# Beacon Budget: Money Manager — Budget & expense tracker > Simple budget and expense tracker for financial clarity and control. (iPhone/iPad app by DAS Budget, LLC.) - Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/beacon-budget-money-manager/id1554488878 (this page in markdown: same URL + `.md`) - Developer: [DAS Budget, LLC](https://appshunter.io/developer/1554488880) - Category: Finance, Productivity - Price: Free with in-app purchases - Rating: 4.50/5 from 139 App Store ratings · 45 written reviews indexed - Age rating: 4+ - Requires: iOS 15.0 · 77 MB - Languages: American English - Released: 2021-11-09 - Data updated: 2026-08-31 - Monetization: free with in-app purchases - User reviews in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/beacon-budget-money-manager/id1554488878/reviews.md ## What is Beacon Budget? Take control of your money with Beacon Budget (formerly DAS Budget), the simple, stress-free way to budget, track spending, and stay on top of your finances. Built for people who want clarity and control without the complexity of spreadsheets or overwhelming finance apps. With Beacon Budget, you can: • Create budgets in seconds – Set spending limits that match your lifestyle. • Track expenses effortlessly – Sync directly with your accounts. • Stay on track with reminders – Never forget bills or overspend again. • See where your money goes – Clear insights show your spending patterns. • Safe and private – Your data is secure and never sold. Perfect for students, professionals, and families who want financial peace of mind. Whether you are saving for a goal, paying off debt, or just want to feel in control of your cash flow, Beacon Budget makes money management simple, clear, and motivating. Download now and let Beacon guide you to financial clarity. ## Key features - Create budgets quickly - Track expenses by syncing accounts - Bill and overspending reminders - Clear spending insights - Secure and private data ## Pricing and in-app purchases Base price: Free. **Subscriptions** | Subscription | Price | Period | | --- | --- | --- | | Standard + 1 Institution | $3.99 | per month | | Premium + 1 Institution | $6.99 | per month | | Premium + 3 Institutions | $7.99 | per month | | Premium + 2 Institutions | $7.49 | per month | | Standard + 1 Institution | $39.99 | per year | | Premium + 5 Institutions | $8.99 | per month | | Premium + 1 Institution | $69.99 | per year | | Standard + 3 Institutions | $4.99 | per month | | Standard + 2 Institutions | $4.49 | per month | | Premium + 2 Institutions | $74.99 | per year | | Premium + 4 Institutions | $8.49 | per month | | Premium + 7 Institutions | $9.99 | per month | | Premium + 10 Institutions | $11.49 | per month | | Premium + 3 Institutions | $79.99 | per year | **One-time purchases** | Purchase | Price | Type | | --- | --- | --- | | 3 Refreshes | $0.99 | one-time | ## Chart rankings - #194 in Top Grossing · Finance (US App Store) ## What do users think of Beacon Budget? Overall sentiment: mixed **Pros** - 👍 Excellent Simple replacement - 💡 Intuitive budgeting system - 🚀 Helps save money effectively - 👍 Great for neurodivergent users - 🔄 Integrates multiple accounts - 💰 Worth the fee - ✅ Automates budgeting - 🎯 Sets aside money for goals - 😌 Reduces financial stress - ✨ Better than Simple - 💪 Handles personal & business budgets - 💯 Highly recommended **Cons** - 🐛 Transactions not updating - 🐛 App breaking after updates - 🐛 Syncing issues - 🐛 Inaccurate bill earmarking - 🐛 Non-existent support - 🐛 Poor native iOS implementation - 💸 Features behind paywall - 🐌 Slow transaction posting - 🤔 Unintuitive UI/UX - ⚠️ Subscription pricing confusion **Commonly reported bugs** - Latest update broke transactions - App started changing bill earmarking amounts - Transactions take days to post - App disconnects from bank frequently - App doesn't refresh for days - Issues with app syncing with banks **Most requested features** - Native iOS implementation - Improved support responsiveness - Web app functionality ## Recent user reviews (10 of 45) All indexed reviews: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/beacon-budget-money-manager/id1554488878/reviews.md ### 5/5 — Digital cash envelopes with valuable insights! *2026-08-24* If you didn’t have Simple bank back in the day, I’d say you missed out - but not really, because Beacon Budget exists! It took the best pieces of Simple’s UI and has now improved upon them. It’s a digital cash envelope system! The envelopes are “stuffed” automatically for you each pay cycle and you know exactly how much you have to spend in each custom selected spending area. Your budget really can be as specific or generalized as you want it to be! And you’ll never miss a due date if you set this up and utilize it right. Recently focused on and made incredible is the insights section! Analyze your spending over any period of time, get integrated recommendations on how to improve your budget to match your real life spending, the list goes on. Thanks Shane for working to make Beacon the best it can be for our family! ### 1/5 — Broken *2026-06-04, version v0.14.1+239* Latest update broke transactions and there is no where to give feedback that gets any responses. App has been unusable for 2 days now ### 5/5 — The best one! *2026-06-02, version v0.14.1+239* This is my absolute favorite budgeting app! ### 5/5 — Best Simple Dupe *2026-04-08* This is the best Simple dupe in the App Store. If you don’t know what Simple was, it was an online bank and digital envelope style budgeting app that was incredible, especially for neurodivergent folks. This app takes things to the next level by allowing multiple accounts to be added like bank accounts or credit cards. While there is a fee, I do feel like it is worth it to make sure the app stays up and running. I hope the developer continues to make updates for many many years. I don’t know how I would manage my money of it wasn’t for DAS Budget. ### 5/5 — Love it! *2026-04-06, version 0.12.1+225* Couldn’t live without this app! It is my simple bank replacement! ### 1/5 — Beware *2026-03-01* I’ve been using this app for years. Out of nowhere it started changing how much it earmarks for certain bills. For example, my rent is 2170 and has been for years. It started just earmarking half that. Same with my cell phone bill, and 60% others. I tried deleting the bill and readding it and it will only pull half. I make ample money and have plenty in the accounts. If I don’t have money saved elsewhere this would have been disastrous for me. Do not rely on this app to be accurate. I sent out an email for tech support and have not heard back. Find a different app if you need to rely on this. **Developer response:** Hi! Thanks for your feedback and sorry for the mix-up. There was a bug in our recent update that caused some bill amounts to show incorrectly, but it’s now fixed and should match your actual bills. We really appreciate you using the app and hope it’s back on track for you! ### 5/5 — I’m finally successfully saving money! *2025-12-09* I’ve poked around at various budgeting apps over the years, but nothing ever really clicked with me in a way that I could be successful in establishing a budget. With DAS Budget, not only am I successfully moving money into savings each month, I’m setting aside money for goals that I hadn’t even thought of! I had a big career change a few years back, and hadn’t been able to afford a lot of gift exchanges for Christmas since then. I now have a goal saving up for next year so I can change that. I’ve been holding on to my phone because I couldn’t finance a new one and didn’t want to empty what little money I had set aside. I now have a goal for that as well! For a lot of people, when they see ANYTHING that’s not free, they tend to move on (and I get it), but I promise you, this one is worth it. I’m paying for a Premium annual and all I did was set a bucket for next year, and it’s such a small amount set aside from each paycheck I won’t even notice it, but I’ll sure notice how my savings is growing thanks to this app! I can’t recommend it enough and I wish these developers many years of success (partially out of selfishness because I’ll be lost again without their app, haha) ### 3/5 — Becoming Unstable *2025-06-10, version v0.9.4+178* Really struggling lately with the app. Support doesn’t work and I’ve tried the discord but people don’t really engage or respond. It’s sad because this use to be an amazing app! ### 5/5 — salvation *2025-04-02, version v0.9.4+178* This app may do more for my mental health than therapy. After we budgeting nerds lost Simple.com to corporate stupidity / oversight DAS Budget was invented to save the day. And I think it may be even better? Because it lets you bring in all of your accounts. Thank you, thank you for creating and maintains this app! ### 5/5 — Perfect budgeting system *2025-03-04, version v0.9.4+178* Simply put, this is hands down the best way to budget. The bucket system give a ton of freedom. ## Frequently asked questions about Beacon Budget ### What does DAS Budget do? DAS Budget is a personal finance app designed to help you budget, track your spending, and manage your money. It offers features like creating budgets, syncing bank accounts to track expenses, and providing insights into your spending patterns. ### How do I track my expenses with DAS Budget? You can track your expenses effortlessly by syncing directly with your bank accounts. This allows the app to automatically record your transactions, giving you a clear overview of where your money is going without manual entry. ### Is DAS Budget free to use? The app is free to download and use, offering core budgeting and expense tracking features. It also includes in-app purchases, suggesting that some advanced features or customization options may be available for purchase. ### Who is DAS Budget for? This app is ideal for individuals who want a simple, stress-free way to manage their finances. It's particularly suited for students, professionals, and families looking for financial clarity and control without complex spreadsheets or overwhelming finance tools. ### How does the app ensure my data is safe? The app emphasizes that your data is secure and private. It states that your financial information is protected and will never be sold, providing peace of mind for users concerned about data security. ## Version history (last 5 releases) ### v0.16.2+267 — 2026-08-27 Bug fixes • Refunds: a refund now returns exactly what the original purchase took from a bucket, rather than the full amount when the purchase only drew part of it. • Setup checklist: it no longer shows a finish line to people who set up their budget long before the card existed, and it stays quiet when you create a second budget. Questions? support@beaconbudget.com ### v0.16.1+266 — 2026-08-26 What's new Let's get set up Stopped partway through setup? Home now shows a card listing what is still open, from connecting an account to assigning your first transaction. How we got this Every suggestion can now show its work. Open the panel on a Budget Checkup card, or tap a card in the Recurring carousel on Home, and you get the actual transactions behind the number. Improvements • Bucket suggestions: fewer junk ones, better category budgets. Bug fixes • Exclude from Insights: the switch saves and reads correctly in both directions. Questions? support@beaconbudget.com ### v0.16.0+265 — 2026-08-18 Beacon Budget release notes - 0.16.0 New Home Screen Beacon now opens to a dashboard with Free-to-Spend, Recent Activity, Upcoming Expenses, and monthly spending. It works offline, and you can tap straight into a transaction or into Insights. Upcoming Expenses shows as a list or a carousel, covering the rest of the month, the next 30 days, or the following month. Beacon Can Now Help Build Your Budget A new analysis engine reads your settled transaction history to identify income, recurring bills, and spending patterns, from weekly through annual schedules. It shows up in three places. Budget Checkup, if you're already set up. From the Buckets tab or Home, Beacon re-analyzes your recent spending and shows where your budget has drifted, like "You're trending $340/mo vs $250 budgeted", plus recurring expenses you don't have a bucket for. Every suggestion shows the amount it would change to, and nothing changes until you tap Apply. Budget setup, if you're brand new. After connecting your first bank, Beacon walks you through building your budget. It shows the income it found, lets you add anything it missed, then shows the recurring bills it identified so you can add them with a tap. Recurring card on Home, which surfaces recurring expenses you haven't budgeted for and what they actually cost you. Add one and Beacon creates the bucket with the amount and funding schedule. Getting Around Insights is now on the bottom navigation. The Profile tab has been replaced with a side panel holding everything that used to live there, reachable from detail screens too. You can also create a budget from the budget switcher, and long-press the profile icon to switch budgets. Improved • Saving a bucket returns you to where you came from, with the confirmation there. Fixed • Transactions funded from an archived bucket now show that bucket's name instead of Free-to-Spend. • The Spending From picker no longer double-counts bucket moves. Questions? support@beaconbudget.com ### v0.15.2+260 — 2026-07-30 This release brings home-screen widgets, a faster way to find your bank, plus a round of reliability fixes for Free-to-Spend, Activity, and reports. What's new • Home-screen widgets: See your Free-to-Spend right from your home screen, without opening the app. • New plans and upgrade flow: Choose between Essentials and Premium tiers in a redesigned upgrade flow. Improvements • Bank picker: Search for your bank by name, so you can find and connect accounts faster. • More reliable syncing: We rebuilt how transactions sync from your bank. Pending charges now settle into their posted versions more cleanly, and transactions that drop off your bank are cleared out correctly. Bug fixes • Free-to-Spend: No longer reverts to an old value after you edit buckets, update a widget, or switch budgets. • Reports: "Last month," "last quarter," and "last year" ranges now include the full final day, and the income chart respects the filters you've set. • Buckets: Bucket group reordering now saves, and deleted groups no longer linger. • Notifications: Taps once again open the right screen when app lock is on. • Rules: Creating a rule no longer over-matches by splitting the merchant name into stray keywords. • Categories: Manually set transaction categories now stay put across bank syncs. ### v0.14.7+245 — 2026-06-18 • Fixed a sync issue where a pending transaction could stick around after it posted, showing up as a duplicate. Those pending transactions now clear automatically ## Apps similar to Beacon Budget | App | Rating | Price | Category | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | [Buddy: Budget Planner App](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/buddy-budget-planner-app/id936422955) | 4.7 (9,413) | Free | Finance | | [Toshl Finance - Best Budget](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/toshl-finance-best-budget/id921590251) | 4.7 (1,782) | Free | Finance | | [Expense & Budget App: Spendee](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/expense-and-budget-app-spendee/id635861140) | 4.6 (6,235) | Free | Finance | | [Money Manager Expense & Budget](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/money-manager-expense-and-budget/id560481810) | 4.8 (19,064) | Free | Finance | | [Daily Budget Original](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/daily-budget-original/id651896614) | 4.7 (4,842) | Free | Finance | | [Copilot: Track & Budget Money](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/copilot-track-and-budget-money/id1447330651) | 4.8 (30,049) | Free | Finance | ## Related topics [budgeting organizer](https://appshunter.io/ios/topics/budgeting-organizer) --- *Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-08-31.*