Quicken alternatives: moving from desktop finance software to a web budgeting app

What changes when you leave desktop software

Quicken keeps your data in a file on your computer. Web budgeting apps keep it on the vendor's servers and pull transactions through data aggregators: Monarch names Plaid, Finicity and MX; Lunch Money relies on Plaid; PocketSmith claims bank feeds to over 12,000 institutions. You gain automatic sync on any device and easy sharing with a partner; you give up the self-contained file you can back up, archive and open years later.

This is research from official vendor pages and help centers read on 29 October 2026, not firsthand testing; we have not connected banks, run rules or exported data in these apps. Vendor pages describe what a product offers, not how well it works for you.

Gains and losses at a glance

Which web app fits a Quicken user

• PocketSmith: dedicated Quicken importer, accepts OFX, QFX, QIF and CSV, plus a calendar for scheduled bills and projected balances. Paid plans from $9.99 per month billed annually ($119.88 a year); Free tier with 2 accounts.
• Monarch: best if you want polished mobile apps and linked investment accounts in the US or Canada. $99.99 a year or $14.99 a month; 7-day trial. Imports CSVs and can rebuild balance history from date-and-balance files.
• Lunch Money: best if you track several currencies or like detailed categorization rules. Imports CSV or PDF statements; $10 a month or $100 a year (set-your-own-price annual option) on 29 October 2026; 30-day trial.

Step-by-step migration checklist

• Back up your Quicken data file and keep it; it is your only complete archive.
• Reconcile every account in Quicken to its latest statement so the starting balances are correct.
• Quicken for Windows: File, File Export, QIF file; choose one account, set the full date range, and include transactions and the category list. Repeat per account, as PocketSmith asks for one file per account.
• If you hold investments, also export Security Lists in QIF and save investment reports to Excel, since Quicken notes copying transactions does not work for investment accounts.
• Quicken for Mac: export each account register as CSV.
• PocketSmith: start a fresh account, choose Move from another app, Quicken, upload the files, then enter each account name, bank and balance.
• Lunch Money or Monarch: create accounts first, then import CSVs with date, payee or description and amount columns mapped. Lunch Money limits uploads to 3MB and 10,000 rows; Monarch suggests splitting large files.
• Connect live bank feeds last, and check transactions around the sync start date for duplicates.
• Run Quicken and the new app side by side for one month before stopping Quicken updates.

When to stay on Quicken

If you depend on detailed investment lots, cost basis history or business lists, the web apps we reviewed do not document importing them, and rebuilding by hand may cost more time than a subscription saves. In that case consider keeping Quicken for investments and using a web app only for day-to-day budgeting.