A photo of the finished work is often the quickest way to get an invoice paid. The customer sees what they are paying for, and a charge that needs explaining — the rotten subfloor under the old tile, the extra outlet they asked for on the day — arrives with its evidence.
Invoicing tools handle photos in different ways, though. A few put the photo on the invoice. Most attach it as a separate file, and some only show it on a web page the customer has to open. Here is what the common tools do, checked against their own help pages in September 2026.
Two ways a photo can travel with an invoice
- On the invoice. The photo is part of the invoice document. It is in the PDF, on paper, and still there when the customer forwards the invoice to whoever pays the bills.
- Attached to the invoice. The photo travels as a separate file with the email, or sits on the online invoice page. The PDF itself has no picture in it.
Attachments are fine for one or two photos. With twenty, the customer gets a pile of files
named IMG_4127.jpg and nothing saying which is the before and which is the after.
Invoice Simple
Invoice Simple puts photos on the invoice itself.
- In the app: open the invoice, tap Add Photo, then take a photo or choose one from your library.
- On the web: Add Photo is at the bottom of the invoice.
You can add a description to each image. According to Invoice Simple’s help center, the images appear on both the web copy and the PDF, and the customer can click one to enlarge it.
QuickBooks Online
QuickBooks Online attaches photos as files rather than placing them inside the invoice.
- Create or open the invoice.
- At the bottom, under Attachments, add the photo.
- Tick Attach to email for each file the customer should receive.
QuickBooks staff on the QuickBooks Community also point to Account and settings → Sales → Online delivery, where the email settings decide whether full details and the PDF go out with the invoice. Users there report that attachments arrive in no particular order, so give the files clear names before you upload them.
Square Invoices
Square takes up to 10 attachments per invoice, 25 MB in total, as JPG, PNG, GIF, TIFF, BMP or PDF.
- On a computer: under More options, click Add attachment.
- In the app: under Details, tap Add an attachment, name the file if you like, and tap Upload.
PayPal
PayPal invoices accept attachments, including JPG, PNG and PDF files, and you can keep attachments in an invoice template for repeat jobs. When PayPal introduced the feature, the limit was five files per invoice; check the current limit in the invoice editor.
Xero
Xero has two separate switches, and it is easy to set only one of them:
- On the invoice, use Attach files to upload the photo, and tick Include with online invoice so it shows on the invoice page the customer opens.
- When you email the invoice, tick Include files as attachments so the files go out with the email.
Neither puts the photo into the invoice PDF. Xero’s product ideas forum carries a request from construction users to add photos to invoices.
Wave
Invoice attachments are part of Wave’s Pro Plan. Open the invoice, click Edit invoice, then use the + in the Attachments section, or drag files in. Keep the files under 5 MB: larger ones do not go out with the email, although the customer still sees them at the bottom of the online invoice.
Jobber
In Jobber, adding photos from your file library to an invoice is part of the Grow and Plus plans, and it is done on Jobber.com, not in the app. The photos are not printed in the PDF: the PDF lists the file names and links to client hub, where the customer can view or download them.
Invoice2go
Invoice2go supports attaching photos to invoices, estimates and expenses, and adding a photo from a project to an invoice. Its help pages did not let me confirm where the photos appear or how many you can add, so send a test invoice to yourself first.
At a glance
| Tool | Where the photo ends up | Worth knowing |
|---|---|---|
| Invoice Simple | On the invoice, web copy and PDF | Description per photo |
| QuickBooks Online | Email attachment | Tick Attach to email; order not controllable |
| Square Invoices | Attachment | 10 files, 25 MB in total |
| PayPal | Attachment | Five files per invoice when launched |
| Xero | Online invoice page, and email if ticked | Two separate switches |
| Wave | Online invoice, and email under 5 MB | Pro Plan |
| Jobber | Client hub; the PDF lists file names | Grow and Plus plans, Jobber.com only |
| Invoice2go | Supported; placement not confirmed | Test before relying on it |
Checked against each tool’s help pages in September 2026. Plans and limits change, so look again before you build a habit around one.
More than a few photos? Send one PDF
Twenty loose photos make the customer do the sorting. One PDF with the photos in order — before, during, after — reads better and survives being forwarded to an office manager or an insurer. On an iPhone you can make one without another app:
- In Photos, select the photos, tap Share, then Save to Files, and choose a folder.
- In Files, open the folder, tap More (…), then Select, choose the photos, tap More again and Create PDF.
- Open the new PDF to check the page order, then attach that one file to the invoice.
Some guides report that Create PDF only appears for JPEG images. If it is missing, the photos are probably in Apple’s HEIC format; Settings → Camera → Formats → Most Compatible makes the camera save JPEG from then on.
A PDF made this way has no captions. If a photo needs a sentence of explanation, put that sentence on the invoice line it supports.
Which photos belong with an invoice
- The finished work, from the same angle as a before photo if you took one.
- Anything that explains a line item: damage found once the old material came out, a part that had to be replaced, a change the customer asked for on the day.
- The rating plate or serial number of equipment you installed, for the warranty.
- Not every progress shot. Keep those on file in case a question comes up later.
The app I built for the photo half
DonePix is an iPhone app I built for the part before the invoice. Photos are shot into Before, Progress or After for a job, stamped with the date, time and street address as they are taken, and turned into a branded PDF report — your business name, phone and licence number on the cover, before and after side by side or one photo per page.
That PDF is the thing you attach to the invoice, or send alongside it. Since October 2026 DonePix also writes the estimate and the invoice from the same job, with the client and address already filled in. It keeps the photos out of the invoice, though: the invoice and the photo report are two PDFs, sent one after the other. If you already invoice in one of the tools above, the report goes along with that invoice in the same way. DonePix is on the App Store for iPhone.
Short answers
Can you add pictures to a QuickBooks invoice? You can attach photos to a QuickBooks Online invoice and email them with it. They arrive as attachments, not printed on the invoice.
Can you add photos to a PayPal invoice? Yes, as attachments to the invoice.
Which invoice apps show photos on the invoice itself? Of the tools above, Invoice Simple does, according to its help center.
How do I send many job photos with one invoice? Combine them into a single PDF and attach that, rather than attaching each photo separately.