The best YNAB alternatives on Apple devices in 2026

A ranking written by somebody who sells one of the apps is worth nothing unless every other row gets its real case. So each app below has a case where it beats ours, and ours says plainly where it loses. Follow the links and check the figures yourself — that is what they are there for.

Fundkeep — best for the YNAB method on iPhone, iPad and Mac

Ours. It is the envelope method as YNAB teaches it — money gets a job before it gets spent, envelopes hold what is left rather than what you hoped — on iPhone, iPad and Mac, bought once instead of subscribed to. It reads a YNAB export and rebuilds your categories, accounts and history, then shows every difference between its balances and YNAB’s before anything is saved. There is no bank connection at all: you type transactions or import the CSV your own bank gives you. Envelopes take a monthly goal, and what you entered stays visible for ever, because the app is bought, not rented.

Where it loses, and these are not small:

• It is the most expensive one-time price here. Zeroed is a founder price away at less than half, and Envy’s unlock is a fraction of it.
• Apple only. No Android, no Windows, no web. A mixed household decides against us on this line alone.
• One person’s budget. It syncs across your own devices through your private iCloud; sharing a budget with a partner is not in this version, and YNAB and Goodbudget both do it.
• The trial is 14 days. Zeroed gives 34, YNAB gives 34 on its own site.
• No bank connection, ever. If automatic import is the thing you are paying for, we are the wrong answer and no privacy argument changes that.

Zeroed — best if you also use Windows or Android

Zeroed is the closest thing here to our own argument, made by somebody else: offline, pay once, no subscription, privacy as the headline. Since 14 September 2026 it is on the App Store for iPhone, iPad and Macs with Apple silicon, and it is also on Google Play, the Microsoft Store and as a direct download for Mac and Windows — one purchase covers the lot. It imports CSV and PDF statements rather than connecting to a bank, and its licence travels through your own Google Drive.

For a household that is not all Apple, this is the answer, and at a founder price until February 2027 it undercuts us badly. Two things to weigh: the price rises afterwards to what we charge today, and the licence key living in Google Drive is a third party in a story about having none.

Actual Budget — best if you will run it yourself

Actual Budget is free and open source, and it is the only app here besides ours that names YNAB’s own export formats: its site advertises built-in YNAB4 and nYNAB importers that keep your history. It runs on Windows, macOS, Linux and in a browser, and bank connection is optional — off until you set it up with a data provider of your own, and it never fetches without being asked.

The price of free is that syncing between your devices means running a server — your own, or a paid host. If that sentence sounds like a weekend rather than a chore, nothing here will serve you better, and it will cost you nothing.

Envy — best if you want the cheapest unlock

Envy is the cash-envelope idea on iPhone and iPad, free to download with a single in-app purchase called Envy All Access. It never connects to a bank — its developer says so plainly — and it syncs between your own devices through iCloud.

We charge several times what Envy charges for something that, from the outside, does the same job. Our case is the Mac app, the YNAB migration with a reconciliation report you read before anything is saved, and no third-party code anywhere in the app. Whether that is worth the difference is genuinely your call, and our fourteen days are free precisely so you can make it without taking our word for anything.

MoneyCoach — best if you want bank sync in Europe

MoneyCoach is the most polished Apple citizen in this list: iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Watch, and years of work behind it. Its most used features are free, with a Premium subscription above them — Apple’s US listing shows Premium at several different prices, and a Lifetime Premium at $199.99. Bank connection is optional and Premium-only, and it covers European banks; UK banks are not supported.

If you want your transactions to arrive by themselves and you bank in Europe, this is the app on this page that does it. It is also the only one here that asks for a subscription rather than a purchase, which is the thing you are probably leaving YNAB to avoid.

YNAB — best if what you pay for is bank sync and sharing

Worth saying out loud: staying is a real option. YNAB is $109 a year or $14.99 a month — what it costs, and every price it has charged since 2012 — and for that you get direct import from selected US, Canadian, UK and EU banks, targets with dates and refill rules, and one subscription covering up to six people. None of the apps above does all three.

If you are leaving because the method stopped fitting, none of this list will help. If you are leaving because of the yearly bill, the bank connection, or both, the rows above are the trade you are making.

How to choose

• Everything you own is Apple, and you want the method, paid once. That is the case Fundkeep was built for. Take the fourteen days first, and see which budget apps you buy once if the payment model is what you are shopping for.
• Somebody in the house is on Windows or Android. Zeroed, and it is cheaper until February 2027.
• You would rather pay nothing and are happy to run a server. Actual Budget, which will also read your YNAB export.
• You want the smallest possible bill on an iPhone. Envy’s one unlock.
• You want transactions to arrive on their own and you bank in Europe. MoneyCoach’s Premium.
• You want them to arrive on their own anywhere else, and to share the budget. Stay on YNAB. Nothing on this page replaces that.

How these figures were checked

Every price came from the company’s own page or Apple’s own listing on 26 September 2026, never from a review site or our own notes. Where a figure could not be confirmed first-hand, the table says so instead of printing one. The check that day caught our own mistake: we had been saying Zeroed was not on the App Store, because Apple’s search does not return it for the word “zeroed” — the link on Zeroed’s own site does.

If you are moving in either direction, the YNAB export guide covers what comes out of YNAB and what it leaves behind, and budget apps that don’t need a bank login covers the wider list, including apps that never touch a bank at all.