While mint.com is a good choice for free budgeting software, it’s not the only choice. Here are seven great alternatives to mint.com. The best one is totally free.

Mint.com is a great budgeting tool, all things considered. In fact, it’s one I still use myself from time to time. But for some people, it’s not the right budgeting tool.

You may not like the idea of connecting your bank and credit card accounts directly to your budgeting software. Or maybe you want a tool that focuses more heavily on investments than everyday budgeting.

Whatever your hangups with Mint, there are other budgeting tools around to get you exactly what you want. Here are some you might want to try:

For Longer-Term Budgeting: YNAB

There’s a lot to love about the You Need a Budget (YNAB) budgeting software. But one of the key features that sets it apart from Mint.com is that it allows for longer-term planning. With Mint, you can’t change a budget for that month until the first of the month. That gets frustrating if your budget varies by month and you want to plan for that.

With YNAB, though, you can set up budgets for several months in the future. Another key feature is easy goal setting, which I personally prefer to Mint’s financial goals options. Plus, the point of YNAB is to learn to live on last month’s income. It takes time to get to this point. But it’s a worthy goal that can make your financial life much more stable.

Check out our full review of YNAB here.

For Investment Tracking: Personal Capital

Mint does not offer some investment tracking options. But, frankly, it’s a fun add-on rather than the focus of the software. If your goal is to track your investments closely and even get some free advice, Personal Capital is a much better option.

I like that the interface is as visual as Mint’s. And it also folds in budgeting capabilities. But it has a much more robust investment tracking option.

I don’t personally find budgeting with Personal Capital as easy as I do with Mint. So it may not be your best option for keeping a super-detailed monthly budget. But if you use a simple budget but need to keep an eye on your investments, Personal Capital is definitely a great option.

Check out our full review of Personal Capital here.

For Mac Users: Banktivity 6

I am not personally a Mac user, so I haven’t had the chance to try Banktivity 6. With that said, its features are similar to those of Quicken. So it’s a robust personal financial management tool built just for Macs.

Banktivity tracks all sorts of accounts, including loan accounts and investments. It lets you keep track of your debt, input transactions easily, and search for past transactions. Overall, it’s a good tool for managing your entire financial life if you’re a Mac user.

You can check out Banktivity here.

For a Running Register: PowerWallet

Tracking your budget with Mint is nice. But it doesn’t give you a register that includes future transactions. For some, this can mean losing track of future cash flow and, thus, overspending. PowerWallet solves with problem with its forward-looking dashboard.

Basically, it lets you see how much money you’ve got, and how much money is already gone or is set to go out for the month. It lets you plan for specific goals in the future and gives you alerts for things like low account balances and upcoming due dates. One other interesting feature is PowerWallet Deals. It lets you see potential deals and savings based on where you typically spend your money.

Check out our full review of PowerWallet here.

For the Envelope Budget: Mvelopes

If you like the idea of the old-fashioned envelope budget, Mvelopes may be the budgeting tool you need. It basically lets you assign your income to virtual envelopes for different spending categories. When you spend money, you assign each transaction to an envelope. When the money in that category is gone, you’ll know you should stop spending.

One of the advantages of Mvelopes is that it has a great app. The app even automatically syncs transactions. So you can see where you are with your category-based spending at any point in time. This could make it easier to budget with a spouse or partner, so you can both be on the same page at all times.

Check out Mvelopes here.

For Dave Ramsey Followers: EveryDollar

If you’re a fan of Dave Ramsey, his budgeting software may help you stay on top of the Baby Steps. The EveryDollar budgeting software was created by Ramsey’s parent company. It operates similarly to Mvelopes, since Ramsey advocates for the envelope budgeting method. But it also builds in the Baby Steps, so you can see where you are on the plan at all times.

EveryDollar also has a helpful app, so you can track your spending on the go. And it’s got nice visuals that can help you see where you are at any given time.

You can check out this budgeting software here.

For Calendar-Based Budgeting: PocketSmith

Budgeting for all your bills for the month is great. But unless you get all your money on the first of the month, figuring out your actual cash flow can be difficult. Enter PocketSmith. This personal finance tool offers calendar-based budgeting. So you’ll know how much cash you should have on hand at any given time.

PocketSmith is a great option if you have enough money to pay all your bills, just not all at the same time. It lets you schedule upcoming bills and expenses in a calendar. And it creates cash projections and daily bank balances for up to thirty years in the future. That may be a bit excessive, but projecting daily bank balances for the month could be super helpful. It also lets you test different financial scenarios and makes predictions for you.

If you need a calendar-based budget, check out PocketSmith here.

All-in-all, I still like Mint for many reasons. But if it just doesn’t have what you want, check out one of these alternatives that could fill in the gaps for your personal budgeting plan.

Topics: Budget

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via Finance Xpress