The best free budgeting app in the UK

Plenty of UK budgeting apps have a free tier — but “free” can mean different things. Here’s how to tell a genuinely useful free app from one that’s really an ad for the paid version, and where a privacy-first, no-bank-linking app like Moniquid fits.

What “free” should actually get you

The core, not a teaser. A good free tier lets you track spending, set budgets and see your bills — not just a read-only dashboard nagging you to upgrade.
No cost paid in data. If an app is free because it sells your spending data or shows ads, that’s a price too. Check the privacy policy.
UK-built. Pounds and pence, the UK tax year, UK paydays and UK statement formats matter — US apps retrofitted for the UK often get these wrong.

Two kinds of free app

Open Banking apps connect to your accounts so transactions appear automatically. Many have a free tier. The trade-off is granting a third party a live link to your accounts.

No-bank-linking apps like Moniquid keep you disconnected — you import statements or add transactions yourself. A little more effort, but private, and it works with any bank.

Where Moniquid fits

Moniquid’s free plan gives you the real thing: spending analysis, budgets, recurring bills, savings goals, a debt view and a daily safe-to-spend figure — with no ads and no data selling. It’s built for the UK and never links your bank. Premium (£2.99/month or £24.99/year) adds unlimited statement imports, receipt scanning and unlimited AI coaching, but the free plan is genuinely usable on its own.