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Actual Budget

Actual Budget is a local-first personal finance manager. Your data lives on your own server — no third-party cloud. It uses envelope-style zero-based budgeting: every dollar gets assigned a job before you spend it.

Official docs

Actual Budget's own documentation is thorough. For anything not covered here — reports, goals, rules, bank sync — start at actualbudget.org/docs.

Getting Started​

Enable it, then bring the stack up from the repo root:

EXIST_IS_SERVICES_ACTUAL_BUDGET=true    # in .env.shared
./existential.sh && docker compose up -d

Visit https://actual-budget.<domain>. The server has no default or env-configured password — the first thing you'll see is a Create Password screen, which calls the server's one-time bootstrap endpoint to set your login password. There's nothing to change here later beyond that one field; if you ever need to reset it, use docker exec -it actual-budget node bin/actual-server.js --reset-password (interactive, needs a TTY).

First-Time Setup​

1. Create a budget file​

On first load you'll be prompted to create a new budget or import one. Choose Create new file and give it a name.

A budget file is the container for all your accounts, categories, and transactions. You can have more than one (e.g. personal and business), but for most people one is enough.

2. Add accounts​

Accounts represent your real-world financial accounts — checking, savings, credit cards, investments. Go to Add account in the left sidebar.

Actual distinguishes between:

  • On-budget accounts — spending money you track and budget. Checking, savings, and credit cards go here.
  • Off-budget accounts — assets you want to track (investments, property) but don't budget from.

Add at least one on-budget account for each card or bank account you want to track.

3. Set up your budget​

With accounts created, assign your available money to budget categories. Actual walks you through this on first load — use the official guide if you want a deeper explanation of how envelope budgeting works.

Integrations​

Connect Actual Budget to Decree to import transactions automatically from bank alert emails: Actual Budget integration