Top Three Apps to Manage Your Expenses

Published on / By M. Pattabiraman Twitter: @pattufreefincal

Published: December 11, 2020 at 11:05 am

Last Updated on December 29, 2021

Here are three apps that can help track and manage your expenses. There are two schools of thought when it comes to expense management. Those who wish to track to a reasonable extent and those who think if we spend after planning investments, tracking is not necessary.

Each school of thought has its pros and cons depending on where you are on the money management lerarning curve. Those who like to or wish to track may consult: What 25 Years of Tracking Expenses Taught Me and those wish to track investments and not expenses may refer to: How tracking investments instead of expenses changed my life!

About the author:  Nilesh, is a teacher with an M.Tech Cyber Security with an interest in writing and money management. No part of this article should be construed as money managment advice.

As the Robert Kiyosaki says “it’s through our expenses that we became richer or poorer, regardless of how much money we make.” So it’s we can say that managing your expenses is very important. There were times when there was a month end
and I literally don’t remember where were I have spent my money. I felt both guilty and irritated when I finally remember it.

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I always wished to reduce my expenses by any means only if I knew where I spent those tiny chunks of money. Luckily we are going through digital era where managing money is as simple as making a call, Yes ! you heard that right. Humans are heavily influenced by the day to day technologies and mobile apps are one of them. We know that apps are everywhere and for everything. So why don’t we advantage of it. Here are my top three app recommendations to simplify your expense and a life revolves around it.

I.Walnut- (Android, iOS)

This is the simplest yet most featured app. It not only saves
your money from unwanted spending but also saves time.It
has this autonomous message scan feature which keeps track
of all money you spend via mobile like Net-banking, credit
card, debit card, wallet apps like Paytm, Amazon Pay etc.
Disclaimer- I have been using this App for about more than 3
years. Never a problem or burden for me.

Walnut money management app screenshot 1
Walnut money management app screenshot 1

Pros of Walnut

  1. Automated expense tracking from SMS transaction alerts.
  2. Daily Expenses summary on the time you set.
  3. Option of adding Cash money spent.
  4. Back up and restore mechanism.
  5. App lock for sensitive data.
  6. Weekly, monthly expense tracking along with graphs and email statement
    facility.
  7. Automatically identifies your recurring spends
  8. All data backup to device only, no any hidden cloud storage.
  9. Dark theme for late night money management.
Walnut money management app screenshot 2
Walnut money management app screenshot 2

Cons of Walnut

  1. Ios app does not support automated expense tracking
  2. Has access to your personal data like email, for making improvements in the app.
  3. Need to give SMS access permission to start autonomous scanning feature of expenses.
  4. Need to do KYC with PAN Card to avail certain services which is completely optional.

II.Monito- (Android only)

This is easy to understand and use app.UI is the simplest one.

Monito money management app screenshot 1
Monito money management app screenshot 1

Pros of Monito

  1. Clean and elegant UI.
  2. Facility for expenses export to excel.
  3. Ad-free.
  4. Facility to carry forward remaining balance.
  5. Recurring expenses can be added.
  6. Automatic Google drive backup if you want to.
  7. Categorical split of expenses along with graphs.
  8. Dark theme for obvious reasons.
Monito money management app screenshot 2
Monito money management app screenshot 2

Cons of Monito

  1. No automated tracking every expense need to be entered manually.
  2. Need to add recurring expense like mobile bill, rent etc. manually.
  3. No Default App-lock or Security features.

III. Monefy- (Android, iOS)

Monefy money management app screenshot
Monefy money management app screenshot

Pros of Monefy

  1. Rich set of expense categories to start with.
  2. Facility to export expenses to .csv format.
  3. Different section for cash and payment card expenses.

Cons of Monefy

  1. Need to buy monefy pro for additional features like multi-currency support, passcode protection, synchronisation.
  2. Most of features above apps provided requires you to buy monefy pro (₹149 one time buy).

Do you track expenses? If so with which app/tool?

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Pattabiraman editor freefincalDr M. Pattabiraman(PhD) is the founder, managing editor and primary author of freefincal. He is an associate professor at the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras. He has over nine years of experience publishing news analysis, research and financial product development. Connect with him via Twitter or Linkedin or YouTube. Pattabiraman has co-authored three print books: (1) You can be rich too with goal-based investing (CNBC TV18) for DIY investors. (2) Gamechanger for young earners. (3) Chinchu Gets a Superpower! for kids. He has also written seven other free e-books on various money management topics. He is a patron and co-founder of “Fee-only India,” an organisation for promoting unbiased, commission-free investment advice.
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