Budget

This guide explains how budgeting works in FinyxFin so you can create budgets, assign categories, monitor progress, and manage monthly spending more effectively.

🎬 Watch the Video Tutorial

See Budget basics in action with our step-by-step walkthrough.

▶️ Watch: Budget – Basics

📊 Overview

FinyxFin's Budget module is a monthly spending plan that helps you allocate your income across your fixed obligations, savings goals, and everyday spending. Budgets are organized into three roles — Income, Committed, and Planned Spending — so you always know how much is coming in, what's already spoken for, and how much you have left to spend freely.

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Budget Roles

Organize budgets as Income, Committed, or Planned Spending

📂

Multi-Category

Combine multiple categories into one budget envelope

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Progress Tracking

Real-time spending vs. budget with color-coded status

🔔

Custom Alerts

Set your own threshold for near-limit notifications

📋

Templates

Start instantly with 7 built-in budgeting frameworks

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Reports

Historical trends and budget performance over time

💡 Premium Feature

Up to 12 budgets are available on the free plan. Upgrade from Settings → Premium to unlock unlimited budgets.

🏷️ Budget Roles

Every budget you create belongs to one of three roles. The role determines how the budget is grouped on the dashboard and how its progress is interpreted. The role cannot be changed after creation.

💰 Income

Track money coming in — salary, freelance income, side earnings, etc.

  • Tracks income transactions, not expenses
  • Status is green when you exceed the target (more income is better)
  • Shows "Remaining to Receive" instead of "Remaining"
  • Overspend alerts do not apply to income budgets

📌 Committed

Fixed monthly obligations that don't change much — rent, subscriptions, insurance, loan payments.

  • Tracks expense transactions
  • Feeds the "Income After Bills & Savings" calculation on the dashboard
  • Full alert support for near-limit and over-budget

🛒 Planned Spending

Flexible, discretionary spending — groceries, dining, entertainment, shopping.

  • Tracks expense transactions
  • Shows how much of your free-to-spend money remains
  • Full alert support for near-limit and over-budget
💡 How Roles Work Together

The dashboard calculates: Total Income − Committed − Planned Spending so you can see at a glance whether your budget adds up. This is the core of zero-based budgeting — every dollar of income is assigned a purpose.

➕ Creating a Budget

You can create budgets from scratch or start from a template (see below). To create manually:

1

Open Budget

Navigate to Budget from the sidebar

2

Tap Add Budget

Tap the + button to start a new budget

3

Choose a Role

Select Income, Committed, or Planned Spending. This cannot be changed later.

4

Select Categories

Pick one or more categories this budget will track. You can combine multiple categories into a single budget. Categories cannot be changed after creation.

5

Name the Budget

For single-category budgets, the name is filled in automatically. Multi-category budgets require a custom name.

6

Set the Monthly Amount

Enter how much to budget each month for this category (or group of categories)

7

Configure Alert (Optional)

Choose an alert threshold between 50% and 100% (default is 80%). You'll be notified when spending reaches this percentage of the budget.

8

Save

Your budget is active — existing transactions for the current month are counted immediately.

⚠️ Categories and Role Are Locked After Creation

Once a budget is saved, you cannot change which categories it tracks or its role (Income / Committed / Planned Spending). Plan carefully before saving. You can always edit the monthly amount, name, and alert settings at any time.

📋 Budget Templates

If you're starting from scratch, templates create a complete set of budgets for you in one tap — already categorized and organized by role. FinyxFin includes 7 built-in templates:

Template How It Works
50/30/20 Rule 50% Needs · 30% Wants · 20% Savings — the classic balanced approach
70/20/10 Rule 70% Living expenses · 20% Savings · 10% Debt — suited for high cost-of-living
80/20 Rule Save 20% first, spend the remaining 80% freely
60% Solution 60% Committed expenses · 40% split across retirement, irregular, and fun money
Essential Bills Bills-first structure: Housing, Utilities, Insurance, Groceries, Transport, Savings
Aggressive Savings 50% Living · 50% Savings — for fast wealth-building
Family Budget Designed for families: includes Housing, Kids, Groceries, Transport, and Savings
ℹ️ Templates Create Multiple Budgets at Once

Each template creates a full set of budgets — one per category — already assigned to the correct role. You can edit individual amounts after applying the template to match your actual income and expenses.

📱 The Budget Dashboard

The main Budget screen shows your Monthly Spending Plan — a complete picture of this month's income, fixed obligations, and discretionary spending side by side.

Summary Cards

At the top of the screen you'll see high-level totals:

  • Total Planned Income — Sum of all income budget targets
  • Total Committed — Sum of all committed (bills & savings) budget amounts
  • Total Planned Spending — Sum of all discretionary budget amounts
  • Income After Bills & Savings — What remains after deducting committed budgets from income

Budget Sections

Budgets are grouped into three sections matching their role:

  1. Income — All income tracking budgets
  2. Committed — Fixed obligations and savings
  3. Planned Spending — Flexible discretionary budgets

Unbudgeted Expenses

At the bottom of the screen, FinyxFin shows any cleared expense transactions that don't belong to any budget category. This is a useful signal that you may want to create a new budget for that spending.

Navigating Months

Use the month navigation at the top of the screen to browse previous months and review your past budget performance.

📉 Reading Budget Cards

Each budget is displayed as a card showing its progress for the current month.

What Each Card Shows

  • Budget Name & Category
  • Progress Bar — Visual fill representing spending as a percentage of the budget
  • Amount Spent — Total cleared spending this month in this budget's categories
  • Remaining — How much is left before hitting the limit
  • Monthly Amount — The budgeted cap
  • Status Label — A quick text summary of where you stand

Status Colors for Expense Budgets (Committed & Planned Spending)

Color Status Meaning
Green Healthy Under 60% spent — you're in great shape
Yellow On Track 60–79% spent — spending normally
Orange Near Limit At or past your alert threshold (default 80%)
Red Over Budget Exceeded 100% of the budget

Status Colors for Income Budgets

Color Status Meaning
Green Above Target Income received exceeds the budget target — excellent
Teal On Track 80%+ of expected income received
Orange Below Target Less than 80% of expected income received
ℹ️ Only Cleared Transactions Count

Budget progress is calculated from cleared transactions only. Pending transactions are not included until they clear.

🔍 Budget Detail View

Tap any budget card to open its detail view for a deeper look at that budget's performance.

Stats Cards

  • Spent — Total cleared spending this month
  • Remaining — Amount left in the budget
  • % Used — Percentage of the budget consumed
  • Safe Daily Spend — How much you can spend per day for the rest of the month without going over

Monthly Comparison Chart

A bar chart shows how your spending in this budget has varied month to month, making it easy to spot trends or seasonal patterns.

Transaction List

All cleared transactions that count toward this budget are listed below the chart. For multi-category budgets, you'll also see a breakdown by individual category.

Month Navigation

Use the month picker in the detail view to review this budget's history for any previous month.

📂 Multi-Category Budgets

You can assign two or more categories to a single budget. This is useful when you want to track a group of related expenses under one overall limit — for example, combining Dining and Coffee into a single "Eating Out" budget.

How to Create One

When creating a budget, select multiple categories from the category list. When more than one is selected, you'll be required to enter a custom name for the budget.

How They Display

  • The budget card shows a folder icon indicating it covers multiple categories
  • The detail view includes a breakdown of spending per category within the group
  • The combined spending from all included categories counts toward the single budget limit
⚠️ Categories Are Locked After Creation

Once you save a multi-category budget, you cannot add or remove categories from it. If you need a different grouping, delete the budget and create a new one.

🔔 Alerts & Notifications

FinyxFin notifies you when a budget is approaching or has exceeded its limit.

Alert Types

Alert When It Fires
Near Limit Spending reaches your configured alert threshold (default 80%)
Over Budget Spending exceeds 100% of the budget

Configuring the Alert Threshold

Each budget has its own alert threshold, adjustable from 50% to 100% in 5% steps. The default is 80%. You can change this when creating or editing a budget. You can also disable alerts entirely for a specific budget by toggling alerts off.

In-App Banners

In addition to push notifications, FinyxFin shows in-app banners for:

  • Over Budget — A budget has exceeded its limit
  • Near Limit — A budget has crossed its alert threshold
  • Unbudgeted Expenses — You have cleared expenses not covered by any budget
  • Budget Exceeds Income — Your total planned spending and committed amounts exceed your planned income
ℹ️ One Alert Per Budget Per Month

Each alert type fires only once per budget per month to avoid repeat notifications. Income budgets do not trigger overspend alerts.

📉 Budget Reports

The Reports view gives you a historical picture of your budget performance over time. Access it from the Budget screen.

Time Period Filters

  • Last 3 Months
  • Last 6 Months
  • Last 12 Months
  • This Year
  • All Time

What You'll See

  • Summary Cards — Total Income, Total Spent, Left Over, and Average per Month across the selected period
  • Income vs. Spending Chart — A bar chart comparing income and spending month by month
  • Budget Performance Table — Each budget listed with its average % used and total spent vs. budgeted
  • Monthly Breakdown — Expandable rows showing income and spending detail per month

⚙️ Managing Budgets

Editing a Budget

To edit a budget:

  • On Mac: Right-click the budget card → select Edit
  • On iPhone & iPad: Swipe left on the budget card → tap Edit, or open the detail view and tap Edit

You can edit the following:

  • Budget name (multi-category budgets only)
  • Monthly amount
  • Alert enabled / disabled
  • Alert threshold percentage
  • Notes
⚠️ What Cannot Be Changed

The budget's categories, role (Income / Committed / Planned Spending), and transaction type are permanently locked after creation. To change these, delete the budget and create a new one.

Deleting a Budget

To delete a budget:

  • On Mac: Right-click the budget card → select Delete
  • On iPhone & iPad: Swipe left on the budget card → tap Delete
ℹ️ Transactions Are Not Affected

Deleting a budget removes it from tracking but does not delete any transactions. Your full transaction history is always preserved. There is no archive option for budgets — deletion is permanent.

🔗 How Transactions Count Toward Budgets

Budget progress is calculated from cleared transactions whose category matches a budget's tracked categories:

Transaction Type Counts Toward Budget?
Expense ✅ Yes — if the category matches a Committed or Planned Spending budget
Income ✅ Yes — if the category matches an Income budget
Transfer ❌ No — account transfers are not counted as spending
Investment Buy/Sell ❌ No — asset conversions are excluded
Pending Transactions ❌ No — only cleared transactions count
💡 Category Must Match

A budget only tracks transactions assigned to its specific categories. If a transaction uses a different category, it won't count toward that budget. Keep transaction categories accurate for reliable budget tracking.

❓ Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Do budgets reset automatically each month?
Yes. Budget progress resets at the start of each calendar month. The monthly amount stays the same — only the spending counter resets. There is no rollover of unused budget to the next month.
Q: Can I change the categories a budget tracks after creating it?
No. Categories and role are permanently locked after creation. If you need to change what a budget tracks, delete it and create a new one with the correct categories.
Q: Can I have multiple budgets for the same category?
Each category can only be assigned to one budget. If you try to select a category that's already in use, it won't be available.
Q: What's the difference between Committed and Planned Spending?
Committed budgets are for fixed monthly obligations that are the same every month — rent, subscriptions, insurance. Planned Spending is for flexible expenses that vary — groceries, dining, entertainment. Both track expenses and support alerts, but they're grouped separately on the dashboard to give you a clearer picture of your financial obligations vs. discretionary spending.
Q: Why is my income budget showing orange even though I received some income?
Income budgets show orange ("Below Target") when you've received less than 80% of your expected income for the month. Unlike expense budgets where over-spending is the concern, income budgets flag when you're falling short of your income target.
Q: Can I see past months' budgets?
Yes — use the month navigation arrows at the top of the Budget screen to browse previous months. You can also use the Reports view for a multi-month trend analysis.
Q: Why doesn't my budget progress match what I expect?
Check that your transactions are using the correct categories and are marked as cleared (not pending). Budget progress is calculated from cleared transactions only, and only from categories that match the budget.
Q: What does "Safe Daily Spend" mean in the detail view?
Safe Daily Spend is the amount you can spend per remaining day in the month without exceeding the budget. It's calculated as: remaining budget ÷ days left in the month. It updates in real time as you spend and as the month progresses.
Q: What happens to transactions if I delete a budget?
Nothing — transactions are never affected by budget changes. Deleting a budget only removes the tracking; all your transaction history is preserved.
Q: Do transfers count toward spending budgets?
No. Only expense transactions count toward Committed and Planned Spending budgets. Transfers between your own accounts are not considered spending.

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