Comparison

Budgets vs Emma

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Budgets

Track your spending against custom budgets to avoid overspending. See how much money you have left to spend with visual displays and review your purchase history. This app helps you regain control of your finances.

Highlights
  • Create custom budgets (monthly, weekly, etc.)
  • Log purchases against budgets
  • View remaining budget amounts visually
  • Track spending history
  • Secure passcode protection
Features
Read full description

Where does the money go? Create your Budgets and keep to them - Get 'Budgets - Expense Tracker' ! 'Budgets - Expense Tracker' logs your purchases against your budgets so you can see how much you have spent. Your budgets can be monthly, weekly, or any other time period you like. ◆ Know instantly how much you've got left to spend in your budget ◆ Keep track of your spending so you Don't Overspend. You can set up as many Budgets as you need and monitor your spending over any time period. √ See how much of your Budgets you have left to spend with the Coin Tubes Display! √ Budgets can be monthly, weekly, or any time period you define √ View your Purchase History √ Includes Secure Passcode Entry System to keep your budget data private ◆ This app is part of the MoneyBudgie Finance Tracking Suite. - All 4 Apps work together to help you get in control of your finances. For example, you can use budgets planned with the Home Budget Plan app in this app, whilst purchases logged in this app affect your bank account balances tracked by Spending Log, etc. Get 'Budgets - Expense Tracker', create your Budget and keep to it.

About

Emma

Consolidate all your financial accounts in one place to track spending, manage subscriptions, and set budgets. Receive weekly reports, daily balance notifications, and overdraft alerts. Offers bank-level security with SSL encryption and biometric authentication.

Highlights
  • Consolidate all accounts
  • Track subscriptions
  • Set budgets
  • Weekly spending reports
  • Overdraft alerts
  • Bank-level security
Features
Read full description

Meet Emma, your financial super app ● All your accounts in one place ● Find and track your subscriptions ● Set budgets ● Weekly reports ● Analyze your spending & expenses ● Daily balance notifications ● Overdraft alerts BANK LEVEL SECURITY Worried about sharing your data? We hear you. ● Emma uses SSL 256-bit encryption - the same security protocol that banks use - to ensure that your sensitive, personal information is fully encrypted and securely stored. ● Emma uses biometric security authentication for an added level of protection. CUSTOMER REVIEWS “This app is amazing! I used to manually track my expenses using a notepad or a spreadsheet but always used to make mistakes and never found time to update it. This fixes all my budgeting issues and saves me so much time as well as money!” Sarah “I love the fact that I can do everything within this one app. I mainly use it for tracking my expenses but have also started using it to instantly send/receive payments which makes things super easy. Also, the money I’ve saved from using this app is used to invest in my favorite companies using the investment feature!” Mike OUR MISSION We believe everyone deserves a financial advocate to help with money management and budgeting. Someone who watches our back no matter who we are and where we come from. We provide a great experience, which relies on a basic principle - caring about our customers’ financial well being. This is who we are and what we stand for. We have received amazing feedback from the finance community and have been featured in Forbes, Financial Times, Politico, The Sunday Times and CITY A.M. MORE FEATURES? GO PLUS, PRO OR ULTIMATE We have 3 subscription upgrades available in Emma to power charge your finances. Here’s what is available in each subscription upgrade: Emma Plus True Balance - preemptively see the balance of your bank account after your subscriptions are removed Fraud Detection - find out whether your personal details have been part of a known data breach Bill Reminders - get reminded about your upcoming bills so you never miss a payment Cashback - get cashback from your favorite brands Emma Pro All the features in Emma Plus Custom categories - so you can customize your finances to your heart's content Rename transactions - for easier reference Export data - to understand your finances on excel Create Offline Accounts - to manage your cash expenses and any accounts you can’t link to Emma Create Smart Rules - to automate your Offline Accounts. Look, no hands! Split your transactions - into multiple categories for more flexibility Legendary Pro Icon - because you are a Pro Emma Ultimate All the features in Emma Plus & Pro Spaces - group together different accounts to see separated analytics and budgets Ultimate Icon - so you can show them who's boss ----------------------------------- If you choose to purchase Emma Plus, Emma Pro or Emma Ultimate, payment will be charged to your iTunes account, and your account will be charged for renewal within 24-hours prior to the end of the current period. Subscription automatically renews unless auto-renew is turned off at least 24-hours before the end of the current period. Subscriptions are managed by the user and auto-renewal may be turned off by going to the user's Apple ID. Emma subscription prices start at $4.99 CAD/USD/month with 1-month and 12-month packages available. Prices are subject to change without notice. No cancellation of the current subscription is allowed during the active subscription period. If you don’t choose to purchase Emma Plus, Emma or Emma Ultimate, you can simply continue using Emma for free. Emma Technologies LTD is registered with the Financial Conduct Authority under the Payment Services Regulations 2017 for the provision of payment services. Reference no. 794952 Company Registration Number: 10578464. Terms and Conditions: https://emma-app.com/terms Privacy Policy: https://emma-app.com/privacy

Screenshots

Budgets4 screens
Emma4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: Budgets at 100% against Emma's 38%. Budgets also leads on iOS requirement (13.0 vs 15.1). Emma's advantage is update cadence (every 6 days vs every 6 weeks) and rating (4.7 vs 4.3). On price, ads, in-app purchases and monetization model there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Budgets sells 6 one-off in-app purchases and Emma sells 8 in-app purchases, starting at $4.99 per month. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Emma holds the better App Store score, 4.7 against 4.3. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Emma has 1.4K ratings behind it against 3, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews complicate that: 100% of Budgets's written reviews are positive against 38% of Emma's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Budgets ships an update every 6 weeks, Emma every 6 days. The most recent releases landed on August 23, 2026 and September 29, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
Budgets versus Emma: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterBudgetsEmma
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.3 (3 ratings)4.7 (1.4K ratings) — better
Positive reviews100.0% of reviews — better38.3% of reviews
Number of ratings31.4K — better
Update frequencyEvery 6 weeksEvery 6 days — better
AdsYesYes
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhone, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS13.0 — better15.1
Further details — not scored
Size12 MB165 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperMoneyBudgieEmma Technologies LTD.

Customer experience

Budgets

All ratings3 ratings
Positive66.7%
Neutral33.3%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews1 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Emma

All ratings1,409 ratings
Positive92.5%
Neutral1.4%
Negative6.0%
Written reviews686 reviews
Positive38.3%
Neutral8.9%
Negative52.8%

Bugs and requests

Budgets

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

Emma

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • App crashes or freezes frequently
  • Transactions not syncing properly or showing incorrect balances
  • Issues connecting to certain bank accounts
  • Recurring payments not being tracked accurately

Requested features

5 requests
  • Add support for more banks and financial institutions
  • Improve budgeting features with better categorization and goal-setting
  • Provide more customization options for categories and reporting
  • Integrate with investment accounts and track net worth
  • Offer a more affordable pricing model or free tier with core features

In-app purchases

6 purchases

Budgets

One-time6
  • Descriptions with Purchases$0.99
  • Carry Over Under & Over Spend to next Period$0.99
  • No Ads$1.99
Show 3 more
  • Transaction CSV Export, Multi-Delete & Filter$1.99
  • App Customisation using Themes$1.99
  • PRO - All Features$4.99
8 purchases

Emma

Subscriptions8
  • Emma Plus Monthly7 Days trial$4.991 Month
  • Emma Pro Monthly7 Days trial$9.991 Month
  • Monthly Pro Subscription7 Days trial$9.991 Month
Show 5 more
  • Emma Pro7 Days trial2 variants$9.991 Month
  • Emma Ultimate7 Days trial$14.991 Month
  • Emma Plus Yearly7 Days trial$41.991 Year
  • Emma Pro7 Days trial2 variants$83.991 Year
  • Subscription7 Days trial$83.991 Year

Questions

Is Budgets free?
Budgets is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Emma free?
Emma is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Budgets or Emma?
Emma is rated higher. Budgets averages 4.3 out of 5 from 3 ratings, while Emma averages 4.7 from 1.4K ratings.
Do Budgets or Emma have ads?
Both Budgets and Emma show ads.
Which is updated more often, Budgets or Emma?
Budgets ships an update every 6 weeks, and Emma every 6 days. Most recently, Budgets was updated on August 23, 2026 and Emma on September 29, 2026.

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