The YNAB methodology.
Without the subscription.
Zero-based budgeting works. Paying $109 every year for a tool that needs your bank password does not. SelfCapsule keeps the methodology and drops everything else.
Quick verdict
SelfCapsule is for people who want zero-based budgeting on a Mac or Windows, with an iPhone app launching soon, their data on the device, and a one-time payment. YNAB is still the right fit if you rely on Plaid sync, the web app, and mobile parity every day. If you came to YNAB to escape Mint and the cloud bothers you more than it solves problems, this is the next step.
Keep the methodology. Drop the rest.
YNAB earned its reputation honestly. The envelope philosophy, the discipline of giving every dollar a job, the community that built around it: those parts worked, and they kept working after Mint shut down.
What does not need to come along is the rest of the stack. The annual renewal. The Plaid login. The cloud database that holds the only copy of your transactions. SelfCapsule is the version of that idea that runs on your laptop, in a file you own, paid for once.
See the one-time paymentYour budgeting timeline
Mint
2007 to 2024Free, ad-supported. Aggregated everything. Shut down November 2023.
YNAB
Today$109/yr renewal. Plaid bank connection. Account required.
SelfCapsule
Next$29 once. File on your disk. No login, no Plaid, no telemetry.
Scene 01 · Budgeting
Give every dollar a job.
Allocate income across category envelopes. Watch the targets fill, the spending bars rise, and the "needs attention" flag appear when a category goes over.
Budgets
Pick the method that fits how you think about money.
Goals
$6,400 of $10,000
$1,350 of $2,200
Scene 02 · Reports
Real reporting. Not a stub.
Spending by category, net worth over time, income vs expense. Drawn from your local data. No telemetry. No aggregation across users.
Reports
Analyze your money. Advanced reports unlock with Premium.
Investments
PremiumTotal market value
$28,852.05
Across 6 holdings
Unrealized gain/loss
+$2,452.05
+9.29% return
Portfolio value trend
| Symbol | Name | Qty | Avg Cost | Current | Market Value | P&L | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| VTI | Total Market Index | 42 | $198.40 | $221.15 | $9,288.30 | +$955.50 | Mar 12, 2024 |
| QQQM | Nasdaq 100 Index | 30 | $152.10 | $178.42 | $5,352.60 | +$789.60 | Jun 03, 2024 |
| SCHD | Dividend Equity Index | 55 | $76.40 | $82.15 | $4,518.25 | +$316.25 | Aug 19, 2024 |
| VXUS | Intl Equity Index | 60 | $58.20 | $61.05 | $3,663.00 | +$171.00 | Oct 07, 2024 |
| SCHG | Large-Cap Growth Index | 25 | $88.60 | $104.30 | $2,607.50 | +$392.50 | Jan 15, 2025 |
| BND | Total Bond Index | 48 | $74.90 | $71.30 | $3,422.40 | -$172.80 | Feb 22, 2025 |
Scene 03 · Reconciliation
A disciplined month-end close.
Match your statement balance to your register. Tick transactions as they clear. Built for people who actually balance their books.
Accounts
Manage your financial accounts and track balances
Net Worth
$20,160.77
Total Assets
$20,160.77
Total Liabilities
$0.00
Everyday Checking
Current Balance
$11,660.77
Primary spending account
25 transactions
Scene 04 · Import
Bring your statements. Skip the bank login.
Drop a CSV, OFX, QFX, or QIF file. Map columns once, save the template. Your bank credentials never leave your bank.
Import transactions
Bring in a CSV from any bank. We map the columns for you.
Match your file to the ledger
Migration
How to move from YNAB to SelfCapsule.
Roughly thirty minutes for a year of history. The shape of your budget comes with you; a few YNAB-specific concepts do not.
- 1
Export your YNAB budget.
In YNAB, open Budget Settings and choose Export Budget Data. YNAB produces a ZIP file containing a register CSV (every transaction) and a budget CSV (categories and assigned amounts). Save both. This is your archive even if you never import it.
- 2
Install SelfCapsule and create your accounts.
Download for macOS, Windows, or iOS, open the app, and add the accounts that match your YNAB setup: checking, savings, credit cards. Account names are local; pick whatever you actually call them.
- 3
Import the register CSV.
Drop the YNAB register CSV into SelfCapsule's import view. Map the columns once: Date, Payee, Category, Memo, Outflow, Inflow. Save the mapping as a template called "YNAB". Future YNAB exports, or any bank CSV, reuse the same template.
- 4
Rebuild your category groups.
Categories come across as plain text on each transaction. Open the budget view, group them the way you grouped them in YNAB, and set monthly targets. This is a deliberate ten-minute task: it is the moment you re-decide which categories you actually use, not just the ones that accumulated.
- 5
Reconcile and lock the starting balance.
Open the latest statement for each account and reconcile. Once balances tie out, you have a clean opening position. From here forward you import statements monthly, the way you would have done with YNAB before the bank-sync era.
What does not transfer cleanly
- · YNAB Goals: target dates and shapes do not map one to one. Recreate them as monthly targets in SelfCapsule.
- · Scheduled transactions: re-add them in SelfCapsule. They are usually a short list.
- · Split transactions: come across as flat rows. Re-split the few that matter; ignore the rest.
For background reading: personal finance without subscriptions and how to budget privately without an account.
FAQ
Questions worth a direct answer.
Is there a YNAB alternative that does not require linking my bank?
Yes. SelfCapsule never asks for a bank login. You import transactions from CSV, OFX, QFX, or QIF files that you download from your bank yourself. Your bank credentials never leave your bank, and there is no Plaid intermediary in the path between your accounts and your budget.
Is YNAB really worth $109 a year?
If you use the bank-sync, web access, and mobile sync every week, the subscription buys you those services. If you mostly want zero-based budgeting on a laptop, you are paying every year for infrastructure you do not need. SelfCapsule keeps the methodology and removes the recurring cost.
Can I keep my YNAB data after I cancel?
YNAB lets you export your budget as CSV before you cancel. SelfCapsule imports CSV directly, so the migration path is: export from YNAB, import into SelfCapsule, archive the export. Your historical transactions live with you on disk after that, not behind a paywall.
What is a private budgeting app for Mac and iOS?
SelfCapsule is built native for macOS, and ships a universal iPhone and iPad app on the App Store. Transactions stay on your device, encrypted at rest with AES-256. There is no account, no email signup, and no telemetry. The file lives in your home folder, in a format you control.
Does SelfCapsule sync between my laptop and desktop?
SelfCapsule uses a local-first model: your budget is a file on disk. If you want it on two machines, place that file in a folder you already sync, like iCloud Drive, Dropbox, or Syncthing. SelfCapsule does not run its own sync server, which is the tradeoff for keeping data off the cloud by default.
Is SelfCapsule a one-time payment?
Yes. SelfCapsule is a one-time payment for the full app. There is no annual renewal, no per-seat fee, and no feature gating that pushes you back into a subscription. The free tier covers core budgeting if you want to try it before paying.
Pay once. Or every year.
Across five years of zero-based budgeting, the math looks like this.
YNAB
$109/yr
- · $545 over 5 years
- · Cloud-stored data
- · Plaid bank connection encouraged
- · Account + email required
SelfCapsule
$29, once
- · $29 over 5 years
- · Local-only data, AES-256 encrypted
- · No bank connection, ever
- · No account, no email, no telemetry
Your finances. Contained.
A free tier covers core budgeting. Upgrade once if you want the full toolkit.
Download SelfCapsule