Yes, Empower is free to use. Empower's own tools page answers its pricing question with "Nothing! The dashboard experience and financial tools are completely free," and that covers net worth tracking, budgeting and cash flow, the retirement planner and portfolio analysis. What costs money is Empower's separate advisory service, which is built around investing $100,000 or more with them. Here is exactly where the free part ends, what you give up in exchange, and who should skip it.
Is Empower truly free?
Empower is truly free for the Personal Dashboard and its financial tools, with no subscription, trial clock or per-feature unlock that we could find on Empower's own pages. The FAQ on empower.com/tools asks "How much does it cost to use the Empower Personal Dashboard and financial tools?" and answers "Nothing!"
Want to see where your own money actually goes? Try Spendalyst free for 14 days →
The free list on that page is long: Retirement Planner, Net Worth, Budgeting & Cash Flow, Portfolio Analysis, Savings Planner, Debt Paydown, Emergency Fund and Transactions. If you came from the old Personal Capital app, the transition page says "Your award-winning dashboard and features will remain free." That is the same product under a new name, and Empower's page states that Personal Capital's tools and people moved to Empower.
One practical cost that is not money: the same page says you will "provide an email and phone number to get started." We come back to why that matters below.
Is the Empower budgeting app free?
Yes, the budgeting part of Empower is free, but it is a smaller piece of the product than the name suggests. "Budgeting & Cash Flow" is one of the eight tools on the list above, described as "Spend smarter when you know what's coming in and out." Most of the other seven tools on that list are about investments, savings and retirement rather than day-to-day spending.
That is worth knowing if you searched this because you want a budgeting app. Empower will show you where your money went. It is not designed to coach you through a month, and people who already tried a category-and-limits system and quit it will recognise the shape of what they are being offered. We cover that tradeoff in is Empower safe and in our Monarch Money vs Empower comparison.
What does Empower charge for?
Empower charges for advice, not for the dashboard. On its wealth management page the company says "We charge an annual advisory fee as a percentage of your total assets under management (AUM) using a tiered fee structure," and adds "No hidden fees, no trailing fees, and no trade commissions." The page does not print the percentage in its text, so we are not going to quote one. Ask for the fee schedule in writing before you sign anything.
The tiers, from the same page, are about account size:
| What you want | Cost | Source page |
|---|---|---|
| Personal Dashboard and financial tools (net worth, budgeting, retirement planner, portfolio analysis) | Free: "Nothing!" | empower.com/tools |
| Dashboard stays free after the Personal Capital move | "Your award-winning dashboard and features will remain free" | empower.com/empower-personal-wealth-transition |
| High-yield Cash Account | "No account fees, no minimums," with aggregate FDIC insurance up to $5 million | empower.com/tools |
| Investment Services (human advisors, managed ETF portfolio) | Tiered percentage fee; $100K minimum | empower.com/products-solutions/wealth-management |
| Wealth Management | Tiered percentage fee; $250K minimum | empower.com/products-solutions/wealth-management |
| Private Client | Tiered percentage fee; $1M+ in investments | empower.com/products-solutions/wealth-management |
| Fund expense ratios inside managed portfolios | Average ETF expense ratio 0.08%, "can be lower or higher" | empower.com/products-solutions/wealth-management |
If you are not investing at those levels, you will never be billed by Empower for the dashboard. That is what "free" means here.
What is the catch with Empower being free?
The catch is that the free dashboard sits next to a paid advisory business, and you should assume the two are connected. Our reading of Empower's own pages, not a quote from them: the free tools are how most people first meet the company, and the advisory service is how it earns money from the people who qualify.
That shows up in small ways. Empower asks for a phone number at sign-up. The wealth management page puts a "Schedule a call" button on the same navigation as the tools. If you have $100,000 or more to invest, you are the customer that service is built for. If you do not, the dashboard still works and you are under no obligation to buy anything.
The other half of the trade is data. To do its job, the dashboard needs your accounts connected. Whether that is a fair deal depends on what you are comfortable sharing, and we go through Empower's security and privacy statements line by line in our Empower safety check. The short version: it is a real company with published security practices, and it is worth reading those before you connect a brokerage account.
Is Empower rideshare free?
Not in the sense this article means. There is a separate company that uses "Empower" for a ride app, and it has nothing to do with the personal finance dashboard. Searches for "is Empower free" often mix the two. Everything above is about the finance product at empower.com, and we have not verified pricing for the ride service, so check that app directly.
Who should use Empower, and who should not?
Use Empower if you want net worth, investment and retirement tracking in one place and do not mind that it is run by a company with an advisory arm. Its tools are strongest for people with investment accounts across several providers who want to see the whole picture and test a retirement plan.
Skip it, or pair it with something else, if what you actually want is to stop feeling dread about spending. Empower leaves that part to you. That is where tools aimed at people who gave up on budgeting come in, and where the free-versus-paid question changes: free is less useful if you stop opening it.
How does Spendalyst compare for people who hate budgeting?
Spendalyst is not free, and it is not trying to be Empower. It is a paid money coach for people who tried budgeting apps, quit, and still want clarity. The honest summary is this: Empower is free and broad, Spendalyst is paid and narrow.
What you pay: a 14-day free trial with no credit card required, then $10.99 a month or $89.99 a year (about $7.50 a month, which saves $41.89 against twelve monthly payments). The trial does not turn into a paid plan on its own. At the end of it, your account pauses until you choose one.
What you get: a read-only bank connection through Plaid that works with Chase, Wells Fargo and 12,000+ other institutions, or manual entry and CSV import if you would rather not connect a bank. Each Monday, a coach card shows what changed in your spending in specific dollar figures, compared with your own recent weeks rather than a budget you set. You can see a six-month trend, and you can export your data as CSV or JSON.
What you do not get: Empower's retirement planner, portfolio analysis or investment tools. If investments are the point, Empower is the better pick and it costs nothing. If you want a few ways to try before you pay, our guide to free budget apps in 2026 and our walkthrough on managing money without a budget cover the field. And if you want to see what an app can do without you managing it, the Spendalyst trial is a low-risk way to find out.
The verdict on "is Empower free"
Empower is free for the dashboard, budgeting and planning tools, and it charges only if you hire its advisors, starting at a $100,000 minimum. The price you pay for the free part is a phone number, connected accounts and the likelihood of being marketed to. For investors that is a fair deal. For someone who just wants to stop avoiding their bank account, it may not be the right shape of tool, however free it is.