Budget planning is a crucial part of managing your finances. Income and expenditure planning helps you determine how much should be allotted to different expenses every month, which helps you make sure you always have an ample supply of cash at hand.
You probably know that a budget is essential to long-term financial success. If you have never budgeted before, getting started can feel like a huge challenge. However, I believe that anyone can create an effective personal budget that includes the expenses they need to cover and the savings goals they’re working towards — even if you’re completely new to the concept! Even if you think you need personal budgeting software the UK. But don’t worry — personal budgeting software the UK isn’t required for creating an effective budget for your circumstances. In fact, there are several great ways to create an awesome budget regardless of whether or not you use the software. Keep reading to learn how!
With so many choices of free budgeting software out there, it can be a tad overwhelming to choose from a variety of options. So how do you choose? The best place to start is by analyzing your needs and tastes such as affordability; features; usability; functionality; and more.
If you’re looking for useful personal finance software, you’ve come to the right place! In this article, we provide you with a list of the best UK personal finance software for 2022. Personal finance is an important part of your life – as it will guarantee your financial freedom, and can help you conquer debts and find more effective ways of spending your money. Keep reading to discover more
Best Budgeting Apps
We’ve compiled a list of some of the best budgeting and money management apps in the UK. These are manual and open banking budgeting apps that help you track your spending, categorize your expenses, organize your money and identify wasteful subscriptions.
All the open banking budgeting apps listed here are available on Android and iOS and regulated by the UK’s financial watchdog, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA).
1. Money Dashboard
Money Dashboard is a free online personal finance tool that helps you manage your money by giving you a clear picture of your bank and credit card accounts, all in one place. It’s easy to set up and use, so there’s no need to be an expert with Excel spreadsheets or other complicated financial software.
How it works: The first thing you need to do is input all of your banking information into Money Dashboard. The app will automatically pull in information from over 1,000 banks in the UK and Ireland (including NatWest, Barclays and Santander), so if you have multiple accounts with different providers then don’t worry – they’ll all be listed here! Once this is done simply click “Next” until you reach the end of the process where there are two options: either continue using Money Dashboard as-is or upgrade to Premium for enhanced features such as Mac/PC access via browser plugin or mobile app for iOS devices (Android coming soon).
2. Budget Bee
Budget Bee is a new budgeting app but it is a great one. It’s free to download and easy to use, so if you’re looking for a way to track your spending or save money this is the app for you.
The first thing that stands out about Budget Bee is its user interface: it has been designed by people who clearly understand how users interact with software and apps. The layout is intuitive, simple, and uncluttered—something many other budgeting apps could learn from!
In addition to being well-designed from an interaction perspective, Budget Bee also has powerful features that make managing your finances easier than ever before. It comes with built-in tools like graphs showing exactly where all of your money goes every month as well as reminders when bills need paying so there’s no chance of forgetting them again (or worse still – paying them late).
3. PocketSmith
PocketSmith is a free budgeting software that you can use on your desktop or mobile. It has many of the same features as Mint, but it also offers more flexibility in how you track spending. If you’re looking for something free with more power and control over your finances, then PocketSmith may be a better fit for your needs than Mint.
The main difference between PocketSmith and Mint is its ability to work with multiple accounts at once. This means that instead of pulling all transactions from one bank account into one place (like Mint does), PocketSmith allows users to enter up to 20 different bank accounts individually so they can keep track of each account’s spending separately without having them mixed together in one big pile of money-related data points. The result? A much clearer picture of where all your money goes every month!
4. Moneyhub
Moneyhub is a UK-based company that offers personal budgeting software to residents of the United Kingdom. The software can be used on mobile devices and is designed to help users track their spending and save money by automating the categorization of their transactions.
Moneyhub provides two versions of its budgeting software: free (which includes all features but limits the number of accounts) and premium (from £4.99 per month). Moneyhub’s premium version integrates with UK banks and credit cards, as well as investment accounts, making it easy to manage your finances in one place. In addition, Moneyhub uses machine learning technology so that your financial habits become more automatically categorized over time based on patterns detected in previous transactions. This makes it easier for you to stay on top of your finances without having to do much extra work!
The personal finance tools offered by Moneyhub include a debt management tool that allows you see all debts owed across different accounts at once – no matter where they’re held – helping reduce stress levels associated with keeping track of multiple loans/credit lines etcetera effectively
5. CountAbout
CountAbout is an online personal finance tool that connects to your bank accounts and automatically downloads your transactions for you to categorize. It’s one of the few personal finance software that lets you upload your Quicken data into their system.
6. Yolt
Yolt is another budgeting app that can help you manage your finances. The app allows you to sync all of your accounts and transactions in one place, while also providing insights on how much money is coming in and going out of each account. The free version of Yolt will only allow 2 accounts at a time, but if you upgrade to the paid version ($3/month), you’ll be able to add unlimited accounts for $3 per month—a great deal for any small business owner or freelancer.
Yolt has an impressive list of features:
- Sync transactions from any bank account
- Automatically categorize expenses and income
- Create custom categories (e.g., groceries)
- View graphs showing monthly spending trends
7. Money Lover
Money Lover is one of the best budgeting apps out there. It has a clean and intuitive interface that’s easy to use, syncs with your bank account, supports multiple currencies and languages, and allows you to customize your categories. The app also allows you to add manual transactions (e.g., cash), recurring payments (e.g., rent), income/bills tracking (e.g., salary), and investments tracking (if you’re into that sort of thing).
Money Lover also lets you track your credit score using Experian or Equifax once you sign up for a free trial from either company — just enter some basic information including address and personal details into their respective websites before linking them with your Money Lover account in order for this feature to work properly!
Take control of your finances with the best budgeting and money management software for UK users
You can use our list of the best budgeting software for UK users as a guide to help you decide on the right app or software for your needs.
- YNAB (You Need A Budget). The free version is limited but still useful. If you want to take advantage of all the features and don’t mind paying £60 per year, then it’s well worth upgrading.
- Mint Personal Finance Software. An excellent free app that helps track bank accounts plus credit cards, loans and investments in one place with no hidden fees – though it does have advertising during use which can be annoying when trying to get things done quickly!
- Money Dashboard Personal Finance Software. Another great personal finance app for tracking daily spending habits – this one has an easy-to-use interface that makes it very simple to keep track of where your money goes each month without having too much detail cluttering up how things look at first glance;
Quicken (free for 30 days)
Quicken is one of the more popular personal finance software options. It’s used by over 8 million people, and it makes budgeting and tracking your finances easier than ever before.
What is Quicken?
Quicken is a personal finance management program that makes it easy to keep track of all your money. You can create budgets and track spending, which helps you stay on top of how much money you have left in your account and how much you spend on certain things (like groceries or gas).
How much does Quick Cost?
You can try it for free for 30 days, but after that, there are three subscription options available: $99/year; $149/year with bill pay; or $179 with bill pay plus syncing between mobile devices. Each plan includes unlimited support from live chat agents 24/7 year round as well as access to their mobile app during those same hours. There isn’t any difference between these plans other than what’s offered besides additional features on higher tiers like financial planning advice from certified advisors through their partnership with LearnVest who has been featured in TIME magazine multiple times as well as Oprah Magazine’s list of “8 Top Women Money Experts You Should Follow On Twitter”.
Money Dashboard (free)
Money Dashboard (free)
Money Dashboard is a powerful tool, but it’s not perfect. The software itself is free, but the service isn’t—you’ll have to pay $1 per month or $10 per year to use it. Most users won’t mind paying for this kind of functionality, but if you’re looking for a completely free option with no strings attached, Money Dashboard isn’t what you’re looking for. You can also access all your data from their website without needlessly downloading anything on your computer: that’s fine if all you want to do is check-in occasionally and see how things are going; however, this does mean that there’s no way for anyone using the service on their phone or tablet device (though the website works just fine).
While not open source like Qoins, Money Dashboard does make money by charging customers for subscriptions rather than selling ads—a model that many would say makes sense when companies are providing tools as useful as theirs are! It also doesn’t have any Linux client as of yet (though we hope they add one soon!). However, there is an iPhone app available through the iTunes Store which allows users who don’t want to log into their accounts through web browsers only but still want some sort of mobile access should consider trying out this option first before investigating further solutions such as Xero Mobile which might work better depending on what type person they happen
YNAB (paid software)
YNAB is a personal finance software that has been around since 2004. It is the brainchild of Jesse Mecham, who created it after trying various budgeting methods with his wife and struggling to stick to them. YNAB stands for You Need A Budget and their tagline is “Live your life, not play house” which sums up what they want you to do with their program.
The first thing to mention about YNAB is that it can be used on Macs, PCs and iPhones/iPads. This makes it very easy for anyone to use this system regardless of which computer you have at home or work! The interface is simple yet effective so even if you don’t consider yourself particularly “techie” then this shouldn’t worry you too much when looking into getting some assistance with managing your money better than before!
There are some other features included in YNAB including:
- Automatically imports transactions from 18000+ banks & credit cards
- Support for multiple currencies (including crypto) – example; USD $120 becomes £80-ish GBP depending on exchange rate etc.; You can also set budgets by currency too e.g. if an item costs $10 but we want our budget control over purchases then we could put that item as £6 instead (or whatever amount). This way our spending will reflect actual cost rather than inflated prices due to exchange rates changing every day so often!
Moneydance (paid software)
Moneydance is a personal finance software that is available for both desktop and mobile. It’s secure, flexible, and easy to use. Moneydance offers a number of features including budgeting, investment tracking, bill payment reminders and more.
Sage 50cloud Accounting (paid software)
Sage 50cloud Accounting is a well-known brand of accounting software that includes features for invoicing, bank reconciliation, and stock control. It’s a great choice for small and medium-sized businesses. The software is easy to use and the user interface is intuitive; you’ll be up and running in no time.
You can try Sage 50cloud Accounting for 30 days free of charge by signing up on their website!
How to Stop Going Over Your Budget
Here are our top tips to help you stop going over your budget:
- Set SMART goals: Set SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Timely) goals and plan for each month of the year. There’s no point in planning to save 70% of your income next month if you’ve never saved up 20% before. A rule of thumb is to start small and increase your savings goals each month. For example, if you save 10% this month, you can try 11% next month, 12% the following month and so on.
- Open a separate savings account for each budget category: There are three main budget categories – needs, wants and savings. Opening a separate savings account or pot for each category will help you better track your spending. For example, you can open an ISA (tax-free savings account) for your savings and a standard savings or current account for your needs and wants. Banks like Monzo, Starling and Barclays allow you to create virtual savings pots within your existing account, so you don’t have to go through the hassle of opening multiple accounts. This method of budgeting is called the envelope budgeting method.
- Set up a standing order for each payday: If you have different savings accounts for each budget category, use your bank app to set up a standing order to move money from your current account to your savings account every payday. This way, you are allocating money to all three budget categories immediately after you receive your salary. If you have an investment account, you should consider setting up a direct debit to automate transfers to your investment account too.
Conclusion
Moving out of your parents’ home and becoming an independent adult can be both exciting and frustrating. It is something you have dreamed about since you were a child but now that the day has finally come, it is time to take control over your finances. But when the only money you’ve ever really managed was your weekly allowance, finances can seem very complicated and confusing at first.
You can use it on your own or with multiple devices at once. There are options to backup online and synch devices, as well as provide security with an option to password protect your app. It’s got a simple look and design, making it easy to navigate around the different choices. It uses colorful icons that make it easier to keep track of where you are within the software, especially when you have more than one account set up with the program. There is also a calculator option included in this app, which is extremely convenient for finding out how much you need to save up in order to hit a certain financial goal (like saving for a car or down payment for your home.) The only thing that we didn’t like about this app was the lack of free budgeting templates to get started. So hopefully there will be some future additions made that include help from additional resources/software programs. However, if you’re looking for an easy personal finance software option that won’t break your bank then Personal Budgeting Software Uk is a great place to start!