What is the budget plan?

Check that all your targets fit in your income, and adjust the ones that drift away from it.

The budget plan adds up the targets of all your budgets, personal and shared, and compares them with your average income. It answers one question: does what you plan to spend fit in what comes in?

To open it, tap the Budget plan card at the top of the Budgets screen. An alert card on the home screen also leads there when a budget has no target or your targets are above your income.

Budget plan: Plan complete, average income $2,450, budget targets $1,120 per cycle, available margin $1,330, Groceries flagged as an opportunity, then the budgets shared with Sam

Reading the summary

The top card compares two amounts: your Average income, worked out over your last complete cycles, and your Budget targets per cycle. Its title sums up the situation:

Plan complete: your targets fit in your income, and Available margin shows what is left.
Targets too high: your targets are above your income, and To rebalance gives the gap.
Plan incomplete: at least one budget has no target. Tap Set target on its row to set one.
Budgets planned: every target is set, but no income is recorded — see how to record an income.

How targets add up

To add up targets with different periods, the plan brings each one back to a cycle, that is one month of your budget cycle.

Example. A $1,200 yearly target counts as $100 per cycle. A $100 weekly target counts as about $433 per cycle. On a shared budget, only your share counts: for Home, with a $600 target and a 50% share, the plan keeps $300 share / cycle.

Each row also shows that budget's part of the total, for example 27% of budgeted total.

Target signals

The plan compares each target with what the budget really spends:

an orange or red amount flags a budget that spends more than its target, in the current cycle or usually;
a green amount flags an Opportunity: the budget regularly spends well under its target. In the example, Groceries usually spends $285 for $400 budgeted, which would free $100 per cycle.

Adjusting a target

Tap the budget's row in the plan.
Read the Usual: … or Forecast: … reminder and the Suggested target, with its effect on your margin.
Tap Apply to use the suggested amount, or enter your own.
Tap Done, then Save.

Edit budget Groceries, Spending target window: target $400 per month, usual $285 per cycle, suggested target $300 freeing $100 per cycle, Apply button

Nothing changes until you save. The suggested target stays a proposal, based on what the budget has really spent.

Good to know

The plan is available without Premium.
The same adjustment is offered from a budget's detail when it is about to go over its target — see what to do when a budget is about to exceed its target.