I’ve been using Mint for 3 years to track my spending and visualize my budget — here’s what it’s like to use the personal finance app

AP Photo/Mark Lennihan

Mint is one of the most popular personal finance apps.
I’ve been using Mint for three years, and it’s helped me track my daily transactions and visualize my spending.
Here’s what it’s like to use Mint.
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I like to track where my money goes so I can make sure that my spending matches my priorities and my budget.

I’ve done this for years — first in a little notebook and later in spreadsheets. When that got to be too much trouble, I downloaded Mint.

Mint is one of the most popular personal finance apps on the market. Made by the financial-software company Intuit — the same company behind TurboTax — Mint claimed to have 20 million users worldwide in 2016.

I’ve been using Mint for three years, and found it a useful tool to track my daily transactions and keep my budget in line. It also visualizes my spending activity in useful reports I can access any time. The app is free, although it does show ads for financial service and credit cards.

Here’s a step-by-step guide to how Mint works:

Mint is the popular personal finance app from Intuit, the makers of TurboTax.

Mint

After you create your Mint login, you’ll be prompted to add financial institutions where you have accounts. Simply type in the name of the bank or credit card and a list will pop up. Select your bank from the list.

Laura McCamy

Once you’re set up, you can log into Mint on your computer or smartphone to view or enter information. I primarily use Mint on my phone to enter and update transactions I make on the fly.

Laura McCamy

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