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A category is a job you give your money: Groceries, Rent, Car Insurance, Vacation. A group is a labeled section that holds related categories together. Together they are the shape of your budget.

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Categories

Each category has three numbers on the budget page:
  • Assigned — what you put into it this month.
  • Activity — what you spent from it this month, as transactions come in.
  • Available — what is left to spend. Green when there is money, red when you overspent.
You spend from a category by recording transactions against it. The Available amount is the truth about how much you have left for that job.

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Good categories are specific enough to act on

“Stuff” is a useless category. “Groceries,” “Eating Out,” and “Household Supplies” each tell you something. Split categories when you want to see the difference, and merge them when the detail is not worth the upkeep. Add a category for the irregular costs people forget — car maintenance, annual subscriptions, gifts — so they never blindside you.

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Groups

Groups organize categories into sections so a long budget stays readable. Common groups: Bills, Everyday, Savings Goals, Debt. Collapse a group to hide its rows when you are not working in it. A group shows the combined total of the categories inside it.

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Working with categories and groups

You manage all of this on the Budget page, in context — no separate setup screen.
  • Create a category or group as your budget grows.
  • Rename anything; the name is just a label.
  • Reorder categories and groups by dragging, so the order matches how you think.
  • Hide or archive a category you have stopped using. Hiding keeps its history intact, which is why you hide instead of delete a category that has transactions.
You can hide a category that has history, but you cannot delete one outright, because deleting it would orphan past budget months and transactions. Hide it instead — the history stays, and the row leaves your active budget.

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Income is its own kind of category

Income categories feed Ready to Assign rather than holding spending money. When money lands in an income category, it becomes money you can assign. Most budgets have one or two income categories.

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Credit-card payment categories

When you add a credit card, the budget creates a payment category for it automatically. You do not assign to it directly the way you assign to Groceries — it fills up as you spend on the card with budgeted money. See How credit cards work.

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Next

Organize categories

Create, rename, reorder, group, and hide — the practical steps.

Set a target

Tell a category how much it needs and by when.