Android App of the Day: Mint.com Personal Finance

Tracking and managing your finances can present a seemingly daunting task. Take it from a girl who likes her Starbucks and expensive shoes, spending money is the easiest part of the whole process. It’s knowing how to stay within your budget and finding the right tools to help you achieve your financial goals that is truly the difficult part. Thankfully Mint.com has an Android app that provides you with a powerful mobile service aimed at streamlining all of your credit cards, checking, savings, and brokerage accounts into one easy to access financial picture. For anyone who already uses Mint’s desktop service, the Android app brings the absolute best of the site to your mobile device, and for anyone who is completely new to Mint, the app only takes a few minutes to learn how to use its core features.

Pros:

• Add all of your credit cards, checking, savings and brokerage accounts so you can get your complete financial picture in one place
• See how your spending decisions will affect how much money you have to spend or save
• Mint automatically analyzes your spending habits and accounts to find ways to save tailored to you
• Stay up-to-date on your accounts and set up alerts to avoid fees or low balances
• Mint uses the same bank-level security that financial institutions do, and no one can transfer money at all – in or out
•  See all your personal finance accounts—checking, savings, and credit cards.
• Automatically categorizes transactions
• Charts and graphs show you at a glance where you’re spending. (tablet only)
• Track your budget
• Track your cash spending
• View finances offline. The app stores information from your latest download. (tablet only)
• Attractive layout with intuitive features

How it works:

• Download the app
• Log in with your existing account or create a new user account
• Find your bank or credit card
• You can search manually for the bank name or URL, or you can select a bank name from the provided list
• Tap on bank account
• Enter in your user name (access ID)
• Enter in password (PIN)
• Tap add account
• Overview screen displays at a glance everything that you have been spending money on and where you need to save in order to stay within your budget
• App features Mint’s classic “wheel,” which is basically a multi-colored pie chart that illustrates how much money is being spent on what
• Tap on the wheel once to enlarge it
• Hold a finger down on it to spin the wheel around “Wheel of Fortune” style
• Once the wheel stops a window pops up to show you how much money you’ve spent in that category
• You can also scroll through a list of your recent transactions

Conclusion:

In summary, the Mint app for Android is the perfect mobile companion for anyone who is already accustomed to the desktop service. You will be able to access all of the website’s core features without having to be stuck behind your PC. If you’re new to Mint, you’ll only need few minutes to feel out the app as it’s extremely well designed with intuitive features and gestures. After using the app for a few weeks I did experience a time delay for daily purchases so I wouldn’t rely on this app for daily finance managing. With that said, Mint is truly ideal for having a weekly or monthly picture of what you’re spending your money on. If you’re in the market for a free financial tool with robust features this app is absolutely the download.

Mint.com Personal Finance is available for free in the Google Play Store. Android requirements vary with device. Play Link

This is part of our Android App of the Day series. We take our favorite app for Android for each day and post it here for you to check out. Feel free to check out all of our App of the Day posts here.