No — Monarch Money is not free, and it has no free tier. Monarch offers a 7-day free trial, after which every account becomes a paid subscription: $14.99 per month, or $99.99 per year for the Core plan, with a separate Plus tier at $199.99 per year (prices as listed on Monarch's pricing page at the time of writing). Monarch's own help centre states it plainly: "we only offer paid subscriptions, billed either monthly or yearly." There is no ad-supported version, no limited free plan, and no permanent free account.
If you found this page because a friend recommended Monarch and you assumed it was another free Mint replacement — that's the confusion worth clearing up. Mint was free because it sold your attention to advertisers and your data to partners. Monarch decided not to do either, and the price of that decision is a subscription. Whether that trade is worth $99.99 a year to you is a separate question, and this article walks through the numbers so you can decide before your trial ends and the card gets charged.
Want to see where your own money actually goes? Try Spendalyst free for 14 days →
Can I use Monarch Money for free?
Only for seven days. Every new Monarch account starts on a 7-day free trial of the Core plan with nothing locked behind a paywall during that window — account syncing, budgeting, goals, cash flow and investment tracking are all open. When the seven days end, the subscription begins automatically at whatever plan you selected at signup. So if you're searching for a free version of Monarch Money, the honest answer is that the free version is the trial and nothing else.
There are three legitimate ways to stretch that, and none of them make Monarch permanently free:
How much does Monarch Money cost in 2026?
Monarch runs two tiers. Here's the structure, current at the time of writing — always check Monarch's pricing page before you subscribe, since Monarch commits to giving at least 30 days' notice before a price change but pages go stale faster than that.
| Plan | Price | Billing | Who it's built for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Core | $99.99/year, or $14.99/month | Monthly or annual | Most people. Budgeting, cash flow, goals, net worth, investment tracking, unlimited household sharing |
| Plus | $199.99/year | Annual only | Complex finances — business income, side hustles, rental property, advanced planning |
Paying monthly costs $179.88 a year versus $99.99 annually — a 44% premium for the flexibility to leave. If you're confident enough to commit, annual is the obvious choice; if you're the kind of person who has already abandoned two budgeting apps this year, monthly is cheaper insurance.
What Plus adds over Core: forecasting that projects net worth and cash flow forward, business tracking that separates a side hustle or rental from personal spending, deeper investment analysis (gains and losses with tax lots, plus Morningstar-powered fund breakdowns), and a complimentary couple's will through Trust & Will that Monarch values at $299. One caveat straight from Monarch's help centre: Plus features are currently desktop-only, with mobile support promised later.
What are the drawbacks of Monarch Money?
The most common complaints cluster around three things, and price is only the first.
It costs real money before you know whether you'll use it. Seven days is a short runway for a tool whose value comes from *trend* — you need at least a full billing cycle to see whether your spending story is what you thought it was. Most people are still connecting accounts and fixing miscategorised transactions when the trial expires.
It's a dashboard, and dashboards require you to show up. Monarch is excellent at showing you everything in one place. But "everything in one place" is still a place you have to visit. If your actual problem is that you avoid opening finance apps at all, a richer dashboard doesn't fix that — it just gives you more to avoid. This is the honest limitation behind a lot of churn, and it's not unique to Monarch.
Setup is real work. Categorisation rules, budget targets, goals, account connections. Monarch rewards the effort, which is a genuine strength for people who enjoy the process. It's a genuine barrier for people who don't.
For the full verdict on whether the product justifies the price, we go deeper in our Monarch Money review, and we put it head-to-head with a cheaper rival in Monarch Money vs Rocket Money.
What's the best budgeting app that's free?
Several apps do have genuinely free tiers — but "free" always costs something, and it's worth knowing what. Here's what the free options actually give you:
| App | Genuinely free tier? | What "free" really means |
|---|---|---|
| Monarch Money | No | 7-day trial only, then $14.99/mo or $99.99/yr |
| Empower Personal Dashboard | Yes | Free forever — funded by a wealth-management arm that will call you about your portfolio |
| Rocket Money | Yes, limited | Free tier tracks spending; subscription cancellation and the better features sit behind Premium |
| PocketGuard | Yes, limited | Free tier caps categories and features; Plus unlocks the rest |
| Goodbudget | Yes, limited | Free plan restricts you to a small number of envelopes; manual entry by design |
| Spendalyst | No | 14-day trial, no credit card required, then $10.99/mo |
The pattern: free personal finance software is funded by selling you something else — leads, referrals, or an upsell path. Paid apps are funded by you. Neither is dishonest, but if the free version keeps nudging you toward a product you didn't come for, it isn't really free. We break the free options down properly in our guide to the best free budget apps in 2026.
Is there anything better than Monarch Money?
"Better" depends entirely on which problem you have.
If your problem is that you want a complete financial command centre — every account, investments, net worth, forecasting, shared with a partner — the Monarch app is one of the best-built products in the category and $99.99 a year is a fair price for it. Don't switch away from it for the sake of saving forty dollars.
If your problem is that you've quit three budgeting apps already, more dashboard isn't the answer. That's the gap Spendalyst was built for. It connects through Plaid to Chase, Wells Fargo and 12,000+ other banks (or you can skip the connection entirely and use manual entry), and instead of expecting you to log in, it sends one coach card every Monday with specific dollar figures — what you spent, what moved, what's worth a look. You get spending reports with a 6-month trend when you want to dig in, and CSV export if you'd rather take your data elsewhere. It's $10.99/month with a 14-day free trial that doesn't ask for a credit card — twice Monarch's trial length, and no risk of an accidental charge.
To be straight about it: Spendalyst does not do investment tracking, net worth projections, or the business-income separation that Monarch Plus offers. If those matter to you, Monarch is the better tool. If what you actually want is to stop dreading your bank balance without adopting a system, that's a different product. Our full list of Monarch Money alternatives for 2026 covers the middle ground, and how to manage money without budgeting explains the approach in more detail.
How to try Monarch Money without risking money
If you want to test Monarch properly rather than in a rushed seven days, use the money-back guarantee — it's more generous than the trial and Monarch publishes it openly.
Monarch's help centre states that if at any point after purchase you decide it isn't for you, they will refund the remaining time on your subscription, no questions asked. In practice that means subscribing annually, using it for a full month or two with real data, and requesting a refund for the unused portion if it isn't working out.
One critical exception: subscriptions purchased through the Apple App Store are managed by Apple and Monarch cannot refund them. If you plan to rely on the guarantee, subscribe directly through Monarch's website, not through an in-app purchase.
Two other details worth knowing before you commit: if you cancel, your data stays in your account and you can still log in to download your history — but 30 days after a subscription ends, Monarch disconnects your bank institution connections.
The short answer, one more time
Monarch Money is not free. It's a 7-day trial followed by $14.99/month or $99.99/year, with a $199.99/year Plus tier for complex finances. That's a deliberate business model — no ads, no data sales — and for people who want a full financial dashboard it's money well spent. For people who bounce off dashboards, the cheapest budgeting app is the one you don't need to open.
Frequently asked questions
Is Monarch Money free?
No. Monarch Money has no free tier. Every account begins with a 7-day free trial and then converts to a paid subscription — $14.99 per month or $99.99 per year for Core, or $199.99 per year for Plus. Monarch's help centre confirms it offers paid subscriptions only, billed monthly or yearly.
Can I use Monarch Money for free after the trial ends?
No. When the 7-day trial ends, the subscription begins automatically at the plan you chose at signup. There is no downgrade path to a free version of Monarch Money. If you don't want to be charged, cancel before the trial expires — or subscribe and use Monarch's money-back guarantee, which refunds the remaining time on your subscription.
Does Monarch Money have a student discount?
Monarch does not publish a student plan or a verified-student discount. General promo codes for the first year of the annual Core plan circulate from time to time and are open to any new subscriber, student or not. If a student rate is what you're after, check each app's own site — some competitors do offer verified-student pricing, and Monarch currently isn't one of them.
What happens to my data if I cancel Monarch Money?
Your data stays intact and you can still log in to download your historical data or restart the subscription. Bank institution connections are disconnected 30 days after a subscription ends, so export anything you want to keep before that window closes.
Is there a free alternative to Monarch Money?
Yes, several — Empower Personal Dashboard is free to use, and Rocket Money, PocketGuard and Goodbudget all offer limited free tiers. Each is funded by something other than your subscription, usually an upsell or a referral fee, so read what the free tier actually includes. If you'd rather pay less than Monarch without the free-tier trade-offs, Spendalyst is $10.99/month with a 14-day trial that requires no credit card.