Simplifi Vs Mint: Which is Better?

Finding a powerful yet affordable budgeting app can yield many benefits, as tracking your spending and planning customizable savings goals is easier. Simplifi and Mint are two of the most popular budget software thanks to their numerous budgeting and financial planning features.

To the surprise of many long-time budgeters, Mint is no longer a long-term option as the budgeting app is closing its doors. Our Simplifi vs. Mint review compares the overlapping features and unique money management tools to decide if Simplifi is a suitable Mint alternative. 

What is Simplifi by Quicken?

Simplifi by Quicken is a mobile app and web budgeting platform that can help beginners and experienced households track transactions, make a spending plan, and complete other personal finance tasks.

Some of its core features include:

• Bill payment reminders
• Download and categorize transactions automatically
• Personizable savings goals
• Predict future cash flow and balances
• Real-time alerts
• Safe-to-spend calculations

It has a fully customizable platform without any ads. However, you pay a small subscription fee starting at $2.99 monthly. I find this fee very reasonable in relation to the membership perks and an excellent app for making an easy-to-follow budget.

Personalized Spending Plan

The most compelling reason to use this service is to build a customizable spending plan using your income, bills, savings goals, and debt payoffs. It can show your spending history along with forecasting future expenses and income.

You can track spending by budget category and auto-categorizing transactions after linking to your banking accounts. The budget app lets you omit select transactions that skew your spending habits.

The platform breaks down your income, expenses, recurring bills, and goals into separate tabs. You can differentiate between one-time and planned costs. I find the budgeting process to be simple and less intimidating than pricier programs that aggressively maximize your savings rate or pay off debt.

Spending Watchlists

Anticipate receiving alerts when approaching the target spending limit for the current budgeting period. You will also get notifications when Simplifi detects larger-than-expected transactions, low account balances, and bill payment reminders.

Instead of receiving random alerts, you can create spending watchlists by category, payee, or budget tag. You may set a spending target for each list along with viewing the spent-so-far and projected amounts. 

In addition to making a budget, the app can calculate a “safe to spend” amount based on actual income instead of a budgeted amount. This feature makes it easier to make mid-month adjustments as you respond to alerts and reminders.

While these alerts are not exclusive to Simplifi, the alert accuracy goes beyond many free apps that I try. I also like that the platform adjusts your month-to-date spending to paint a realistic picture of your finances.

Spending Reports

It’s possible to retrieve several in-depth spending reports with the ability to filter by payee, category, or tag. As a paid budget platform, these reports can be more extensive and make it easier to analyze where your money goes.

The available reports include:

• Monthly summary
• Income
• Net income
• Net worth
• Refunds
• Spending
• Savings

Unfortunately, these reports are not downloadable or printable, but you can export via a CSV file. From there, you can modify them with other software. For additional accuracy, it’s possible to exclude accounts and transactions, which I like as it makes it easier to use the data to improve your money management skills. 

Investment Tracking

This platform doubles as a basic investment portfolio tracker. It tracks your brokerage and retirement account balance. You can view news headlines for your current portfolio positions, too. 

Linking your investment accounts and adding manual cash accounts makes evaluating your full financial situation easier. Your investment balances should update automatically to reflect the current market valuations.

This feature may not be as robust as an investment analyzer. Still, all-in-one account monitoring is convenient if you’re like me and use several investing apps. 

Cost

Simplifi by Quicken costs $3.99 monthly or $36 upfront when billed annually ($2.99 monthly). While there isn’t a free plan tier, this is one of the most affordable budgeting apps and it can be a good fit for casual budgeters and enjoying an ad-free experience.

Further, there is a 30-day money-back guarantee to test the software limits and decide if it’s worth the money. There isn’t a free trial period, though.

What is Mint?

Mint is one of the best free budgeting apps, making creating a spending plan and savings goals easy. It’s possible to link to your banking and investment account. The platform supports adding manual accounts too. 

Some of its most popular features include:

• Customizable budgets
• Spending alerts
• Bill payment reminders
• Personalized insights
• Credit score tracking

I use Mint for its free and personalizable budgeting to ensure I live within my means. Personally, the mixture of account syncing and adding manual accounts to track my real-time balances in one place. 

This platform has much to like as it’s easy to use and has a surprisingly vast selection of free features. Sadly, Mint is shutting down on March 23, 2024, and its users must find another platform, which might be Simplifi, thanks to its affordable price and competitive perks.

You can compare the best Mint alternatives to find the best fit for your personal goals. There are several free and paid platforms with several overlapping features.  

Custom Budgets

You can build a basic budget within a few minutes by choosing from many spending categories and the spending amount. This platform doesn’t support budget percentages, although it makes it easy to see if you’re spending more or less than the initial estimate.  

You can choose from general categories and frequent sub-expenses such as auto repairs, household essentials, and various insurance premiums. I find customization among the best for a free budget, although paid apps are better for more hands-on control.

The app lets you decide to track spending on a monthly, one-time, or quarterly frequency. There is an option to roll over the remaining funds into next month, too.

Personalized Insights

You can receive “Mintsights” for spending, saving, and debt payoff. These personalized assessments can look for ways to identify trends, look for ways to improve, and track your spending history. 

One frustration is that the platform recommends banking accounts, loans, and credit cards related to these insights. These advertisements are how the service remains free and there is no obligation to apply. 

Investment Tools

Mint provides basic investment account tracking to monitor your portfolio performance and current stock prices. For example, this service lets you track your investment returns from five days to one year. 

You can also filter holdings by position size, best performers, and worst performers. I like using this tool to keep tabs on my current stocks and funds without logging into my brokerage accounts.  

Cash Flow Tracker

Mint is an excellent option for casual budgeters who mostly want to see how much money they have and to avoid overspending. The cash flow tracker quickly compares your income to expenses. It also takes recurring bills and transactions into account.

I also like that it sends alerts when it spots subscription price increases. Plus it sends bill payment reminders. 

Free Credit Score

You can track your credit score and view your credit report for free through Credit Karma. You can receive weekly updates and a simple analysis of positive and negative factors impacting your score.   

Cost

Mint is free but ad-supported. It’s one of the best budgeting apps for making a free budget, but it lacks the in-depth capabilities or specialty budgeting strategies paid services offer as a membership perk. 

Simplifi vs. Mint Features and Benefits

Below is a quick Simplifi vs. Mint head-to-head comparison of each platform’s best features. 

Is Simplifi or Mint Better?

Simplifi offers more personalization and in-depth budgeting tools, alerts, and graphs. It also provides an ad-free experience, but you must be willing to pay a small monthly or annual fee starting at $2.99 monthly. 

Mint is free and helps you make a basic budget to track spending and plan future goals. It can also track your investments and credit score to monitor your entire financial picture. However, the tools are less robust, the platform has ads, and is permanently closing in March 2024.  

Frequently Asked Questions

Here are several questions to consider while comparing Simplifi and Mint. 

Is Simplifi worth the money?

Simplifi is worth the cost when you want in-depth budgeting and transaction tracking tools that free budget apps are less likely to offer. The pricing starts as low as $2.99 per month, making it one of the most affordable and easiest-to-use money management apps. 

Is Mint going away?

Unfortunately, Mint closes on March 23, 2024 and current users must migrate their data before to Credit Karma or another budgeting app to avoid losing their transaction history.

Does Simplifi have a free trial?

Simplifi offers a 30-day moneyback guarantee instead of a free trial. As a result, payment is due upfront for a monthly or annual membership, but it’s easy to request a refund if it’s not a good fit. 

Summary

Typically, Simplifi offers more features than Mint to get a personalized budget, although both services make it easy to track spending and create savings goals.

With Mint going out of business, Simplifi is a powerful and affordable alternative for people wanting an all-in-one money management app.