Cortena is a Candis alternative for teams that want an agent, not a faster form to fill in.
Candis is a mature, well-built invoice tool with deep roots in the DATEV world. Cortena starts from a different premise. You brief an agent the way you would brief a bookkeeper, and it codes every field with a reason you can read. Here is a fair, factual comparison so you can decide which one fits.
Comparison written and reviewed July 2026. Where a Candis detail is not publicly documented, we mark it "varies" rather than guess.
What Candis does well.
We are not here to run Candis down. It is a genuinely good product, and for many teams it is the right one. Credit where it is due.
A mature, proven product
Candis has been in the German market for years, with a large customer base and a polished, dependable interface. That maturity counts, and it shows.
Deep in the DATEV ecosystem
Candis is well established with DATEV and the tax-advisor community around it. If your Steuerberater already recommends it, that is a real advantage.
Broad document management
Beyond invoice capture, Candis covers document handling, spend management and card features. For teams that want one broad suite, that breadth is useful.
If those points describe what you need, Candis is a sound choice and you can stop reading here. The rest of this page is for teams who want something Candis was not built to do.
OCR-era tools still need a human to finish the job.
Most invoice tools, Candis included, were built in the OCR era. They read the document well, then hand you fields to complete and rules to maintain. Cortena is agent-first. You instruct it once, in plain language, and it does the coding with a reason on every field.
Explainable AI on every field, not a black-box guess.
Cortena codes the GL account, cost centre and VAT key, and shows why it chose each one: the precedent it followed, the rule it matched, the line it read. Your team reviews reasoning, not a bare suggestion, so trust builds fast and mistakes are easy to catch.
- Account, cost centre and BU code coded per line
- A plain-language reason attached to every field
- Precedent learning from your own corrections
Recurring server hosting from Hetzner Online GmbH. Last 6 invoices booked to 6837 (IT services), cost centre 4200. Reverse-charge not applicable, German VAT 19 %.
You brief it like a bookkeeper, not a rules engine.
Instead of building and maintaining rigid if-this-then-that rules, you write guidelines in plain language, the way you would onboard a new colleague. Cortena follows the briefing and applies judgement to the edge cases, then asks when it genuinely is not sure.
- Guidelines in plain language, not rule trees
- Judgement on edge cases, questions when unsure
- One briefing that improves as your books do
The honest comparison.
Row by row, on the dimensions that actually change your week. Cortena facts are what we ship today. Candis facts we keep to what is publicly documented, and mark the rest "varies".
Candis is a capable product and its exact behaviour depends on plan, configuration and your tax advisor's setup. Where we could not verify a detail from public sources, we wrote "varies" instead of inventing one. If any fact here is out of date, tell us and we will correct it.
Who should pick which.
Candis is the better fit when
- Your tax advisor already works in Candis and prefers it.
- You want one broad suite for documents, cards and spend.
- You value a long track record over a newer approach.
Cortena is the better fit when
- You want coding done for you, with a reason on every field.
- You would rather brief an agent than build and maintain rules.
- You run several entities and want workflows to inherit.
- You want free white-glove setup and the official DATEV service.
Moving from Candis takes about 15 days.
There is no data migration to dread. Your ledger stays where it is and your accountant keeps their tool. We connect your invoice inbox, learn your accounts and rules from your history, and run alongside you until the coding earns your trust.
See multi-entity onboarding- 1Connect and brief, day 1Point your invoice inbox at Cortena and write your first briefing. No migration, no project team.
- 2Learn from your historyCortena studies past codings and your chart of accounts, then codes new invoices side by side with you.
- 3Go live in 15 daysOnce the coding is right, you review by exception and export booking-ready batches straight to DATEV.
Questions people ask before switching.
Yes, for teams that want an agent to do the coding rather than a faster form to fill in. Both capture invoices and route approvals, but Cortena codes every field with an explainable reason and is briefed in plain language instead of maintained as rules. Candis remains a strong choice if you want a broad, mature suite.
Cortena uses the official DATEV Rechnungsdatenservice 1.0 to send booking-ready entries into DATEV Unternehmen online, with the source document attached to each one. Candis also has an established DATEV integration. The archive stays in DATEV in both cases, and Cortena works GoBD-aligned.
No. There is no ledger migration. Your books stay where they are, your accountant keeps their tool, and Cortena connects to your invoice inbox and learns from your history. Most teams are live in about 15 days with free white-glove setup.
Cortena is built for multi-entity work. Workflows and briefings inherit across Mandanten, and a root mailbox can route invoices to the right entity automatically. If you run several companies, this is one of the clearest reasons teams choose Cortena.
We have tried hard to keep it fair. We credit what Candis does well and, where a detail is not publicly documented, we mark it "varies" rather than invent a fact. If anything here is wrong or out of date, tell us and we will fix it.
- Still have a question?
See the difference on your own invoices.
Book a demo and bring a week of real supplier invoices. We will code them live, reason on every field, so you can compare for yourself.
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