Analytic accounting in Odoo: where margin comes from (or goes)

Practical guide to plans, cost distribution and profitability

October 9, 2026 by

Financial accounting tells you if you made a profit. Analytic accounting tells you where. It is not a tax. It is not the official P&L. It is an internal tree: plans (dimensions) and accounts, to see a business, a customer, or a grant without touching the chart of accounts.

In Odoo 16 tags became plans. Accounts kept the same name. The video is recorded in Odoo 19 Enterprise. In Community the base module is the same. Albert Cabedo, Contaldia. About 67 minutes plus Q&A.

3 plans

project, business, grant
at ~70% of Contaldia clients

100 %

a mandatory plan must sum to 100
or Odoo will not let you post

67 min

the full video
demo in Odoo 19 + Q&A

Turn on analytic accounting

You need the Spanish localization (Spanish accounting installed). Accounting → Configuration → one checkbox turns on analytic accounting. In Enterprise there is nothing else to install. In Community the base module is the same; extras (parents, product category in older versions) are OCA.

Accounting settings: checkbox that turns on analytic accounting

Accounting settings. The checkbox that turns on plans and accounts. Video screenshot, 04:29.

Without that checkbox there are no plans or accounts. You do not need a special module if you are on 16+. Until v16 there were analytic tags; from v16 there are plans. Albert does not recommend the module that in 16/17/18 simulated the tags: it caused problems.

Invoice analysis in a pivot table: category, month, base, and margin

Before you create a plan

Invoice analysis (pivot table) is not analytic accounting. Albert uses it every day and has not configured anything. Columns: base, quantity, margin, average price, product category, month, customer, year, product, country.

Other paths he shows before touching a plan: 629 and 700 subaccounts, several sales journals, the margins module. Invoice sequences: in 99% of cases he does not recommend them; that is what analytic accounting is for.

This is not analytic accounting. Sales by country or by category: start here, not on a plan. The same kind of analysis is in inventory and on sales orders. You can download it to Excel or send it to a spreadsheet / dashboard.

Plans and accounts (the tree)

Create few plans. The three that show up at ~70% of Contaldia clients: project or customer, business, and grants. Install Projects if you want the customer plan: each project creates the account and nests it. On each plan, the actual accounts. Overhead: a «general expenses» or «administration» account on the business plan.

In the demo: project plan → PL SL and Peter SL; business plan → IT and Recursos humanos; grants plan → one ICO. On the plan: optional / mandatory / unavailable, color, and a domain only if needed.

Analytic accounts created and nested by the project on the customer plan

The project already is an account

When you install Projects, the plan appears. Each project creates the nested analytic account. In the demo, Power/Peter is linked to the plan. You do not need to invent the tree twice.

Analytic plan form: sub-plans, optional or mandatory, color, and domain

Plan form: sub-plans, optional / mandatory / unavailable, color, and domain. 16:42.

Analytic accounting does not generate tax. You set it up and undo it for internal use. Mandatory = that plan must sum to 100% or Odoo blocks. Optional can go over 100% if it sits next to another plan. Analytic parent accounts: not in standard; OCA account_analytic_parent. Albert does not need it to see profitability by business and by customer.

Automate: distribution models

By hand on every invoice it does not hold: it is a nest of errors. Configuration → analytic distribution models. Turn on columns (product category is often hidden). Criteria: contact, product, product category, GL accounts.

Albert's usual recipe: contact → customer plan; product category → business plan. Limit to accounts 6 and 7. A grant with its own account: often by hand. Sort the list: the one on top wins if they clash (in the video he flags it with doubt).

Analytic distribution models with contact, product, and category columns

Distribution models. Turn on the product category column if it is hidden. 23:10.

Customer invoice with analytic distribution filled in automatically

It has to fill itself in

Test: an invoice for the contact or a product (Bodyboard in the demo) must carry analytic without typing it. In the demo, everything from Pau Muñoz goes to Paul SL. The product gets the analytic accounts when you pick it.

Groups 6 and 7 only. Capital, customers, VAT (groups 1 to 5) must not carry analytic: it is for a «tuned» P&L, not for the balance sheet. If a 430 or a 2xx shows analytic, the setup is wrong. In versions before 18, product category may not exist: OCA module.

Want to build the tree on your Spanish chart of accounts?

info@contaldia.com · 931 94 94 80

Where it is fed from (always the journal entry)

It is fed from financial accounting, wherever it comes from. Posted invoice → the 6/7 journal item carries the distribution. Manual journal entry (inventory variation, payroll): distribution on the line. Sale or subscription: there is an analytic column (you have to turn it on); it counts when you post the invoice, not on a draft quotation.

Assets: analytic goes on depreciation (681), not on the asset purchase. The purchase is not group 6/7. You set it on the asset or on the asset model. You can automate it: everything on 681 → general expenses.

Asset model with analytic distribution on account 681

681 yes, purchase no

The fixed-asset purchase does not carry analytic. Depreciation does. On the asset model you set the 681 distribution. 32:30 in the video.

Analytic and financial do not have to tie out. Prepayments, accruals, and a grants plan half allocated prevent it. Recurring question from the webinar. On POS the terminal has no native field: product, category, or a Simplified Invoice customer (one per store if there are several POS).

group 7 lines
with no analytic, in the demo

group 6 lines
also empty

6 and 7

the only accounts
that should carry analytic

Check that nothing is missing (or extra)

In v19: Journal Entries (create few) versus Journal Items (Review) = every line. Accounting → Review → Journal Items. Filter: account 6… or 7… + analytic not set → fill in. The other way: if a 430, a VAT, or a 2xx carries analytic, remove it. Add the column if it is hidden and save the filter.

Journal items filtered: group 6 and analytic account not set

Journal items. Group 6 + analytic account not set. 38:09. Forty-two and fourteen empty, as in the demo, mean the tree exists and automation does not cover everything.

Deleting an analytic item does not touch the journal. Analytic ends up wrong. Another reason it does not tie to financial: someone deletes lines or allocates badly (removes 5,000 and only puts 3,000). Albert never edits analytic items, except when reallocating general expenses.

Analytic items: −5,000 on general expenses and allocation to businesses

Reallocate general expenses

Analytic items are not journal entries: one line, no debit or credit. The 5,000 of overhead is not moved with a journal entry. You post a manual analytic item: −5,000 on general expenses (it goes to 0), +3,000 on IT, +2,000 on the other line. Basis: sales, hours, whatever the company uses. It is internal.

Timesheets and payroll not at the same time. Logging hours on a project creates an analytic line if the user is linked to the employee and there is an hourly rate (demo: Albert 30 €/h). If you post the hourly cost and payroll with analytic, you double it. Decision in the video: technicians who log the 8 h → analytic from timesheets, not on payroll; admin staff → analytic on payroll. So the timesheet does not cost: do not link user–employee, or hourly cost = 0.

Reports: pivot, P&L, and MIS

Analytic items → pivot view. Month, business, customer. «None» = expense with no customer. If «analytic report» exists, it is the same pivot; if it is not there, the pivot view is in every version. Enterprise: Reporting → P&L → filter by plan and by account. Community: MIS → analytic filter.

One plan at a time. Two plans at once on the v19 P&L show as columns. To filter a plan on journal items: «project is set», not an «analytic plan» field. One hundred percent on the customer and one hundred percent on the business is not double income: they are two readings. Adding them into a single total is the mistake. This does not replace knowing the company: without clear lines the tree is useless. Analytic accounting comes in when the invoice pivot is not enough.

Profit and Loss filtered by analytic plans and accounts

P&L filtered by plans and accounts: one business, one customer, one grant. 49:41. In the demo, Peter account: 1,100 € of income and 5,000 € of expense → the customer is not profitable.

Optional at the top, 705 mandatory: it works in 19. In 17, an optional plan at the top plus mandatory on applicability lines blocked. Live test: a product with 700 posts without analytic; with 705 it requires it. Logic Albert recommends: optional plan at the top; mandatory only on the accounts that need it. Mandatory at the top = mandatory for everyone. Credit note: it carries the analytic from the line (live demo).

October 29 · 12:00–14:00 · online

Full course on Spanish accounting in Odoo 20.

Full video: YouTube. Tree on your Spanish chart: info@contaldia.com · 931 94 94 80.

in Accounting