See Exactly Where Your Money Goes Every Month
Break your spending into real categories, see it stacked against typical US household patterns, and find the recurring charges you forgot about. We are not a bank and we do not access your accounts — everything runs from numbers you type in.
What's mainly bringing you here?
Six routes into the same question
Pick the one that matches what you're actually trying to work out.
Where your money actually goes
Categorizing transactions and separating fixed from variable spending, explained plainly.
See how it works →Finding forgotten subscriptions
The fastest real win in most spending reviews, and exactly where to look.
Find the leaks →Auditing and canceling subscriptions
A systematic way to go from 'I think I have too many' to an actual list and a plan.
Start the audit →How your spending compares
Typical US household spending patterns by category, and what to do with the comparison.
See the benchmarks →Tracker vs budgeting app vs planning app
A genuinely useful distinction between three different kinds of money app.
Compare the categories →Spotting lifestyle creep
Why spending rises quietly with income, and how to catch it before it becomes permanent.
Read the guide →See the actual breakdown, not a guess
Every calculator here runs in your browser from numbers you type in — nothing is stored, nothing is sent anywhere.
Monthly spending breakdown
Sort your take-home pay into real categories — housing, food, transport, utilities, debt and everything else — and see exactly what's going where.
Assumptions this uses
- Uses monthly take-home pay, not gross income before taxes
- Assumes the amounts entered are recent real averages, not aspirational targets
- Does not include annual or irregular expenses unless you've divided them into a monthly amount first
- A snapshot tool, not a live connection to your accounts
Limitations: Does not connect to your bank accounts and cannot verify actual spending against these categories.
Runs entirely in your browser.
A category that looks 'too high' might just be misclassified
Before assuming a category is genuinely overspent, check whether a few large one-off purchases landed in it by mistake — a holiday gift under "groceries," a car repair under "other." Reclassifying a handful of transactions correctly usually explains more of an apparent overspend than actually cutting spending does.
Ask about your specific spending
A quick way to get a plain-English read on what a spending pattern or subscription actually means for your situation.
Tell us about your spending situation
If you'd like a more direct next step than the calculators, send us a few details and we'll point you toward the guides and partners relevant to your situation.
This isn't a financial advisory service — it's just a way for us to point you in the right direction, with no obligation.
Partner link — we may be paid a fee at no cost to you. How we make money.
See a tool built to find recurring charges automatically
Once you know roughly where things stand, a dedicated subscription tracker can scan your accounts and flag recurring charges you'd otherwise miss.
See how it works →A few things worth owning, not selling
Plain, useful items for a spending review — not products we're pushing, and removing them changes nothing about the site.
How we make money: some links here are partner or affiliate links and we may be paid a fee at no cost to you. It never changes what we write or how options are ordered — see our disclosure and methodology.
Document organizer folders
Keeping statements findable makes a monthly review take minutes.
Check price →Paper shredders
The cheapest piece of financial security you can buy once you're going through old statements.
Check price →The Spending Visibility & Subscription Audit Kit
A short, practical guide for anyone in the US who wants a real picture of their spending — a fillable worksheet, a subscription audit checklist, and where to check official information for further reading.
Tools that can help once you see the picture
These are the partners we work with once you know where your money is going — the calculators above work exactly the same whether or not you ever click through.
How we make money: some links here are partner or affiliate links and we may be paid a fee at no cost to you. It never changes what we write or how options are ordered — see our disclosure and methodology.
Rocket Money subscription tracking
Scans your accounts for recurring charges and helps you cancel the ones you forgot about, often in a few clicks.
Find forgotten subscriptions →Empower financial planning
Free net-worth and cash-flow tracking that sits alongside a spending review rather than replacing it.
See your full financial picture →Spending questions people actually ask
No hedging, no upsell. Where the honest answer is 'it depends', we say what it depends on.
How do I actually see where my money is going each month?
Pull the last one to two months of transactions from your bank and card accounts, then sort each one into a small number of categories — housing, food, transport, subscriptions, and so on. The goal on the first pass is a rough, honest picture, not a perfectly categorized ledger.
What's the difference between fixed and variable spending?
Fixed spending is roughly the same amount every month, like rent or a loan payment. Variable spending changes month to month, like groceries or dining out. Separating the two matters because fixed costs are hard to change quickly, while variable spending is usually where a review finds room to cut.
How many subscriptions does the average person actually have?
It varies widely and self-reported estimates are often lower than what a full statement review turns up, since people tend to forget the ones they don't actively use. Rather than anchoring to a number, the more useful move is a direct audit of your own statements.
How do I find subscriptions I forgot I was paying for?
Scroll through a full three to twelve months of bank and card statements rather than just the current one, since some charges are annual. Also check your phone's app store subscription list and your email for renewal notices — a surprising number of forgotten charges live outside the bank statement entirely.
Is it better to cancel a subscription or downgrade it?
It depends on whether you use the service at all. If you haven't opened it in the last one to two months, cancel it. If you use it but rarely need the premium tier, downgrading usually captures most of the savings while keeping what you actually use.
How does my spending compare to a typical US household?
General patterns exist for how households typically split spending across categories like housing, food, and transport, but they vary a lot by location, household size, and income. Treat any comparison as a rough benchmark for spotting an outlier category, not a target to hit exactly.