There is an abundance of programs designed to help you save and grow your hard-earned money. The best personal finance apps make it easy to stay on top of your finances, from income and spending to savings and investments. These include budgeting, financial education, money management, bill-tracking, and investment apps.
These applications simplify personal financial management by letting you consolidate your records and backing them all up in one place, often using cloud storage for more flexibility. Some of these types of mobile apps and online solutions are completely free to use, while others offer both free and paid options with monthly or annual plans.
Here are the top 10 best personal finance management apps that can help you gain control of your finances and increase your net worth.
1. EveryDollar
EveryDollar is an online budgeting tool that program stands out for its user-friendly, everyday language to walk you through the budgeting process. EveryDollar is useful for manually setting up a basic budget. You can customize your budget, create virtual savings funds for emergencies or big purchases, set up due dates for bill payments, and track your debt payments. EveryDollar also lets you sync all your bank savings and investment accounts, generate customized budget reports on your income and spending, track your transactions, and receive tracking recommendations and reminders.
2. Mint
Mint is perhaps the best tool for budgeting and tracking your finances. It includes basic budgeting features such as bill payment reminders and customizable alarms when you go over your budget. Mint syncs your bank accounts, retirement accounts, and credit cards to help you keep track of your income, savings, and spending. It includes a daily budget planner that recommends budget goals (which you may add to and adjust) depending on your spending.
The app automatically updates and categorizes your expenses, but you may also edit and add categories as needed. Moreover, the app lets you set your own savings goals and track your investments. Mint stands out from other budgeting apps by offering credit monitoring in addition to budgeting and money tracking. You have round-the-clock access to your credit score, a credit report summary, and notifications of changes in your credit report.
3. Personal Capital
Personal Capital ranks well because it provides the best free wealth-building tools. While most personal finance apps focus on essential personal finance features such as budgeting and expenditure tracking, Personal Capital focuses on investing and retirement planning. The program offers different views of your holdings and retirement projections.
It also includes transaction management and cryptocurrency tracking tools. Personal Capital lets you see how your actions today impact your capacity to retire when you choose. With Personal Capital, you can personalize your budget, plan long-term financial actions, and track the health of your investments and net worth.
4. Simplifi
Simplifi, as the name suggests, is a simplified approach to personal finance. This cloud-based program lets you keep track of your money and budget from anywhere. It provides a visual overview of your financial health and a personalized spending plan with real-time updates on how much you have left to spend during the month. The app syncs your bank accounts to show you where you stand and how far you’ve come toward reaching your financial goals.
It also keeps track of your monthly payments and subscriptions, categorizes your spending automatically, and provides a trend analysis of your income, savings, expenses, and more. The Simplifi app has robust budgeting features that let you customize watchlists to track and limit your spending by category or payee. The personalized spending plan also monitors cash flow to ensure that you never spend more than you earn.
5. YNAB
YNAB, which stands for You Need a Budget, is one of the most popular and reputable budget planning apps. Unlike other personal finance apps, YNAB concentrates on creating zero-sum budgets that promote mindfulness when it comes to money management and budgeting. It takes a proactive approach to budgeting rather than tracking what you’ve already spent. After you sign up, you build your first budget and assign each penny a purpose, such as your rent, utilities, and monthly transportation costs.
The idea is to eventually be at least one month ahead of schedule, so you’re spending money you earned a month ago. The application helps you manage your expenses, pay off debt, save more, grow your wealth, and gain complete control of your financial future. You can gain insights into your finances via the app’s spending and net worth reports, and you can link your bank accounts to view all your finances in one place.
6. PocketGuard
PocketGuard is a comprehensive finance app that offers budget planning, bill organizing, and subscription management. This app lets you link your accounts to track your spending, view all your balances in one place, and create a monthly budget. They crunch the numbers to show how much spendable money you have after setting aside enough for bills, goals, and necessities. It is easy to learn more about your habits with customized spending reports and insights.
One of the app’s most unique features is the ability to view and manage all your subscriptions in one place. When you want to cancel a subscription, you can do so through PocketGuard without visiting a separate website. You can also view all your upcoming bills, and PocketGuard will notify you when you may be able to save on specific monthly bills.
7. Spendee
Spendee is a budget planner and money tracker that makes it easy for users to track their spending habits and maintain a responsible budget. You can connect your bank accounts to view all your finances in one place, and unlike other apps, Spendee also lets you link your cryptocurrency wallets. Charts and reports let you learn more about your spending habits, and personal insights help you learn how to spend your money more responsibly. Spendee also stands out thanks to its features that help users manage shared financial accounts, making it a great option for couples.
8. Acorns
Acorns is a unique finance app that helps users build up their savings by investing their spare change. The app’s unique Round-Ups feature invests your spare change every time you make a purchase, and you can earn bonus investments when you shop using the app or browser extension.
Acorns can also help you set up a retirement account, and Acorns Early lets you set up an investment account for your kids. By creating an Acorns checking account, you can invest with real-time Round-Ups, automatically invest a portion of every paycheck with Smart Deposit, and get paid up to two days early with direct deposit.
9. Personal Capital
Personal Capital is designed specifically to help users plan and track their retirement savings. You can use the app to monitor and track your investments, net worth, and financial accounts. The app analyzes your portfolio to project whether or not you will be able to reach your retirement goals with your current investments.
In addition to your investment accounts, you can also use the app to track your debt, personal banking accounts, and more. The interactive cash flow tool lets you see your total income and total expenses across all your accounts, and the Investment Checkup tool makes it easy to analyze how well your investments are performing.
10. Mobills
Mobills is a budget planner and bill organizer that allows you to create a monthly budget, track your spending, and set financial goals. You start by defining financial goals (e.g., getting out of debt, saving for retirement), and the app will help you create a budget that reflects your goals. You can view graphs and reports to gain financial insights and learn more about your spending habits. Mobills stands out from other finance apps thanks to its credit card management features, which allow users to track their credit card balances and credit limits, as well as get bill payment reminders.
Final thoughts
Each of these applications improves your financial well-being in some manner, but the best app for you will depend on your specific needs and preferences. Whether it’s having enough for your short-term financial needs, planning for retirement, or saving for your child’s college education, the best personal finance apps can help you achieve your financial goals.
