How to choose an expense app in 2026: the seven questions that decide it

App rankings go stale in three months: a price changes, a new limit appears, and the list is left recommending something that no longer matches its own description. So this post isn't a ranking.

It's the seven questions that decide whether an app will work for you, with Kesef's own answer stated next to each one so you know where this is written from. Answer them for whatever you're looking at and you'll know more than ten reviews would tell you.

1. Is there an expense cap on the free plan?

This is the question that filters most and gets checked least before installing. A daily or monthly cap doesn't bother you if you log two expenses a week; it shows up exactly on the day you logged the most — a trip, a move, the month you finally got serious — and that's the day people quit.

Look for it before installing. It's usually buried in the plan comparison, and sometimes you can only infer it from the paid plan listing "unlimited expenses" as a feature.

Kesef: no cap on expenses or groups in the free plan.

2. Does it need a bank connection to be useful?

Two apps can do the same thing and one be useless where you live. If the connection doesn't exist in your country, if your bank isn't supported, or if you simply don't want to hand over credentials, an app designed around automatic import leaves you with a shell.

And even where it works, the connection can't see cash, doesn't pick your categories, and doesn't know which part of a shared expense is yours. It's developed in tracking without connecting a bank.

Kesef: works without connecting anything. It never asks for bank credentials.

3. Does it handle shared and personal expenses in one place?

This is where the market splits in two, and it's the most underestimated difference.

Shared expense apps record what you divide with other people; what you spend alone doesn't live there. Personal finance apps do the opposite. If your case is "I want to understand my spending and I also share a home", keeping them separate means half of what you spend never appears in your summary.

Kesef: both. Your share of a group expense lands in your month.

4. Does it handle more than one currency, and how does it convert?

If you earn or spend in more than one currency, "supports currencies" isn't enough. You have to look at how it converts: if it recalculates everything at today's rate, a closed month changes size every time you open it and the history stops being comparable. The reasoning is in tracking two currencies.

Kesef: 60+ currencies, with the conversion locked to the day of the expense.

5. Can recurring expenses be set up once?

In a typical household, rent, utilities, subscriptions and instalments already decide half of monthly spending. Without recurring entries, that half gets retyped every month — ten or twelve identical entries that add nothing. It's the repetitive work that makes people quit. It's in recurring expenses.

Kesef: yes, on the free plan.

6. Can you get your data out?

The question almost nobody asks until they need it. Without export, five years of your data depend on that company continuing to exist and continuing to charge you the same. Check the format too: a flat table preserves neither groups nor tags. It's in exporting your expenses.

Kesef: JSON and CSV on the free plan, Excel on Pro.

7. What does it cost, and what happens if you stop paying?

Both halves matter. A cheap subscription that leaves your data read-only when it lapses is more expensive than a slightly pricier one that doesn't.

Concrete questions: is the price published on the site, or does it only appear when you open the subscription? What exactly is lost on dropping to the free plan? Are there ads?

Kesef: USD 3 a month or USD 20 a year. The free plan shows ads and has no expense cap.

One data point to calibrate price

Kesef Pro is USD 20 a year. For a sense of the range in this category: Spendee publishes its Plus plan at USD 14.99 a year, and YNAB publishes USD 109 a year. These are different products with different scopes, so it isn't a like-for-like comparison — it's a scale for placing whatever you're looking at.

Splitwise doesn't publish the price of Pro on its site: it appears when you open the subscription from the app or on the store listing. Which is why we don't state it here.

In one line

Before installing, answer: cap on the free plan, whether it requires a bank connection, whether it holds shared and personal together, how it converts currencies, whether it has recurring expenses, whether you can export, and what happens if you stop paying. That's the decision made.

Kesef is free, on iPhone and Android

Shared expenses with no cap, 60+ currencies, and the numbers explained.