How to Reconcile a Bank Account in Xero

Based on Xero’s own help pages (Reconcile your bank account and Find transactions to match), checked October 2026. Xero changes its screens often, so follow the labels you see.

Statement lines come first

Xero reconciles against bank statement lines: the transactions that arrive from a bank feed or from a statement file you import. If a period is missing (the feed started late, or broke for a while), import it first. Download the statement as OFX or CSV, or convert a CSV or PDF with Bank CSV to Xero, then follow importing a bank statement into Xero.

The bank account’s Bank Statements list shows each line’s status: Unreconciled, Reconciled or Deleted.

Step 1: Confirm the suggested matches

For each unreconciled line, Xero looks for a transaction in your books with the same amount and a similar date or reference, and suggests it. Check the suggestion and confirm it if it’s right.

Xero’s matching engine (JAX) reconciles a line automatically only when it is highly confident. Otherwise it suggests a match and leaves the decision to you.

Step 2: Use Find & Match for the rest

When the right invoice, bill or transaction is already in Xero but isn’t suggested, use Find & Match. It lets you:

• search for unreconciled transactions by amount, name or reference;
• reconcile one statement line against several items, such as one deposit paying three invoices;
• account for a bank fee or small difference as part of the match.

Step 3: Create transactions for lines with no match

Some lines aren’t in your books at all: bank fees, interest, or a payment you forgot to record. For those, create a new transaction from the statement line with the right account and tax rate. Bank rules can do this automatically for lines that repeat every month.

Reconciling without a statement line

If a transaction cleared the bank but its statement line can’t be imported, you can mark the transaction as reconciled by hand. Xero then creates a statement line to match it, labeled with the source User. Use this sparingly: importing the real statement is more reliable.

When Xero’s balance and the bank don’t agree

The bank reconciliation summary compares Xero’s statement balance with your books and helps you find missing, deleted or duplicated statement lines. The usual causes:

• A gap: days missing between an imported file and the start of the bank feed.
• A duplicate: the same period imported twice, or a file overlapping the feed. See how to fix duplicate bank transactions.
• A deleted line: a statement line removed by mistake, which needs re-importing.

For a stubborn difference, matching the statement against an export of the account in a spreadsheet often finds it faster: see bank reconciliation in Excel, which has a free template.

How often to reconcile

Xero’s own guide suggests reconciling weekly for most small businesses, daily if you have a lot of transactions, and monthly at the very least. Little and often keeps each session short and makes errors easier to place.

Frequently asked questions