Trial Balance

Definition: A listing of every general-ledger account with its closing debit or credit balance, used to check that total debits equal total credits.

Core idea

The trial balance is the starting point for preparing financial statements. It proves the ledger is internally balanced and gives the practitioner the raw account balances to classify, adjust (via Journals), and map into financial statement line items.

Key principles

• Total debits must equal total credits.
• Balancing does not prove correctness — it only proves the books balance.
• A working trial balance adds adjustment columns on top of the raw balances.

Examples

• In Draftworx, practitioners work the trial balance before producing financial statements: importing balances, mapping accounts, and posting adjusting Journals.

Connections

• Journals — adjustments are posted as journals against trial-balance accounts

Source

General accounting knowledge.