Signing in with your Intuit account is mandated only with the following scenarios:

• A new QuickBooks Company file is created.
• If you have the following connected services: Payments, Payroll direct deposit, TSheets time tracking, Payroll Workforce, and Receipt Management (new for QuickBooks 2021).
• When an existing QuickBooks Desktop Company file is opened using the Admin credentials, and no Intuit account is associated. QuickBooks users will be prompted to log in or create an Intuit account. 

 

As I asked earlier in this topic,  what about those of us that do not have internet available at the location of the computer that our file is on?  Can we open the file without internet, or are you saying that we have to move the computer somewhere and connect to the internet to get the file opened the 1st time we use the file after upgrading to 2021?