Free IT inventory management — the options, honestly

The key facts

• IT inventory is asset tracking with a twist: discovery (what is on the network), lifecycle (warranty, licence, assignment), and custody history.
• Free routes that work: a disciplined spreadsheet for small fleets; open-source discovery and asset tools for networks; freemium tiers with predictable walls.
• BSimple's partial fit: assets as records with locations and custody history — no network discovery, no licence metering — stated plainly.
• No free BSimple tier: $180/month AUD upward with a full trial; this page lists the genuinely free routes without pretending we are one.

What IT inventory actually needs to track

Three layers, often confused. The register: every device — model, serial, purchase date, warranty end, assigned user. The network: what is actually connected — discovered automatically by scanning tools, because manual registers rot within a month. The custody trail: who has which laptop now, what was reassigned when, and what was installed on it. The first layer is a spreadsheet; the second is why discovery tools exist; the third is where systems beat registers — check-out history is exactly what a movements-based record does well and a spreadsheet does badly.

Software licences add a fourth dimension — entitlement counts versus installs — and that alone pushes many IT teams to dedicated tooling. The IT-asset open-source route and the network-discovery tools cover those layers in depth.

The free routes, and where each ends

The spreadsheet register. Genuinely free, genuinely fine for a few dozen devices with stable assignments. Ends at the custody problem: reassignments happen faster than the sheet gets updated, and the warranty date you needed was never entered.

Open-source discovery and asset tools. The software is free; the server, updates and troubleshooting are yours. Discovery tools answer "what is on the network" impressively; the trade is the self-hosting discipline — backups, upgrades, and being the support desk.

Freemium tiers. Useful starts with predictable walls — usually agent counts or the audit history IT teams specifically need. The free-options ledger prices the pattern.

The upgrade trigger is custody churn: when devices move between people daily or weekly, the register must record movements, not merely list them — which is a system, not a document.

BSimple's partial fit, stated plainly

We build BSimple, so weigh that: it is not IT-discovery software — no network scanning, no software-licence metering, no agent deployment. Its fit is the custody-and-history half: hardware as non-depleting asset records on the operations record, locations and assignments as recorded movements with full history, barcode scanning for check-out/check-in, and the same machinery running the business's actual stock beside it. That suits organisations whose IT assets ride along with a broader operation — a warehouse business tracking its own fleet of scanners and tablets — rather than IT departments needing discovery at scale. Plans run $180/$250/$399 per month AUD with the trial as the full product; the hardware-inventory reading covers the neighbouring use cases.