Monarch Money is a full-featured personal finance tool that helps you see your whole financial picture clearly. Monarch Money Review – Best. Monarch has quickly become the best app for anyone who wants to take charge of their finances. This year, it won the Wall Street Journal’s and Forbes’ Best Budgeting App awards.
Monarch is different from other apps that only help you with budgeting or tracking your expenses. It takes a more comprehensive approach to managing your money by including budgeting, setting goals, tracking investments, and working together, all in a simple, easy-to-use design with no ads or upsells.
Monarch is a wonderful example of what personal finance apps should have always been: strong yet easy-to-use tools that change to fit your needs instead of making you follow strict rules. Couples and families who want to manage their money together will find it very useful, but individuals will also find it useful because it has so many features.
Key Features of Monarch Money Review – Best
Everything about Monarch Money is designed with one clear objective: providing users with complete financial visibility while offering flexible tools that adapt to individual preferences and goals.
Plan and Pricing
Monarch Money offers a single premium plan that includes all features and capabilities.
After a 7-day free trial, during which new users can fully explore the platform with no commitment, Monarch costs $8.33 per month when paid annually ($99.99 total) or $14.99 per month when paid monthly.
Comprehensive Financial Dashboard
Monarch’s dashboard provides a complete view of your finances through a single, customisable interface. The app securely connects to accounts with over 13,000 financial institutions, including:
- Bank accounts and credit cards
- Investment accounts and retirement funds
- Real estate assets (via Zillow integration)
- Cryptocurrency holdings (via Coinbase integration)
- Loans and other liabilities
- Vehicle values
This integration allows for real-time transaction tracking, accurate balance updates, and a dynamic calculation of your complete net worth.
Dual Budgeting Systems
Recognising that different people approach budgeting differently, Monarch offers two distinct methods:
- Category Budgeting: A traditional approach where you set specific spending limits for individual categories like groceries, dining out, or entertainment.
- Flex Budgeting: A more adaptable system that separates expenses into fixed, flexible, and non-monthly buckets, allowing you to focus primarily on controlling your flexible spending.
Both systems feature visual progress bars, the ability to plan non-monthly expenses with rollovers, and customisable notifications to help keep you on track.
Smart Transaction Management
Monarch uses AI to automatically categorise transactions, and it allows you to create custom rules for organising your spending.
- Swipe to Review feature for quickly processing new transactions
- Custom tags and notes for detailed expense tracking
- Search functionality across all accounts
- Monthly transaction summaries with insights on spending patterns
Collaboration Tools
One of Monarch’s standout features is its robust collaboration capabilities:
- Add partners or household members at no additional cost
- Create a shared view of finances while maintaining separate logins
- Flag transactions as “Needs Review” and assign to family members
- Grant access to financial advisors or tax professionals when needed
Custom Reports and Analytics
Monarch offers powerful reporting tools to help users understand their financial patterns:
- Save and revisit custom financial reports without rebuilding them
- Track spending trends and cash flow over time
- Monitor tax-deductible expenses
- Visualize data through customizable charts and graphs
Goal Setting and Tracking
Monarch lets users create and track progress toward multiple financial goals:
- Set custom goals with target amounts and timeframes
- Assign specific accounts to individual goals
- Track progress automatically as account balances change
- Set up monthly contributions toward goals alongside your budget
Investment Tracking
Beyond basic budgeting, Monarch provides comprehensive investment monitoring:
- Track individual stocks, mutual funds, ETFs, 401(k)s, and cryptocurrencies
- View historical performance and asset allocation
- Identify top performers in your portfolio
- Monitor your overall savings rate
Bill and Subscription Management
Stay on top of recurring expenses with:
- View all recurring expenses in calendar or list format
- Get reminders for upcoming payments
- Track subscription services to identify ones you may want to cancel
- Bill Sync feature that displays statement balances and minimum payments due
Advantages of Monarch Money Review – Best
Monarch stands out in several key areas that collectively make it one of the most powerful personal finance tools available.
- Truly Comprehensive Financial View. Monarch provides perhaps the most complete picture of your finances available in any personal finance app. By connecting to over 13,000 financial institutions and incorporating everything from bank accounts to investments to real estate, users gain unprecedented visibility into their complete financial situation. This comprehensive integration means you’re always working with accurate, up-to-date information across all aspects of your finances.
- Best-in-Class Syncing Capabilities. Monarch uses multiple financial data aggregators to ensure reliable connections with financial institutions. This redundancy results in fewer sync issues than competing apps that rely on a single data provider, giving users confidence that their financial data is current and accurate.
- Powerful Collaboration Features. Few financial apps handle collaboration as elegantly as Monarch. The ability to securely share access with partners or financial professionals at no extra cost makes Monarch particularly valuable for couples and families. Each user maintains their login while having appropriate access to shared information.
- Flexible Budgeting Options. By offering both Category and Flex Budgeting systems, Monarch adapts to your preferred money management style rather than forcing you into a one-size-fits-all approach. This flexibility means the app works with your natural habits instead of against them.
- Clean, Ad-Free Experience. Monarch’s commitment to an ad-free experience means no distracting promotions for credit cards or other financial products. This clean interface, combined with a pledge never to sell user data to third parties, creates a more focused and trustworthy environment for managing your finances.
- Highly Customizable Interface. From the dashboard layout to budget categories to notification preferences, Monarch allows extensive customisation. This adaptability ensures the app works the way you do, showing you the information that matters most to you.
- Consistently Excellent Mobile and Web Experiences. Monarch delivers equally powerful experiences across mobile and web platforms, with all features available regardless of which device you’re using. This consistency means you can manage your finances wherever and whenever it’s convenient.
Disadvantages of Monarch Money Review – Best
Despite its many strengths, Monarch does have some limitations worth considering.
- No Free Plan. Monarch is a premium product with no permanent free tier. After the 7-day trial ends, continued use requires a subscription. This option contrasts with some competitors that offer limited but functional free versions.
- Higher Price Point. At $99.99 annually or $14.99 monthly, Monarch costs more than many competing financial apps. The extensive feature set makes this premium worthwhile for many users, but consumers on a tight budget may find the cost off-putting.
- Occasional Sync Issues. Despite using multiple data providers, some users report occasional difficulties with certain financial institutions disconnecting or requiring frequent reauthentication. Monarch actively works to address these issues, but they can be frustrating when they occur.
- No Credit Score Monitoring. Unlike some financial apps that include credit score monitoring, Monarch doesn’t currently offer this feature. Users interested in tracking their credit will need to use a separate service alongside Monarch.
- Learning Curve for New Users. Monarch’s wealth of features and customisation options can initially overwhelm new users, particularly those with limited experience using financial apps. However, the interface is intuitive enough that most users become comfortable after a short adjustment period.
Final Word of Monarch Money Review – Best
Monarch Money stands as the benchmark for personal finance management tools. By combining comprehensive account integration, flexible budgeting approaches, powerful collaboration features, and an ad-free experience, it creates a platform that adapts to your financial management style rather than forcing you to adapt to it.
The app particularly shines for couples and households seeking to collaborate on finances, though individuals will find equal value in its robust feature set. The ability to track everything from day-to-day spending to long-term investments with a single, customisable interface makes it an extremely versatile financial companion.
Is Monarch worth its premium price? For most users seeking a comprehensive financial management solution, the answer is definitely yes. The combination of powerful features, regular updates, and exceptional user experience justifies the investment for anyone serious about gaining clarity and control over their finances.
While the lack of a permanent free tier may deter some potential users, Monarch’s 7-day trial provides ample opportunity to experience its capabilities before committing. For those who value comprehensive financial visibility and are willing to pay for quality, Monarch Money stands as the definitive personal finance platform.
