Whether you are salaried or self employed or in Business, we all know that earning money is difficult whereas spending money is easy. And with increasing use of plastic money – our spending habits have increased. It is a proven fact that a person ends up spending more if he uses Credit/ Debit Cards as compared to expenses made using Cash.

In this era of ever increasing expenses, it is not only important for everyone to keep a track of all the incomes and expenses but also keep a track of all the Investments which will help in better Money Management. But who has the time to track the Incomes and Expenses?

This is where your smart phone will come handy and help you in better money management. There are several Money Management Apps which automatically track all your Incomes and Expenses as well as your Investments and give you financial advice. There are more Money Management Apps for Android Phones as compared to iOS Phones and the features offered by theses Apps for Android Users are also much better as compared to the features offered for iOS Phones.

These Money Management Apps act as your Personal Finance Manager and help you identify areas wherein your expenses can be reduced and also advice you on best investment options which will yield the maximum returns. Many people have used these Apps and found them really useful in managing their money.

As a Chartered Accountant, I have used most of them and have divided these Money Management Apps in 5 Categories i.e.

  1. Money Manager Apps
  2. Stock Market Investment Apps
  3. Tax Calculator Apps
  4. Bill Split Apps
  5. Digital Locker Apps

A review of the best money management App in each category has been mentioned below

5 Best Money Management Apps in India

1. mTrakr – Money Manager App

mTrakr is a Money Management App which not only helps you manage your Wealth but also helps in managing your income and expenses. The mTrakr App  is a very comprehensive app and covers all aspects of personal finance and covers all the day to day needs of a common man.

The expense tracker in the mTrakr Money Management App has been beautifully built and you don’t need pen and paper anymore to keep a track of your expenses. You can keep a track of all your expenses through the mTrakr App and you are not required to maintain the expense sheet anymore as this app automatically does everything for you. It also helps in identifying the areas wherein you are over spending and helps you reduce these expenses.

Moreover, if you have more than 1 Bank Account, then many a times – it gets a bit difficult to manage multiple accounts. The mTrakr app acts as your Personal Finance Manager and helps you manage multiple bank accounts at the click of a button.

The best part about the mTrakr Money Management App is that it is all automatic and they don’t even ask for any bank passwords. This App is so easy to use that even a layman with no finance background can also use it at the click of a button.

Apart from displaying all your Bank Accounts in a consolidated format, the App also automatically classifies all your expenses into various categories like Shopping, Food & Drinks, Travel etc and helps you identify your over-spend areas.

Once these over-spend areas have been categorised, it gives suggestions on how these expenses can be reduced. This intelligent feature of the mTrakr App is something which I personally liked a lot and would highly recommend people to use.

There are several other features as well in the mTrakr App like setting Budgets, Event Calender, Document Manager etc. which help simplify Money Management and even a non-finance person can easily manage all his finances.

Although this is a fairly new App but it seems to be going viral very fast. If you are looking for a complete money management app, this is one App which I would advise everyone to use.

2. Moneycontrol – Stock Markets Investment Tracker

If you trade/invest in Stock Markets or Mutual Funds– then the Moneycontrol App is the best app for you. It very neatly summarises all your Stock Market and Mutual Fund Investments and also keeps you updated with the latest prices of these Investments.

You can create your own Portfolio on the Moneycontrol App and very easily track all your Stock Market Investments through this App at the click of a button. Apart from simply tracking the latest value of your Investments, it also gives you suggestions on whether you should buy/sell or hold your investments.

It also has a very active forum wherein people keep on discussing about the best Investment ideas, best time to buy/ sell and various other investment related discussions.

Moneycontrol has been the most popular portal for tracking stock market investments for the past many years. It was earlier operating through its web-version only i.e. moneycontrol.com but they now have both the web version as well as the App.

Almost all active stock market traders use moneycontrol to keep a track of their investments. The portfolio which you create on the Website can be also be viewed on the App and vice-versa.

The Moneycontrol App is currently available on both iOS as well as Android and can be downloaded from the following link

3. Tax Calculator

Albert Einstein once said “The hardest thing in this world is to understand Income Tax”. Maybe, they didn’t have Smart Phones that time on which Income Tax Calculators could work.

Considering the fact that the no. of taxes have increased and the taxation system has got more complicated, it is now even difficult for a common man to compute their taxes. This is where this App comes handy which computes all your taxes at the click of a button and helps you in better Tax Planning.

Irrespective of whether you understand Income tax or not, you would be able to use this App very easily. This App is available on both Android as well as iOS and can be downloaded from here:-

4. Splitwise – Bill Split App

We all go out in groups and enjoy movies/ food/ outings etc and then we divide the bill among all the participants. This is where this app comes handy in splitting the expenses. Many people think that splitting bills is simple mathematics but if you try out this app you’ll realise how easy it is to split expenses using this app.

This app has become very popular among the college goers as they usually hangout in groups. Moreover, if you are staying in groups or with roommates, this is where this app comes even more handy when all your expenses are joint expenses and it gets difficult to split expenses.

5. DigiLocker – Digital Locker App

DigiLocker is a Digital Locker App launched by Narendra Modi in 2015 which helps people to keep their documents online in highly safe and secure manner. You can keep all your confidential and financial documents on the DigiLocker like your PAN Card, Income Tax Returns, Bank Documents etc on this DigiLocker.

This DigiLocker can accessed both through the Web as well as the App. This DigiLocker is linked to your Aadhaar Card and proper authentication is done before accessing the DigiLocker. A one-time password is sent to your registered mobile no. every time you want to access this locker. Moreover, the DigiLocker is available for free for everyone.

Although the DigiLocker solves the same purpose as Google Drive and Dropbox but it is still recommended that you use the DigiLocker for all your financial and other confidential documents as it is much more safer than Google Drive and Dropbox.

The following are the 2 main reasons on How DigiLocker launched by the Indian Govt is better than Google Drive and Dropbox:-

  1. If we store anything on Google Drive or Dropbox – then we are governed by the US Regulations and there is no direct protection under the Indian Laws whereas the DigiLocker provides Direct Protection under the Indian IT Act 2000
  2. The DigiLocker Account is directly linked to your Aadhaar Card Number, thus providing more security unlike the “Dropbox” or “Google Drive” which requires just the email address and password to access one’s account
  3. Similar to Online Banking Transactions, DigiLocker sends an OTP everytime someone accesses his account, something which is absent in other storage tools.

Disclaimer – The above article has been authored by CA Karan Batra who is All India Rank 22 in CA Exams and is the founder of the website www.charteredclub.com. This post is only for information purpose and he does not have any vested interest in any of these apps.

The above 3 Money Management Apps are the ones which I think are the best in their category. We tested several other Apps as well like MyUniverse, Yahoo Finance, Gullak Expense Manager and MoneyView.