A YNAB alternative built around debt and irregular income
YNAB popularised zero-based budgeting: every dollar gets a job. MoneyQuilt keeps that idea — you can run simple categories or full envelopes — and builds the rest of the picture around it, from card utilisation and BNPL instalments to invoices for your side business.
Where MoneyQuilt is different
Debt payoff is a first-class module, not a category
Snowball and avalanche plans side by side, projected debt-free dates, total interest, and per-card utilisation with a healthy spend figure for the current statement cycle.
Statement and inbox import
Upload a PDF or CSV statement and rows arrive categorised with money-in/out set. Connect the inboxes where card statements land and new ones get queued for review automatically.
BNPL instalments tracked properly
Buy-now-pay-later plans are detected from statements and folded into bills and the cash-flow forecast, instead of surprising you as random charges.
A business workspace in the same app
Switch to business mode for invoices, estimates, clients, expenses, pay runs and reports — useful if you freelance, drive or run a small shop alongside your household budget.
Everything is editable, with an audit trail and undo
Forgot to stop a work timer or miscategorised an import? Edit any entry after the fact, see what changed, and undo your last edit.
Who should stay with YNAB?
If a single, purely rule-driven envelope budget is all you want, and you already enjoy the discipline of assigning every transaction by hand, YNAB does that one job extremely well.
MoneyQuilt is the better fit if your money is messier than a single household budget — cards and BNPL plans to clear, income that changes week to week, or a side business whose invoices and expenses you are currently tracking in a spreadsheet.
Frequently asked questions
- Does MoneyQuilt support zero-based budgeting like YNAB?
- Yes. Envelope mode assigns every dollar of income to a category until nothing is left unassigned, and you can move money between envelopes when a category overspends. There is also a simpler category-and-cap mode if full envelopes feel heavy.
- Can I import my existing transactions?
- You can upload bank or card statements as PDF or CSV. Transactions are categorised on import, duplicates from overlapping statement periods are detected and skipped, and you can bulk-edit categories before confirming.
- Is MoneyQuilt free?
- You can create an account and use the app free, and the calculators on the site work without signing up at all.
Switching from YNAB? Start in about five minutes
Create a free account, upload a statement, and MoneyQuilt sets up your categories, bills and debt plan from your real numbers — nothing is pre-filled with made-up data.
Free to start · no card required