Best Electrical Certification Software UK 2026: 8 Apps Compared

The best electrical certification software for a UK electrician is the app that fills in the BS 7671 schedule of test results fastest on site, works with no signal, and produces certificates your NICEIC or NAPIT assessor accepts without comment. Eight products cover most of the market: Certio, Tradecert, iCertifi, Certly, Elec-Mate, Pro Certs, Megger CertSuite and Electrical Certificate App. At published prices checked in September 2026, monthly plans run from £4.99 (Certio Starter) to £20 plus VAT (Electrical Certificate App), and only three of the eight can take readings from a test instrument rather than your thumbs. This guide compares them on the things that cost you hours, including where Certio is not the right pick.

What does electrical certification software actually do?

Electrical certification software produces the certificates and reports required by BS 7671:2018+A4:2026 in a digital format instead of on carbonless pads. The three core documents are in Appendix 6 of the Regulations: the Electrical Installation Certificate (EIC) for new installations, additions and alterations involving new circuits; the Minor Electrical Installation Works Certificate (MEIWC) for additions and alterations that do not extend to a new circuit; and the Electrical Installation Condition Report (EICR) for periodic inspection and testing under Chapter 65, with the inspection and testing procedure set out in IET Guidance Note 3. Most apps also cover PAT records to the IET Code of Practice for In-service Inspection and Testing of Electrical Equipment, 5th edition (2020).

A good app does five things. It captures test results into the schedule of test results and checks them against the maximum Zs values in the Regulations. It records observations with C1, C2, C3 or FI codes and the regulation reference. It produces a PDF a landlord, letting agent or building control body will accept: for a private rented home in England, that PDF has to reach the tenant within 28 days under the Electrical Safety Standards in the Private Rented Sector (England) Regulations 2020, as GOV.UK guidance sets out. It keeps the certificate where you can find it when the next inspection falls due. And on a dark landing in a plant room, it does all of that with no signal.

How do the eight apps compare?

The table summarises published facts checked in September 2026. Each provider's own website or app store listing is the source. Prices and features change; verify before you buy. "Not listed" means the feature was not stated on the provider's site when we looked, not that it definitely does not exist.

Two other names come up in searches but are different kinds of product. Quickler is a WhatsApp-based inspection tool for several trades whose reports are not laid out to the certification body formats; Checker App is a multi-trade job manager with electrical forms bolted on. Both are covered in their own comparisons at Certio vs Quickler: WhatsApp Reports or a Certificate App? and Certio vs Checker App: Certificate App or Job Manager?.

Certio: built around the instrument and the voice

Certio's design starts from the slowest part of an EICR, which is typing readings into the schedule of test results. Three features attack that directly. Live screen reading points the phone camera at a Megger MFT-X1 display and puts the reading into the right cell of the schedule; it is limited to that one model for now, with more instruments to follow. Voice dictation lets you say the circuit and the reading with both hands still on the probes. The AI board scan photographs the consumer unit and drafts the circuit schedule, reading the ways, device types and ratings, and leaving blank anything it cannot read rather than guessing.

AI-suggested observation wording proposes C1, C2, C3 or FI text with a regulation reference for the inspector to check and confirm. The app does not decide the code; you do. Certificates are laid out to the current BS 7671:2018 model forms, with the Amendment 4 update in hand before Amendment 2 is withdrawn on 15 October 2026.

Certio covers EICR, EIC, Minor Works and PAT records. It does not do EV charger, solar PV, fire alarm or emergency lighting certificates, so a multi-discipline contractor may need a second app for those. Pro adds quotes, invoices with CIS and reverse charge VAT, card payment links and receipts. Made by Certio Software Ltd; the iPhone app has been on the UK App Store since 23 September 2026.

Best for: electricians whose bottleneck is data entry on domestic and small commercial EICRs, and who want AI drafting with a human check on every line, at the lowest monthly price in the table.

Tradecert: the widest certificate list, with AI tokens

Tradecert runs on iPhone, iPad, Android and the web, works offline and syncs when you are back in signal. Its AI fills circuit details from a board photo and imports PDFs and past certificates, and it offers AI-drafted observations. Live multi-user editing with roles suits a firm where an apprentice enters readings while the QS reviews from the office.

Certificate coverage is the widest of the eight: EICR, EIC, Minor Works, EV charger, solar PV, domestic and commercial fire alarm, emergency lighting, PAT and danger notices. Contractors working under Section 712 (solar PV) and Section 722 (EV charging) get everything in one place.

Pricing on Tradecert's own page, checked 12 September 2026, is £18 a month ex VAT plus £7 per additional user, with 250 AI tokens a month that roll over and extra tokens at 2p. Manchester Compliance's February 2026 round-up quoted the same £18 and 250 tokens. A free plan with no card watermarks the PDFs. Heavy scanning can push the bill above the headline.

Best for: multi-discipline contractors and small firms needing several users on one certificate.

iCertifi: the long-established Apple-only option

iCertifi dates from 2011, which makes it one of the most mature products here. It is Apple-only: iPhone, iPad and Apple silicon Macs, with sync between devices. Android users are excluded, which is its main limitation.

Its AI features are Board Vision (board recognition), Test Vision (reads a photographed meter display into the certificate), SmartFill, Spark AI for BS 7671 questions and a compliance check it calls Certificate Guardian. Test Vision is the closest thing in the table to Certio's live MFT-X1 reading, though the approaches differ: one reads a captured photo of any meter, the other reads one instrument's display live.

Pricing checked 29 September 2026: £59.99 for 3 months, £89.99 for 6 months or £125.99 for 12 months, billed through Apple with VAT included; Enterprise £399.99 a year for unlimited engineers. iCertifi Cloud Pro, the multi-device version, is £24.99 a month or £190 a year with a 7-day trial and team tiers at £699 and £1,099.99. Fire, PAT and gas CP12 are separate apps with their own subscriptions.

Best for: Apple-only firms, and landlord compliance work that combines electrical, gas and fire on one platform.

Certly: straightforward cloud certification with QS sign-off

Certly runs on iPhone, Android and any browser. It covers EICR and EIC in standard and domestic versions, Minor Works for single or multiple circuits, a visual condition report, Part F ventilation, danger notification, and smoke and fire detection certificates. One-click QS sign-off is built in, which matters if you run apprentices or subcontractors; see Qualified Supervisor (QS) Sign-Off Explained for how that workflow should look.

It lists no AI features today, with an AI assistant for regulation questions described as coming soon. Some electricians prefer that: fewer things to go wrong. Offline support is partial. A certificate must be started online, data entry carries on if the connection drops, but image upload is unavailable offline. Pricing checked 29 September 2026 is £14.99 plus VAT a month or £149.99 plus VAT a year, with a free trial and no card.

Best for: contractors who want a simple, predictable cloud tool with QS review, and who mostly work where there is signal.

Elec-Mate: low entry price with a long AI feature list

Elec-Mate starts from £6.99 a month after a 7-day trial, the second-lowest paid entry price in the table, though its page does not say whether VAT is added. It runs on iPhone, Android and the web, works offline and syncs later, and lists 19 certificate types including EV charger, solar PV, fire alarm, emergency lighting and PAT.

The AI list is long: a board scanner, defect coding from plain English into C1 to FI with references, fault diagnosis, an AI quote builder, RAMS generation, voice test entry, a BS 7671 tutor and a circuit designer, plus 70-odd calculators and a training library. Voice entry overlaps with Certio's dictation, so if voice is your priority, trial both on a noisy site. Check what the £6.99 tier includes against the higher tiers before assuming every feature is in.

Best for: price-sensitive sole traders who want AI features and a wide certificate list at a low monthly cost, and are prepared to check the tier limits.

Pro Certs: offline, cross-platform, no AI

Pro Certs is one of the few that runs on Windows as well as iPhone and Android, with a Mac build for M1 or later. It works offline with cloud sync between devices and users, and has a management web portal for multi-user accounts. Certificates cover EIC, EICR and Minor Works plus BS 5266-1 emergency lighting, BS 5839-6 fire alarm (Grades C, D and F) and Part F ventilation.

No AI features are listed. Pricing checked 29 September 2026: £9.99 a month or £19.99 a quarter for a single user, with a 7-day trial; multi-user licences are £80 per user a year for up to 10 users and £60 for 11 to 20. The page we read does not state VAT treatment.

Best for: firms that want a Windows desktop option and a cheap per-user rate for a team, without AI.

Megger CertSuite: the instrument maker's own software

CertSuite is Megger's certification platform, sold as CertSuite Installation for BS 7671 work with separate PAT and Asset products. It runs as a web app on Windows and Mac plus iOS and Android apps, stores data in Microsoft Azure, and works online and offline with sync. Its distinctive feature is Bluetooth transfer of results straight from Megger instruments: the MFT-X1, the S1 and MIT insulation ranges and the DLRO2X. The PAT400 range exchanges data by USB.

Megger's own page lists monthly and annual options without a price and offers a 30-day trial. Test4Less, a reseller, lists the 12-month single-user licence at £128 ex VAT (£153.60 inc VAT), checked 29 September 2026. There is no AI board scan. If you already own an MFT-X1 and want results moved by Bluetooth rather than camera, this and Certio are the two to trial side by side.

Best for: contractors standardised on Megger instruments who want direct transfer without AI.

Electrical Certificate App: certificates plus job admin, no AI

Electrical Certificate App, from Trade Apps Ltd, pairs EICR, EIC, Minor Works, fire alarm and PAT certificates with job sheets, a diary, quotes and invoices. It works offline on iPhone and Android. Pricing checked 25 September 2026 is £20 plus VAT a month or £216 plus VAT a year, with a 14-day trial and no card; the App Store listing shows in-app prices of £17.99 and £194.99. The last App Store version at that date was 3.8.5 from August 2024, and there is no AI or instrument reading. A fuller comparison is at Certio vs Electrical Certificate App: Which Suits You?.

Best for: electricians who want certificates and basic job admin in one app and do not mind typing every reading.

What does each app really cost per year?

Headline prices hide VAT, extra users and AI tokens. The table works the published figures through for one user and for a three-person firm, using September 2026 prices and 20% VAT where the provider charges it.

For comparison, NICEIC members can buy the scheme's own online certificates at £1.55 plus VAT each, per Manchester Compliance's February 2026 round-up. At 100 certificates a year that is £186, with no app features at all. How you price the EICR itself is covered at How to Price an EICR: A Method for Electricians.

How should you choose electrical certification software?

Use these criteria, roughly in order of importance for a working electrician.

Does it produce compliant BS 7671 model forms?

The certificate must contain the information in the Appendix 6 model forms. Amendment 4 was published on 15 April 2026 and Amendment 2 is withdrawn on 15 October 2026, so ask each provider which amendment its forms are on and whether its maximum Zs tables have been updated. An out-of-date form is a finding at your next scheme assessment. The values themselves are at Maximum Zs Values BS 7671: Tables, 80% Rule and Ze.

How fast is data entry on site?

A domestic EICR has ten to twenty circuits, each with a dozen fields. Whether the app types those for you (instrument reading, voice, board scan) or you do is the biggest difference in hours per job. Trial on a real board. The column-by-column method is at How to Fill In a Schedule of Test Results, Column by Column.

Does it work offline?

Put the phone in flight mode and try to open, complete and export a certificate. Then check that sync does not overwrite or duplicate certificates when the connection returns. Only Certly in the table describes a hard online requirement to start a certificate.

Who owns the data, and can you export it?

You need your certificates at least until the next inspection, and longer for defence in a dispute. Confirm you can export PDFs and the underlying data in bulk if you leave, and what happens to your records when you stop paying. Retention periods and GDPR are covered at Electrical Certificate Retention and GDPR for Electricians.

Does it support QS sign-off?

If a Qualified Supervisor reviews an apprentice's work, you need a review-and-sign workflow. Certly and Tradecert describe one explicitly; Pro Certs offers a management portal for multi-user accounts.

Is the pricing model right for your volume?

Flat monthly pricing suits high-volume contractors. Per-user, per-certificate and token-based pricing can be cheaper for a sole trader doing a few reports a month but climbs with a team. Run the sums on your actual certificate count and the number of people who need a login.

Are the AI features accurate enough to save time?

Board scans and instrument reading are only faster if you spend less time correcting them than you would have spent typing. Every provider, including Certio, expects you to verify the output. Electrical Safety First puts electricity behind more than half of accidental house fires in Great Britain, and a wrong Zs or a missed C2 in a scanned schedule is your signature on the line, not the app's. Check a scanned schedule against the board carefully the first few times, and prefer an app that leaves a field blank over one that guesses.

For a fuller checklist see Electrical Certification Software: What to Look For (Buyer's Guide), and for the paper-versus-digital question see Digital vs Paper Electrical Certificates: What Schemes Accept. Coding the observations you record is at EICR Observation Codes Explained: C1, C2, C3 and FI.

How Certio helps

Certio produces the EICR, EIC, Minor Works certificate and PAT records on the BS 7671 model forms and turns them into branded PDFs. Photograph the consumer unit and the circuit schedule drafts itself; point the phone camera at a Megger MFT-X1 and the reading goes straight into the schedule of test results, or dictate it while your hands stay on the probes. Suggested observation wording with the regulation reference is there for you to check and confirm. The judgement stays yours; the typing goes. Starter is free for 7 days, then £4.99 a month.

Written by the Certio team. Last checked 29 September 2026.