is not a quote for your business.
Strengths and tradeoffs
Useful strengths
- Inventory, sales orders, purchasing, production, and warehouse work share one operating record.
- Live stock visibility spans channels, locations, materials, and finished goods.
- Commerce, accounting, shipping, API, and automation connections extend the inventory core.
Points to check
- Accurate planning depends on clean items, units, bills of materials, locations, and opening stock.
- Warehouse, manufacturing, forecasting, users, and integrations vary by plan.
- The product is centered on physical-goods operations rather than general service work.
The decision is about the production workflow
A product business can need more than a channel stock counter: it must decide which order gets scarce material, what to purchase, and when finished units can ship. Evaluate Katana around these connected decisions.
Use one shared scenario with MRPeasy rather than separate vendor demos. Ask both vendors to show a missing component, a partial receipt, and a shipment before the production job is finished.
A useful detail to test: partial completion
Katana's documentation says partial manufacturing completion uses planned ingredient quantities until the order is fully completed. Actual ingredient use is applied at final completion. That distinction matters when scrap or yield differs from the recipe.
In the trial, complete 8 of 20 stands, record the ingredient and finished balances, and ship 6. Finish the remaining 12, then reconcile any actual-use adjustment. Avoid calling an interim planned cost a final batch cost.
Compare the configured price
Budget for Core and the Manufacturing Management add-on separately. Use the dated plan records below, then confirm the full subscription, usage, locations and onboarding in a quote.
Check whether you also need traceability, extra locations, warehouse features, usage capacity, or onboarding. The limited free plan is not a like-for-like substitute for a paid production workflow.
What would make it the right choice?
Keep Katana on the shortlist if your operators can follow the material shortage through purchasing, production, and delivery without maintaining a second spreadsheet. Reject or escalate any unexplained difference in available, expected, reserved, and on-hand stock.
The linked comparison supplies the complete fictional ledger. Time the routine tasks and record missing capabilities yourself; we have not measured task speed, support quality, or implementation effort.
A few more useful answers.
Is Katana an inventory system or an ERP?
Katana centers on cloud inventory, sales, purchasing, and manufacturing operations, with integrations for surrounding systems. Whether it replaces an ERP depends on your accounting, compliance, HR, service, project, and reporting requirements.
Can Katana track raw materials and finished products?
Yes. Its manufacturing model connects product recipes or BOMs, components, manufacturing orders, and finished goods. Test co-products, scrap, substitutions, outsourced steps, units of measure, lot traceability, and rework if those matter.
Does Katana work with Shopify and accounting software?
Katana documents ecommerce and accounting integrations, including Shopify, QuickBooks, and Xero-related workflows. Confirm sync direction, timing, tax, refunds, bundles, locations, COGS, and failure recovery for your exact stack.
How should a manufacturer test Katana?
Use a sandbox dataset containing a multi-level product, shortage, partial receipt, rush order, scrap, return, stock adjustment, and month-end reconciliation. Include an operator, planner, purchaser, salesperson, and accountant in acceptance testing.
Sources and research scope
By the ArtisanSW Research Desk. This assessment draws on published product information. It does not claim firsthand product testing or measured customer outcomes. Confirm material requirements in a trial or with the vendor.
- Katana pricing and feature table
- Katana manufacturing orders
- Katana: partially completing a manufacturing order
- Katana: partial shipment when making to order
- Katana: applying recipe changes to open orders
Have a correction? Email info@artisansw.com with the claim and a supporting source.
Keep the terms in view
Plans, prices & the important limits
Prices are checked against official sources and show the verification date. Currency, billing commitment and usage charges matter; these are not like-for-like total costs.
Core · per account · Public monthly starting price; confirm configured quote
Checked Oct 2, 2026Official pricing ↗- Free
- Free per accountNo subscription charge · 30 SKUs; unlimited users; Free ecommerce integration currently limited to Shopify.
- Core
- US$299/mo per accountPublic monthly starting price; confirm configured quote · Unlimited users; 1 location
- Manufacturing Management add-on
- US$199/mo per accountAdditional monthly charge · Requires applicable base subscription
- Traceability add-on
- US$249/mo per accountAdditional monthly charge · Requires applicable base subscription
- Warehouse Management add-on
- US$149/mo per accountAdditional monthly charge · Requires applicable base subscription
Core excludes some manufacturing/traceability/warehouse capabilities. Usage, locations and onboarding can increase the total; do not compare an add-on price as a standalone subscription.
