Compare
Simple Balance vs. YNAB
YNAB and Simple Balance are both budget apps. YNAB costs $14.99 a month or $109 a year after a 34-day free trial. Simple Balance is free for three accounts in use at once, with ads, or $3 a month or $30 a year for Premium, and it’s open source, so you can also run your own copy for free. YNAB can connect to your bank. Simple Balance has no bank connection today, so you import a CSV file you download from your bank.
Feature comparison.
| Feature | Simple Balance | YNAB |
|---|---|---|
| Hosted for you, and what it costs | Free, or $3 a month or $30 a year for Premium | $14.99 a month, or $109 a year[1] |
| A free plan, hosted for you | Yes, with every feature, for three accounts in use at once and with ads | No. A 34-day free trial, with no card needed[1] |
| Run your own copy | Yes, free, on a server you look after, with no plan, no account limit and no ads | No |
| How your transactions get in | You download a CSV file from your bank and import it, or type entries in. There’s no bank connection today. | Direct Import can connect to your bank through MX or Plaid. It’s optional, and you can import files instead.[2] |
| Files it imports | CSV | CSV, OFX, QFX and QIF[3] |
| How budgets work | A budget for each category or group, which can carry what’s left into the next month | The YNAB Method: each time money comes in, you decide what it’s for[4] |
| Sharing with a partner | No. Each person who signs up has their own books. | Up to six people on one subscription[1] |
| Open source | Yes, under the AGPL-3.0 license | No |
| AI assistants | An MCP server an assistant can sign in to, to read, to propose entries for you to approve, or to make changes as you allow | No official one. A public API, which MCP servers built by other people use[6] |
| Where you use it | A web browser, on a computer or a phone. There’s no app-store app. | The web, iPhone and iPad, Android and Apple Watch[5] |
When YNAB is the better choice.
- You want transactions to arrive without downloading anything. YNAB’s Direct Import brings transactions in from your bank, and Simple Balance has no bank connection today.[2]
- You want the YNAB Method, deciding what each dollar is for as it comes in.[4]
- You share your money with a partner or a family. One YNAB subscription covers up to six people, and Simple Balance gives each person separate books.[1]
- You want an app from an app store, on a phone or an Apple Watch.[5]
- Your bank offers OFX, QFX or QIF files and not CSV. YNAB reads all three, and Simple Balance reads CSV only.[3]
When Simple Balance is the better choice.
- You’d rather pay less, or nothing. Simple Balance’s free plan has every feature, and it isn’t a trial.
- You’d rather check each transaction before it counts. Everything you import waits on Staged until you commit it.
- You want to read the code or run your own copy. Simple Balance is open source under the AGPL-3.0 license, and free to run yourself with no limit and no ads.
- You keep money in more than one currency. Each account keeps its own, and nothing is converted at an exchange rate.
- You want an AI assistant to work in your books through an MCP server the app runs itself.
Moving from YNAB.
YNAB exports a plan’s transactions as a CSV file from its web app: choose the plan’s name at the top of the sidebar, then Export Plan.[7]
Simple Balance puts every row of a file into the one account you choose, so a file that holds more than one account needs splitting into one file per account first. Its amounts have to be plain numbers, without a currency sign, and a row that can’t be read waits on Staged for you to fix rather than counting.
Your bank’s own CSV files work as well, and they’re what the import is built for. Budgets don’t come across either way: set them up again on Budgets, and the bills that repeat on Recurring.
Importing a statement, step by step