Monarch: Budget & Track Money

If I knew in August, when I decided to try this app, what I know now, I would not have allowed a subscription to go through. A one week free trial is not long enough to learn that this app is subpar and a major hassle. I have nothing but problems with connecting accounts and it staying up to date. The online version is a better display than on a phone screen. But if it is not going to help me track my numbers consistently, then why bother? What a waste of money.

If your thinking about using this app but uncertain I would say try to find info online. The first thing you see when you open up is a required login. The second thing, is a pay wall. Then the third thing, is the main UI with a blocking popup saying connect credit cards. You are not allowed to interact with anything until you've fully committed to it. I downloaded the app with the intention of seeing what the features/UI are like before connecting my many banks. But apparently its not allowed.

Really disappointing that an app that's supposed to help you manage money is setting you up for a "free trial" with a subscription renewal that you'll hopefully forget about before you're even allowed to see what the app does. Also defaults to the annual plan that's made to look like a cheaper monthly option. This may actually be a good app, but with tactics like this in place, I won't be trying it.

It's actually a fairly good app as far as look and feel. BUT, it only updates accont data occasionally. On one of my accounts, the latest transaction was Jan 7th, it was Feb 8th. How can this info be helpful for budgeting and expense tracking when it's up to a MONTH out of date? AND, the fee is very high for the service. Definitely NOT WORTH THE PRICE.

When I first got the app it was perfect. It truly suited my needs perfectly. Now it isn't nearly as good. I dont know if it's all this AI slop being added or the changes to goals v3, something is wrong. If my accounts aren't losing and locking connection, they're duplicating (which ruins my transaction history, cash flow, AND budget). I'm giving it until my sub ends to decide if I'm staying or going.

Good, but to actually acuratly track payments it needs more functionality. It needs more functionality for splitting payments, Walmart is a mandatory one that has to be added. I also want to be able to customize the days for recurring payments instead of only being able to select from the 1 and 15th. There also has to be a way to change the recurring payment catagory from the recurring payment menu (income, childcare, etc...). Another important need is to become a broker approved app.

I really liked this app when I first got it. I liked it so much despite being finicky and not updating as smoothly as mint used to, I bought a gift subscription for a friend. But then my savings account couldn't sync anymore, and manually adding transactions would not let me update the total. Then when my credit card had to be replaced, I got a bunch of duplicate transactions. Hiding didn't work. deleting them blew up all of my rollovers even ones not touched by the card.

Updating my review due to the horrible implementation of goals. Doesn't work at all and they've done nothing to address the issues. Edit: I've left feedback and nothing has changed. When transactions hit my retirement account, they are appearing in my transactions list but they do not get tagged to the goal and you've removed the option to manually tag it to a goal. I've tried deleting the goals and starting fresh but it does not work. Also, credit card pay off goals can't be added to budget.

Doesn't sync all transactions. The suggestion I got was to upload them manually. That defeats the purpose of the app. App is also awful in looks and function. Desktop version looks better and is actually more functional. Still not syncing. IF they have a solid service and can give the help needed to make it work great, but seven days is not enough time to figure that out. Just not worth the headache. I never thought I would prefer an Intuit product to anything.

ETA. I have cancelled. They are being overwhelmed with requests for help and customer service is non existent. Plaid is apparently to blame but no solution. All my Chase accounts have lost connection for the last 22 days. I have emailed support several times and no one will get back to me. this has rendered the program useless to me. it always loses connection. I have been using for a couple of years. they should not be charging for an app that you can't rely on.

Literally can't even check it out without hitting a pay wall. As others have said, you can't do anything until you create an account, and fork over your credit card info. Yea there's a "free trial" but payment info is still required because they know most people forget to cancel. It's also $100 a year /$15 a month. Which is probably the most expensive budget app out there. Find something else.

The app worked great during the free trial—smooth setup and seamless tracking of my wife’s and my spending. After paying for the yearly membership, though, my accounts stopped updating. I had to delete and relink them, but even then, they show as “healthy” while not updating (last refresh was two days ago). It could be an issue on my end, which is why I left 3 stars. If it works like it did during the trial, I’d gladly update to 5.

Another Bad Budgeting App. Why make something user friendly, that can automatically update, and not be overly expensive? Another "Budgeting" app with an expensive anual price and charging for an app that doesn't work. Can't sync payments, doesn't allow recurring transactions or payments, and is overly complex and confusing for the price. Not to mention that you need to break everything down to even more simpler sub categories that conflict with others of the same name, because reasons?

It's been over a year since I started using the Monarch app! I love most of the features by now, especially the one that shows me each transaction and asks for my review. I've caught so many unknown transactions, mostly because I forgot to cancel subscriptions, but it also tells me what's coming next so I can close or cancel or be prepared for it. I've saved a few bucks for sure by using this, worth the premium or subscription!

Not a good enough replacement for Mint. Creating a budget is overly complicated, I'd rather just creat custom categories than have to disable a ton that I don't need. I can't budget by pay period so I end up using a spreadsheet anyway, which defeats the purpose of the app. Its even more annoying when you have to reconcile venmo transfers with your budget categories. I regret paying for the annual version even with a coupon code. Only helpful for tracking transactions, not worth the money.

Only one week of using the app and I am greatly impressed with it. I will check back and provide an update if anything has an issue. So far I love that it integrates with all of my accounts (investment, bank, loans), keeps visual track of my cash flows, allows me to budget, makes reviewing recent transactions easy, allows configuring rules to process types of transactions, keeps track of reoccurring transactions, shows net wealth. make sure you get a discount code if you go to sign up for this.

Used to use Mint, free app where I expected issues. Monarch is paid for and the number of issues isn't worth price. Constantly having to reconnect accounts, often that doesn't work, like this morning with Fidelity, Monarch telling me the accounts don't exist and yet I was able to click the check boxes next to the accounts. Mobile help chat box is covered by the keyboard so I can't even use it as the screen won't scroll up while I'm typing. Highly considering finding something else this year.

I love the way it displays everything on both desktop and the app. I wouldn't recommend just using the app since the desktop displays a little more depth to the experience, but a person could certainly do that if they want. If you put in the time and effort to really get to know how everything works I think you'll find it to be a nice display of your finances, including any goals you may have like emergency fund. Now let's see if I can stick to my budget!

This product does not show transactions in a timely manner. It frequently disconnects from linked accounts, and sometimes it takes about a week for things to reconnect or fix themselves. I never had these issues when using Mint. I was told this was supposed to be better than Mint, but it isn’t. I probably won’t renew for another year.

Worst sorting. STILL TERRIBLE. NOT worth paying. Constant GLITCHES, loses connections and instead of fixing them, you are forced to delete everything you did and reconnect the account. You are expected to manually create rules. No dates for sorting & rules?! Support is slow and useless. Every existing retail could be added data in minutes so it would know that Michael's is shopping & categorize it properly, but they don't. We are currently paying while teaching a bad program basic data.