Rocket Money vs. Mint [2023]: Which Free Budgeting App Can Help You Save More?

If saving money, creating a feasible budget, and getting your finances under control sounds overwhelming to you,  consider using an app like Rocket Money or Mint. Both Rocket Money and Mint can help in many different financial situations, but the better app for you depends on what you’re looking for. 

This Rocket Money versus Mint comparison will help you better understand how each of these apps works, as well as their benefits and drawbacks. With this knowledge, you can decide which app might be the right fit for you.

Our Pick

Rocket Money is not only good for budgeting, but it can save you money on subscriptions and bills

• Automatically find and cancel subscriptions
• Slash your monthly phone, cable, and internet bills
• Save an average of up to $720 a year

Visit Rocket Money

Rocket Money vs. Mint

The best budgeting apps can make it easy to quickly check your finances whenever you need to, whether from a phone or computer. They might also help you create and stick to a budget if you’re trying to save up money or pay down debt.

Rocket Money and Mint are both considered free budgeting apps because they offer complimentary financial services to help with your budgeting needs, though Rocket Money offers optional paid features. Both apps are designed to help you keep track of your finances and spending with the overall goal of helping you save money. However, each app achieves this goal in different ways, so depending on what you need, you might prefer one app over the other.

Use the table below to see Rocket Money and Mint’s similarities and differences to see which app might align more with your financial goals.

Type of app	Budgeting	Budgeting
Cost	Free, with optional paid features	Free
Availability	Desktop web browsers and mobile apps (Android and iOS devices)	Desktop web browsers and mobile apps (Android and iOS devices)
Features	Budgeting, financial tracking, savings goals, checking credit score, bill negotiation	Budgeting, financial tracking, savings goals, checking credit score, money-saving opportunities
Best for...	Budgeting and bill negotiation	Budgeting, savings goals, and checking your credit score
	Visit Rocket Money	Visit Mint

How does Rocket Money work?

Rocket Money (previously known as Truebill) is a free financial services app that could potentially help you save money through budgeting, lowering bills, and getting rid of unwanted subscriptions. If you want to create a budget to help reach your financial goals, this could be a good place to get started. However, a lot of the true value of Rocket Money may come from its other services, including locating your recurring bills and offering negotiating services to help lower your bills.

For example, the Rocket Money dashboard in your online account shows all the subscriptions and bills that Rocket Money finds in your connected financial accounts. This can help you locate any subscriptions you want to get rid of and you can also have Rocket Money negotiate any applicable bills that seem too high.

Be aware, Rocket Money will take 30% to 60% of any savings it gets you when negotiating lower bills during the first 12 months of your membership. You can pay that portion with either a credit or debit card. If Rocket Money doesn’t negotiate a lower bill, it doesn’t take anything from you.

Sign up for Rocket Money

... Or read our Rocket Money review.

Lower Your Monthly Bills

Rocket Money Benefits

• Automatically find and cancel subscriptions
• Slash your monthly phone, cable, and internet bills
• Save an average of up to $720 a year

Lower your bills

How does Mint work?

Mint is a budgeting app owned by Intuit that works to help you save money through creating budgets, setting savings goals, and keeping track of your spending in real time. Mint’s interface is simple and easy to use on either a computer or a mobile device. And because the app is free, there’s no stress about an added cost when you’re trying to save money.

In addition, Mint makes it easy to check your credit score at any time and keep track of the factors affecting your credit. And if you’re interested in deals on credit card and loan products, Mint offers those as well.

For more help with saving money, be sure to browse the “ways to save” tab in Mint. This area gives valuable information on different types of financial products you might find helpful, including credit cards, personal loans, life insurance, and more.

Visit Mint

What both budgeting apps excel at

Because both Rocket Money and Mint are budgeting apps designed to save you money, they’re bound to have a few similarities. Here are a few ways both apps excel with the services they offer:

• Free to get started: Both apps require you to create accounts to get started, but it’s free to sign up and use their services. You’ll also need to connect your bank accounts and credit cards to either app if you want to track all your finances, but the process is quick, free, and easy.
• Easy access: It’s easy to use Rocket Money and Mint from wherever you are because you can access their services from any compatible mobile device or computer. Both apps are available for iPhone and Android, or you can access your online account straight from either website.
• Financial tracking: Connecting your financial accounts to Rocket Money and Mint allows you to quickly see a full overview of your cash flow. This can be helpful if you have multiple bank accounts and credit cards you’d like to keep track of, especially if you’d typically have to access them through different online accounts. Everything’s in one place with Rocket Money and Mint, so there’s no wasted time navigating between different financial institution and card issuer websites.
• Budgeting: Both apps offer free budgeting services if you want to cut down on your spending in one or more categories. So if you want to keep track of how much you’re spending on something like gas or groceries, consider adding the category as a budget and then choose how much money you want to stay under each month. This might help you be more thoughtful about your spending as you categorize your expenditures and see what's happening in each area.
• Savings goals: Rocket Money and Mint have straightforward savings features if you’re interested in saving up money for a specific goal. Both apps work similarly to help you save money, but you’ll have to upgrade to a premium account on Rocket Money if you want to access its Smart Savings feature.

4 important differences between Rocket Money and Mint

Rocket Money and Mint have plenty of similarities, but they also have a few striking differences. By looking at their differences, it’s easy to see how one app might be more valuable for you than the other. This may include whether additional budgeting features cost money to use or how you specifically want to use an app to save money.

Here are a few important differences between Rocket Money and Mint:

1. Desktop interface

Both apps are easy to navigate and understand through their mobile app interfaces. You simply navigate to the Apple Store or Google Play store on your device and install the app. Then you log into your account and start managing and tracking your finances. However, the experience isn’t the same when you use a computer for the Rocket Money services.

The desktop interface for Rocket Money only shows a few things on your dashboard, including your monthly summary, subscriptions, and monthly bills. On the Rocket Money app, you’ll find a lot more features, including budgets, bank account details, credit card account balances, and savings goals. Of course, this can be limiting for computer users because the mobile app is a lot more in-depth.

The Mint mobile app and desktop experience are very similar, so you won’t necessarily miss out on any features when switching between the two options.

2. Lowering your bills

Budgeting apps like Mint and Rocket Money are designed to help you create and stick to budgets each month, which might help you save money over time. However, Mint doesn’t go far beyond helping with your typical financial features, like budgeting, setting savings goals, and checking your credit score.

Rocket Money, though, offers unique ways to lower your bills and save money. Rocket Money works to automatically identify all your subscriptions when you connect your bank accounts and credit cards. This can be helpful for tracking your spending on subscriptions, but it can also be useful for identifying and canceling subscriptions you no longer need.

In addition, Rocket Money also offers negotiation services to help lower bills that are too high and it can also help you get refunds on fees and outages. You’ll have to pay 30%-60% of the savings or credits for these services, but saving something is still better than saving nothing.

3. Paid features

Rocket Money offers optional paid features to unlock additional services within the app. Mint doesn’t offer any paid features, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. If you compare the services you have to pay to unlock with Rocket Money to what Mint offers for free, there’s not much difference.

For example, you can check your credit score with the free version of Rocket Money, but if you want to see the factors affecting your credit score, you’ll have to pay for its premium features. In addition, it’s easy to set up a budget with Rocket Money, but you’re limited to how many budgets you can set up for free. You have to pay if you want to unlock unlimited budgets. Rocket Money Premium membership costs between $3 and $12 each month. And you get to choose how much you want to spend on your premium benefits within that range.

Mint doesn’t charge anything to use its services and features. Every member gets complimentary access to checking their credit score and credit score factors, creating customized budgeting plans, creating savings goals, and more.

4. Ways to save

You may notice different types of financial products and services available to browse as you use Rocket Money and Mint. These products aren’t necessarily offered by either app, but they can still be helpful for you depending on what you’re looking for. However, Mint easily has a more robust offering of available products for its users.

Within the Mint app, you can find credit cards, loans, investment accounts, savings accounts, and different types of insurance. The Rocket Money app currently (as of Jan. 14, 2021) only shows options for different types of car insurance.

It’s helpful to have more available options in the Mint app, as these offerings can help you save money on important financial products.

Which budgeting app should you choose?

The best budgeting app for you between Rocket Money versus Mint comes down to what you’re looking for. Both budget apps offer services and features that can help you learn how to save money while also tracking all your finances, including income and expenses. Both apps are also free to use and you have the option to use them from a computer or compatible mobile device.

However, it’s easier to see where either Rocket Money or Mint might be the better option for you when you look at their differences. Mint has all the features you need for creating budgets, hitting savings goals, gaining insight into your spending habits, and reviewing your credit. It’s an excellent option for tracking your daily expenses, cutting down overall on your spending, and getting a good picture of your financial health.

Rocket Money is a free app, but it also has optional paid features. Some of these paid features, like creating unlimited budgets and looking at your credit score factors, are freely available on Mint, which makes Mint the more affordable option for budgeting. However, Rocket Money does have other money management features you won’t find with Mint.

If you specifically want to cut down on your monthly subscriptions and lower your monthly bills, Rocket Money excels in these areas. Rocket Money locates your monthly subscriptions so you can decide whether you want to get rid of any. Rocket Money can also help lower your monthly bills with its professional negotiating services, which cost you money only if they end up saving you anything.

For overall budgeting, it’s hard to beat Mint’s free services. For specific ways to lower your bills, Rocket Money makes a good case.

FAQs

Bottom line

Figuring out how to manage your money is made a lot simpler when you take advantage of helpful financial apps. In addition to Rocket Money and Mint, there are other apps out there, including YNAB (You Need a Budget), Empower (formerly known as Personal Capital), EveryDollar, and Goodbudget. And, of course, there's always good old Google Sheets.

But when it comes to Rocket Money versus Mint: Rocket Money might be one of the best money-saving apps for subscriptions and bills, while Mint could be one of the best choices for creating monthly budgets and monitoring your entire financial life. 

Either personal finance app could work for most people, but it’s important to consider them both when thinking about your finances. One of them may align better with your goals, which would make your decision between the two more straightforward.

Of course, you can always use both apps at the same time if you want to take advantage of their different features and benefits. Using Rocket Money to help lower your upcoming bills and using Mint to manage your finances can potentially offer more value than using either app by itself.

Lower Your Monthly Bills

Rocket Money Benefits

• Automatically find and cancel subscriptions
• Slash your monthly phone, cable, and internet bills
• Save an average of up to $720 a year

Lower your bills

Author Details

Ben Walker, CEPF Ben Walker, CEPF, is a Senior Credit Cards Writer at FinanceBuzz. For over a decade, he's leveraged credit card points and miles to travel the world. His expertise extends to other areas of personal finance — including loans, insurance, investing, and real estate — and you can find his insights on The Washington Post, Debt.com, Yahoo! Finance, and Fox Business.

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