What it is

Money Manager Ex is a free/libre, open-source, cross-platform personal finance application written mainly in C++17 and built with wxWidgets. It is distributed under the GPL-2.0 license and is available for GNU/Linux, macOS, Windows, Android, and iOS. The project states that its design goals are simplicity and user-friendliness for everyday use.

The concrete problem it addresses is the need to organize personal finances and track cash flow with a local, nonproprietary application. It supports checking, credit card, savings, stock investment, and asset accounts, along with budgeting, cash flow forecasting, reminders, and reporting. It stores data in a SQLite database that can use Advanced Encryption Standard, which gives users a local file-based record of their finances.

Key capabilities

• The application manages checking, credit card, savings, stock investment, and asset accounts.
• It supports unlimited nested multi-level categories and multiple tags per split transaction.
• It includes reminders for scheduled bills and deposits.
• It provides budgeting and cash flow forecasting.
• It generates reports with graphs and charts, and it supports custom reports from a general reports repository.
• It imports data from CSV and QIF files.
• It can run as a portable version from a USB or flash drive.

Who uses it and how

• Individuals use it to organize finances and track cash flow on desktop systems such as GNU/Linux, macOS, and Windows.
• Mobile users use the Android and iOS applications to work with personal finance data on mobile devices.
• Users who need a portable setup run the application from a USB or flash drive instead of installing it on a computer.
• Users import transaction records from CSV or QIF files.
• Users download additional reports from the general reports repository and open database files with wxsqliteplus.

Getting started

Typical installation is to download a stable desktop release for GNU/Linux, macOS, or Windows, or to install the Android app from F-Droid or Google Play and the iOS app from the App Store. Developmental desktop releases are also listed, and the README mentions Docker images as an external public resource.

When to use it — and when not to

Use Money Manager Ex when you want a local, open-source personal finance application with account management, budgeting, reporting, CSV or QIF import, and cross-platform desktop or mobile support. It may not be suitable when a hosted web service, collaborative multi-user accounting, or a fully managed server deployment is required, because the provided facts describe desktop and mobile applications with a local SQLite database. The project notes that ChartNew.JS is outdated, and the repository has 452 open issues, which are possible maintenance signals to consider.