Meet Odoo 18: The Highlights

2. Sales

a) Improved Product Customization during the sales process

For Product Variants, a new field for Attribute Value Free Text is added. This feature gives your sales team and customers the option to customize their products when purchasing e.g. letter engraving on a Necklace. 

For your sales team, through the backend of Odoo:

For your customers, through the E-commerce shop:

b) PDF quote builder improvements

The PDF quote builder feature has been released since version 17 but is improved in version 18. Now, you can directly select additional documents to be merged into the final PDF. If a selected document has custom fields, they appear as editable text boxes to be filled in.

When the PDF Quote is printed, it will include the information you have inputted on the Quotation form view: 

More information about how to set up PDF Quote Builder: https://youtu.be/SIvlo2JFU_U?si=Qj1HigEhQybvz6Of

c) Combo products on Sales Order and E-commerce

Combo products are now available in the eCommerce and Sales applications. They allow combining several products into a single one with the possibility for customers to pick from multiple choices.

d) Prevent price recalculation on quantity change in sales orders

Before, when updating the Unit Price and then changing the Quantity, Odoo will reset to the default Unit Price. 

Now, the updated Unit Price will remain the same even after changing the Quantity.: 

e) Combine product name and description on Sale Order Line

Products and descriptions are combined in a single column when editing sales order lines. This helps save space for other product information.

3. Inventory 

a) Inventory Valuation by Production Lots

Each lot or serial number of the same product now has a separate valuation Even if the products are of the same type, they can be identified by their lot or serial numbers.

b) Introduction of MTSO: Make to Order (MTO), but use available stock if any (like MTS)

When a rule is set as "Take from stock, if not available, trigger another rule", it launches a PO/Procurement only for the quantity missing from the new move. 

c) More flexible routes and updated push to pull rules 

Push rules are now triggered when a transfer is validated. Transfers are not created in advance, allowing more flexibility. So, transfers waiting for another transfer are no longer polluting the space.

All default multi-step routes have been redesigned to reflect this change.

d) Create backorders in advance

Split pickings before validating, allowing deliveries at two different locations or dates.

4. Purchase

a) Added option to Link RFQs together and compare them

On the Purchase Order, you can find the new tab ‘Alternatives’ where RFQs are compared. The field Company Total shows the total amount in your company’s main currency to assist with comparison. 

b) RFQ Management from Portal

In Odoo 18 Enterprise, a new feature has been introduced that allows suppliers to accept or decline RFQs directly from the portal or via email.

5. Accounting

a) Abnormal invoice alert

On the Customer form view in the tab Invoicing, Odoo added a statistics-based alert system to automatically identify abnormal amounts and dates in invoices.

b) Duplicate bill detection

Improved Vendor Bill duplicate detection. Potential duplicates (using Bill references) both in draft and posted entries, are looked for in the database before creating the new Vendor Bills. Smart links are available to directly navigate to the potential duplicate(s).

c) Warning for potential duplicate invoices

A warning is displayed when editing a customer invoice if it is a suspected duplicate of another one by comparing the customer, the date of the invoice, and its amount.