Comparison
Everykept vs YNAB
YNAB is a budgeting method with software attached. Everykept is a record of your money that includes the paperwork. They are aimed at different problems, and the honest comparison says so.
What YNAB is
YNAB (You Need A Budget) is built around zero-based budgeting: every dollar you have is assigned a job before you spend it, and you rebalance when reality disagrees. It is a genuine behaviour-change tool with a large, committed community, a mature mobile app, and a long track record of helping people get out of debt. If the practice appeals to you, it works.
Which one you should use
Taken seriously, because recommending the wrong tool wastes more of your time than saying so plainly.
Choose YNAB if
- You want to adopt zero-based budgeting as an actual practice, not just track spending
- You need a polished native app on iOS and Android
- You want savings targets and goal tracking with progress toward a number
- Several people in your household need to work in the same budget
- You want net-worth tracking and a debt payoff calculator
Choose Everykept if
- You need the receipt, not just the amount — for warranties, expenses or a tax query
- You run a small business or side income alongside personal money and need them genuinely separate
- You want to see where the money went without adopting a method or keeping up a weekly ritual
- You want multi-currency books that do not silently convert
Feature by feature
Including the rows Everykept loses. A comparison table with no losses is an advertisement.
| Capability | Everykept | YNAB |
|---|---|---|
| Automatic bank sync Both connect through aggregators rather than screen-scraping. | ||
| Receipt attached to an individual transaction YNAB tracks the amount; it has no receipt storage. | ||
| EXIF and location stripped from receipt photos | ||
| Separate personal and business books YNAB can hold more than one budget, but they are budgets rather than business books with their own currency. | ||
| Zero-based budgeting method | ||
| Savings goals and targets | ||
| Net worth tracking | ||
| Debt payoff calculator | ||
| Native iOS and Android apps Everykept has no native app yet; the web app works on a phone, including the camera. | ||
| Shared access for a household A YNAB subscription can be shared; an Everykept workspace belongs to one login today. | ||
| Budgets per category | ||
| Cash and manual accounts | ||
| Transfers excluded from spending automatically YNAB handles transfers well within its method; Everykept flags them on arrival from the bank and pairs the halves. | ||
| Multi-currency, per set of books | ||
| No advertising or data sale | ||
| Free while in beta YNAB is a paid subscription after a trial. Everykept will also charge once it leaves beta. |
Compiled from each product’s public documentation. Competitors ship changes without telling us; if something here is out of date, it is a mistake rather than a tactic.
The honest summary
The fair summary is that YNAB will make you better at budgeting and Everykept will make you better at record-keeping. If your problem is that you overspend and cannot see it coming, YNAB is the more useful purchase and we would rather say that than sell you the wrong thing.
If your problem is that the money is tracked fine but the paperwork behind it is scattered across a camera roll, an email inbox and a drawer — and especially if some of that paperwork belongs to a business — that is the gap Everykept was built to close.
They are not mutually exclusive, either. Some people budget in one place and keep the record in another.
More on the thinking behind these trade-offs on the why Everykept page, or see the full feature list.
Try it against your own accounts
Free while Everykept is in beta. Connect one account, attach one receipt, and judge it on your own money.
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