Pigget or Actual Budget: native convenience or open-source control?

Short verdict

Neither is the universal winner. Pigget is a private beta with no public price yet. Actual is mature open-source software, but the person running it owns more of the hosting, updates, provider credentials, and troubleshooting.

Pigget vs Actual Budget at a glance

This compares current public product documentation, not equivalent hands-on testing. Facts checked 20 August 2026.

The budgeting method is the common ground

Both products are designed around envelopes: money on hand receives a purpose, categories show what remains, and the plan changes as reality changes. Someone moving from one to the other will recognize the central discipline more quickly than someone coming from a retrospective expense tracker.

The experience around that method differs. Pigget is shaped as a focused native household app, with transaction review, targets, expected income, reports, currencies, and bank imports presented in an Apple-device workflow. Actual is intentionally flexible software. Its open ecosystem, rules, schedules, reporting, and operator-controlled server appeal to people who want to understand and configure the whole system.

Privacy, source code, and who operates the system

Actual's clearest advantage is inspectability and operational control. The project is open source, the budget can remain local, and an Actual server can be self-hosted. Its sync documentation describes optional end-to-end encryption for budget data. That does not remove every trust decision—hosting infrastructure, browser security, backups, and bank providers still matter—but it gives a technical user unusually direct control.

Pigget stores its budget locally and uses Apple's CloudKit for sync and sharing. It does not operate a separate Pigget account database containing the household ledger. Optional bank connections and consented analytics involve additional processors described in the privacy notice. Pigget is not open source, so users rely on its published policy and platform controls rather than auditing the application code.

Bank sync: integrated service versus do-it-yourself configuration

Pigget's bank flow is part of the product. The public catalogue distinguishes provider availability from Pigget's own completed test flow and documents current institution capabilities. Connections are read-only and cannot initiate payments.

Actual treats bank sync as an optional server feature. Its documentation says users need an Actual server and their own provider account and credentials. Sync is manually triggered. For Europe, the official page says new GoCardless bank-sync accounts are no longer accepted, while Enable Banking support is experimental. Existing provider users may have a different path, so check the current instructions before choosing Actual because of a particular bank.

The practical distinction is responsibility. Pigget aims to make the provider relationship part of one app workflow. Actual gives the operator control, but also makes the operator responsible for credentials, server configuration, updates, and provider changes.

Multiple currencies are the sharpest product difference

Pigget is designed for accounts and goals held in different currencies inside one household plan. Values can remain in their native currency while the budget uses a base-currency view.

Actual's official documentation says it does not natively support multiple currencies. It publishes an experimental workaround based on off-budget accounts, conversion payees, rules, and manual rate updates. That can be useful for a technical user who accepts the maintenance, but it is not equivalent to a native multi-currency ledger.

If the household regularly uses euros, forints, pounds, or another combination, test transfers, rate changes, reimbursements, and reports before migrating. Currency support is an accounting behavior, not a checkbox.

Sharing and device access

Pigget uses Apple iCloud sharing for a household budget. Its fit is therefore strongest when everyone editing the plan uses supported Apple mobile devices.

Actual's browser-based interface and desktop clients cover a broader set of computers and operating systems. A configured Actual server provides sync across clients. This is better for mixed-device access, but households should agree on who maintains the server, backups, upgrades, and recovery.

Free software and total operating effort

Actual Budget is free and open source. That is a genuine price advantage, but “free software” does not guarantee a zero-cost setup: hosting, a domain, backups, and optional bank providers can cost money or time.

Pigget's beta is available through TestFlight; final pricing has not been announced. The honest comparison today is therefore not a subscription calculation. It is whether Pigget's narrower devices and managed workflow are worth evaluating against Actual's broader control and operational responsibility.

Methodology and official sources

This page uses first-party documentation and states Pigget's conflict of interest. It does not claim independent testing of every feature.

• Actual installation options
• Actual desktop and mobile guidance
• Actual server sync and encryption
• Actual bank-sync setup and provider status
• Actual multi-currency limitations and workaround
• Pigget product facts and limitations
• Pigget privacy notice

Pigget is not affiliated with Actual Budget. Product names and trademarks belong to their respective owners.