Comparison

PocketGuard vs Surplus

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

Head to head
About

PocketGuard

This app simplifies personal finance by automatically tracking expenses and bills. It helps you understand your disposable income, analyze spending habits, and manage subscriptions to save money. Set financial goals and create debt-payoff plans with smart algorithms.

Highlights
  • Automatic expense tracking
  • Bill and subscription monitoring
  • Disposable income calculation
  • Spending habit analysis
  • Financial goal setting
  • Debt-payoff plan creation
Features
Currently charting
Read full description

PocketGuard is an award-winning Budget App, Spending Tracker & Money Manager trusted by 1.7M+ users. Plan your budget, track expenses, manage bills, and know what’s safe to spend. RECOGNIZED AMONG THE BEST BUDGET APPS OF 2026 • Forbes Advisor — Best for Managing Recurring Expenses • Kiplinger — Best for Debt Management • NerdWallet — Featured among The Best Budget Apps for 2026 • Experian & Investopedia — Featured among the Best Budgeting Apps of 2026 “PocketGuard is the best budgeting app for tracking spending. PocketGuard makes it easy for users to analyze their spending habits through custom reports and allows them to create a fully customized budget and a personalized debt payoff schedule.”— Forbes Always Know What's in Your Pocket • Track all your income and expenses • Safe-to-spend amount after bills, goals, and essentials • How much you can safely contribute, save, invest Budgeting Features • Custom categories • Budget limits • Overspending prevention • Rollover budgets • Spending Prediction Spending Pace — Predict Your Spending Spending Pace analyzes your spending habits to predict whether you’ll stay on budget before the month ends. Choose your budgeting method • Zero-based budgeting • Envelope budgeting • 50/30/20 budget rule • Build your own custom budgeting system. Smart Transaction Rules — Automatic Expense Categorization • Detect merchant names, keywords, amounts, categories, and accounts • Rename merchants, fix categories, and add hashtags for tracking • Apply rules to every new transaction Spending Insight & Monthly Budget Review • Visual spending reports • Categories, budgets, bills and merchant breakdowns • Month-to-month budget • Spending trend analysis Bills organizer and Subscription manager Connect your bank and PocketGuard automatically identifies bills, subscriptions, and recurring payments. • Never miss a due date • Spot and cancel forgotten subscriptions • Lower bills using a built-in bill negotiation service Build Your Debt-Payoff Plan PocketGuard builds a personalized debt payoff plan based on your balances and repayment strategy, helping you reduce interest costs, see your debt-free date, and track every payment along the way. Bank-Level Security Your data is protected with 256-bit SSL encryption, biometric login (Touch ID & Face ID), PIN codes, and industry-standard privacy practices. FAQ You need a budget to track every dollar? PocketGuard connects to your bank accounts via secure data connectors (Plaid, Finicity, Salt Edge, Apple Wallet), automatically categorizes transactions, identifies bills and subscriptions, and calculates leftover which you can contribute to any budgeting category or spend guilt-free, setup a goal, save or invest. Which budgeting methods are supported? PocketGuard is a category budgeting but the app lets you budget your way. Use zero-based budgeting, envelope budgeting, the 50/30/20 rule, or create your own custom budget — without being locked into one budgeting method. Who is PocketGuard best for? Anyone who wants to plan a budget, track spending, stop overspending, pay off debt, manage subscriptions or build savings. Is it safe to connect my bank? Yes. PocketGuard uses 256-bit SSL encryption, biometric login, PIN protection, and MFA. Your credentials are never stored — read-only access only. Which countries and banks are supported? PocketGuard Budget App connects to financial institutions in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom. Can I use PocketGuard without connecting to a bank? Yes. You can add transactions manually or manage cash accounts. PocketGuard Plus Subscription Start a 7-day free trial and choose a plan: Monthly — $12.99 Annual — $74.99. Prices may vary by region. Subscriptions renew automatically unless canceled at least 24 hours before renewal. Any unused portion of a free trial is forfeited once a subscription is purchased. Privacy Policy: https://pocketguard.com/privacy/. Terms of Use: https://pocketguard.com/terms/.

About

Surplus

This app helps you manage your monthly finances by tracking income, expenses, and upcoming payments. It provides insights into your spending habits, categorizes transactions, and offers customizable reports. Sync your accounts automatically or manually for a clear overview of your leftover spend.

Highlights
  • Monthly income and expense tracking
  • Categorization of spending
  • Customizable reports with CSV export
  • Transaction grouping
  • Home and lock screen widgets
  • Automation via Shortcuts app
Features
Read full description

Surplus is a monthly expense tracker that takes into account your monthly income, expenses and upcoming payments to provide you with a clear overview of your leftover spend. -- Spend Wisely -- Know how much you have left to spend, including your subscriptions and installments. -- Profile Your Spend -- Categorize your expenses into meaningful groups that drive insights into your spend profile. This can include popular budgeting methods such as the “50/30/20 budget rule” or the “80/20 budget rule”. -- Adaptable Workflows -- Manual or automatic, easily sync and categorize transactions from all your accounts. -- Transaction Collections -- Group related transactions across buckets and time. They can be themed around trips, shared expenses or anything you'd like! -- Widgets -- Customize your home and lock screens with widgets that showcase your leftover spend, upcoming transactions and buckets. -- Interactive Reports -- Customizable reports for your historic and upcoming spend with support for CSV Export. -- Shortcuts -- Automate your expense tracking with actions configurable via the Shortcuts app. Examples include triggering an expense entry when leaving your favorite coffee shop or scheduling spend summaries on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. Actions can be run via Siri, Apple Watch and the Shortcuts app. -- Privately Synced with iCloud -- All financial data is stored on your device(s) and synced privately via your iCloud Account. We do not store any personal information or transaction data on our servers. Surplus is free to use with pro features that can be activated via in-app purchases. Surplus Pro can be purchased as a one time payment or as a recurring subscription. Current pricing and purchase offers are available in the app. By downloading and using Surplus you agree to our terms and conditions: Terms of Use https://surplus.app/terms Privacy Policy https://surplus.app/privacy Surplus is an indie app developed and maintained by Omar Inam. If you have any questions or feedback please feel free to contact me through Twitter @_oinam

Screenshots

PocketGuard4 screens
Surplus4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: Surplus at 83% against PocketGuard's 39%. Surplus also leads on ads (none vs shown) and rating (4.8 vs 4.6). PocketGuard's advantage is ratings volume (7.7K vs 28) and chart position (#63 vs unranked). On price, update cadence, 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. PocketGuard sells 8 in-app purchases, starting at $2.99 per 7 days and Surplus sells 4 in-app purchases, starting at $3.99 per month. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Surplus holds the better App Store score, 4.8 against 4.6. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: PocketGuard has 7.7K ratings behind it against 28, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 39% of PocketGuard's written reviews are positive against 83% of Surplus's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

PocketGuard ships an update every 3 weeks, Surplus monthly. The most recent releases landed on November 1, 2026 and November 3, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 6 level
PocketGuard versus Surplus: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterPocketGuardSurplus
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.6 (7.7K ratings)4.8 (28 ratings) — better
Positive reviews38.5% of reviews83.3% of reviews — better
Number of ratings7.7K — better28
Update frequencyEvery 3 weeks — betterMonthly
AdsYesNo — better
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree with in-app purchases
Best chart rank#63 — better—
DevicesiPhone, Apple WatchiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS16.015.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size167 MB67 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperPocketGuard, Inc.Dev Harvest LLC

Customer experience

PocketGuard

All ratings7,678 ratings
Positive90.5%
Neutral3.6%
Negative5.9%
Written reviews353 reviews
Positive38.5%
Neutral11.3%
Negative50.1%

Surplus

All ratings27 ratings
Positive96.3%
Neutral3.7%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews6 reviews
Positive83.3%
Neutral16.7%
Negative0.0%

Bugs and requests

PocketGuard

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Inconsistent transaction syncing and labeling
  • Inability to delete or manage connected accounts
  • Budgeting data disappearing or not updating properly

Requested features

5 requests
  • Ability to carry over unspent budget to next month
  • More advanced reporting and analytics
  • Light/dark mode theme options
  • Improved transaction categorization and learning
  • Support for multiple users/family budgeting

Surplus

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

8 purchases

PocketGuard

Subscriptions8
  • Weekly offer with 7 day trial7 Days trial$2.997 Days
  • PocketGuard Plus3 variants$4.991 Month
  • Monthly subscription$4.991 Month
Show 5 more
  • Monthly subscription$7.991 Month
  • Monthly Subscriptions7 Days trial$12.991 Month
  • Monthly Subscription$12.991 Month
  • PocketGuard Plus$34.991 Year
  • Yearly Subscription7 Days trial$74.991 Year
4 purchases

Surplus

Subscriptions3
  • Surplus Pro Monthly$3.991 Month
  • Surplus Pro Yearly$14.491 Year
  • Surplus Pro Yearly$29.991 Year
One-time1
  • Surplus Pro Lifetime$29.99

Questions

Is PocketGuard free?
PocketGuard is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Surplus free?
Surplus is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, PocketGuard or Surplus?
Surplus is rated higher. PocketGuard averages 4.6 out of 5 from 7.7K ratings, while Surplus averages 4.8 from 28 ratings.
Do PocketGuard or Surplus have ads?
PocketGuard shows ads; Surplus does not.
Which is updated more often, PocketGuard or Surplus?
PocketGuard ships an update every 3 weeks, and Surplus monthly. Most recently, PocketGuard was updated on November 1, 2026 and Surplus on November 3, 2026.

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