Personal Finance Apps to Help Make Managing Your Finances Enjoyable
Personal Finance Apps to Help Make Managing Your Finances Enjoyable
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1. Mint
Let’s make this quick: there’s a reason Mint makes every list of the best personal finance apps. It’s everyone’s go-to finance app because it really is that great. There are other budgeting app alternatives (more on those next), but if you haven’t downloaded Mint yet, you should at least try it. It’s a great place to get started. Mint can also help users pay down debt,
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1. Mint
save more money, and track goals. The app also shows users their credit score, net worth, and includes a ton of user-friendly FAQ within the app.
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2. YNAB
I tried You Need a Budget for a few months last year, and honestly, I wish I’d stuck with it! This is the perfect app for someone who needs to make a significant change to their spending habits. Think of it as you pulling out the big guns.YNAB’s main idea is that you “give every dollar a job” so that you're always mindful of where you're putting your cash. There
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2. YNAB
are a few other reasons we love YNAB (and why we had their founder, Jesse Mecham, on our podcast!).Beyond the app itself, YNAB also offers extensive educational resources and customer support to keep you on track. Best of all, they are a privacy-first finance app, which is why they use top-grade encryption for all data.
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3. Digit
Digit was the first budgeting app that changed my mind about my ability to actually control my finances.Digit analyzes your spending habits, then pilfers money you won’t miss from your checking account, moving those dollars into a savings fund. Every time I open the app, I’m shocked at how much money I find in there. And if that doesn’t convince
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3. Digit
you: after my friend did a No Spend Month recently, she opened her Digit to find almost $700 waiting for her.
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4. Gas Buddy
Yeah, gas is expensive, so if you don't have this app, get it. Now.I’m therefore obsessed with Gas Buddy. You plug in your location, and the app pulls up a crowdsourced price list of gas stations nearby. These days, I just open the app on weekends, find the cheapest spot near me, and go top off my tank.
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5. Acorns
Ever since the whole GameStop thing, we've all been thinking about getting into small-time investing, right? That's how we got on the Acorns bandwagon.The app uses a process it calls “micro-investing,” meaning that when you sync Acorns to your debit card, it starts to sneakily dip into your balance, taking the leftover change on each of your transactions and rounding it up to the nearest dollar.
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6. Qapital
Much like Digit, this app siphons money out of your checking account, but with Qapital you can get a little more specific about your goals.Whether you want to pay down debt, take a trip, or just start a general savings account, Qapital lets you pick a target, then set a “round-up rule” for your card. In my case, the app rounds to the nearest $2 each
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6. Qapital
time I swipe my debit card. Another cool aspect? You can share a goal fund with a friend or family member who’s also on the app.
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7. Albert
Albert is sort of like having a financial advisor in your pocket. It analyzes your debt, accounts, and spending, then recommends ways you can optimize your finances.Organize your money into categories, track your spending, and receive real-time alerts on unusual transitions, bill hikes, and overdraft fees.
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8. Cartwheel
Make a lot of Target runs? Using the Cartwheel app saves me anywhere between $10 and $50 every time I go. I also use grocery store apps at my local spots (Sprouts and Vons have them, among others).
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9. RetailMeNot
Then there’s RetailMeNot. All you have to do is open the app when you step into a store to find out what coupons or discounts are currently available. When you check out, the clerk just scans the coupons on your phone.
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10. Honey
Last but not least, if you haven’t downloaded Honey, you must. This is actually a browser extension, not a phone app, but hey—technology is technology.Honey analyzes every online cart before you checkout to see if it can find you discount codes. I saved bank at West Elm recently.
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11. Mvelopes
If you're a fan of the gamification of money-saving challenges like the famous envelope challenge, you're likely to fall in love with Mvelopes, too. Mvelopes links to your bank accounts and makes it easy to create customized budgets in minutes. Reduce your stress and worry by giving control to every dollar you earn.
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12. Goodbudget
Yes, this is another app based on those fun money-saving challenges. Use Goodbudget to put a why in your budget. Keep your finances on track by putting your expenses in their own expense tracker "envelopes" and keep track of all of your daily spending while you pay down debt, build savings, or rest easier with more financial security.
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13. Honeydue
Do you want to sync your finances and financial goals with your partner or spouse? Me neither, but sometimes it's necessary to save for something big (like, LOL, a house, maybe?) or plan for future retirement.Honeydue is a way to manage money with your partner. While we're not huge fans of the name, based on the infamous
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13. Honeydue
"honey-do list", it is a great app to help share a financial snapshot with your partner and keep an eye on both shared and personal accounts—and the accompanying budgets, bill reminders, bill payments, bill due dates, and, you know, bills.
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14. Personal Capital
If you've built some wealth for yourself, first of all, freaking kudos to you! That's amazing and we think you've got impressive assets.Personal Capital is a budgeting and savings app that helps you take a look at your entire financial picture. It also has wealth advisory tools built right in, including investment snapshots, investment fee
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14. Personal Capital
analyzers, financial planning, cash flow tracking, education cost planning, and real-time net worth tracking.If you want a financial app that "does it all", this is a great download. Just don't spend too long marveling at your net worth. Just kidding, do it. You've earned it.
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15. Trim
The Trim app is like your own personal bodyguard, but one who will call your credit card company and say "please please please, lower my interest rates." Trim's main function is to help its users save money, but there's a caveat. Due to the unique value of this financial app, their pricing is based on how much they save
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15. Trim
you. The basic version of the app is free, but Trim also "trims" their own cost from your accrued annual savings, taking 33 percent of the savings they helped to negotiate.