Budgeting
Find out where your money is actually going.
Most budgets fail because they are a guess written down. Cipili starts from what you really spend, groups it, and shows you the one number most people never calculate: how much of your income you actually keep.
Your Financial Score is free. The tools on this page are part of Premium.
Overview
The Budget module takes your income and spending, either typed in or pulled from a connected bank, and sorts it into categories you can read at a glance. No envelopes to maintain, no forty-row spreadsheet to keep alive.
From there it works out your savings rate, the share of what comes in that you keep, and shows how that rate compares to the benchmark for your stage. That single figure drives most of what happens to your money over a decade.
Key benefits
Tracking that does not need babysitting
Connect a bank once and your categories fill themselves in, or enter your figures by hand if you would rather not link anything. Both paths give you the same analysis.
Spending you can actually see
Your outgoings are grouped so the shape of your month is obvious: what is fixed, what is discretionary, and which category quietly grew since last time.
Your true savings rate
Not what you meant to save, what you saved. Cipili works it out from real numbers and shows what moving it a few points would do over time.
Suggestions with the maths shown
Every suggestion comes with the figures behind it and the assumptions it rests on. If you disagree with an assumption, you can change it and watch the answer change.
Budget tracking
Your income, your fixed costs, and your variable spending in one view. Connect an account through Plaid and transactions are categorised for you. Prefer not to connect anything? Type your figures in and every feature still works, because the module was built to run on either.
Spending analysis
Cipili groups your spending and shows the proportions, so you can see the categories that matter rather than a list of two hundred transactions. The point is not to shame you out of a coffee, it is to surface the recurring costs that are big enough to be worth a decision.
Savings recommendations
Once your savings rate is known, Cipili compares it against the benchmark for your life stage and suggests where the next dollar is best put to work: building an emergency fund, clearing high-interest debt, or moving idle cash somewhere it earns. Each suggestion is an estimate with its assumptions written next to it, never a guarantee.
AI budgeting insights
Your budget feeds the AI coach, which reads the shape of your month and explains what it means in a paragraph you can actually use. It works from your figures and the published benchmarks, not from a hunch, and it will tell you when it is not confident.
- Written in plain English, with the numbers it used sitting right there
- Flags the categories that changed most since your last checkup
- Points you at the module that addresses whatever it found
Frequently asked questions
Do I have to link my bank?
No. Bank linking through Plaid is optional and can be disconnected whenever you like. Everything works from figures you type in.
What happens to my transaction data?
It is encrypted in transit and at rest, kept under row-level access control so only your account can read it, and never sold. Your banking credentials are never stored by Cipili at all.
Will Cipili move my money or pay my bills?
No. Cipili is read-only. It explains and compares, it never moves a dollar.
Is budgeting included in the free plan?
Your Financial Score is free, and it includes the savings component. The Budget module itself, with the tracking and the recommendations, is part of Premium.
Related features
Banking
The gap between a typical savings account and a high-yield one is one of the few places in personal finance…
Learn moreFinancial Score
Your credit score tells lenders how you handle borrowing. It says nothing about whether you are saving enou…
Learn moreAI Coach
It reads your actual figures and explains what they mean in plain English. It will not pick your investment…
Learn moreFind out where you stand, in about two minutes.
Onboarding asks for your age, income, goals, and rough balances. Ranges are fine, and it never asks for account numbers. Your Financial Score is free.
Cipili provides financial education, comparisons, and estimates based on the information you provide. It does not provide investment, tax, legal, or accounting advice, and is not a registered investment adviser or fiduciary. Estimates rest on stated assumptions and are not guarantees of future results.