10 Cheapest & Free YNAB Alternatives

If you spend aimlessly through life, throwing your money at every pretty, shiny object that happens to catch your eye, how will you ever save up enough money to buy a car, take that trip to Paris, or put a down payment on a house?

A budget helps you figure out your overall financial performance while it keeps you in tune with your long and short-term goals.

While YNAB may be one of the oldest and most prominent personal financial management apps, there are a whole lot of cheap and free YNAB alternatives for both iPhone and Android users.

So, in this article, we’ll be showing you cheap and free alternatives to YNAB. I’m sure you wouldn’t want to miss out.

Every successful thinking man needs and works with a budget.

Why You May Want To Switch

There might be over a hundred reasons why you’ve been longing for a better YNAB alternative, nonetheless, let’s go through the main reasons why YNAB may not be the best option for you.

Cost of running the app

After the free trial for 34 days, be sure to pay $6.99 monthly to keep their services coming.

While this may not seem like a whole lot of money to you, to some other persons their tight budget and inability to sustain the services might be a factor to consider.

Therefore, with the availability of alternatives that render the same services for free or at a cheaper rate, you might have to consider a switch.

Access to investing tools

Unlike YNAB, there are alternative personal finance management apps that provide access and tools for investment. So, if you want more than just budgeting, you might want to consider other apps that create investment options.

You Need Two-Factor Authentication

YNAB does not currently offer two-factor authentication, unlike its counterparts. Two-factor authentication is a type of security system that enables you to access your data.

With two-factor authentication, you’ll obtain a unique code via text or email whenever you log into your account or use a new device. Without this code, you can’t get into your account.

With two-factor authentication, your account is more secure and free from unwarranted access.

What Are The Features To Look Out For In An Alternative?

With a whole lot of personal finance apps competing for your sign-up, how can you decipher which to pick or rather the right one for you?

Here’s a list of some features you should look out for when picking a YNAB alternative

To maintain the same pace and be in tune with not only budgeting but other investing tools and investing education, YNAB might not be the app you need.

Therefore, you have to look out for other types of personal finance apps and services that offer you something that goes beyond budgeting.

These apps will not only help you budget but will expose you to more investment opportunities like setting up an IRA after your household budget is under control, and bill pay or credit monitoring services that will help you create a plan to finally pay off your credit card debt once and for all.

Low Price Tag

Choosing a budgeting app somewhat cheaper than YNAB or absolutely free will help you save extra bucks.

There are tons of highly useful choices that don’t demand a monthly subscription fee.

Compatibility with Multiple Users

If you’re married or running a corporate budget, you know firsthand that sticking to a budget is much different than when you were managing your money alone.

With apps that have compatibility with multiple users, multiple users can log into a single account.

This will give you a one-stop location for all of your credit cards, checking, and savings account information and will help you and your family or business stay on the same page.

Best Alternatives to YNAB

Here’s our list of the top 10 best free and cheapest YNAB alternatives.

#10 Tiller Money

Tiller Money is not a mobile app. It’s a spreadsheet service that synchronizes your financial data and updates your budget using Google Sheets technology. Additionally, it helps build a spending plan and allot money to specific expenses.

Tiller features compatibility with over 18,000 financial institutions, ranging from Visa to Vanguard. This allows the system to render a one-stop portfolio that highlights all of your debts, investments, income, and expenses in a single place.

You can also modify your sheets to set spending and savings goals and let Tiller manage the data, mathematical aspect of it.

On Tiller, all you have to pay is $5 per month.

#9 Savology

Despite being new in the game, Savology has won the hearts of many through its fast and free amazing services.

This app oversees your overall financial health from your budgeting, spending, personalized action items, recommendations, and more.

Savology interprets your financial life into a personalized plan and actionable steps to reach your goals. It is not just a budget tool, but a comprehensive plan for your insurances, debt, retirement, estate planning, and more. The services on Savology are all free.

#8 PocketSmith

PocketSmith is a smart budgeting and finance software that allows you to manage your budget and forecast your finances.

The financial app is an easy-to-use, convenient personal finance software that lets you track all of your spending, credit, and investing accounts, as well as project your future finances.

PocketSmith is an online money management software that’s currently used in over 200 countries. They currently specialize in personal financial forecasting and use a visual approach to budgeting, with live bank feeds.

PocketSmith offers three levels of plan and pricing: free service, premium, and super. The premium costs $9.95 per month (or $90 per year). Super costs $19.95 per month (or $169.92 per year).

Nonetheless, the free version will help you save some costs and at the same time render value.

#7 CountAbout

CountAbout is a personal finance app that helps you keep track of your finances wherever you are.

You don’t need to download any software to get started all you need is the internet to log in.

The easy-to-use personal finance application can import data from Quicken and Mint and automatically downloads data from banking, credit card, and retirement accounts.

After the 15-day free trial, it will cost $9.99 per year, or with the premium version, $39.99 per year.

#6 Personal Capital

Personal Capital is on our list of YNAB alternatives because of its amazing features.

This amazing free app helps you create Budgets, track your spending and save for the future. Their money management tools can help you meet your day-to-day goals.

Their website’s encryption is rated A+ by the world-renowned Qualys SSL Labs, a stronger rating than most major banks.

With Personal Capital, you link any accounts you want like checking, banking, investments, credit cards and you’ll get an overall view of your finances and net worth.

Personal Capital is also free to use, but they do have paid investment and wealth services you might fancy too

#5 GoodBudget

YNAB Alternative: GoodBudget — *Source: goodbudget.com*

GoodBudget is a personal and household budgeting system for the Web, Android, and iPhone. It keeps track of money to spend, save, and give toward what’s important in life.

This YNAB alternative operates based on the envelope system of budgeting. After you create an account, you can manually fill expense categories with the amount that you plan on spending for the month.

As you enter transactions, GoodBudget will use a bar graph and visuals to show you how much money you have left.

Goodbudget keeps you on the same page by syncing your household budget beyond all your iPhones and Androids. When you subtract money from an envelope, the person you’re sharing with knows what’s spent, where, and when.

GoodBudget is the ideal app for savers who need to get their family members on board with a budgeting program. For $5 a month, couples can subscribe to GoodBudget Plus, which allows an unrestricted number of users to connect their devices and budget under a single household.

GoodBudget is a low-cost YNAB alternative that grants multi-device sync and essential money management tools.

#4 PocketGuard

PocketGuard makes it easy to be in charge of your money, optimize your spending, and grow your savings automatically.

PocketGuard is a budgeting and saving app that helps users create and stick to a budget with money left over for investments and retirement accounts.

Just like YNAB, PocketGuard features bill reminders and assistance that builds a budget based on your income.

The app can link your banks, credit cards, loans & investment in one place, to keep accurate track of your account balances, net worth, and more.

The app has a paid version at $34.99 a year, which offers more in-depth budgeting tools for less than the price of a year’s subscription to YNAB. Perfect YNAB alternative, right?

Unlike YNAB, PocketGuard offers multi-factor authentication tools to keep your data protected. It employs high-level encryption security with 256-bit SSL — the same security layers used by large banking institutions.

#3 EveryDollar

EveryDollar helps you create a monthly budget so you can achieve your money goals.

It assigns a responsibility to every dollar in your paycheck, which allows you to set a monthly budget for expenses.

This personal finance app follows your plan by keeping track of your spending throughout the month. Each time you spend money, create a transaction and track it to your budget.

This YNAB free alternative offers two versions of its app: a free version and a paid version, which costs $99 per year and automatically sends transactions for you from banking and credit card accounts.

EveryDollar’s free version offers zero ads and promotional materials, which offers you a smooth and less cluttered experience.

#2 Mint

Mint is a web-based desktop and mobile app that offers a complete series of budgeting and credit management tools and services.

This top financial app brings together all your accounts, bills, and more to make it easier to manage your finances from one dashboard.

After you send your banking and credit card information into Mint’s platform, the app offers you a full picture of your finances, upcoming bills, and even your current FICO credit score.

In addition to its multiple safety measures like secure encryption and multi-factor authentication, Mint is free to use forever. A worthy YNAB alternative?

#1 Stash

Stash offers you an opportunity to own your financial future by exposing you to multiple investment platforms and budgeting that helps you effortlessly pay bills, track your spending, and save for goals.

The personal finance app has 3 tiered plans for you to choose from: Stash Beginner costs $1 per month and is ideal for first-time budgeters and newbie investors, Stash Growth costs $3 per month and is probably better suited for saving for the long haul, Stash+ is just $9 per month and is better suited for families and knowledgeable investors.

Stash doesn’t just help you budget, it offers investment options like shares, ETFs $1 or less.

Final Thoughts

With these YNAB alternatives, be sure to get the best of budgeting and investment services while you save some bucks too.

10 Cheapest & Free YNAB Alternatives | You Deserve Better