I used TurboTax this year, and honestly I was underwhelmed, especially when it came to the state forms. It didn’t really seem like it did much, and the California form experience were full of obvious bugs. Questions with no context. (“Enter city 2”) Questions being given out of order. PDFs being viewed through a mail slot. PDF forms where the entry blanks and the entries would scroll at different t rates, so you couldn’t read the form. It was super frustrating. The whole thing felt like a cheap unskilled body shop of a program, and made me want to just use a pen.
I have to file mildly complicated taxes due to getting my income from a partnership, and even that I can do in a couple hours by following the 1040 instructions, and the filling out any ancillary schedules that are required.
If you have straightforward W2 income, taking the standard deduction, and a reasonable number of retirement or investment accounts, it should take you an hour to fill out the form following the instructions. Maybe plan on a couple hours the first year, while you get used to it, but it's no so bad.
I used TurboTax this year, and honestly I was underwhelmed, especially when it came to the state forms. It didn’t really seem like it did much, and the California form experience were full of obvious bugs. Questions with no context. (“Enter city 2”) Questions being given out of order. PDFs being viewed through a mail slot. PDF forms where the entry blanks and the entries would scroll at different t rates, so you couldn’t read the form. It was super frustrating. The whole thing felt like a cheap unskilled body shop of a program, and made me want to just use a pen.