Finox Personal compared with a budget spreadsheet
Finox or a spreadsheet: which should hold your budget?
A spreadsheet is free and does anything you build into it. Finox costs money and does a fixed set of things without being built. Here is how the two compare, including the cases where you should keep the spreadsheet.
Side by side
| Side by side | Finox Personal | A spreadsheet |
|---|---|---|
| Cost | $39.99 a year or $4.99 a month until 31 December 2026. Regular price $55.99 and $6.99. Free for the first 14 days. | Free with Google Sheets. Excel if you already pay for it. |
| Getting started | Add your accounts and their current balances. A few minutes. | A template is quick. Your own design takes an evening, and you maintain it from then on. |
| Adding a transaction | A short form: amount, category, account. Balances and budgets update on their own. | Type a row. Totals update as long as your formulas cover the new row. |
| Budgets | A limit per category, with spent and remaining shown live, renewed each month, and an alert before you cross a limit. | Whatever you build. Nothing warns you unless you open the file and look. |
| Savings schemes and fixed deposits | Built in. Interest, tax on interest, payout schedule and maturity date are calculated for you. | Possible, with compound-interest formulas you write and check yourself. |
| Loans and EMIs | An EMI schedule, due-date reminders and payoff progress. | A repayment table you build yourself. No reminders. |
| Net worth | Worked out from everything you have entered, and kept up to date. | A summary tab that is right for as long as every other tab is. |
| Reminders | For bills, EMIs, savings instalments and deposit maturity dates. | None. You keep a separate calendar. |
| Reports | 9 report types, each exportable to CSV, PDF or image. | Any chart you are willing to build. |
| Flexibility | A fixed structure, designed for personal finance. | Total. Any column, any formula, any layout. |
| On a phone | Runs in any mobile browser. There is no app in the app stores yet. | Sheets and Excel both have phone apps. A wide sheet is awkward on a small screen. |
| Where your data lives | On Finox servers, encrypted in transit and at rest. Export or delete it whenever you like. | In your own file, or in your Google or Microsoft account. |
When the spreadsheet is the better choice
- You enjoy building and tuning your own system, and you want every column to be yours.
- Your money is simple: one account, a handful of categories, no loans or deposits to follow.
- You do not want to pay for a tool, or keep your numbers on anyone else’s servers.
- You need a calculation that is particular to you. A spreadsheet can do it today. Finox may never do it.
When Finox is the better choice
- You have deposits, loans or instalments with dates you cannot afford to miss.
- The spreadsheet has stopped being updated, or a formula broke and you no longer trust the totals.
- You want to know your net worth without maintaining a summary tab.
- You enter most transactions on your phone, where a form is quicker than a row.
- More than one kind of account is involved: bank, cash, mobile wallet, card.
Try it beside your spreadsheet
Every feature is unlocked for 14 days. Keep the spreadsheet open as well, and see which of the two you are still updating at the end.
Start your free 14-day trial →Free 14-day trial · No credit card required
Frequently asked questions
For many people, yes. If you have one account and a few categories, and you keep the sheet up to date, a spreadsheet does the job and costs nothing. It starts to strain when you add loans, deposits with maturity dates, several accounts, or anything that needs a reminder.
Not at the moment. There is no import tool. You start by entering your accounts and their current balances, then record transactions from that day forward. Your old spreadsheet stays as your record of everything before.
Yes. Any report can be exported to CSV, PDF or image, and a CSV opens in Excel or Google Sheets. You can also delete your account and its data at any time.
No. Finox never asks for a bank login. You enter the numbers yourself, the same as you would in a spreadsheet, which is also why it works with any bank, wallet or cash.
You choose a plan to continue. No card is taken when you start, so nothing is charged unless you subscribe. If you decide not to, your data is kept for 30 days.
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