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Budgie

Private Expense Tracker — On Your Device, Off the Cloud

No account. No aggregator. No telemetry. Six features that make Budgie the most private expense tracker on iOS and Android.

  • Your data stays on your device, encrypted with your PIN once you set one — no cloud copy ever
  • No account required to start tracking
  • Biometric and PIN locks before any transaction view
  • Screenshot blur on balance fields and app-switcher previews
  • Backups to your own iCloud Drive, Google Drive, or Dropbox
Join WaitlistAll Features

Monobank Expense Tracker — Direct API Sync, No Plaid

Direct API. No aggregator. Full transaction history to your device.

PIN App Lock — Nothing Opens Without Your PIN or Biometrics

A 4-digit PIN guards the app, with a growing wait after wrong tries and optional fingerprint or face unlock.

Face ID, Touch ID and Fingerprint Unlock

Biometric unlock hands Budgie only a yes or no — your PIN stays the fallback.

Screenshot Protection — Hide Bank Balance from Previews

Ask your phone to block screen capture and hide amounts in the app switcher with one switch in Settings.

Export Your Transactions, Plus a Full Backup

CSV for spreadsheets. A full database backup for restore. Both yours, never ours.

Database Backup & Restore

One file. No account. Restore by picking it — encrypted if your PIN was set.

Private Budget App — A Cloud-Free Alternative

Cloud-based personal finance apps mirror every transaction to their servers. Budgie keeps your ledger on your device. No account, no aggregator, no copy on somebody else's server.

FeatureBudgieCloud-based PFM apps
Where transactions liveOn your phone, encrypted once you set a PINVendor's cloud + aggregator
Account requiredNoYes — email + password
Bank loginOptional, direct API tokensRequired, via aggregator
SubscriptionNone — there is no paid tierMonthly recurring
AI runsOn your phoneIn the vendor cloud
Public sourceYesNo

Where a cloud-free budget app keeps your money data

Budgie's Settings screen opens on a Privacy card, and the Security group sits right under it. Between them they show the whole arrangement: one local database, no sign-in, and a lock you turn on yourself.

  1. Privacy is the first group in Settings. Every account, transaction and category lives in a single file on the phone — there is no vendor database holding a second copy.

  2. Nothing on this screen asks who you are. There is no account, no email, no sign-in step — so there is no server-side profile that a breach could expose.

  3. App Lock is opt-in, and the PIN you set does double duty: it becomes the key the whole file is encrypted with. Until you set one, the file is ordinary local storage — private to the app sandbox, but not encrypted.

Budgie Settings screen with a Privacy card stating all financial data is stored locally on the device, above a Security group where App Lock is not yet enabled and Screenshot Protection is off
Stored locally on your device
App Lock, off by default
  1. Stored locally on your device
  2. App Lock, off by default

Budget App Without Bank Login — Direct API or Statement Import

Aggregators sit between you and your bank, mirroring every transaction to their servers. Budgie talks to your bank directly via tokens or imports statements you download yourself.

FeatureBudgieAggregator-based PFM apps
Bank accessNever sharedAccess token held by aggregator
Sync methodDirect API tokens or PDF/CSVOAuth via aggregator
Aggregator middlemanNoneThird-party aggregator service
Bank breach impactBank-level onlyBank + aggregator + app
Works with offline-only banksYes (statement import)Often no
Sync intervalManual or scheduledAggregator's clock

Frequently Asked Questions

Does Budgie send any financial data to a server?
No. Every transaction, category, and balance lives in a database on your device, encrypted with your PIN once you set one. Budgie has no backend that receives financial data.
Do I need to create an account to use Budgie?
No account is required. You open the app and start tracking immediately. There is no sign-up screen, no email address collected, and no session token ever sent to our servers.
Where are my backups stored?
Backups go to your personal cloud storage — iCloud Drive on iOS, or Google Drive or Dropbox on Android. Budgie never receives a copy; you own every byte.
Does Budgie use any analytics or crash-reporting SDKs?
Budgie ships with zero third-party analytics or advertising SDKs. Crash reporting is opt-in and anonymized; financial data is never included.
How is the on-device database encrypted?
Set a PIN and Budgie encrypts the database with that PIN as the key. The PIN is the only key and it never leaves your device. Without a PIN the file is not encrypted, though it stays inside the app sandbox.
How is Budgie different from cloud-based PFM apps?
Cloud-based PFM apps mirror your transactions to their servers, share data with aggregators, and store your bank credentials. Budgie does none of this — your ledger stays on your device, and setting a PIN encrypts that file.
How does bank sync work without an aggregator?
Budgie talks to Monobank's own API with a token you paste in, parses Erste PDF statements and PrivatBank Excel exports on the device, and imports any other bank through generic CSV. No aggregator sits in between.
What about multi-device sync?
Export Database writes the whole database to one file and hands it to the system share sheet, so you choose where it goes — iCloud Drive, Google Drive, Dropbox, a NAS. Budgie has no sync server and no integration with any of them.
How do I move my data to a new phone?
Export a backup on the old phone, carry the file across yourself, then pick it in Import Database on the new one. Confirm the replacement and, if the backup is PIN-protected, enter its PIN, which becomes your app PIN. No account and no server sit in between.
What happens if I lose my phone?
Without a backup file your data is gone, because Budgie has no copy to restore. That is the price of keeping everything on your device, so save backups to storage you control.
Is the privacy claim verifiable?
Yes — Budgie's source is public. Read the network code yourself: github.com/budgie-at/budgie.
What about third-party aggregators?
Aggregators sit between you and your bank, mirroring transactions to their servers. Budgie deliberately does not use them.
Is direct API more secure than OAuth?
Both can be secure when implemented correctly. The difference is the threat surface: direct tokens are bank-to-you; aggregator OAuth adds a third party with an access token and your transaction stream.
Which banks have direct API support?
Monobank today; we add direct integrations as banks publish stable APIs. For everything else, statement import (PDF, CSV, Excel) covers the gap.