Income is irregular, not a salary
A term-time job, a grant paid in instalments, and money from family do not look like a monthly paycheque. SpendBalance lets you enter income whenever it arrives rather than assuming a fixed monthly figure.
A free budget app for college students
SpendBalance is a free iPhone and iPad budget app built for the way student money actually works: no bank account to link, no sign-up, no subscription, and categories for things like tuition, books, coffee, and nightlife. Everything you enter stays on your phone.
Why student money is hard to budget
A lot of spending is cash or split with friends
Bank sync cannot see a cash payment or your share of a group dinner. If you are tracking those anyway, manual entry is not extra work — it is the only thing that captures them.
It works with your bank, wherever you bank
SpendBalance has no supported-bank list, because it never connects to one. An account at home, an account abroad, or both at once while you are studying all work the same way, in any of 66 currencies.
Free means the whole app
Every feature is available to everyone: no in-app purchases, no premium tier, and no trial that expires. There is nothing to upgrade to, so there is nothing that stops working part-way through term.
Categories that match student spending
SpendBalance ships with 38 categories. These are the ones students tend to use most — each can be renamed and recoloured to match how you think about your money.
- Education
- Books & Supplies
- Tech & Gear
- Coffee & Snacks
- Eating Out
- Nightlife
- Commute
- Rent & Bills
- Subscriptions
- Fitness
- Gaming
- Events & Concerts
Set the fixed costs once
Rent, a phone plan, a transit pass, and streaming subscriptions are the predictable part of a student budget. Enter each one as a recurring transaction — daily, weekly, or monthly — and SpendBalance records it automatically from then on. What is left to track by hand is the variable spending that actually needs watching.
The balance history chart then shows whether you are on track to reach the end of term with money left, which is the only question that really matters.
Honest limitations
- iOS only — there is no Android, web, or desktop version.
- English only.
- No bank sync, so every transaction is entered by hand.
- No shared or joint budgets.
- No built-in data export yet.
- The app is new and has too few App Store ratings to show a rating average.
Recurring entries cover the fixed costs, but the variable spending is typed in — if you know you will not keep that up, this is not the right tool for you.
Download SpendBalance
Free on the App Store for iPhone and iPad running iOS 15.1 or later. No account, no bank connection, no in-app purchases.